Tales of Ise: Lyrical Episodes from Tenth-Century Japan [Hardcover]

Helen Craig McCullough (Author)

Product Details

• Hardcover: 280 pages
• Publisher: Stanford University Press; 1 edition (June 1, 1968)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0804706530
• ISBN-13: 978-0804706537
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 5.7 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,597,436 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Episodic and Engaging Tales of Ise Enjoyable in English, July 31, 2006

By 

Crazy Fox (Chicago, IL USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Tales of Ise: Lyrical Episodes from Tenth-Century Japan (Hardcover)

Something about "The Tales of Ise" really grows on you. If you are expecting characterization and psychological depth or even just a continuous narrative, you won't find it here. In fact, most any of the standards by which we tend to judge literature nowadays are conspicuous in their absence. And yet it doesn't seem to matter. The grace, elegance, and intense regard for the varieties of emotional experience found in these episodic vignettes gets you all the same.

There is also much of historical interest in this work, and that helps it out a little, too. First of all, in terms of literary history, this is definitely a transitional work, as the translator points out in her introduction. In the Kokinshu poetry anthology, for instance, each poem is preceded by a short prose passage explaining its social and situational context, but the poem is the main thing. In later prose narratives like the "Tale of Genji" or the many literary diaries, poems pop up in the characters' conversations but the story is paramount. "Tales of Ise" falls somewhere in-between. The poems are still much in focus, but the prose surrounding them has increased in length, importance, and development, transcending the status of headnotes though serving a similar function. And in terms of social history, this is of great interest, too, for each story gives us a precious fleeting glimpse of Heian courtier society and its values, and of the role of poetry in their social interactions (romantic and otherwise).

As far as waka (or tanka, as we call it today) poetry goes, these were some of the best I've read. It is readily apparent that this was still a relatively new poetic form, fresh and full of possibilities not yet hackneyed and worn thin (this would start to ensue soon enough). The emotion in them seems less affected and stylized, though definitely sublimated by the form's poetic conventions.

It should be noted too that this is definitely the definitive version of this work in English. McCullough has given us a very careful and scholarly translation that is nonetheless lively and literary. Her introduction is informative and extremely helpful in understanding the Tales, and each episode is annotated for specific info (in the back of the book, so that you can consult it if curious or not as you please). There is also a concise discussion of the different manuscripts of "Tales of Ise" and their textual histories, and a translation of the Kokinshu poems that also appear here, often in a different context that alters the import of the poem. So this charming classic has been given the classic treatment it so richly merits.