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[Micro102]

Well I've got a Japense literature class and have to write a thesis paper on "The Tale of Genji". I have gone with the topic that Murasaki (the author) wrote Genji as her ideal man.

Is anyone familiar with the book and other works of hers, or ones that relate to my topic, that can give me suggestions on where I should be focusing some of my research? I don't wish to buy a bunch of books I do not need. Also any advice ont hings to look otu for would be helpful, as my proffessor warns against using western psycology as there was no such knowledge of things when the book was written.

[Vester]

You're going to want to take a look at Japanese aesthetics, specifically the principles of Mono no Aware, Yugen, and Wabisabi. Wikipedia is your friend.

Murasaki died before finishing the book (if she even existed at all, and wasn't just a pseudonym for another court lady). The later chapters were appended by a different author. She had no other works.

EDIT:

I have gone with the topic that Murasaki (the author) wrote Genji as her ideal man.

You're going to have an impossible time defending that thesis, since no one knows Murasaki's "ideal man". You can, however, look at Japanese culture of the time and look at what they considered an ideal man, and see if Genji fits into the ideal boots. For example: in the tale of Genji, Genji has sex with someone because they remind him of his mom, on another occasion he accidentally has sex with someone's maid after she pulls a disappearing act on him, in another he has sex with a girl's little brother because she wouldn't have sex with him.

Was this kind of behavior what the ideal (Japanese) man would engage him? Note that his chronic fornication comes back to bite him in the butt several times. It's not by any means portrayed as unambiguously positive.

[Micro102]

You're going to want to take a look at Japanese aesthetics, specifically the principles of Mono no Aware, Yugen, and Wabisabi. Wikipedia is your friend.

Murasaki died before finishing the book (if she even existed at all, and wasn't just a pseudonym for another court lady). The later chapters were appended by a different author. She had no other works.

I was told she had diaries and other personal writings.

[Vester]

You're going to want to take a look at Japanese aesthetics, specifically the principles of Mono no Aware, Yugen, and Wabisabi. Wikipedia is your friend.

Murasaki died before finishing the book (if she even existed at all, and wasn't just a pseudonym for another court lady). The later chapters were appended by a different author. She had no other works.

I was told she had diaries and other personal writings.

Oh, the Diary of Lady Murasaki you can get off Amazon or there's probably one in your public library. But that one's not fiction, it's poetry.

[Micro102]

Any reference helps, thanks.

[Micro102]

Well I have another question (and saw that edit, my proffesor thinks it's fine and I am going for more of a "subconsious" version of her ideal man so it should be fine.)

Are there any books where the author has been analyzed to have written about her ideal man? Not obviously, but subtly or one who actually HAS written out her ideal man and bases the story around him, or one that did it subconsiously (but I don't hold any hope that such a book exists.)

[RedKing]

It's been argued that John Galt in Atlas Shrugged was Ayn Rand's ideal man.

[Il Palazzo]

Does Jane Austen count? Mr Darcy is kinda the ideal man, no?

[darkflagrance]

It's been argued that John Galt in Atlas Shrugged was Ayn Rand's ideal man.

More like Howard Roarke, amirite 

[Micro102]

It can't be a socially ideal man, as then it would have to be a socially ideal japanese man. And I don't think that would be very convincing, as you can see in Vester's post.

I was going to use Murasaki's (the character not the author) tolerance to Genji and her being his main love to support this (since they have the same name). Also that his father as a ghost comes back and says that Genji did nothing wrong, and I am interpreting that as Murasaki herself (the author this time) saying that she does not mind Genji's actions.

[RedKing]

Well in both cases above I don't see the examples as socially ideal.

Darcy in Pride and Predjudice is wealthy and well-respected, but he detests his upper-class English peers and for the most part refuses to take part in their frivolities. He freely associates with the "lower-class" country gentry and even with commoners. He embodies Austen's social critique of Victorian society, and represents what the landed class SHOULD have been like if it all worked properly.

...what?
My wife is a serious Jane Austen fangirl, so I know these things. 


Does it have to be a female author? There are plenty of male authors who have their "ideal man" characters, just not in any kind of romantic sense.

[Micro102]

Well female would probably be more supportive of my argument, but as long as I can pull an example as to what someone might subconsiously do when writing about an ideal person it should be good.

Since Austen has clear statements on what she likes, in order to compare it to murasaki, I would have to have some sort of clear statement she made on what her ideal are. Which I don't. If I come across one then that would be a nice use, but for now I'll just have to speculate based on information from her poems.

[Vector]

There are plenty of male authors who have their "ideal man" characters, just not in any kind of romantic sense.

':I

Here is a list of gay authors:

Proust
Oscar Wilde
Shakespeare
Melville
Wittgenstein
Turing

(Had to get my math people on there, hehe)

It is nowhere like complete.  At all.

There are plenty of male authors who talk about their ideal man, romantically.  How... unsurprising.

[Heron TSG]

Well I've got a Japanese literature class and have to write a thesis paper on "The Tale of Genji". I have gone with the topic that Murasaki (the author) wrote Genji as her ideal man.

Is anyone familiar with the book and other works of hers, or ones that relate to my topic, that can give me suggestions on where I should be focusing some of my research? I don't wish to buy a bunch of books I do not need. Also any advice on things to look out for would be helpful, as my professor warns against using western psychology as there was no such knowledge of things when the book was written.

I made it through about the first half of the fully-translated unabridged edition by Royall Tyler, and it's a pretty good source for extra info. At the bottom of each page there are footnotes annotating the various references to other works written into the book. You might want to check that out if you can.

[DJ]

Lots of autobiographies try to describe an ideal man