Sei Shōnagon (966–1025)

Written by Sei Shōnagan (966-1017), a lady of the Japanese court of Empress Fujiwara Teiji (Sadako), this is a journal which covers court life and her personal musings from about 991-1000. Shōnagan writes cleverly and with beautiful descriptions. She loves a good list (lists of Very Tiresome Things, lists of Things That Make One Happy), and is said to be history’s first blog writer. She is sharp-witted, observant, and somewhat capricious and cantankerous. She loves beautiful things, a good gossip, an illicit late-night meeting with a lover-provided he leaves quickly enough and not too quickly, with the appropriate amount of poetry exchanged first. She’s not fond of the lower classes, boring people and has many other irritations and personal peeves. This book would have been a lovely insight into court life in medieval Japan if I had not made the mistake of reading the translation by the pompous, over intrusive Arthur Waley. Many of the beautiful quotes I have read in other reviews are absent as he rather arrogantly decided to exclude anything he considered “dull, unintelligible, repetitive.” He even has the nerve to interrupt her writing, with something pretty much equivalent to “blah, blah” and go back to his own commentary. I just wanted him to get out of the way with his patriarchal, colonialistic crap (he describes the “intellectual passivity” of the Japanese and berates an “absence of mathematics, science, philosophy”) and let me read Sei Shōnagan. I would like to read another translation to enjoy more of her quirky lists and musings.… (plus d'informations)

An unexpectedly lovely book. Full of details about life at the Japanese imperial court more than a thousand years ago, beautiful imagery, court gossip, anecdotes, poetry. Sei Shōnagon must have had an amazing visual memory - the descriptions of clothes are wonderfully detailed.
At times the author comes across as an obnoxious snob. A few pages later, there is a paragraph that is personal and poignant.
My favourite part of the book: the lists! Did I mentions the lists? "Things that make the heart beat faster". "Things that give a comfortable feeling." Etc... Give me more, please.… (plus d'informations)

Los pensamientos de un diario privado de una dama de la corte japonesa del siglo X, que mas se puede pedir?

No solo eso sino que leyendolo te das cuenta lo poco que hemos cambiado en todos estos siglos. Aunque algunas cosas como esperar a que los criados hagan cosas no se corresponde a mi experencia personal pues no soy mega-rico, en general los sentimientos que expresa son similares a los mios, y no puedo mas que estar de a cuerdo con la mayoria de sus listas de cosas que deben ser grandes, pequeñas, etc.… (plus d'informations)