Born: 966, Japan
Died: 1025
Country most active: Japan
Also known as: 清少納言, Kiyohara no Nagiko (清原 諾子) (Possible real name)
Poet and author Sei Shōnagon was a court lady who served the Empress Teishi (Sadako) around the year 1000 during the middle Heian period. She is the author of The Pillow Book (枕草子, makura no sōshi), a collection of essays, anecdotes, poems and descriptive passages inspired by moments in her daily life.
Sei Shōnagon’s actual name is unknown, though it may have been Kiyohara no Nagiko (清原 諾子). Little is known about her life except what can be found in her writing. She was the daughter of scholar and poet Kiyohara no Motosuke, from a family of middle-ranking courtiers who had financial difficulties, possibly because they were not granted a revenue-producing office.
At age 16, she married Tachibana no Norimitsu, a government official, and later gave birth to a son, Norinaga. She may have been divorced in 993, when she began serving the Empress Teishi at age 27.
Shōnagon gained acclaim for The Pillow Book, a collection of lists, gossip, poetry, observations and complaints written during her years in the court, a genre of writing known as zuihitsu. Her essays detail the daily experiences and customs of the time, and the affairs of the Imperial Court in Kyoto. With a light tone, Shōnagon underplays and leaves out the darker events, like the empress’s death in childbirth, matching the style of the time by recounting her time at court with a witty, gossipy lens. For centuries, The Pillow Book existed in handwritten manuscripts before it was first printed in the 1600s. Because of this, different versions exist, with four main variants. Various editors changed the order of elements, added, edited or deleted passages or comments.
Shōnagon was known for her excellent memory, and her writing includes many recollections of court events, often with precise details such as the clothes people wore, despite being written down several years later. She was skilled at remembering and quoting classic poems to suit different occasions, in a court where knowledge of poetry was considered an essential skill. Shōnagon was also known for her rivalry with writer and courtier Murasaki Shikibu, author of The Tale of Genji, who wrote about Shōnagon – somewhat scathingly, though conceding Shōnagon’s literary gifts – in her diary.
Little is know of her life after the empress’s death in 1000, and nothing is known after 1017, though The Pillow Book is thought to have been finished in her early retirement, between 1001 and 1010. One version of events is that she lived the rest of her life as a Buddhist nun in poverty; another says that married the governor of Settsu province and had a daughter, Koma no Myobu.