This book owes a great deal to all the undergraduate students at Indiana University who have read the Tale of Genji with me in English translations each year for nearly thirty years. They have taught me more than they may realize about how to read and reread with passion. Former graduate students, including Hiroko Hara Bush, Allison Darmody, Lynn Dearden, LeRon Harrison, Sara Langer, Emily Mathes, Laura Meyer, Mary Miller, Joannah Peterson, Vance Schaefer, and Takako Shigehisa, accompanied me on deeper forays into the literary mazes of the Heian period. One of them, Suzy Cincone, now an accomplished editor, provided meticulous help with the final manuscript.
I could not have written this book without extended time away from teaching, and I am grateful to Indiana University for two sabbatical leaves that afforded me time to pursue my work abroad. The Japan Foundation and the Social Science Research Council funded preliminary phases of research in Japan. It is my great pleasure to thank Takahashi Tōru, then still teaching at Nagoya Daigaku, who served as sponsor during my Japan Foundation Fellowship and kindly included me in regular meetings of the Kansai-based Kodai Bungaku Kenkyūkai. Their edition of Mumyōzōshi was then in process, the subject of lively debates and raucous post–study group dinners and conversation, which I was lucky to attend. In 2016–2017, I was granted an IU Research Leave Supplement and a year away from teaching and administrative duties, which I spent happily at Research Triangle Park in Durham, North Carolina, as the Robert F. and Margaret S. Goheen fellow at the National Humanities Center. Among the wonderful circle of fellows and staff whose companionship added so much to my rethinking of the manuscript during that blissful year, I particularly thank members of the Objects and Agents seminar and the Global
At conferences, symposia, and lectures over the years I benefited immensely from interlocutors and hosts Margaret Childs, Edwin Cranston, Charo D’Etcheverry, Gus Heldt, Edward Kamens, Terry Kawashima, Robert Khan, Kojima Naoko, Tzvetana Kristeva, Christina Laffin, Michael Marra, Melissa McCormick, Rajayshree Pandey, Joanne Quimby, Richard Okada, Esperanza Ramirez-Christensen, Rein Raud, Catherine Ryu, Paul Schalow, Michel Vieillard-Baron, Janet Walker, Dennis Washburn, and Takeshi Watanabe. Closest to home, the intrepid members of Indiana University’s Premodern East Asianist Writing Group—Heather Blair, Manling Luo, Morten Oxenboell, and Joannah Peterson—deserve special mention. Without their constant prodding and good-humored critiques, my messy drafts might never have seen the light of day.
Catherine Ryu generously read and commented on early drafts of chapters 2 and 3; Edwin Cranston and Melissa McCormick, gracious hosts of two lectures for the Reischauer Institute’s Japan Forum series, raised questions that significantly altered the final version of chapter 2; Cynthia Talbot offered advice on the introduction; and Michiko Suzuki and Michael Foster provided timely feedback on grant applications and the book’s prospectus. Two anonymous readers for Harvard University Asia Center Publications commented in ways that made this book better than it would have been without their pointed queries. I am grateful to Bob Graham and Kristen Wanner for shepherding the manuscript through the publication process and to Elizabeth Lillehoj for suggesting the perfect cover image and advising me on procuring permissions for the book’s visuals. Matthew Stavros generously gave of his time and skill to adapt and produce the line drawings. Finally, I thank the East Asian Studies Center at Indiana University, and its director, Michael Brose, for granting me a subvention to defray the book’s production costs.
—E.S.
Owen County, Indiana