Thoughts from Episode 18: Feast your eyes on this!

Last time, Sara was tasked with sorting out the flooding of the Kamogawa. Since then, he’s been getting on with the job, and when he reports back, the Emperor wants to speak to him up close. Tsuwabuki fears that the Emperor knows something about Sara, but really, it’s because he has designs on Suiren – which is just as bad! Sara agrees to have Suiren perform music at an upcoming moon-viewing party. But after Umetsubo makes an embarrassing effort to threaten Suiren (who is in hysterics when her bullying methods are lifted directly from The Tale of Genji), Togu decides it’s too risky to attend the party at all.

On the day of the party, Sara informs the Emperor that Suiren is unwell. When the Emperor then sends a sympathy gift her way, Sara encourages her to reply with a rubbish poem to put him off. Unfortunately, the Emperor decides to show up in person, and when Suiren instinctively flees the scene, Sara is left pretending to be her while the Emperor attempts a conversation from the other side of a blind. As the Emperor leaves, a convenient gust of wind lets him see Sara – who doesn’t know who he thinks he saw.

Recreation of a famous kaimami scene at The Tale of Genji Museum in Uji.

That last scene provides today’s little topic for discussion: the idea of kaimami (垣間見). Literally “looking through a gap in a fence”, this refers to the practice of observing someone indirectly, from behind some form of partition. These acts of voyeurism were all the rage in the Heian period, when architecture didn’t create much real privacy, but inner areas were dim and dark, and members of the opposite sex – especially those of different social positions – weren’t normally supposed to see one another. And because of that, kaimami scenes show up a lot as a kind of “love at first sight” motif in The Tale of Genji and other places.

In Torikae baya, as well, we see that men are not supposed to directly look at women of high status if they aren’t married. In Sara’s early days at court, he gallantly shields the court ladies from sight when the blind hiding them falls down. When he first encounters Umetsubo, she strikes him with her fan for having the insolence to look up as she walks by. And when courting Shi no Hime, he sits outside her sleeping area and simply hopes she’ll respond when he speaks.

On the other hand, Tsuwabuki, who sees himself as a passionate romantic like Genji, is unsurprisingly the manga’s #1 peeping tom. The standout scenes are in Episodes 8-9, when he goes to pay Suiren an unexpected visit – at first he is enchanted by her looks, but her violent reaction leaves him feeling confused – and in Episode 10, when he hears Shi no Hime playing the koto and spots her from afar. In both of these incidents, the thrill of these furtive glimpses isn’t enough for Tsuwabuki; he is immediately too excited to hold himself back.

Tsuwabuki sees Suiren for the first time.

Panel from volume 2, page 114. ©Chiho Saito／Shogakukan

When the Emperor in today’s episode asks Sara to arrange a kaimami, a major worry is of course that it will end the same way as those scenes with Tsuwabuki. Eventually, he speaks with Sara and believes him to be Suiren, thanks to the blind between them, but Sara is still panicking over the possibility that the Emperor will rush in after all. But when he finally gets the glimpse he was looking for, he is satisfied and leaves. Obviously, one thing doesn’t inevitably lead to the other. Sometimes kaimami is just a matter of idle nosiness. It’s not even necessarily a phenomenon of men ogling women – the moment where Sara hides the court ladies from view happens because they were so eager to get an eyeful of handsome young guys like Sara and Tsuwabuki that they knocked the blind down themselves.

Anyway, it’s very interesting to think about! Kaimami scenes appear in Torikae baya because they’re such a well-known aspect of Heian culture and therefore part of the aesthetic Saito wants to portray. But at the same time, the concept is a reminder of how the society operated and particularly how separate men’s and women’s lives were. In a way, the same cultural expectations and architectural practicalities that lead to practices like kaimami are what make it possible for Sara and Suiren to live as they do with very few people noticing anything out of the ordinary.

Thoughts from Episode 7: Sara meets Shi no Hime, Suiren meets Togu

This chapter revolves around the implementation of decisions made last time: Sara goes ahead with his marriage to Shi no Hime and Suiren goes to court to work for the new Togu. At the end of Episode 6, we find out that Shi no Hime isn’t happy to marry somebody as low-ranking as Sara (not that he knows anything about it), and so as he initiates the proceedings by visiting her for three consecutive nights in this chapter, he faces an uphill struggle.

On the first night, Shi no Hime remains silent in her bedchamber (御帳台) and has an attendant meet him to deliver a letter saying she is ill; determined to succeed, Sara sleeps on the floor. The next night, Sara’s attempts to speak to her finally get a response, but it’s an angry one. On the third and final night, after everyone thinks he’s given up, Sara takes a leaf out of Tsuwabuki’s book and barges in on her in her bedchamber. He finds out that she blames a scar on her forehead for the fact that she won’t be marrying the Emperor after all, and tries to convey some sympathy. In the end, Sara thinks he has to sleep on the floor again, until Shi no Hime snappily implies he should join her.

Meanwhile, Suiren arrives at the palace, scared out of her wits by the throngs of people, and meets the adorable Togu. As it turns out, Togu is a nerd who immediately starts gossiping with Suiren about The Tale of Genji, and when she learns that Suiren also writes, she insists on reading her work – to Suiren’s clear embarrassment. Things go so well that at the end of an evening of reading, Togu won’t let Suiren leave, and invites her to sleep over in her own bedchamber.

Sara bowing outside Shi no Hime’s bedchamber.

Panel from volume 2, page 46. ©Chiho Saito／Shogakukan

Before anything else, I’ll briefly address the use of “bedchamber”. The buildings in the palace are laid out in the shinden-zukuri style, which has presented a few difficulties in translation – ones I’m not sure I’ve adequately resolved yet! Mostly this has involved which things I should describe as verandas, hallways, corridors, etc... but this time the issue is with where people sleep. Rather than a modern bed in a modern bedroom, the michodai (御帳台) is a raised platform surrounded by curtains in a larger room. The challenge here is that it’s still fairly spacious and is totally closed off, making it somewhere in between a big bed and a small bedroom. Also, looking at the situations we’re seeing so far, I don’t think it’s always accurate to describe them as characters literally getting into each other’s beds – so at this stage at least, I’ve settled for “bedchamber”.

Of course, what I really want to talk about today is the fact that this is the chapter where Suetsumuhana is mentioned! When Togu and Suiren first meet, Togu asks Suiren for her favourite female character in The Tale of Genji. Suiren pauses and answers “Suetsumuhana”, and Togu says she agrees.

As I briefly mention here, this character doesn’t stand out for her beauty and talents. The name we know her as refers to the safflower, which is traditionally used to make red dye. Genji, the story’s lustful protagonist, compares her to the flower in a poem, alluding to her big red nose. Apart from her unfortunate appearance, Suetsumuhana is also remembered for living in a dilapidated mansion, being difficult to deal with and having old-fashioned tastes.

So I thought it was fascinating that Suiren and Togu both agree that she’s the best girl in The Tale of Genji! It’s only one passing mention, but it says something about the two characters. Both are shy and reclusive, and they both feel out-of-place in their current positions: Suiren, who was first introduced as Marumitsu’s baby son, doesn’t think she’s cut out for working at the palace as a naishi no kami, while it’s public knowledge that Togu is only in her role – usually given to a male heir of the Emperor – as a stopgap measure. It makes some sense that they might relate to a literary character who is clearly not the ideal woman.

And then I decided to use that as my handle just as a fun reference! Incidentally, the avatar is another reference, this time to Takahata Isao’s film Only Yesterday (おもひでぽろぽろ), where safflower-picking plays a big part.