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context: literature

a lovely modern cover to The Pillow Book

Heian Literature

This was the great flowering of Japanese culture, and includes some of the earliest works of their kinds in the world: perhaps more importantly, these works are still well worth reading now, including arguably the earliest extended prose writing that has held up so well.

Literacy and Script

Diaries

The Pillow Book of Sei Shonagon

The Tale of Genji

backwards: Ancient

forwards: Medieval