Event

In this lecture, professor Beth M. Carter (Case Western Reserve University) will offer an innovative re-reading of post-death scenes in the fictional Genji monogatari (The Tale of Genji c. 1008). Carter argues that mourning activities of female characters, be they empresses or ladies-in-waiting, are crucial to placating the tale’s spirits. Genji’s detailed scenes of bereavement divulge that earlier, shamanic-based, rituals conducted by women, often considered minor or marginal characters, remained relevant to mourners in later periods. The implications for this new feminist reading not only allows for a deeper and more nuanced understanding of post-death scenes within the monogatari genre, but also of the important roles played by female mourners, both historical and fictional. This talk aims to make women’s work that was previously invisible, visible.

Dr. Carter’s area of research is mourning rituals and practices in classical Japanese literature with a special emphasis on The Tale of Genji. She also has a secondary interest in representations of women in premodern Japanese texts. Her work introduces the concept of “mourning poetics,” or the way authors layer codified mourning ritual with structures of time and poetic lament to further shape character’s expressions of grief, clarify relationships, and negotiate the divide inherent in death.