Worlding SEI Sh?nagon: The Pillow Book in Translation

The Makura no Sôshi, or The Pillow Book as it is generally known in English, is a collection of personal reflections and anecdotes about life in the Japanese royal court composed around the turn of the eleventh century by a woman known as Sei Shônagon. Its opening section, known as the haru wa akebono, or the “spring, dawn” passage, is arguably the single most famous passage in Japanese literature.

Throughout its long life, The Pillow Book has been translated countless times. It has captured the European imagination with its lyrical style, compelling images and the striking personal voice of its author. Worlding Sei Shônagon guides the reader through the remarkable translation history of The Pillow Book in the West, gathering almost fifty translations of the “spring, dawn” passage, which span one-hundred-and-thirty-five years and sixteen languages. Many of the translations are made readily available for the first time in this study.

The translations gathered in Worlding Sei Shônagon are an enlightening example of the many ways in which translations can differ from their source text, undermining the idea of translation as the straightforward transfer of meaning from one language to another, one culture to another. By tracing the often convoluted trajectory through which a once wholly foreign literary work becomes domesticated—or resists domestication—this compilation also exposes the various historical, ideological or other forces that inevitably shape our experience of literature, for better or for worse.

The Makura no Sôshi, or The Pillow Book as it is generally known in English, is a collection of personal reflections and anecdotes about life in the Japanese royal court composed around the turn of the eleventh century by a woman known as Sei Shônagon. Its opening section, known as the haru wa akebono or the “spring, dawn” passage, is arguably the single most famous passage in Japanese literature.

The Pillow Book has been translated countless times over the centuries. It has captured the European imagination with its lyrical style, compelling images and the striking voice of its author. Worlding Sei Shônagon guides the reader through the remarkable translation history of The Pillow Book in the West, gathering 50 translations that span 135 years and 16 languages, many of which are made readily available for the first time.

By comparing the translations of the “spring, dawn” passage, Valerie Henitiuk reveals how the Western understanding of Japan has transformed over time. The stylistic features of the passage have challenged every translator, who have alternated between being faithful to the original and respecting readers expectations and cultural sensitivities. The wide range of interpretations of this passage highlights that a translation is always inevitably a creation of its time and place and that linguistic, cultural and historical equivalence are rarely captured in translation.

A comparative study of translations of The Pillow Book.