Beneath the waves illustration concepts

Ariko no Naishi (A.D. 829-900), a lady in waiting in the Heian court, is despondent over an unrequited love. As she prepares to jump from the boat and drown herself, she recites the following verse, How hopeless it is; it would be better for me to sink beneath the waves; perhaps then I could see my man from Moon Capital.

Source: Yoshitoshi’s One Hundred Aspects of the Moon, John Stevenson, Hotei Publishing, Netherlands 2001 .
This is one of the most charmingdesigns of the series. The moon is shown only in reflection — theprinter’s execution of this concept is excellent. In addition to wipingaway her tears with a poignant gesture, Ariko seems also to be shadingthem from the brilliance of the reflected moonlight. The design was afavorite of the writer and critic Noguchi Yone; in a lecture to theLondon Japan Society in 1914, he described pasting an impression ofthis print on a screen and his pleasure whenever he looked at it.

Theblack of Ariko’s robes has been burnished with a piece of ivory, givingit a shiny finish. The design on the robe is made up of large wheelsand stylized vine leaves, probably morning-glories, in a colorfultie-dyed pattern. (The wheel, associated with the Buddhist concept ofthe Wheel of Life, was a common religious motif in Japan; as a means oftransport, however, wheels were impractical and little used in Japan’shilly countryside, where objects and people were more usually carried –during the time of Lady Ariko they were most commonly used on the oxcarts of the aristocracy.) A design of small wheels over waves waspopular in the Heian period (794-1185), but the oversize wheels hereseem more appropriate for a kimono pattern of the Edo period(1600-1868). Perhaps a kimono design with waves would have seemedexcessive for a print where waves are the most important element of thecomposition. Most of the bottom half of the design is devoted to thewater, which has the effect of drawing the figure downwards. The wavesare choppy, blown by a cool breeze that, if we stop for a moment, wecan almost feel and hear.

Contents

Beneath the waves illustration concepts

The Story Depicted in the Print as Told by John Stevenson

Image from Publisher’s Bound Album (Issued shortly after Yoshitoshi’s death)

Beneath the waves illustration concepts

An early, if not first, state of this print.

The Story Depicted in the Print as Told by John Stevenson

Source: Yoshitoshi’s One Hundred Aspects of the Moon, John Stevenson, Hotei Publishing, Netherlands 2001 .
38.

The poem at the upper right reads:
How hopeless it is
it would be better for me to sink beneath the waves
perhaps then I could see my man from the Moon Capital
— Ariko

hakanashiya
nami no shita nimo
irinubeshi
tsuki no miyako no
hito ya miru tote
– – Ariko

Ayoung woman sits in a small boat on Lake Biwa, weeping. Her right hand,wiping tears from her eyes, holds a plectrum with which she has beenstrumming the strings of her lute. She is richly dressed and her hairis loose in the courtly Heian manner. Hopelessly in love, she ispreparing to jump from the boat and drown herself.

The lady isAriko no Naishi, who was a lady-in-waiting at the Heian court. The“Naishi” of her name is a title which indicates that she was a memberof a special bureau, naishi no tsukasa. This office managedthe household of the empress and was made exclusively of women. Theman she loved was Tokudaiji no Sanesada, who held the post of Dainagon,a term for four senior councilors at the imperial court. The story ofAriko’s unrequited love was made into a Noh play called Ariko no Naishi. In the play, one of Sanesada’s retainers encounters Ariko’s ghost, and they discuss the passion that led to her suicide.

The tsuki no miyakoof the poem, literally “moon capital”, was a poetic name for Kyoto, theHeian capital. A viewer of the print and reader of the poem might alsohave been expected to remember the famous final words of Lady Nii inthe Heike monogatari. As the Taira leaders on board theirflagship realize the totality of their defeat in a naval battle, shetells the boy-emperor, “in the depths of the ocean is our capital,”hugs him to her, and jumps into the sea where they both are drowned.

Image from Publisher’s Bound Album (Issued shortly after Yoshitoshi’s death)

About the Series “One Hundred Aspects of the Moon”

For details about this series which consists of one hundred prints with the moon as a unifying motif, see the article on this site Yoshitoshi, One Hundred Aspects of the Moon.