‘The Tale of Genji through Contemporary Manga’ by Lynne K. Miyake (Review)

I’m always on the look-out for books to add to my library of works focusing on The Tale of Genji, so when I was reminded a while back of a fairly recent addition to the field, I shot off a speculative email to Bloomsbury Australia asking for a review copy. Having got no reply, I’d forgotten about it entirely when I checked my letter box one day and found a parcel there, containing a very welcome surprise! As a result, my adventures in Genjiland continue apace, with today’s instalment proving that there’s more than one way to tell the Shining One’s tale, with time, location and even gender mere suggestions… ***** Lynne K. Miyake’s The Tale of Genji through Contemporary Manga: Challenging Gender and Sexuality in Japan, provides exactly what you might expect from a book of that title. Manga is a huge industry in Japan, and just as the TV and film industry use literature as the basis for their projects, manga itself often looks back to its literary antecedents for inspiration.…