Richard Bowring

There's no meaning to the star rating here, so I forgo it.

This was a very odd reading experience: the editor and translator of the Penguin edition seemed most keen to stop me reading the actual diary itself. He stressed, time and again, that it's very hard to understand what's going on and there's really not that much here etc etc... Well, that's true. On the other hand, the actual diary is very short, Bowring's annotations, introductions and appendices are helpful, and, unless we've all show more been massively hoaxed, this is a bit of a diary by one of the great writers the human species has ever thrown up (I confess, I say this based on reputation, rather than a thorough knowledge of Genji), and is well worth reading for that alone. Murasaki is a charming diarist, even though she's describing rituals and goings-on that I really do not understand even in the slightest (in brief: a royal baby is born. Much ritual follows). What I do understand, however, is gentle melancholy, which is here in spades, and literary snark, of which there is only half a spadeful, but boy, what a spadeful she drops on Shonagon's head. That's a spat I'd *love* to know more about.

I say Bowring's editorial work is helpful, but it isn't that helpful. For instance, people are often referred to by honorary titles ("Her Excellency", "Her Majesty" etc...) But we're never told what those titles might mean. I think I worked it out, but I could easily be wrong. Given that we have multiple architectural diagrams of fairly easy to visualize buildings, the note to read another book to learn about the titles seems a little grudging. show less

From the initial sections, this appears to be a fairly introductory text. However, as you proceed, it covers fairly higher (say, intermediate) levels of expression and usage. it is obviously meant to aid in consolidating or revising a first course in basic language, such as Genki I (and II), as it presupposes knowledge of kana script and does not contain any detailed drilling in them. Thus it will serve admirably as bridge to more advanced grammar. plus it introduces a good selection of show more Kanji and a profusion of example sentences, including formal (respect) language and letter writing. Obviously, I have only made a first pass, and will require a more detailed second study. (Book 2 is a workbook, but without answer key, so less useful). show less