I Parker: The Masuda Affair

Relations between men and women in Heian Japan were both more casual and more formal than in western societies. Husbands and wives observed proper courtesies towards each other, but polygamy was permitted, probably because of high child mortality. It was generally practiced only by those who could afford to support large households. A gentleman might have several wives, ranked by importance, as well as several concubines, who might or might not live in the same household. Generally, customs favored males unless a wife had powerful parents. Wives could be divorced or deserted at the whim of the husband – in which case they returned to their families, or he moved out, because bridegrooms often took up residence in the house of the bride. Casual affairs were common for both sexes. Though there is no record of a ‘Willow Quarter’ in Heian-Kyo during the eleventh century, such places existed, most notably along the Yodo River, a mere river pleasure cruise away from the city.

Medicine, as practiced in eleventh-century Japan, was based on Chinese herbal treatises, acupuncture, moxibustion, and a good deal of superstition. Practitioners ranged from university-trained physicians to Buddhist monks and local pharmacists. The medicines mentioned in the novel were all available at the time.

Finally, the psychological concept called ‘the darkness of the heart’ serves to some extent as the theme of this novel. Almost a commonplace in the literature of the period, which made much of human emotions, it refers to the dilemma faced by parents who lose a child. Although Buddhist doctrine insists on denial of all worldly attachments, a parent’s love for and the bitter grief attendant on the loss of a child cannot be denied. The term is found in both poetry and prose fiction of the time, for example in the Tosa Diary and Lady Murasaki’s Genji.