Mapping Courtship and Kinship in Classical Japan: The Tale of Genji and Its Predecessors by Doris G. Bargen (review)

Doris Bargen’s previous book on The Tale of Genji was A Woman’s Weapon: Spirit Possession in The Tale of Genji (University of Hawai‘i Press, 1997). A bold reframing of how past scholars had interpreted the text’s scenes of spirit possession, that publication effectively illustrated how such approaches overlooked the relationship shared by the possessing spirit, the possessed, and the observer, and it argued that a more thorough examination of this relationship yields nuanced and sometimes unexpected understandings of gender configurations as well as the political and social critiques expressed in Genji. Bargen’s new book, Mapping Courtship and Kinship in Classical Japan, represents an analogously fresh re-examination of the same text, this time with a focus on the narrative strategy of kaimami (“looking through a gap in the fence”), which the author identifies as the principal and unique element of aristocratic courtship in Heian Japan.

The book is divided into three main parts framed by a brief introduction and conclusion. Part 1 provides an expansive overview of the Heian courtly setting. Chapter 1 includes diagrams that depict the capital, the imperial palace grounds, courtiers’ gardened residences, and carriages, noting architectural details, interior elements, and vehicular particularities that featured prominently in—and greatly affected the parameters of—courtship among elites, including in the trope of kaimami. These physical spaces are then brought to life by a discussion of the social practices of the people who populated them, such as the various players in the rear palace, as related by the likes of Sei Shōnagon (through Makura no sōshi) and Murasaki Shikibu (through Murasaki Shikibu nikki). Chapter 2 succinctly describes elite Heian courtship and marriage practices that necessitated much agility on the part of the courtier and notes that since primary marriages tended to be loveless, arranged political unions, much emphasis was placed on the excitement of pursuing secondary liaisons, which could also result in the formation of kinship ties.

The second part of the book, entitled “The Gap in the Fence: Courtship before The Tale of Genji,” consists of two chapters. Chapter 3 provides a concise-yet-dense outline of the author’s main concerns about gaze, agency, and courtship in Heian literature and society. This is followed by a chapter that broadly surveys scenes of kaimami and courtship in a number of well-known monogatari that preceded Genji, including Taketori, Ise, Yamato, Utsuho, Ochikubo, and Sumiyoshi, as well as texts in other genres such as Makura no sōshi, Sarashina nikki, and Murasaki Shikibu nikki.

Part 3, “The Genealogical Maze: Courtship in The Tale of Genji,” contains the core analytical portions of the book. Chapter 5 sets the stage through useful maps that locate key places featured in the text, as well as several genealogical charts that are crucial for understanding the text’s labyrinth of characters. The next two chapters are devoted to examinations of two main characters—Genji (chapter 6) and Murasaki (chapter 7). The former focuses on instances of Genji’s kaimami of an array of female characters and ascribes those numerous instances specifically to transgressive or inappropriate relationships (or his attempts to direct attention away from them). Bargen discusses these cases one by one and at length by following their stories’ contours from beginning to end, starting with Utsusemi (identified as an atypical, double kaimami with an abbreviated courtship), Yūgao (a vicarious kaimami, with actual kaimami following the sexual encounter), Suetsumuhana (seemingly the only non-transgressive, double kaimami courtship), Oborozukiyo (a bold invitation for viewing on the woman’s part), Akashi (a quasi-arranged, genealogically fruitful relationship marked by a lack of kaimami), Tamakazura (the famous “fireflies scene,” in which Genji orchestrates a kaimami for Prince Hotaru), and the Third Princess (Genji potentially witnessing Kashiwagi’s kaimami of his wife). Chapter 7 shifts its focus almost exclusively to interactions involving Murasaki, tracing in detail Genji...