-
“Every Trivial Little Thing”: Sei Shonagon and the Poetics of Insignificance
- a/b: Auto/Biography Studies
- The Autobiography Society
- Volume 28, Number 1, Summer 2013
- pp. 86-111
- Article
- Additional Information
- Purchase/rental options available:
This article explores the triviality that so emphatically distinguishes Sei Shonagon’s Pillow Book from other masterpieces of the Heian age (794–1186). Although the circumstances surrounding its composition were undeniably tragic, I argue that Sei’s autobiographical narrative observes a directional taboo that forces it to move always toward the “trivial little thing[s]” and away from anything of real historical or political significance.