Murasaki Shikibu Quotes

Real things in the darkness seem no realer than dreams.

Ceaseless as the interminable voices of the bell-cricket, all night till dawn my tears flow.

Anything whatsoever may become the subject of a novel, provided only that it happens in this mundane life and not in some fairyland beyond our human ken.

It is in general the unexplored that attracts us.

Though the snow-drifts of Yoshino were heaped across his path, doubt not that whither his heart is set, his footsteps shall tread out their way.

Think not that I have come in quest of common flowers; but rather to bemoan the loss of one whose scent has vanished from the air.

You that in far-off countries of the sky can dwell secure, look back upon me here; for I am weary of this frail world's decay.

No art or learning is to be pursued halfheartedly," His Highness replied, "...and any art worth learning will certainly reward more or less generously the effort made to study it.

Unforgettably horrible is the naked body. It really does not have the slightest charm.

Does it not move you strangely, the love-bird's cry, tonight when, like the drifting snow, memory piles up on memory?

Mono no aware.

It is useless to talk with those who do not understand one and troublesome to talk with those who criticize from a feeling of superiority. Especially one-sided persons are troublesome. Few are accomplished in many arts and most cling narrowly to their own opinion.

I have never thought there was much to be said in favor of dragging on long after all one's friends were dead.

One ought not to be unkind to a woman merely on account of her plainness, any more than one had a right to take liberties with her merely because she was handsome.