So, yesterday, I finished reading the Fitzwilliam Darcy, Gentleman trilogy by Pamela Aidan. The books in this series are An Assembly Such as This, Duty and Desire and These Three Remain. They were recommended to me and I thought I'd try them out, as I do enjoy the occasional Regency romance.
My impression? Well, mixed. Ms. Aidan is a good writer, although she tends to get a little repetitive and could use a good editor. And why not re-interpret the novel Pride and Prejudice from Mr. Darcy's point of view? But upon reading the books, I felt that the idea fell a bit flat. The Fitzwilliam Darcy, Gentleman trilogy was originally written as fan-fiction and reflects some of the pitfalls of that genre.
Mr. Darcy, for one thing, comes over as somewhat of a "Gary Stu." He's too perfect, and that in fact takes away from some of the appeal he has in the original novel. Let's not mince words here: Mr. Darcy is somewhat of a jerk in Pride and Prejudice. He snubs the heroine and her family (and just about everyone else in their neighborhood), he tries his best to separate his friend Mr. Bingley from the girl that he loves because he doesn't believe she loves him enough, and he's really, really full of himself. Which is half the fun of the character, and it makes it all the more sweeter when this priggish snob finds himself head-over-heels in love with the heroine despite his best efforts to the contrary.
However, in this trilogy, Darcy always has a reason for being the way he is. He isn't a snob, he's just devoted to his family and his duty to his estate. He's religious, he's nice to his sister, he helps out his friends and is kind to his overly-annoying relatives. He also dresses to perfection, fences like a pro, and generally is too perfect. And boring.
I think the mistake the author made here was becoming too enamoured with the character. She always wants to show Darcy in the best light, even when he's making mistakes. This does not make for good literature.
The saving grace of the book was the supporting characters that the author either made up or fleshed out from spear-carriers in the original novel. Fletcher the valet, Lord Brougham, Colonel Fitzwilliam all shine and are a heck of a lot more interesting than the moping Mr. Darcy. The added plot of Irish rebels was a bit overdone, but made me think that the writer might have been better off just writing an original Regency Romance and leaving Pride and Prejudice out of the picture entirely.
The trilogy was an entertaining-enough read, but I admit having to struggle to finish it because I was getting bored. I'd probably not recommend it, unless you are a very big Pride and Prejudice fan. As for myself, I'm passing the books on to my Mom to see if she might have a different opinion.
So I've cut and sewn the third zukin prototype. I think I may have the look I'm going for here.
First, I took a scrap piece of linen 32 inches long and 52 inches wide. (52 was actually the full width of the cloth). Then I cut it in a semi-conical shape as shown below:
This is half the shape--I placed it on the fold of the cloth. The face opening was at 17 inches, which is the length from the top of my forehead to the middle of my collarbone. The rest I curved out until I reached the edge of the cloth. Then I hand-sewed the curved edge (french seam) and hemmed both the top and the bottom edges.
Here is the result. As before, I'm wearing a headband (27 inches long, 2 inches wide) and the zukin is tucked beneath it at my forehead and pinned underneath. The folds took a bit of arranging, but stayed in place quite well.
The advantage this style has over the style the Hokkeji nuns were wearing in this picture:
is that this style (Eshinni-style, I'm calling it, for lack of a proper term, after the portrait of the nun Eshinni) hides the hair better. I did pin up a square of cloth to hang loose like the Hokkeji nuns, but it didn't stay in place very well and my hair kept peeking out.
So, for now anyway, this is the style of zukin that I will be wearing for my SCA persona.
Well, I sewed together prototype #1 and the result is as you see below.
It looks close but not quite there yet. The opening is still too near the face and there aren't enough folds. Still, not bad for a first attempt.
I found that the forehead part stays flatter (and in place) if the top is folded over in and pinned underneath (also the pins don't show that way. However, I'm going to need to put some interfacing in the headband to make it a bit more stiff so it'll keep its shape.
The next thing I thought I'd try is a rectangle shape, to see if that would give me the folds that I wanted. I took a piece of scrap cloth 17 inches wide and 28 inches long and pinned the sides together. Here is the result:
It gets it away from my face, and there are the folds I wanted, but it bunches up and is too narrow. I really think I'm looking for more of a cone shape. Not sure if I'll even bother sewing this one up--I can use the material as part of a belt I'm working on. I have another scrap of the same color that is bigger, so later this week, I'll cut it out in a larger cone shape and see if that works.
I have given some thought to yardage--Japanese looms make cloth about 14 inches wide and they wouldn't have wanted to waste any. However, until I can figure out the shape, I'm not going to focus on that aspect and just use the remnants of cloth I have on hand. Also, I need to take into account that I'm a lot bigger than period Japanese women were. My kosode is wider and uses more cloth, so it stands to reason that the zukin would as well.
I've been working lately on a complete outfit for my SCA Japanese persona. One of the sticking points I'm having is with my hair, which varies between red and blonde (depending on how I'm coloring it at the moment) and is fashioned in a short modern cut. However, medieval Japanese women tended not to cut their hair, and for the most part wore it uncovered and usually tied in some variation of ponytail straight down their backs. The complex hairstyles often associated with Japanese women (as worn today by Geisha) were a product of the Edo period, which is past the time periods covered by the SCA.
So what to do? Some women don't worry about it, and just wear their hair as it. Personally, I think that ruins the effect of the outfit. Some wear long black wigs, which is an acceptable-enough solution, but alas, my complexion is quite ruddy, and black hair looks terrible on me. (I tried to dye my hair black once in college. Ooooh, disaster!) And wearing a long red or blonde-haired wig with Japanese costume would just look like something out of anime. So what is left?
Well, there were a couple of instances where Japanese women wore haircoverings (besides hats, which were only worn outdoors). One was while doing manual labor--they would tie a cloth around their head. Farming women were often shown sporting these headcloths. I'm not sure what they were called in period, but now the cloths are called tenugui. They're made of cotton and come in a variety of patterns. You can see a selection here on this Ebay search. But my persona is kuge-class (noble). She wouldn't be caught dead with one of those towels on her head.
The other option is to take a tonsure and become a nun. Long hair was so important to the sense of Japanese female beauty that the only time a woman would cut it is to while taking religious vows or as a dire punishment. Buddhist nuns shave their heads (as to monks), but there were instances where a woman could cut her hair short in a partial tonsure. This could be as an act of piety, or because she could not leave her home to go to a convent as yet, or as the first step in becoming a "real" nun.
And Buddhist nuns, like Catholic nuns, wear headcoverings. In English, we use the term wimple. In Japanese, they are called zukin. They somewhat resemble each other, but there are some structural differences. This site explains medieval Anglo-Norman wimples very well.
Zukin seem to be shaped slightly differently. They do not cover so much of the neck (it sags down in folds) and I've seen pictures of them in other colors besides white. It could be that the looser fit is due to the warmer climate?
Here are some historical pictures of zukin:
This portrait of the nun Eshinni, wife of Shinran (the founder of Shin Buddhism) is the best example I've seen of zukin. Note how tightly it clings to the top of her head, yet comes down in many folds.
While historical TV dramas are not good sources for historical research, I do want to include some pictures which more clearly show the distinctive shape of the zukin:
I must admit I am not very good at making patterns, so I wasn't quite sure where to start on this venture. I decided to try to make a pattern off of the cone-shaped base of my Anglo-Norman wimple. The pictures from the taiga dramas did not look like the women had rectangular pieces of cloth pinned about their heads. It looked like a cone-shaped piece of cloth that had been pinned in some way to be tight across the forehead.
First, I worked out the pattern. In this case, I simple measured out 3 inches or so from my existing one as shown below:
The other option might be to wear something closer to what this modern nun is wearing:
I'll continue my experimentation. Any feedback on the subject would be greatly appreciated.
So I have these two books out via inter-library loan (ILL), mainly because they're so pricey I can't afford them.
Japanese Women Writers: A Bio-Critical Sourcebook, edited by Chieko Mulhern is an interesting dictionary showcasing Japanese female writers. There's a huge time-gap between the writers of the Heian and Kamakura eras, and then a skip to the Meiji era. I don't agree with the writer's claim that there were virtually no women writers during the Edo period, particularly since I have translations of some of their poetry and Donald Keene notes some diaries written by women during this period in his book Travelers of a Hundred Ages, which I know that Mulhern read because she quotes it in some of her footnotes!
Setting that aside, the book did have some excellent essays regarding the following Heian and Kamakura era writers:
Ono no Komachi
Ise
Fujiwara Michitsuna's Mother
Sei Shonagon
Izumi Shikibu
Sugawara Takasue's Daughter
Sanuki no Suke
Fujiwara Shunzei's Daughter
Ben no Naishi
Abutsu-ni (the Nun Abutsu)
Nakatsukasa no Naishi
Junii Tameko (Kyogoku/Fujiwara Tameko)
Go-Fukakusa'in (Lady Nijo)
Eifuku Mon'in (Dowager Empress Eifuku)
The essays are excellent, reflecting both biographical information and some critical examinations of these writers' major works. I'll probably photocopy them (for personal use! It's allowed!) to refer to later. If the book were not so expensive, I'd buy it. There are also many excellent essays on Meiji and Taisho era female writers, but I'm just beginning to dabble in those waters.
The other book is Engendering Faith: Women and Buddhism in Pre-Modern Japan, edited by Barbara Ruch. This book is a treasure and I hope to be able to afford a copy one day. As the title reflects, it is a collection of essays (many translated from the Japanese) regarding the subject of women, particularly nuns, and their relation to the Buddhist faith. The essays include:
Burning Iron against the Cheek: A Female Cleric's Last Resort
Empress Komyo's Buddhist Faith: Her Role in the Founding of the State Temple and Convent System
State Buddhism and Court Buddhism: The Role of Court Women in the Development of Buddhism from the Seventh to Ninth Centuries
Vicissitudes in the Ordination of Japanese Nuns During the Eighth through Tenth Centuries
Tonsure Forms for Nuns: Classification of nuns according to Hairstyle
Buddhist Convents in Medieval Japan
"Nun Shogun": Politics and Religion in the Life of Hojo Masako
Nuns and Other Female Devotees in Genko Shakusho (1322), Japan's First History of Buddhism
Where the Bones Go: Death and Burial of Women in the Heian High Aristocracy
The Original Bomori: Husband and Wife Congregations in Early Shin Buddhism
And these are a portion of the essays--others go into subjects such as Divorce Temples, Scriptural Issues and Iconagraphy, as well as Tokugawa-era practices. It sounds dry, but actually, it's been very exciting reading so far. The subject of Women and Buddhism is very new to scholars (even in Japan) and there is a lot of work that still needs to be done. Makes me wish I could go to graduate school, finally learn Japanese properly, and be able to help in the study of this field!
I highly recommend this book for anyone interested in medieval Japanese women's lives.
"People say the tanka form [of poetry] is inconvenient because it's so short. I think its shortness is precisely what makes it convenient...We are constantly being subjected to so many sensations, coming from both inside and outside ourselves, that we forget them soon after they occur, or even if we remember them for a little while, we end up by never once in our whole lifetimes ever expressing them because there is not enough content to sustain the thought...Although a sensation may only last a second, it is a second that will never return again. I refuse to let such moments slip by."
Ishikawa Takuboku 1886-1912
"Thus haiku has something in common with painting, in the representation of the object alone, without comment, never presented to be other than what it is, but not represented completely as it is. For if the haiku poet moves us by presenting rather than describing objects, he does so by presenting the particulars in which the emotional powers of the things or scenes reside. And from these particulars comes the significance and the importance of his particular haiku. He renders in a few epithets what he experiences, so that imagination will fill those spaces with all the details in which the experiential value of the images reside. He does not give us meaning; he gives us the concrete objects which have meaning, because he has so experienced them."
Kenneth Yasuda, Japanese Haiku: Its Essential Nature and History, 1957
"The seeds of Japanese poetry lie in the human heart and grow into leaves of ten thousand words. Many things happen to the people of this world, and all that they think and feel is given expression in description of things they see and hear. When we hear the warbling of the mountain thrush in the blossoms or the voice of the frog in the water, we know every living being has its song. It is poetry which, without effort, moves heaven and earth, stirs the feelings of the invisible gods and spirits, smooths the relations of men and women, and calms the hearts of fierce warriors."
Ki no Tsurayuki, Introduction to the Kokin Wakashu, 905
So I've been working on a circle cloak lately, since about January 1st, using a pattern I took from the Known World Handbook. Because the wool I'm using it so thick, I ended up hand-sewing the entire thing. I don't mind--I find hand-sewing rather relaxing--but it does take a long time. However, I'm finally seeing the end of the tunnel and am now just doing the edging in a blanket-stitch, as you can see below:
To give an idea of scale, each of those squares on the cutting board is one inch, so yeah, it's taking awhile! I'm almost done, but I'm running low on light-blue thread, so must wait until I can get some more before I finally finish. Very frustrating!
Also finished up on a card-weaving project that I've been playing around with forever. I do my card-weaving on an inkle-loom--this project is being done on the smaller loom. Don't mind the cat in the picture.
My next project, which I'll probably start on tomorrow (since it's snowing too much to get over to the fabric store for that blue thread!) is a set of two kosode to match an uchikake that I made a couple of years ago. Here's a pic of the uchikake fabric that I took when I was making it (the red is what I lined it with):
The fabric I'm using for the two kosode are both linen/cotton blends, in colors that I'm hoping matches the fabric above:
Finally finished Everyday Things in Modern Japan, which was excellent. It really engrossed me in a subject matter (historical demographics) that usually comes out quite dry. The emphasis is on the Edo period (better records for that time), but the author transitions from the late Sengoku period and also brings in some early Meiji period as well, as her thesis is that traditional Japanese home life didn't really change all that much (from Westernization) until WWII, except among the very rich or the intellectual class. Highly recommended.
I had two books come in this week that I'm really looking forward to reading, both examples of Heian literature. (Wait, don't look at me like that, I know we're poor, but they were used ex-library copies and they were cheap!)
The first was The Changelings (Torikaebaya monogatari no kenkyu), translated by Rosette Willig. This is a story about a brother and sister who decide to "switch places" and each live as the opposite sex. Yes, it sounds like shoujo manga (wait, it IS shoujo manga!), but the story was actually written by an anonymous author sometime between 1196 and 1202. They're not sure if the author is male or female. The writing seems female, but evidently poorly done, so it may be a man imitating a woman, in the same way that Ki no Tsuriyuki did in his Tosa Diary. Anyway, I've been looking for this book for a long time, but just recently found it at a price I was willing to pay. It looks like it will be entertaining.
The second was one I stumbled across recently: The Poetic Memoirs of Lady Daibu (Kenreimon-in Ukyo no Daibu shu), translated by Phillip Tudor Harris. Set during the same time period as the Tale of the Heike, it features some of the Taira clan in a very different light. Lady Daibu's (not her real name, btw) birthdate is unknown, but scholars put it somewhere between 1150 and 1160. She is last heard from in 1232, when she is approached for a couple of her poems to be included in an imperial collection, the Shinchokusenshu. I lucked out on this one and only paid $5 (plus shipping, which made it like $9)! I've only read in about 50 pages so far (all introduction--there's like three introductory essays before the actual translation begins), but so far, so good. Great, concise information about the end of the Heian era, court life and how to put the work in its historical context. Also, the next SCA project I wanted to do (besides all the sewing, which comes with the territory) was a shu (poetry collection), and this book is exactly the format I wanted to emulate.
Damn, I'm such a geek!
