「語り」と見る「女にて見たてまつらまほし」試論

Abstract

‘Amayono Shinasadame’ is one of the most famous scenes in Genjimonogatari. In the scene, Genji’s friends come to visit him at the castle on a night when he must stay over. Genji and his friends start a conversation about women. As Genji listens to his friends telling their own stories about women, Genji looks so beautiful that a voice says, “Onna-nite Mitatematsuramahoshi”. Nowadays, there are two widely accedpted interpretations of this outburst in Japanese : the first interpretation is that ‘Genji is so beautiful like a woman that I want to dress him up like a lady;, the second one reads, ‘Even I, as a woman, can tell that Genji is beautiful’. With a more in-depth analysis of the auxiliary verb ‘tatematsuru’ and the postpositional particle ‘nite’ in this phrase, I have come to subscribe to the latter. But beyond that, it is my belief that this scene is yet another example of Murasaki’s literary technique frequently demonstrated in Genjimonogatari – that of momentarily introducing the voice of ‘katari’ in the guise of ‘soshiji’. I am strongly convinced that ‘Onna-nite Mitatematsuramahoshi’ really is part of ‘katari’ - most likely Murasakishikibu herself – thinking aloud how desperately she wants to be loved by Genji as his lady. I presume that Genji’s characterization is directly based on Murasakishikibu’s hidden lover.