Epic
The Tale of the Heike
平家物語
Anonymous · 1371
Synopsis
The narrative opens with the bell of a monastery whose sound speaks of the impermanence of all things. Kiyomori, head of the Taira clan, marries his daughter to the emperor, and his house comes to hold more than half the provinces; the Encyclopædia Britannica presents him from the opening as a tyrant of unlimited power, destined to fall. There follow a plot among courtiers, burned temples, then a fever so burning that water poured over Kiyomori turns to flames, while the rival Minamoto clan rises again.
Context
The text was born of oral tales and divergent versions, gathered around 1240 according to the British encyclopaedia. It was sung to the biwa by monks who were almost all blind, the biwa hōshi, whose chanting served first of all to appease the spirits of the defeated warriors, according to the journal First Things. The authoritative version was dictated to a disciple in 1371 by the monk Kakuichi, who had come to Kyoto after losing his sight; his guild, the Tōdōza, split over it. The opening is known to most Japanese, writes a Tokyo publisher, and a lesson sheet from a junior high school in Iwate Prefecture provides for its recitation from memory.
Who it is for
A long epic that blends battles, private dramas and Buddhist meditations on loss, for those who like great tales of war.
Prizes and reception
An epic that supplied material for Noh and Kabuki theatre, for prints and for painting.
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