A Tale of False Fortunes (3 page)

shi (daughter of Fujiwara no Michinaga), the second consort of Emperor Ichijò. Akazome was the wife of the noted Sinologist and poet Òe no Masahira. Her reputation also as a poet is attested by the comparison, in Murasaki Shikibu’s diary, of Izumi Shikibu’s poems with those of Akazome, where Murasaki judged the latter to be superior. But Akazome’s temperament was unlike the purely literary dispositions of Izumi Shikibu, Sei Shònagon, or Murasaki Shikibu; Akazome must have been more of a commonsensical sort of person who was also endowed with literary talent. From the prosaic nature of the narration in
A Tale of Flowering Fortunes
and from the fact that Akazome would borrow passages intact from other writers to aid in her own narrative (her description of Michinaga’s residence at the time Shòshi’s first child was born was borrowed from the
Murasaki Shikibu Diary
), we may see that she did not possess the strongly individualistic character typical of most writers, and that rather than putting a premium on her own style, she was by nature a researcher who attached greatest importance to the accuracy of her descriptions.

And then, too, in one respect
A Tale of Flowering Fortunes
is also a genealogy—a eulogistic hymn, as it were—of the Fujiwara family, written with the purpose of giving greater glory to the life of the regent Michinaga. It therefore shows a strong tendency to look with indifference on those who opposed Michi-12 c
A Tale of False Fortunes
naga and, of course, to omit descriptions that otherwise ought to have been recorded. Just by comparing it with a historical romance like
The Great Mirror,
whose author is thought to have been a man, the extent to which Akazome views things from the position of Michinaga becomes evident. In her writing, the closer the narrative comes to Michinaga’s age, the more it loses its comprehensive historical view.

Perhaps the author of
A Tale of False Fortunes
had these same impressions upon reading
A Tale of Flowering Fortunes.
Aided perhaps by a knowledge of the history of the Monarchical Age and by something of a chivalrous spirit in siding with those who suffered defeats and setbacks, the author of
False Fortunes
must have intended to show the other side of things, borrowing passages here and there from the earlier work.

That my inference is not merely arbitrary is born out by the fact that the content of
A Tale of False Fortunes
is quite different in tone from the eulogistic hymn to the regent’s family.
False
Fortunes
attempts instead to portray by contrast the victor’s tyranny hidden behind his prosperity and the sudden misfortunes and ruin of those who attempted to resist that tyranny.

The story was written either in the Kamakura period—not long after the Monarchical Age—or in the Tokugawa period by a writer of the pseudoclassicist school. I am certain that the manuscript I saw was not so very old, but I am unable to determine for sure whether or not it was the original copy. The date of this story’s composition thus remains vague. If, based on this description, the original copy of
A Tale of False Fortunes
should turn up somewhere, there could be nothing more gratifying. But barring that possibility—and considering that my life is half over and that my memory is rapidly deteriorating—there may be some value in my recording for posterity the contents of
A
Tale of False Fortunes,
a work no one but myself seems to have read and that I have committed to fairly accurate memory. I shall fill in gaps by referring to
A Tale of Flowering Fortunes
and other documents.

Of course, if by chance the real
Tale of False Fortunes
should show up somewhere, a close comparison will no doubt reveal many errors in what I write here. After the passage of nearly
Prologue
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forty years, the things I read in books as a child or saw in plays blend with the gamut of emotions experienced in real life and are woven together into a single entity within me that is difficult to separate from reality, and that takes on an elusive life of its own.

However, my decision to call up this story from memory and to reconstruct it with the aid of early histories owes to a fortu-itous meeting in Geneva, Switzerland, on a recent trip abroad.

I learned that Dr. Chamberlain had spent his later years in seclusion there.

The source of this information was a young man, proficient in English, who worked in a watch shop on a main road near Lake Leman. Because of the kimono I was wearing at the time, he perceived immediately that I was Japanese and made some amiable conversation after the sale. He mentioned the name of Dr. Chamberlain, who had been laid to rest there over twenty years ago. Of course, the shop clerk had not known the professor personally, but said that his mother had gone to assist with housekeeping at the professor’s residence and had received such things as a Japanese cloth (probably a
furoshiki
) and a doll. I asked about the professor’s wife and children, but he knew nothing of them. After having mentioned this British philologist to many Japanese and having met only with indifferent reac-tions, the young man seemed rather gratified that I knew something of the professor.

Naturally, when I heard him speak Dr. Chamberlain’s name, I, too, could not help feeling that it was a strangely coinciden-tal meeting.

When I completed my purchase and left the shop, the young man followed after me and, pointing to an area beyond the bridge, said: “On the other side of the Mont Blanc Bridge over there is a landing for an excursion boat. I was told that Professor Chamberlain would sit on a bench every day on the water’s edge and look out over the lake there. Even rain never prevented him from coming for a walk with a cane in one hand and an umbrella in the other.”

Following the young man’s directions, I crossed the Mont Blanc Bridge and walked along the lakefront, turning down a
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A Tale of False Fortunes
street lined with hotels. The excursion boat was docked at the landing, and I could see several people who looked like tourists descending the wide staircase of the landing in order to board the boat. It was a lightly overcast afternoon toward the end of June, but the air had an autumnal chill about it, and the women of the town all looked warm walking about in thick woolen waistcoats. Here and there were flower beds planted with small blooms in patterns like carpets. The colors of the flowers, like the colors of the townswomen’s clothing, were of a sober tone, mellow and warm, which, combined with the cold impression given by the people’s Nordic features, eloquently bespoke the characteristic harmony and sense of proportion possessed by the Swiss nation. Absent was a sense of the inscrutable charm of frenzied passion or of confusion; instead, an ultimate minia-turization of human happiness seemed to be preserved there more than anywhere else in the world.

I sat down on the bench closest to the lake, gazing at the graceful, veil-like spray of the tall jet of water from a fountain on the other side and at the outline of the peak of Mont Blanc, dimly visible in the distance. It occurred to me that the color of the waters of Lake Leman and the imposing shape of Mont Blanc before me now were probably not so very different from what the old philologist saw more than twenty years ago as he walked here daily with his cane and sat on a bench on the lake-side. Such musing moved me to reminiscence. I have no way of knowing what has happened to the thousands of books Dr.

Chamberlain left in Japan in the hopes that they would be used by Japanese. Are they now in a library somewhere, or in a private collection? At any rate, it was then that
A Tale of False Fortunes,
which may have been one of those books, sprang back to life in my mind. I determined then that when I returned to Japan, I would write it down, comparing what I remember of the story with
A Tale of Flowering Fortunes.

Prologue
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Chapter One
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If my memory is not mistaken, the opening section of
A Tale of
False Fortunes
consists largely of extracts from chapters of the first volume of
A Tale of Flowering Fortunes
and chronicles the struggle for power in the regency after the death of Michinaga’s father, Fujiwara no Kaneie. In describing the refinement of the heroine’s life, it was no doubt necessary to portray as its background the tragedy of an aristocratic society caught in the internecine feuds of the age. Those descriptions are taken almost intact from
A Tale of Flowering Fortunes,
and I, too, shall begin by recounting them. I distinctly recall that
A Tale of
False Fortunes
opened with the following words:
During the reign of Emperor Ichijò, there were two consorts. The first of these was Fujiwara no Teishi, the daughter of the Regent Michitaka. Thereafter came Fujiwara no
Shòshi, the eldest daughter of the Buddha-Hall Lord
(Michinaga). Also known as Jòtòmon’in, Shòshi was the
mother of Emperors Go-Ichijò and Go-Suzaku.

This account is, of course, not found in
A Tale of Flowering
Fortunes,
a history of the court from early Heian times focus-ing on the Fujiwara family.

I do not recall the extent to which abbreviated text from
Flowering Fortunes
was used in the succeeding sections, but I am certain that the narrative began from the time when the Higashisanjò chancellor, Kaneie, was still alive and his eldest son, the palace minister Michitaka, had his eldest daughter Teishi installed in court as junior consort to the still-youthful emperor. I, too, shall interpolate descriptions of what I remember from
False Fortunes
as I give a free rendition of portions of
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A Tale of False Fortunes
the earlier work. This kind of writing amounts to a sort of cut-and-paste work, rather irritating to one like me who is used to writing fiction, but there is no other way to reconstruct
A Tale
of False Fortunes
in a manner that would be a credit to the story—a story that remains nowhere but in my memory.

On the fifth day of the first month of Shòryaku 1 (990), the Coming-of-Age Ceremony was performed for the emperor (Ichijò). He was still a youth of eleven years, and there were those who lamented, remarking that his childhood and the charm of his boyish attire were now things of the past. Even with his hair bound up and a man’s cap set on his head, however, he looked very trim and splendid in spite of his small stature.

In the second month, the palace minister Michitaka presented his eldest daughter in court, and both the palace and the minister’s own household were bustling with preparations for the ceremonies. Michitaka’s wife, Kishi, was well versed in the ways of the court, having served there under the name Kò no Naishi. She much preferred a modish and resplendent style over solemn, esoteric matters, and her tastes were reflected in her arrange-ments for her daughter’s presentation at court. The young woman had just turned sixteen, five years older than the emperor. That same evening after the ceremonies, she assumed the position of junior consort.

Shortly thereafter, Kaneie fell ill. Michitaka, the emperor’s mother (Kaneie’s daughter Senshi), and others among the nobles were distraught with worry. Incantations and prayers on behalf of the chancellor were performed everywhere throughout the land, but he showed no sign of recovery. His residence, Nijòin, was infested with the evil spirits that had always haunted the family of Lord Kujò (Morosuke). To these were added the vengeful spirits of both the living and the dead who bore resentment toward Kaneie. Taking advantage of his weakened state, these malevolent spirits contrived to obstruct prayers offered on his behalf. Even the spiritual powers of famous priests like the chief abbot of Hieizan availed nothing against the evil spirits. The women called in as mediums looked like
Chapter One
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specters themselves, their faces ghastly pallid, their eyes twitching, and their hair disheveled. The priests performing the exorcisms whipped the women with rosaries, attempting to prostrate them, but they rolled about and jumped up in defiance. The mediums were both laughing and weeping, and the resulting confusion was like a scene from hell itself. An especially dreadful one among them was possessed by the vengeful ghost of Emperor Murakami’s daughter, the third princess, of whom Kaneie had been enamored in his youth. He had soon tired of her and left her, for which cause she was made the object of much gossip and was despised at court. She became despondent and grieved herself to death.

The medium, known as Ayame of Miwa, was the daughter of the priestess of Miwa. Although ordinarily a timid, inarticulate young woman, while possessed she assumed the lofty mien of the princess herself and denounced Kaneie’s coldness and cru-elty. The intrepid Kaneie, who appeared not to have been particularly intimidated by the imprecations and reproaches of other evil spirits, was deeply shaken by the specter of the third princess. The young court noble most like Kaneie in temperament was his own youngest son, the lesser commander of the guards (Michinaga), whom Kaneie is said to have warned sternly: “There are all kinds of transgressions in this world, but make sure you are never guilty of giving a woman cause for resentment. At first it may remain unexpressed, and you will put it out of your mind with no thought of consequences. But I’m afraid that even if I tell you how horrible those unexpressed resentments can become, someone your age would probably not understand.”

Under these circumstances, Kaneie’s daughter (the emperor’s mother) and sons repeatedly urged him to change residences.

He obliged and moved to the Higashisanjò mansion, but the evil spirits followed him there and his condition only grew worse. On the fifth day of the fifth month he resigned from the positions of chancellor and regent, and a few days later took religious orders. An imperial proclamation was immediately issued appointing the palace minister, Michitaka, as regent.

Though it was perhaps only natural for Kaneie’s eldest son to
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A Tale of False Fortunes
receive such an appointment, news of it pitched the Higashisanjò mansion into such a state of agitation that it seemed almost as if Kaneie’s illness had been forgotten. Those of that household as well as people in other prominent families naturally watched with raised brows as Michitaka’s father-in-law and brothers-in-law—men who were not even of Fujiwara lineage—