tue Brace of Dreans—By Lady Murasaki. "rransiated fromthe Japanese by Arthur: Waley. Being the Second Volume of "the Lady of the Boat" andthe Final Part he Tale of Genii" "Allen Unwin, London. 10/6, Those already familiar with the works of Mr. Arthur Waley will hardly need to be told that anything that he considers worthy of translation is certainly worthy of being I is hard to say who deserves Jmost praise; the original author, Lady Murasaki, or Arthur Waley. himself for his more than admire lable rendering of her works. It is Jalways assumed that a translation bound to lose much of its original beauty, but in this particular cas is hard to" believe that its thor's genius can have been dimmed in any way. Actually this is a novel in six volumes, "The Tale Genii," the "Bridge" of Dr Bing' the last of the series There jis not the smallest occasion to read the preceding, ye works marder appreciate the sixth but ita more than likely anyone reading the fast wil be so fifed with entuiasm that he wil without further delay, order the other fives The translator sates, Nowever, in' his' introduction that ta lite option this last volume the' best the intervening Hok ner the deste becoming somewhat involved and complex.
As Lady Murasaki wrote between the years 1007 and 1086" A'Dy ber forte intereating not chiy "vent S'iterery bat aloe from " batorcal point oP views Sask sin: Shake Fpeare's time it was the fashion to Pay upon words, 90 it would appear that in the eleventh century in Japan it was the fashion, whenever Emotions were. moved, qf speak ferite in "poctey, 'Whether there were many people able, like the characters in this book, to produce, om the spur of the' women auch ems of poetry we can take "leave odode but if "ao, i shows to what a high state of culture the Spree lates of Japan bad The story, ys is of one [Ukifune, legitimate daughter Prince ' Hochi. Because of her resemblance to his late wife, JAgemaki (the prince's legitimate Jdaughter), for whom he has never Jeeased to pine, his Excellency the General Kaoru has the lady secretly removed to his country "house. Prince Nien, married to Agemaki's sister Kezeri (and a somewhat [faithless husband), by chance, caught sight of Ukitui a when to his wife, her half-si and was greatly attracted. "He eventually raced her to Kaoru's house and, by Jposing as the latter, succeeded, in the darkness, in entering her room.
Kaora and Nien, thus become rivals, prepare, owing to. affairs of state preventing their visiting her with frequency, separate houses for her to occupy in the capital she, torn between gratitude and affection Kaoru and her unwillingness to disappoint him, and her more passionate love for Nien, decides, to drown herself in the river, a raging torrent at the foot of the garden, rather than choose between them.
Mourned by all as dead, she has jin reality been picked up'by some passing nuns who take her to their retreat and nurse her back to health jand sanity, Eventually Kaora hears of "her whereabouts and endeavours to see her, but she is Jadamant in her refusal that he is forced to conclude that the story lof her having become a nun herself merely fictitious and that she is, in reality, living with a lover. Thus jthe story reaches its somewhat abrupt conclusion =—PP.c,
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.