September 2010
45 posts
“Soon I shall cease to be.
When I am beyond this world,
can I have the memory
of just one more meeting?” — Izumi Shikibu (via cadaverlovesong)
When I am beyond this world,
can I have the memory
of just one more meeting?” — Izumi Shikibu (via cadaverlovesong)
Play
Sei Shonagon
No 134 Letters are Commonplace
Letters are commonplace enough, yet what splendid things they are! When someone is in a distant province and one is worried about him, and then a letter suddenly arrives, one feels as though one were seeing him face to face. Again, it is a great comfort to have expressed one’s feelings in a letter even though one knows it cannot yet have arrived. If letters did not exist, what dark depressions would come over one! When one has been worrying about something and wants to tell a certain person about it, what a relief it is to put it all down in a letter! Still greater is one’s joy when a reply arrives. At that moment a letter really seems like an elixir of life.
More cast members announced for Ikuta Toma’s “The Tales of Genji”
As reported, Ikuta Toma will star in upcoming movie “Genji Monogatari (The Tales of Genji)” as Hikaru Genji, set for release sometime in 2011. “Genji Monogatari” is a classic work of Japanese literature attributed to Murasaki Shikibu from the early eleventh century.
Unlike the many “Genji Monogatari” movies and dramas made in the past, this new “Genji Monogatari” will be a little different in that it features actual historical figures, such as Murasaki Shikibu, Fujiwara no Michinaga, and Abe no Seimei.
The cast members for these historical figures have been revealed recently: Nakatani Miki as Murasaki Shikibu, Higashiyama Noriyuki as Fujiwara no Michinaga, and Kubozuka Yosuke as Abe no Seimei. Interestingly enough, Higashiyama Noriyuki is a senior of Toma’s in Johnny’s Entertainment, and he has also played the role of Hikaru Genji approximately 20 years ago.
“
The weeds grow so thick
You cannot even see the path
That leads to my house:
It happened while I waited
For someone who would not come.
” —Soujou Henjou (815-890, Kokinshu)Japanese emo poem...from the 10th century
Found this in the my Japanese History book the other day and thought, wow, people really do go through the same problems now as 1000 years ago.
“In reality,
It may well have to be;
But even in my dreams
To see myself shrink from others’ eyes
Is truly sad.”
-Ono no Komachi
“One of the great pleasures in reading the literature of the past, whether ‘The Tale of Genji’ or Shakespeare, is to discover a communality of emotions, across time and space.”
—(via jotei)
Onmyōdō - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia →
en.wikipedia.org
Onmyōji (陰陽師?, also In’yōji) was one of the classifications of civil servants belonging to the Bureau of Onmyō in ancient Japan’s ritsuryo system. People with this title were professional practitioners of onmyōdō.
Onmyōji were specialists in magic and divination. Their court responsibilities ranged from tasks such as keeping track of the calendar, to mystical duties such as divination and protection of the capital from evil spirits. They could divine auspicious or harmful influences in the earth, and were instrumental in the moving of capitals. It is said that an onmyōji could also summon and control shikigami.
Famous onmyōji include Kamo no Yasunori and Abe no Seimei (921–1005). After Seimei’s death the emperor had a shrine erected at his home in Kyoto.
Onmyōji had political clout during the Heian period, but in later times when the imperial court fell into decline, their state patronage was lost completely. In modern day Japan onmyōji are defined as a type of Shinto priest, and although there are many that claim to be mediums and spiritualists, the onmyōji continues to be a hallmark occult figure.
❝the deer that weds
the autumn bush clover
they say
sires a single fawn
and this fawn of mine
this lone boy
sets off on a journey
grass for his pillow.❞
manyoshu vol. 9
“why hadn’t I
thought of it before?
this body,
remembering yours,
is the keepsake you left.” —izumi shikibu [untitled] (via leggomarierose)
thought of it before?
this body,
remembering yours,
is the keepsake you left.” —izumi shikibu [untitled] (via leggomarierose)
“In a certain reign there was a lady not of the first rank whom the emperor loved more than any of the others. The grand ladies with high ambitions thought her a presumptuous upstart, and lesser ladies were still more resentful. Everything she did offended someone.”
—Murasaki Shikibu (via grritsgabby)
