Ochikubo monogatari
The Ochikubo Monogatari ( Japanese 落 窪 物語 , dt. "Story of the young lady in the dungeon") is a Japanese story ( Monogatari ) from the Heian period . The author and the exact time of origin are unknown. Indications immanent in the text suggest that it was written at the end of the 10th century, after the Utsubo Monogatari and before the Makura no Sōshi . Japanese research has Minamoto no Shitagō , who is also believed to be the author of the Utsubo Monogatari, which was created during the same period, as the author. According to Lewin, however, this assumption is not sufficiently well founded. The Ochikubo Monogatari, like the Sumiyoshi Monogatari and the Hachikazuki, which was created much later, can be assigned to the "stepmother's stories" ( 継 子 物 , mamako mono ). It is therefore not only interesting from a literary point of view, but also from a cultural-historical point of view, because it sheds light on the position of stepdaughters in the feudal society of Japan. The narrative consists of four chapters ( Maki ). The oldest surviving manuscript is the Kujōke kyūzōbon ( 九 條 家 旧 蔵 本 ), which probably comes from the middle of the Muromachi period .
content
The main character of the story is a girl who is compelled by her stepmother to live in a small, lower room, adjoining the main building, in a cellar-like shed.
Chūnagon Minamoto no Tadayori ( 源 忠 頼 ) has a daughter from the connection with a princess who died early, who is kept in a basement by his current wife and forced to do sewing work for her four daughters. Only the maid Akogi, who works in the house, takes care of the imprisoned girl.It happens that Tatewaki, the maid's husband, is serving in the household of another dignitary and Sakon-no-shōshō, the young junker in this household, of the girl learns in the basement dungeon. Sakon-no-shōshō falls in love with the girl and does everything in his power to free her from her predicament. When the stepmother learns of the Junker's plans, she tries to place the girl as a concubine with one of her very old uncles. The stepmother's plan fails, Sakon-no-shōshō succeeds in freeing the girl and escaping with him.
The second part of the story tells of the various humiliations of the stepmother and her daughters, which Sakon-no-shōshō gives them in revenge for the treatment of the girl. In the third and last part the narrative takes a happy turn. Sakon-no-shōshō arranged a meeting between the girl and the father, who was clueless the whole time and believed it was lost. Reunited, the father dies relieved in the end, while the mother-in-law ends up in a Buddhist monastery.
literature
- The story of the honorable Ochikubo (= Ochikubo monogatari), transmitted by Christoph Langemann, Zurich, Manesse, 1994
- Bruno Lewin : Japanese Chrestomathy from the Nara Period to the Edo Period . Wiesbaden, Otto Harrassowitz, 1965, pp. 98-102.
Web links
- Japanese version of Komazawa University
- Illustration of a handwritten page from the Ochikubo Monogatari, Kyōto University Library
Remarks
- ↑ The girl is not given a name, but usually with the title himegimi ( 姫 君 ), for example princess, a term for the daughters of nobles, or with ( 落 窪 の 君 ) Ochikubo no kimi , whereby kimi is not used as a personal pronoun, but rather in the meaning of noble lady , so about in the sense of the "noblewoman from the dungeon" is to be understood.