The Tale of Genji Quotes

“Did not we vow that we would neither of us be either before or after the other even in travelling the last journey of life? And can you find it in your heart to leave me now?”
― Murasaki Shikibu, The Tale of Genji

“I should like to indulge in the pleasures of the seasons—the blossoms, the autumn leaves, the changing skies. People have long weighed the flowering woods in spring against the lovely hues of the autumn moors, and no one seems ever to have shown which one clearly deserves to be preferred. I hear that in China they say nothing equals the brocade of spring flowers, while in Yamato speech 41 we prefer the poignancy of autumn, but my eyes are seduced by each in turn, and I cannot distinguish favorites among the colors of their blossoms or the songs of their birds. I have in mind to fill a garden, however small, with enough flowering spring trees to convey the mood of the season, or to transplant autumn grasses there and, with them, the crickets whose song is so wasted in the fields, and then to give all this to a lady for her pleasure.”
― Murasaki Shikibu, The Tale of Genji

“And among the leaves were white flowers with petals half-unfolded like the lips of people smiling at their own thoughts.”
― Murasaki Shikibu, The Tale of Genji

“New grass, you don't even know where to sprout and grow.
How can I, a drop of dew, vanish away in the air leaving you alone?”
― Murasaki Shikibu, The Tale of Genji

“One lovely twilight, with the near garden in riotous bloom, Genji stepped onto a gallery that gave him a view of the sea, and such was the supernal grace of his motionless figure that he seemed in that setting not to be of this world at all. Over soft white silk twill and aster 49 he wore a dress cloak of deep blue, its sash only very casually tied; and his voice slowly chanting “I, a disciple of the Buddha Shakyamuni…” 50 was more beautiful than any they had ever heard before. From boats rowing by at sea came a chorus of singing voices. With a pang he watched them, dim in the offing, like little birds borne on the waters, and sank into a reverie as cries from lines of geese on high mingled with the creaking of oars, until tears welled forth, and he brushed them away with a hand so gracefully pale against the black of his rosary that the young gentlemen pining for their sweethearts at home were all consoled.”
― Murasaki Shikibu, The Tale of Genji

“Remember "the unmoored boat floats about.”
― Murasaki Shikibu, The Tale of Genji

“A woman who has nothing to recommend her is as rare as one who is perfect in every way.”
― Murasaki Shikibu, The Tale of Genji

“And so, in the end, it is simply impossible to choose one woman over another. That is how it is with them: each is bound to be trying, one way or another.”
― Murasaki Shikibu, The Tale of Genji

“Con respecto a quienes alcanzan una posición elevada sin tener derecho a ella por nacimiento, lo cierto es que, a pesar de su ranga, lo sociedad no experimenta del todo los mismos sentimientos hacia ellos, mientras que en el caso de quienes en el pasado tuvieron una posición encumbrada, pero en el presente carecen de medios y pasan por una mala época, decaen hasta que no les queda nada más que su orgullo y padecen un infortunio sin fin. Creo que estos dos grupos pertenecen al grado medio.”
― Murasaki Shikibu, The Tale of Genji