Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-848d4c4894-2pzkn Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-06-09T09:30:21.290Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

6 - Aristocratic culture

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 March 2008

Helen Craig McCullough
Affiliation:
University of California, Berkeley
Donald H. Shively
Affiliation:
University of California, Berkeley
William H. McCullough
Affiliation:
University of California, Berkeley
Get access

Summary

The term aristocratic culture is here used to mean a style of social and artistic expression characteristic of the Japanese court at Heiankyō and limited primarily to its members. The small, isolated, tightly knit court community shared traits that conditioned the development of the culture: a strong sense of status and a firm subordination of the individual; an emphasis on order, decorum, and conformity; a greater interest in immediate solutions to practical problems than in ethical questions, philosophical speculation, or scientific inquiry; a general tendency toward emotionalism in preference to intellectualism; a pervasive, melancholy concern with the changes wrought by the passing of time; a high esteem for literature, calligraphy, and music; an acute sensitivity to beauty and to the moods of nature; and an unwavering belief in the importance of taste as an index of character and breeding. As a group, those characteristics seem to have crystallized during the last decades of the ninth century and the first half of the tenth – a period, symbolized by the cancellation in 894 of the court's last projected official mission to China, during which the Japanese repudiated earlier efforts to make their court a mirror image of the one at Ch'ang-an, and moved instead toward the amalgamation of foreign and native elements into a civilization distinctively their own.

The preoccupation with beauty, one of the most conspicuous aspects of the new culture, influenced attitudes toward nature, standards of judgment in the arts, appraisals of human worth, and norms of social behavior.

Type
Chapter
Information
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 1999

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Andrews, Allan A. The Teachings Essential for Rebirth: A Study of Genshin's Ōjōyōshū. Tokyo: Sophia University, 1973.
Araki, James T. The Ballad-Drama of Medieval Japan. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1964.
Backus, Robert L. The Riverside Counselor's Stories: Vernacular Fiction of Late Heian Japan. Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 1985.
Bowring, Richard . Murasaki Shikibu: Her Diary and Poetic Memoirs. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1982.
Bowring, Richard . Murasaki Shikibu: The Tale of Genji. Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press, 1988.
Brower, Robert H., and Miner, Earl . Japanese Court Poetry. Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 1961.
Bunsaku, Kurata . Mikkyō jiin to Jôgan chōkoku Vol. 5 of Genshoku Nihon no bijutsu. Tokyo: Shōgakukan, 1967.Google Scholar
Carol, Hochstedler . The Tale of Nezame: Part Three of Yozva no Nezame Monogatari. Ithaca: Cornell University East Asia Papers 22, 1979.
Cranston, Edwin A. Atemiya: A Translation from the Utsubo Monogatari .” Monumenta Nipponica 24, 3 (1969).Google Scholar
Cranston, Edwin A. The Izumi Shikibu Diary: A Romance of the Heian Court. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1969.
Field, Norma . The Splendor of Longing in The Tale of Genji. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1987.
Frank, Bernard . Histoires qui sont maintenant du passé. Paris: Gallimard, 1968.
Hiroji, Matsumura and Yutaka, Yamanaka , eds. Eiga monogatari. Vols. 75–76 of Nihon koten bungaku taikei Tokyo: Iwanami shoten, 1964–65.
Hiroji, Matsumura , ed. Ōkagami. Vol. 21 of Nihon koten bungaku taikei. Tokyo: Iwanami shoten, 1960.
Ienaga, Saburo . Painting in the Yamato Style. New York and Tokyo: John Weatherhill and Heibonsha, 1973.
Keene, Donald . “Taketori monogatari.” In Rimer, J. Thomas , Modern Japanese Fiction and Its Tradition. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1978.Google Scholar
Keene, Donald . Seeds in the Heart. New York: Henry Holt, 1993.
Kikan, Ikeda, Shinji, Kishigami, and Ken, Akiyama , eds. Makura no sōshi, Murasaki Shikibu nikki. Vol. 19 of Nihon koten bungaku taikei. Tokyo: Iwanami shoten, 1958.
Kobayashi, Hiroko . The Human Comedy of Heian Japan: A Study of the Secular Stories in the Twelfth-Century Collection of Tales, Konjaku Monogatarishū. Tokyo: The Centre for East Asian Cultural Studies, 1979.
Konishi, Jin'ichi , “The Genesis of the Kokinshū Style.” Trans. McCullough, Helen C. . Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies 38, 1 (June 1978).Google Scholar
Konishi, Jin'ichi . A History of Japanese Literature. 3 vols. to date. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1984–91.
Konjaku monogatari shū. In Yoshio, Yamada, Tadao, Yamada, Hideo, Yamada, and Toshio, Yamada , eds. Vols. 22–25 of Nihon koten bungaku taikei. Tokyo: Iwanami shoten, 1959–63.
Lammers, Wayne P.The Succession (Kuniyuzuri): A Translation from Utsubo Monogatari .” Monumenta Nipponica 37, 2 (1982).Google Scholar
Lammers, Wayne P. The Tale of Matsura: Fujiwara Teika's Experiment in Fiction. Ann Arbor: Center for Japanese Studies, University of Michigan, 1992.
Masao, Ozawa , ed. Kokin waka shū. Vol. 7 of Nihon koten bungaku zenshū. Tokyo: Shōgakukan, 1971.
McCullough, Helen Craig . Brocade by Night: ‘Kokin Wakashū’ and the Court Style in Japanese Classical Poetry. Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 1985.
McCullough, Helen Craig , trans. Ōkagami, The Great Mirror: Fujiwara Michinaga and His Times. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1980.
McCullough, Helen Craig , trans. Classical Japanese Prose: An Anthology. Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 1990.
McCullough, Helen Craig , trans. Genji and Heike: Selections from The Tale of Genji and The Tale of the Heike. Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 1994.
McCullough, Helen Craig , trans. Kokin Wakashū: With ‘Tosa Nikki’ and ‘Shinsen Waka.’ Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 1985.
McCullough, Helen Craig , trans. Tales of Ise: Lyrical Episodes from Tenth-Century Japan. Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 1968.
McCullough, William H., and McCullough, Helen Craig . A Tale of Flowering Fortunes: Annals of Japanese Aristocratic Life in the Heian Period. 2 vols. Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 1980.
Minamoto, H. An Illustrated History of Japanese Art. Kyoto: K. Hoshino, 1935.
Minoru, Watanabe Nihon shokuseikatsu shi. Tokyo: Yoshikawa kōbunkan, 1964.
Mitsuo, Ogi . Nikon kodai ongaku shiron. Tokyo: Yoshikawa kōbunkan, 1977.
Morris, Ivan , trans. The Pillow Book of Sei Shōnagon. 2 vols. New York: Columbia University Press, 1967.
Morris, Ivan . The Tale of Genji Scroll. Tokyo: Kodansha International, 1971.
Morris, Ivan . The World of the Shining Prince. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1964.
Okada, H. Richard . Figures of Resistance: Language, Poetry, and Narrating in ‘The Tale of Genji’ and Other Mid-Heian Texts. Durham: Duke University Press, 1991.
Okudaira, Hideo . Narrative Picture Scrolls. New York and Tokyo: Weatherhill and Shibundō, 1973.
Osamu, Takada and Taka, Yanagisawa . Butsuga. Vol. 7 of Genshoku Nihon no bijutsu. Tokyo: Shōgakukan, 1969.
Paine, , Treat, Robert, and Soper, Alexander . The Art and Architecture of Japan. Pelican Historv of Art. Baltimore: Penguin Books, 1955.
Pekarik, Andrew , ed. Ukifune: Love in the Tale of Genji. New York: Columbia University Press, 1982.
Reischauer, A. K.Genshin's Ojo Yoshu: Collected Essays on Birth into Paradise.” Transactions of the Asiatic Society of Japan. 2nd series. 7 (1930).Google Scholar
Seidensticker, Edward G. The Tale of Genji. 2 vols. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1976.
Seidensticker, Edward , trans. The Gossamer Years: The Diary of a Noblewoman of Heian Japan. Tokyo and Rutland, Vermont: Charle E. Tuttle Co., 1964.
Seidensticker, Edward . “Murasaki Shikibu and Her Diary and Her Other Writings.” Literature East and West 18.1 (March 1974).Google Scholar
Seiroku, Ōta . Shindenzukuri no kenkyū. Tokyo: Yoshikawa kōbunkan, 1987.
Shimpen Kokka taikan. Shimpen, Kokka taikan henshū iinkai , ed. 10 vols. in 20. Tokyo: Kadokawa shoten, 1983–92.
Shirane, Haruo . The Bridge of Dreams: A Poetics of ‘The Tale of Genji.’ Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 1987.
Sockel, Dietrich . Emakimono: The Art of the Japanese Hand-Painted Scroll. London: Jonathan Cape, 1959.
Teikichi, Ishimura . Yūsoku kojitsu kenkyū. 3 vols. Tokyo: Yūsoku kojitsu kenkyū kankōkai, 1957.
Terukazu, Akiyama . Emakimono. Vol. 8 of Genshoku Nihon no bijutsu. Tokyo: Shōgakukan, 1968.
Terukazu, Akiyama . Japanese Painting. New York: Rizzoli International Publications, 1977.
Tokuhei, Yamagishi , ed.Genji monogatari. Vols. 14–18 of Nihon koten bungaku taikei. Tokyo: Iwanami shoten, 1958–63.
,Tokyo National Museum. Painting 6th–14th Centuries. Vol. 1 of Pageant of Japanese Art. Tokyo: Toto shuppan, 1957.
Tomotarō, Suzuki Hisao, Kawaguchi, Yoshimoto, Endō, and Kyōichi, Nisbishita , eds. Tosa nikki, Kagerō nikki, Izumi Shikibu nikki, Sarashina nikki. Vol. 20 of Nihon koten bungaku taikei. Tokyo: Iwanami shoten, 1957.
Tomoyuki, Yamanobe, , Okada, and Osamu, Kurata , eds. Senshoku, shikkō, kinkō. Vol. 20 of Genshoku Nihon no bijutsu. Tokyo: Shōgakukan, 1969.
Tsutomu, Ema . Yūsoku kojitsu. Kyoto: Kawara shoten, 1965.
Umetomo, Saeki , ed. Kokin waka shu. Vol. 8 of Nihon koten bungaku taikei. Tokyo: Iwanami shoten, 1959.
Uraki, Ziro . The Tale of the Cavern. Tokyo: Shinozaki shorin, 1984.
Ury, Marian . Tales of Times Now Past: Sixty-Two Stories from a Medieval Japanese Collection. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1979.
Waley, Arthur . The Tale of Genji: A Novel in Six Parts. 2 vols. Boston and New York: Houghton Mifflin Co., 1935.
Whitehouse, Wilfred, and Yanagisawa, Eizo . Ochikubo Monogatari or The Tale of the Lady Ochikubo: A Tenth Century Japanese Novel. Tokyo: Hokuseido Press. Rev. Ed. 1965.
Willig, Rosette E. The Changelings: A Classical Japanese Court Tale. Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 1983.
Yasuaki, Nagazumi and Isao, Shimada , eds. Kokon chomonjū. Vol. 84 of Nihon koten bungaku taikei. Tokyo: Iwanami shoten, 1966.
Yoshiaki, Kudō and Shinji, Nishikawa . Amidadō to Fujiwara chōkoku. Vol. 6 of Genshoku Nihon no bijutsu. Tokyo: Shōgakukan, 1969.

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure coreplatform@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×