Ancient Literature in our Modern World

As with many others my classmates have chosen this piece of artwork depicts a certain scene in The Tale of Genji. In the earlier chapters we see Genji being a womanizer, he was married however decided that he would leave her at home and go with every woman he laid his eyes on. In this picture however we see Genji stoop to the lowest level he can reach. In her mothers arms we see Murasaki a young lady who has no intentions in Genji and is way to young to even be seen around him. Genji however is determined to take Murasaki with him and hold her as either his mistress or his wife. We see the mood in the picture is gloomy and sad. The mother is holding Murasaki and doesn’t to let her go but she knows once Genji comes by he will be taking her with him. On the bottom of the picture we see Genji sweeping in and the mother it seems is saying her final goodbyes.  As seen with many of the pictures regarding Genji the characters are dressed in long skirts and they all have long hair. I think this has to do with when the tale of Genji was written and where it took place in the eastern part of the world. The pictures carefully portrays this scene for us to better understand the book.