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Elegant and lyrical, The Tale of Genji—written by Murasaki Shikibu, considered by many to be the world’s first novelist—predates the seminal Don Quixote by an incredible 600 years. This extraordinarily beautiful program traces the plot, which centers on the romantic relationships of the noble hero Genji, through the panels of a series of illustrated hand scrolls dating from the early 12th century. The program explains both Genji’s adventures and the visual effects created by the paintings, decorated paper, and calligraphy of the scrolls, making accessible to Western audiences a formative work of Japanese culture and one of the milestones of world literature. (60 minutes)
