The Sacred Tree: Being the Second Part of 'The Tale of Genji'

Transcriber Note: The cover image was created by the transcriber from the original cover and elements of the title page. It is placed in the public domain.
BEING THE SECOND PART OF ‘THE TALE OF GENJI’
LADY MURASAKI
TRANSLATED FROM THE JAPANESE BY
ARTHUR WALEY
BOSTON AND NEW YORK
HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY
The Riverside Press Cambridge
1926
To MARY MacCARTHY
PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN
SEVERAL critics have asked to be told more about the writer of the Tale of Genji. Unfortunately little is known of Murasaki’s life save the bare facts recorded in the first appendix of Volume I. What other knowledge we possess is derived from her Diary , which will be discussed in a later volume and is meanwhile available in Mr. Doi’s translation. Reviewers have also asked for information concerning the state of literature in Japan at the time when the Tale was written. This I have supplied; and I have further ventured upon a short discussion of Murasaki’s art and its relation to the fiction of the West.