ACTIVITY 9

Direction: Find the story “Genji Monogatari” and answer the following
questions.

1. Who is Genji?

Genji is not a fighter, comes before the samurai warrior ideal makes its
entry into Japanese literature, a few hundred years later He is a dancer, a singer,
a poet--a man of all arts--and, above all, a lover.

2. Why Genji Monogatari is considered as court romance?

Because he shares many traits with the English romantic poets through
both the way he lives his life and through his poetry. He understands and
appreciates the ephemeral qualities of life, in turn giving him the heightened
sensibilities required of a poet.

3. Give at least three memorable lines from the Genji Monogatari.

 “Real things in the darkness seem no realer than dreams.”

 “There are as many sorts of women as there are women.”
 “No art or learning is to be pursued halfheartedly...and any art worth
learning will certainly reward more or less generously the effort made to
study it.”

4. What lesson did you learn from Genji Monogatari?

The moral lesson we can get from the story is that love isn't about the
desire of having sex for many women or about the struggle to conquer all pretty
women. But love must be kept with a woman we love forever.