The disaster comes in the opening pages of “Wakana One,” which in character and quality, as well as in narrative content, represent a new departure for the tale.[70] It is as though the author paused after the preceding chapter (“Fuji no Uraba”) to look back over what she had done, reflect on her future purpose, gather all her skill, and then re-launch the work.
Feeling that he has little longer to live, Retired Emperor Suzaku seeks for his favorite daughter, the Third Princess, the “protector” (husband) she needs, and his choice settles on Genji. Genji’s acceptance culminates the series of Murasaki’s “three perils.” The danger does not pass this time. Neither her life nor his will ever be the same again.
In her thirteenth or fourteenth year, the Third Princess is still a child. Like Murasaki, she is a niece of Fujitsubo. Unlike Murasaki, she is, in her own person, a nonentity, but her father loves her extravagantly. Before leaving the world to prepare for death, he gives her almost everything of value that he owns. Rank and wealth make her a prize coveted by many ambitious gentlemen of the court. One of them is Genji.
In this connection, it is worth reflecting on what Genji is really like. Whether hero or villain, he is to most readers the lover, the man of endless charm and wandering fancy, whose unerring style and taste define a courtly age. However, he is also a man of ambition, power, and pride. For example, after returning from exile he spares none of those who had earlier turned their backs on him. The author only rarely and briefly evokes him as a statesman or political patron, a maker and breaker of men, but he is that, too. Early in “Wakana One,” Retired Emperor Suzaku puts it lightly but well.
“Yes,” he said, “it is true, [Genji] was exceptional [in his youth], and now, in his full maturity, he has a charm that reminds one still more of just what it means to say that someone shines. When grave and dignified he has so superbly commanding a presence that one hardly dares to approach him, and when relaxed and in a playful mood he is sweeter and more engagingly amusing than anyone in the world.”[71]
The enchanting lover and host can also inspire awe.
The reader glimpses this Genji directly in “Wakana Two.” Aware of Kashiwagi’s transgression with the Third Princess, Genji has nonetheless been expressing publicly the most generous affection for him; but the reader also knows that he, who is now the honorary retired emperor, is outraged beyond forgiveness. Genji then hosts a party that the frightened Kashiwagi must attend and singles him out for attention with a venomous show of friendly banter.
“The older you are, the harder it gets to stop drunken tears,” Genji said. “Look at [Kashiwagi], smiling away to himself—it is so embarrassing! Never mind, though, his time will come. The sun and moon never turn back. No one escapes old age.” He peered at [Kashiwagi], who seemed far less cheerful than the others and really did look so unwell that the wonders of the day were lost on him.
Kashiwagi goes home ill, thinking, “I am not that drunk, though. What is the matter with me?”[72] He soon takes to his bed, and a few months later he is dead. As Mumyōzōshi puts it, Genji has “killed him with a glance.”[73] One does not trifle with such a man.
Hikaru Genji’s “light” (hikari) therefore suggests not only beauty, grace, and so on, but danger. Kashiwagi is already dying when he confides to Kojijū, the gentlewoman who knows his secret, “Now that [Genji] knows what I did, I shrink from the prospect of living—which I should say only shows what a special light he has…As soon as I met his gaze that evening my soul fled in anguish, and it has never come back.”[74] Genji has extraordinary potency and charisma. However, that does not shield him from error. He may simply err more gravely than lesser men.
He does so in marrying the Third Princess, as once he had wished to marry Princess Asagao. The error springs from ambition and pride. Genji believes that he can successfully achieve perfect prestige by adding to his panoply the last ornament that it lacks (a suitably exalted wife), while at the same time keeping the unreserved love of the only woman who really matters to him. In acquiring the first, he begins to lose the second, and as he does so he begins to lose himself. He soon compromises himself in the eyes of Suzaku and of society at large, for, despite his decision to marry Suzaku’s daughter, his love for Murasaki will prevent him from honoring the Third Princess as he should. Then his inability to tear himself away from Murasaki when at last she becomes ill leaves the door open for Kashiwagi to violate the Third Princess. That incident, which remains secret, nonetheless leads to the Third Princess becoming a nun, which reveals to all the failure of her life with Genji. Genji’s marriage is therefore a private disaster with respect to Murasaki and a public failure with respect to the Third Princess.
[70] Ōasa Yūji, Akiyama Ken, and others have noted that the writing in the “Wakana” chapters is qualitatively new (Ōasa, Genji monogatari seihen no kenkyū, 75; Akiyama, Genji monogatari no sekai, 150).
[71] TTG, pp. 579–580; GM 4:26.
[72] TTG, 669; GM 4:280.
[73] Higuchi and Kuboki, Matsura no Miya monogatari, Mumyōzōshi, 199. For this, the text calls Genji “despicable” (muge ni keshikaranu ōnkokoro).
[74] TTG, 677; GM 4:295.