The hardness of the
lives of others I have looked
upon with pity,
and I never thought that it
would come round to me as well
- Meaning
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I have looked with pity on the hardness of other people's lives, and never thought it would come round to me as well.
- Commentary
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Part Two: Yugiri
Kumoinokari answered Tono Naishi's poem with this one. What she had watched happen to other marriages, she says, she never expected to happen to hers—and she takes the comfort offered without resistance. Tono Naishi, who had for years occupied the place of the husband's other woman, and Kumoinokari, his principal wife, face each other here as two people sharing the same trouble. The chapter closes on this exchange, and the tale goes on to the fortieth.
"The lives of others" is what happens to other people, and here to other marriages. "Hardness" is what is painful. "Looked upon with pity" takes up the other woman's word. "Come round to me" is a thing happening to oneself. The idea—that what one watched from a distance has arrived—is a plain one, and it is felt, and it says a good deal about a principal wife who is no safer for holding the place.
- Author
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Murasaki Shikibu
- Source
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Genji Monogatari
- Other
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