Ugetsu Monogatari or Tales of Moonlight and Rain (Routledge Revivals)

by Ueda Akinari

  430 ‘I was married before’ Kitanaki mono ni: literally, ‘I am a thing defiled,’ owing to her previous marriage.

  431 ‘Said nothing to Manago’ Kotō beki [4, 6a] kotoba naki wo.

  432 ‘Sea to rise and cover me’ Umi ni mo ira de: cf. The Tale of Genji, p. 83; and NKBT, vol. 14, p. 181. Notice the similarity of imagery in ‘Chrysanthemum Tryst.’ See note 166.

  433 ‘Stumbles on the hill of love, as did even Confucius’ Kushi sae taoruru koi no yama: cf. The Tale of Genji, pp. 484-5; and NKBT, vol. 15, p. 403.

  434 ‘Prized as a matchless treasure’ Futatsu naki takara ni mede [4, 6b] tamo.

  435 ‘Tonight you must stay here with me’ Koyoi wa koko ni akasase tamae: If he had, presumably they would have been man and wife. See William H. McCullough, ‘Japanese Marriage Institutions in the Heian Period,’ Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies, 27 (1967), 103-67.

  436 ‘Oversee the fishermen’ Ago totonōru: cf. Man'yōshū, NKBT, vol. 4, pp. 144-5 (no. 238); and NGSK, p. 61.

  437 ‘Someone gave it to me yesterday’ Kinō hito no esa- [4, 7a] seshi wo.

  438 ‘Great shrine festival’ Ōmiya no matsuri: traditionally held at the Shingu shrine on the 15th day of the 9th month, and now on 15 October.

  439 ‘But really’ Makoto- [4, 7b] ni.

  440 ‘Although it may be beyond my power’ Oroka nari [4, 8a] to mo.

  441 ‘Taking the weapon to his father’ Mimae ni mochi- [4, 8b] ikite.

  442 ‘Has never stolen so much as a single hair’ Ichimō wo mo nukazaru: conventional metaphor for honesty, found in The Book of Mencius.

  443 ‘Through what sin of ours should he turn to such evil’ Nan no mukui ni te kō yokaranu kokoro ya ide-kinuran: reflecting the Buddhist idea of retribution and implying that he may be caught in a web of misfortune beyond his control.

  444 ‘Turn him in tomorrow’ Asu wa uttae-ideyo: stealing property from a large shrine was classified as a crime the punishment for which extended to the entire family. See Nakamura, NKBT, vol. 56, p. 106, n. 18.

  445 ‘Escorted him to the head priest's mansion’ Tachi ni ōi mote [4, 9a] yuku.

  446 ‘Pillars of the entrance,’ etc. Mon no hashira, etc.: cf. The Tale of Genji, p. 64; and NKBT, vol. 14, p. 142.

  447 ‘Utterly dumbfounded’ Tada akire ni [4, 9b] akire.

  448 Tsukushi: see note 289.

  449 ‘Large pine tree lay sprawled’ Ōki-naru matsu no fuki- [4, 10a] taoretaru: cf. The Tale of Genji, p. 69; and NKBT, vol. 14, p. 151 (see also note 395).

  450 ‘Warriors had taken these things back’ Monofu-ra kore wo [4, 10b] tori-motasete: alternatively, ‘After the warriors made Toyoo carry these things back, they explained. . . .’

  451 Tsuba: now part of the city of Sakurai, in Nara Prefecture, south of the city of Nara. Sei Shōnagon called this market the most noteworthy in all of Yamato province, because everyone on their way to Hase temple stopped there, and its connections with the image of the Goddess of Mercy at Hase distinguished it from other places of its kind (see Morris, Pillow Book, I, 14). It is also mentioned in the Kagerō nikki (The Gossamer Years) and other Heian texts. Akinari, himself, wrote a brief sketch on the subject of travelling to Hase, in which he mentioned the bustling nature of Tsuba market and the goods and products sold there.

  The episode that follows bears comparison with the portion of The Tale of Genji where Tamakatsura's visit to Hase temple and reunion with her childhood nurse are described. See pp. 444-54; NKBT, vol. 15, pp. 343-54; and ‘Hatsuse mode,’ in Akinari ibun, pp. 388-90.

  452 ‘Second Month’ Kisaragi: wood-block, Kisaraki; Chinese characters for 2nd month, with Japanese gloss meaning, ‘the month of new buds.’

  453 Hase temple: slightly to the east of the urban centre of Sakurai. Known variously as the Hatsuse-dera, the Chokokuji, and the Kagura-in, it was first built during the Nara period, and later it came to be associated with the Shingon sect. The eleven-headed image of the Goddess of Mercy enshrined here was especially popular in the Heian period. The temple has been destroyed several times by fire, including once at the end of the middle ages, when Hideyoshi ordered it put to flames, but it has always been rebuilt, most recently in the 18th century.

  454 ‘Among the various Buddhist deities’ Hotoke no [4, 11a] on-naka.

  455 ‘Renown had spread abroad to China’ Morokoshi made mo kikoetaru to te: According to a legend found in one of the manuscript versions of The Tale of Genji, the T'ang emperor, Hsi Tsung, had a wife who was very-ugly. On the advice of a Taoist sage, he prayed to the Goddess of Mercy of the Hase temple. Then he dreamed that a priest came from the east riding on a purple cloud and washed the empress's face with a jar of water that he carried with him. Suddenly she became very beautiful. See p. 444; and NKBT, vol. 15, p. 343.

  For Lady Sarashina's description of a pilgrimage to Hase temple, see Morris, As I Crossed a Bridge of Dreams: Recollections of a Woman in Eleventh-Century Japan (New York: The Dial Press, 1971), pp. 98-107.

  456 ‘Put your mind at ease’ Mikokoro yari-sesase [4, 1lb] tatematsuran.

  457 ‘Soon made the house look dilapidated and abandoned’ Tomi-ni [4, 12a] nora-naru yado no sama wo koshiraeshi.

  458 ‘The twin fir trees’ Futamoto no sugi: among the objects of worship at Hase temple. They are mentioned in a sedōka, or verse in two stanzas of 5-7-7, in the Kokinshū,

  Hatsuse-gawa On Hatsuse River

  Furukawa nobe ni Not far from the Ancient Stream

  futa-moto aru sugi By the twin fir trees standing there,

  Toshi wo hete I hope that in future years

  mata mo ai min Once more we shall meet

  futamoto aru sugi By the twin fir trees standing there.

  These trees fell from heaven, it was believed, and had the power to bring together people in love. See NKBT, vol. 8, p. 313 (no. 1009); The Tale of Genji, p. 453; NKBT, vol. 15, p. 354; and Robert Brower and Earl Miner, Fujiwara Teika's Superior Poems of Our Time (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1967), pp. 94-5.

  459 ‘Your patient search and long vigil’ On-kokoro-ne no itōshi- [4, 12b] ki ni.

  460 ‘The clouds,’ etc. Katsuragiya Takama no yama ni, etc.: wood-block, Kazuraki; Katsuragi refers to the ridge of mountains in the districts of Kita-Katsuragi and Minami-Katsuragi, between the prefectures of Nara and Osaka, and it denotes especially the group of peaks around Mt Kongōsen, for which Mt Takama is another name. Katsuragi and Takama appear in the earliest poetry and chronicles, and Akinari's diction calls to mind especially Emperor Godaigo's verse in the Shinshūishū,

  Katsuragiya The billows of cloud

  Takama no yama ni That form on Katsuragi's peaks

  iru kumo no And on Mt Takama

  yoso ni mo shiruki Elsewhere sometimes leave their mark

  yūdachi no sora In showers of evening rain.

  See also the Shinkokinshū,

  Toshi mo henu Year after year has passed,

  inoru chigiri wa As I pray to meet my love

  Hatsuse yama At Hase temple,

  onoe no kane no But the bell that echoes on the ridge

  yoso no yūgure Tells of someone else's evening tryst.

  See also notes 225 and 309. Kokka taikan, p. 589 (no. 289); and NKBT, vol. 28, p. 243 (no. 1142).

  461 ‘Third Month’ Yayoi: the Japanese name, used as a gloss for the Chinese characters, is thought to come from iya oi, meaning the time for the buds to grow.

  462 ‘Of lovely name’ Na-guwashi no: pillow-word for Yoshino. See Man'yōshū, NKBT, vol. 4, pp. 38-9 (no. 52); and NGSK, p. 69 (see also note 293 and cf. note 425, hana-guwashi).

  463 Mt Mifune: a steep slope near Miyataki (where the Yoshino River forms a series of rapids); found in early poetry, e.g., Man'yōshū, NKBT, vol. 4, pp. 146-7 (no. 242).

  464 Natsumi River: name of a part of the south bank of the Yoshino River around Miyataki, so-called for its fame as a place to pluck {tsumu) fresh green shoots (na) in the early spring. Cf. Tanizaki Jun'ichirō (1886-1965), ‘Yoshino kuzu’
(1931), for a modern story in which these same historical places figure in the narrative.

  465 Verse: ascribed to Emperor Temmu, in the Man'yōshū,

  Yoki hito no When the good men of old,

  yoshi to yoku mite Beheld it and saw it well,

  yoshi to ii shi They pronounced it good;

  Yoshino yoku mi yo Look well now at Yoshino,

  yoki hito yoku mi You poets, now sing you well.

  NKBT, vol. 4, pp. 24-5 (no. 27).

  466 ‘Even people from the capital regret it’ Miyako no hito mo minu [4, 13 a] wo urami.

  467 ‘Close connections with a certain temple,’ etc. Nanigashi no in wa kanete, etc.: cf. The Tale of Genji, pp. 81-2, 90; and NKBT, vol. 14, pp. 177-8, 196 (see note 484) where Genji, recuperating from an ague after his disastrous affair with Yugao, calls on a wise priest in the Northern Hills.

  468 ‘Set for them a frugal evening meal’ Yūge ito kiyoku shite kuwase [4, 13b] keru.

  469 ‘Area around the cascades’ Taki aru hō: present-day Miyataki (see note 463).

  470 ‘Emperor's pleasure-palace’ Idemashi no miya: see Man'yōshū, NKBT, vol. 4, pp. 28-9 (no. 36); 168-9 (no. 315); and NGSK, pp. 28,116. Kakinomoto no Hitomaro's verse, ‘On an Imperial Visit to the Pleasure Palace of Yoshinu,’ is especially well known.

  471 ‘Young fish swim upstream’ Chiisaki ayu-domo no mizu ni sakō: ayu; a hard-boned game fish common to Japan. The adults spawn in the sea, and the young fish climb upstream in the spring to feed and grow in the swift, fresh waters of the mountains.

  472 ‘How strange’ Ayashi [4, 14a].

  473 ‘Arose and leaped into the cascade’ Odori-tachite taki ni tobi-iru to mishi: In early modern times skilled swimmers would dive from the rocks and let themselves be carried downstream, and Akinari's idea may have come partly from this practice. See Uzuki, Ugetsu, p. 529, quoting from a guidebook of the Tokugawa period, Yamato meisho zue.

  474 ‘These evil creatures are aged serpents,’ etc. Kono ashiki kami wa toshi hetaru orochi nari, etc.: cf. Wu tsa tsu, 9, lb, ‘The nature of the dragon is the most lustful of all. When it mates with a bull it gives birth to a unicorn; when it mates with a pig it gives birth to an elephant, and when it mates with a horse it produces a dragon steed. Should a woman happen to meet with one, she is very likely to become defiled.’ See also Takizawa Bakin, Nansō Satomi Hakkenden, Iwanami bunko (Tokyo: Iwanami, 1935), I, 26, who shows indebtedness to both Ugetsu monogatari and Wu tsa tsu.

  475 ‘So stubborn’ Kaku made shūneki wo [4, 14b].

  476 Yamato Shrine: also called Ōyamato-no-jinja; in the city of Tenri, Nara Prefecture, near Nagara Station on the Nara rail line. Formerly venerated as one of the most powerful Shinto shrines in Japan, it is worshipped as the home of a god of the harvest, a Yamato clan deity, and a deity charged with protecting the nation against calamity and disaster.

  477 ‘Courage and spirit’ Masurao kokoro: or, the qualities of a ‘manly heart.’ These may be thought to derive from a ‘tranquil heart.’ See Introduction.

  478 ‘As if awakening from a dream’ Yume no same- [4, 15a] taru kokochi.

  479 ‘Hamlet of Shiba’ Shiba no saw. a place name that has puzzled commentators. See Uzuki, Ugetsu, pp. 538-9, who supposes it to be the present-day town of Nakahechi, district of Nishimuro, Wakayama Prefecture, on the Kumano Kaidō highway, west of the city of Tanabe. Uzuki cites an early nineteenth-century travel journal, Kumano yuki, in which the name Shiba-mura is associated with this location. Nearby the town of Nakahechi was the home of the forsaken and vengeful Kiyohime, of the Dōjōji legend, who owing to the excess of her passion was turned into a serpent (see note 490).

  480 Shōji: referring to his position as head of the manor of Shiba; cf. the nō play, Dōjōji, where Kiyohime's father is called Masago no Shōji.

  481 ‘Splendid to behold’ Hanayagi masari [4, 15b] keru

  482 ‘You, wh ave forgotten your old promises,’ etc. Furuki chigiri wo wasure tamalte, etc.: cf. The Tale of Genji, p. 67; and NKBT, vol. 14, p. 146, where Lady Rokujo's jealous spirit appears to Genji in a nightmare or hallucination.

  483 ‘If you believe’ Makotoshiku 0- [4, 16a] boshite.

  484 Kurama temple: founded in the late 8th century on a mountainside in Sakyō-ku, Kyoto; now affiliated with the Tendai sect. Old commentaries on The Tale of Genji identify this institution with the ‘certain temple on the Northern Hills,’ where Genji went to rest (see note 467).

  485 ‘Holy man who knows many kinds of exorcism’ Ito mo gen-naru hōshi nite [4, 17b]: For a pertinent discussion of belief in evil spirits, ghostly possession, and their treatment, see Morris, World of the Shining Prince, pp. 135-9.

  486 ‘Dropped the flask’ Kogame wo mo soko ni [4, 18a] uchi-sutete.

  487 ‘Poisonous vapors’ Ashiki iki: cf. the Nihon shoki, which tells of a giant water snake that lived by a river and killed many people with its poison. A hero challenged the serpent, which changed itself into a deer and fled. The hero then pursued it into a cave under the water and slew it and all of its fellows, causing the river to flow red with blood. Aston, Nihongi, I, 299; and NKBT, vol. 67, pp. 414-15.

  488 ‘Has the demon caused you to lose your mind?’ Ko wa mono ni [4, 18b] kurui tamō ka.

  489 ‘You must at least spare Tomiko's life’ Kono Tomiko ga inochi hitotsu [4, 19a] tasuke yokashi: Manago has assumed Tomiko's form, and they are as if two souls sharing the same body.

  490 ‘In Komatsubara, at the Dōjōji temple’ Komatsubara no Dōjōji; a Buddhist temple of the Tendai sect, founded in the early 8th century; in the town of Kawabe, district of Hidaka, Wakayama Prefecture. The Dōjōji temple is famous for the legend of Kiyohime, who fell in love with a handsome priest named Anchin, when he spent the night at her father's house on his way to visit the holy spots of Kumano. Anchin promised to return to Kiyohime, but he failed to do so. She grew enraged and changed into a serpent and pursued Anchin to the Dōjōji temple. The monks hid Anchin inside a huge temple bell, but Kiyohime in her serpent form coiled herself around the bell, and the heat of her anger burned Anchin, leaving only his ashes. Cf. versions in Konjaku monogatari, NKBT, vol. 24, pp. 277-80; and the no, NKBT, vol. 41, pp. 129-42. A kabuki version, Hidaka-gawa iriai-zakura (On Hidaka River Cherry-Blossoms Fall with the Evening Bells), was performed in Osaka in 1759. See also, U. A. Casal, ‘Magic Vengeance in Old Japan,’ Asiatische studien, 10 (1956), 114-29.

  491 ‘I've heard that old age,’ etc. Ima wa ōite, etc.: cf. The Tale of Genji, p. 81; and NKBT, vol. 14, p. 177.

  492 ‘Mustard-seed incense’ Keshi no ka [4, 19b]: see note 346.

  493 ‘A white serpent more than three feet in length’ Shiroki orochi no mitake [4, 20a] amari nam.

  494 ‘For all time’ Yōgō ga aida: defined in Buddhist terms as a measure of cyclic time; the period between the creation and the recreation of a world or universe.

  8 The Blue Hood

  495 Title: A blue hood suggests an inexpensive flaxen cloth used as a head covering, especially by Buddhist priests of the Soto Zen sect.

  496 Kaian Zenji: Kaian is his religious name, and Zenji means Zen priest. He was an actual person and belonged to the Soto sect of Zen; he died in 1493, in his 72nd year by Japanese reckoning.

  497 ‘Principles of Zen Buddhism’ Kyōgai no mune: The Japanese text means literally studies outside the normal sects or schools. These were the intuitive doctrines of Zen.

  498 ‘Devotions’ Ichige: an ancient practice that began in India of spending the rainy season in religious exercises at a monastery. These lasted for ninety days from the 16th day of the 4th month to the 15 th day of the 7th month.

  499 Ryūtaiji temple: of the Soto Zen sect; founded in the late 14th or early 15 th century in the mountains near Shimōchi, in the city of Seki, Gifu Prefecture.

  500 ‘Hamlet of Tomita’ Tomita to iu sato: in the town of Ōhira, district of Shimotsuga, Tochigi.

  501 ‘Took up a heavy staff’ Yama ōko wo [5, lb] torite.

  502 ‘Patron of B
uddha’ Dan'etsu: from the Sanscrit, dānapati, an alms-giver, or one who escapes the karma of poverty by bestowing charity (see note 257).

  503 ‘Above this village’ Kono sato no [5, 2a] ue.

  504 Oyama: see Introduction.

  505 ‘Baptism’ Kanjō: A ritual administered to priests of the Shingon sect. It involves inauguration or consecration by sprinkling or pouring water on the head.

  506 Koshi: denoting the Hokuriku area, or the modern prefectures of Niigata, Toyama, Ishikawa, and Fukui. Here, the Eiheiji temple, one of the two leading institutions of the Soto sect, is located.

  507 ‘It was useless - the boy finally died’ Tsui ni munashiku [5, 2b] narinu.

  508 ‘Now you can see why’ Saru yue no [5, 3a] arite.

  509 ‘A lady in waiting to the King of Ch'u,’ etc. So-ō no kyūjin, etc.: cf. Wu tsa tsu, 5, 15b-16a, following the section that Akinari used for his introductory passage to ‘The Caldron of Kibitsu.’ The moth is fearful because of its associations in Chinese literature with the idea of death.

  510 ‘Took his Zen rod’ Zen jo wo [5, 4b] mote: a rod, usually about two feet in length made of hard wood, bamboo, or reed, with a ball of softer substance on the end, used by a Zen priest during practice in meditation to chastise sleepy disciples.

  511 Ma Shu-mou: an evil official who served the despotic first emperor of the Sui dynasty and was charged with the responsibility of building the Grand Canal. Eventually he was stricken with a rare disease. In order to cure the illness he drank lamb's blood, but after once tasting human flesh he became addicted to it. He fulfilled his craving for it in the manner that Akinari relates. Mentioned in Wu tsa tsu, 5, 7a.

  512 ‘His constant piety’ Tsune no gyō- [5, 5a] toku.

  513 ‘Sinful path’ Meiro: a Buddhist term defined as the ‘path of delusion’ and identified with the Sanscrit māyā, meaning ‘magic,’ or ‘supernatural power.’

  514 ‘A slothful mind creates a monster, a rigorous one enjoys the fruit of the Buddha’ Kokoro yuruseba yōma to nari, osamuru toki wa Bukka wo uru. A Tendai Buddhist saying derived from a 6th century Chinese commentary on the Lotus Sutra (see Introduction).