Outline of the Literature of Japan Before 1868
By Roger Blackwell Bailey, Ph. D.
Maintained by tmcquien@mail.accd.edu
I. From Earliest Times to 794
A. History
The Kojiki. Completed in 711 by Ô no Yasumaro. Translation by Donald Phillipi ( Princeton, 1969 ). See Keene, Anthology,pp.54-58.
The Nihongi. Completed in 720 . Translated Aston, 1896 ( Reprint, Tuttle ). Translations from both of these early histories are to be found in Sources of Japanese Tradition.
B. Poetry
The Man'yôshû. Completed sometime after 795. Selections in Keene Anthology. See also Manyôshû. ( Columbia, 1965 ). The latter translates 1000 of the 4500 poems in this early anthology of Japanese poetry. A complete translation by Ian H. Levy is published by Princeton.
The Kaifûsô. Completed in 751. Selections in Watson, I.17-26.
C. Stories
Miraculous Tales of Japan ( Nihon Ryôiki ). Buddhist tales of the early ninth c. See Watson I.27-39 for examples.
II. The Heian Period ( 794-1185 )
A. Watson ( I.40-69 ) translates some specimens of Japanese prose and poetry in Chinese from this period.
B. Diarists
Earl Miner translates several diaries in his Japanese Poetic Diaries ( California, 1969 ).
The Pillow Book of Sei Shônagonwas translated by Ivan Morris ( Columbia, 1967 ).
The [ Lady ] Sarashina Diary ( Mid 11th c.), sampled in Keene ( pp. 156-161 ), has been translated by Ivan Morris as As I Crossed a Bridge ( Dial, 1971 ).
C. Fiction
Tales of Ise (? Late 9th c. ).Translated by Helen McCullough ( Stanford, 1968 ). Sampled in Keene, pp.67-75. Prose passages introduce the 209 poems, many of which are by the poet/nobleman Ariwara no Narihira ( 825-880 ) to whom the whole work has been traditionally attributed.
Lady Murasaki ( 978-c. 1016 ). The Tale of Genji. Perhaps the world's first novel and the national novel of Japan. Translated by Waley in 1935 and by Edward G. Seidensticker in 1976. See also Ivan Morris' study of Genji, The World of the Shining Prince ( Reprinted, Penguin ). Murasaki Shikibu Page
Tales of Time Now Past: Sixty-two Stories from a Medieval Japanese Collection ( California, 1979 ) is the title of Marian Ury's translation of Konjaku Monogatari
D. Poetry
Kokinshû Collection of Old and New ( Poetry ). Completed early 10th c. Waka or Tanka poems, 31 syllables in 5 lines as follows: 5-7-5-7-7. See Keene pp.76-81 for some specimens in transliteration and translation.
III." Medieval" Japan ( 1185-1600 )
A. Stories
Heike Monogatari ( Late 12th c. ). Selection in Keene, pp.179-191 . Translation by Helen McCullough ( Stanford, 1988 ).
B. Essays and Memoirs
An Account of my Hut. By Kamo no Chômei. Translated in Keene, pp197-212.
Essays in Idleness by Yoshida Kenkô (1283-1350 ). Translated by Keene ( Columbia, 1967 ). See also his Anthology ( pp.233-241 ) for selections.
C. Poetry
ShinkokinshuThe New Collection of Old and New ( Poetry ). See Keene, pp.192-196.
D. Drama: The Nô
Royall Tyler, in his Japanese Nô Dramas(Penguin, 1992), has translated and introduced twenty four plays and also provides a general introduction, diagram of the theater, notes, and bibliography. It is probably the best place to start.
Twenty Plays of the Nô Theatre,edited by Donald Keene ( Columbia, 1970 ), is another good place to start with Nô ( or Noh, as this drama is also called ). It contains an introduction on " The Conventions of the Nô Drama" and a diagram of the stage. Another more detailed diagram appears in his Anthology, p.263. See also Keene's Nô: The Classical Theatre of Japan ( Tokyo, 1966 ).
The Nô has had considerable influence on Western writers such as Brecht, Pound, Wilder and Yeats.
Nô Drama on-line from UVA:
Nô Plays
IV. The Tokugawa Period (1600-1868)
A. Fiction
Ihara Saikaku ( 1642-1693 ), Five Women Who Loved Love. Translated by Wm. Theodore De Bary ( Tuttle, 1956 ). See also Ivan Morris' translation, Life of an Amorous Woman and Other Writings ( New Directions, 1963). Some Saikaku selections in Keene, pp. 335-362. Howard Hibbett's The Floating World in Japanese Fiction (Oxford, 1959 ) studies the ukiyo tradition in fiction.
B. Poetry
Matsuo Bashô ( 1644-1694 ). The Japanese poet everybody has heard of and whose seventeen-syllable haiku is more familiar in America than is the sonnet. Keene has some samples with transliteration in his Anthology and more Bashô can be found in Nobuyuki Yuasa's Narrow Road to the Deep North ( Penguin, 1966 ). Lucien Stryker translates and introduces On Love and Barley: Haiku of Bashô ( Penguin, 1985), and Donald Keene has translated Narrow Road, illustrated by Miyata Masayuki. ( Kodansha, 1996 ) See also A Haiku Journey: Bashô's Narrow Road to a Far Province. Translated by Dorothy Britton. Kodansha, 1974. The haiku's seventeen syllables are distributed in three lines of 5-7-5 syllables, respectively. Like the Nô, Haiku has influenced Western writers, Aiken, Frost, Lowell, Pound, and Yeats, to name a few. Earl Miner has studied this influence from East to west in his Japanese Tradition in British and American Literature ( Princeton, 1958 ).
A Bashô Page Biography and Haiku.
Issa ( 1762-1826 )
Issa Home Page.
C. Drama
Chikamatsu Monzaemon ( 1653-1725 ), the author of numerous plays for the Kabuki and puppet theaters. He is regarded as the greatest of Japanese dramatists. Donald Keene has translated eleven of the plays in his Major Plays of Chikamatsu ( Columbia, 1961 ). There is one play, "The Love Suicides at Sonezaki" and a critical piece, "Chikamatsu and the Art of the Puppet Stage" in Keene's Anthology, pp386-409. Keene has also translated Chûshingura ( The Treasury of Loyal Retainers ), A puppet play by Takeda Izumo, Miyoshi Shôraku and Namiki Senryû ( Columbia, 1971 ).
Chikamatsu Monzaemon Page.
Japanese Drama Page from Horace Mann.
V. Modern Japan (1868-)
Jun'ichiro Tanizaki ( 1886-1965 ).
Akutagawa Ryonosuke ( 1892-1927 ).
Yasunari Kawabata ( 1899-1972 ).
Kobo Abe ( 1924-1993 ).
Yukio Mishima ( 1925-1970 ).
Kenzaburo Oe ( 1935- ).
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