Imai Hisayo

In Genji-Monogatari Hikaru-Genji and Murasaki-no-Ue are represented as an ideal pair who apparently correspond with each other through their "spiritual union". But in the form of their dialogue Hikaru-Genji is the main narrator while his wife passively responds to him. Then the "spiritual union" is politically motivated: it is based not as much on real partnership as on belief in the gender system. Later in the latter part of "Wakamurasaki" she is so shocked with the loss of her status as his wife that she falls fatally ill. But by the very loss she is eventually turned from the yoke of her lover's influence, and ironically she can make poems in her own form and voice.