Did those long ago
lose their way in this manner,
bewildered as I?
This road at the break of dawn
is one I have never known
- Meaning
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Did people long ago lose themselves like this? This road at daybreak is one I have never traveled before.
- Commentary
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Part One: Yugao
At dawn on the fifteenth night of the eighth month, Genji, avoiding all eyes, took the woman from the house at Gojo into his carriage and carried her off to a ruined mansion. Still without telling her who he was, he felt on the way a bewilderment at his own conduct and spoke this poem. She answered with one of her own, revealing her unease. That very night, at the house they reached, the disaster falls.
"Did people long ago do so too" is a way of testing his own state against the world of older poetry. "The road at daybreak" usually means the road home after a night together, but here it is this unheard-of journey with a woman beside him. "One I have never known" states his inexperience and his fear plainly, showing that this is no convenient diversion but real confusion.
- Author
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Murasaki Shikibu
- Source
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Genji Monogatari
- Other
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