Worlding Sei Shônagon: The Pillow Book in Translation

Arthur Waley (1928) English

Arthur Waley The Pillow-Book of Sei Shônagon 1928. London: George Allen & Unwin, Ltd., 1929 Arthur David Waley (1889–1966), né Schloss, is generally considered the West’s single most influential translator of Classical Chinese and Japanese. Within Japan as well, where many native writers once claimed to have first learned to appreciate The Tale of Genji via his English translation, he is widely revered. Waley’s Pillow-Book contains approximately one hundred passages, or excerpts of passages, from the original text, interspersed throughout the extensive socio-cultural commentary that forms the bulk of his volume. Although generally laudatory toward his author—he applauds “the delicate precision of her perceptions” (150) and “her extreme readiness of wit” (152)—Waley can at times be quite remarkably dismissive. In his own words: “I have here translated about a quarter of the Pillow-Book. Omissions have been made only where the original was dull, unintelligible, repetitive , or so packed with allusion that it required an impracticable amount of commentary” (5). It should be borne in Arthur Waley (1928) 98 mind that, until Morris’s version appeared in the late 1960s, this partial translation remained the primary English version , with a readership that extended into many non-English -speaking countries as well. Waley’s translation came out very shortly after that of Matsuo and Steinilber-Oberlin, and the following footnote was inserted at what must have been the last minute: “Since this was written there has appeared Les Notes de l’oreiller, … containing extracts which amount, like mine, to about a quarter of the original. My selection was, however, made from a very different point of view and coincides with theirs only to the extent of a few pages. The two books are therefore complementary” (5–6). Given Waley’s stature as such a preeminent translator of Asian literature, it is a sorry loss to future generations that he left us no version of haru wa akebono . Without mentioning this passage in particular, Waley does offer a rationale for his limited selection: “… I have avoided what has been translated before, not on principle, but because it seemed to me that, on the whole, the least interesting passages had been chosen” (5). (For further details, see his Appendix 3.) English 99 No translation of this passage appears. ...