Saikaku , The Life of a Sensuous Woman

Saikaku, in “’Life of a Sensuous Woman”, discusses many different professions the narrator was forced into. The narrator deals with various relationships with various men. One relationship the narrator deals with was when a priest had fallen in love with her. “Eventually the head priest of one temple fell in love with me, and I agreed to become his temporary wife for three years in exchange for twenty-five pounds of silver” (pg. 600). The narrator agreed to become the priests’ wife in exchange for a payment. This, is clear prostitution. During this marriage, the priest would cheat on the narrator, and the narrator was aware of this. “And the head priest would bring his secret wife of the moment right into the monks’ quarters” (pg. 601). The narrator was depressed and unhappy during her relationship with this priest. “Living like this was depressing enough, but sleeping with the priest made me even sadder” (pg. 601) quoted the narrator. This was one of the many disastrous relationships the narrator had experienced.

-William Dayan

In the story, the narrator deals with her many men in different ways. One of the first stories she tells is of a lord. The narrator tells this story almost like it was just a simple job, of getting hired to work for a lord, however there were clear signs to believe that she was sold as a sort of prostitute to the lord to keep him sexually happy. She describes the experience of being working for a lord very luxurious and also dreamlike, as she couldn’t imagine there being anything else she wanted. “I’ve always been an unlucky woman, but with the lord I was fortunate. He was tender to me, and we enjoyed our lovemaking” (559). It is clearly seen here that being one of the lord’s women almost gave her a more positive outlook in life, as she felt lucky to be with him. It also seems to be that she starts to fall in love with him despite the fact that she is just there for sexual purposes. It is more clearly proven that she develops feelings for the lord when he begins taking herbal pills that make him weak and haggard. The councillors decide it is at fault of the narrator, and sends her back home to her parents, which is something she does not agree with. “These old me didn’t know the first thing about love, but they made the decisions” (599). We can see that the narrator did believe what she had with the lord was love, but it was taken away from her. The narrator seems to turn simply being hired as a woman for the lord to use into sharing a love with the lord, which shows how she can use love to deal with this specific situation.

-Sabera Qazi

At the end of the story, the narrator comes full circle, showing how she dealt with her profession that can be considered prostitution, by creating feelings of love for each and every man she came across. However, the narrator was left with a huge sense of guilt, as she describes recognizing that her body had been with so many men as “It made me feel low and ashamed to go on living so long. My heart burned like a burning wagon in hell” (pg610). It can be seen that being forced into this career had left a huge burden on her shoulders, one she had never found peace with and was holding in for so long. She even describes it as driving her so crazy she wanted to simply run off and commit suicide. However, she is stopped and instead decides to commit herself to meditation and to enter the way of the Buddha. When the two men appear at her door she is able to finally tell her story in detail. “The lotus flower in my heart opened for you, and before it closed it told everything, from beginning to end. I’ve certainly worked in some dirty professions, but is my heart not pure?” (pg611). Here we can see her final way of dealing with her past. By opening up and telling her story she can come to accept her actions and that she did what she had to do. She can finally be freed from the guilt as she was open about it, and feel that her heart is still pure for fulfilling the tasks she was given in life.

-Brian Baigorria