Every writer needs a book that will make you want to write. That will instill the need to put your own words to paper so urgently, that you’ll begin scrambling for your keyboard as soon as you finish a sentence. There are many books like that in the world — different strokes for different folks — but readers who are writers? I have found the definitive work.
A couple of months ago I was reading a random book pulled from a friend’s bookshelves and in it, they had made mention of a memoir written by a Japanese courtesan in the year 1000. The book was called The Pillow Book (no one knows why, it’s presumed that it was because she slept with it by her side) and is an intricate and detailed selection of passages and lists of court life in early Japan. She gives few details of herself though — you know she has a son because she mentions it, but nowhere does it state her real name, the name The Pillow Book is published under is Sei Shonagon which is actually a reference to a court title.
So, this other novel I was reading (not very good) had lengthy references and excerpts from The Pillow Book and I grew so curious that I had to Google it and see if it actually existed. It did! And not only that, I was able to place an order and even though it took a while (not being available in India), it finally arrived and I have finally begun to read it.
I now sleep with a notebook by my bedside table, my very own pillow book, and as I read about Shonagon’s description of a weekend away with the empress or spring in the kingdom, or a particularly nice turn of phrase, I am so inspired that I quickly pull out my own notebook and write down something that I hope is a mark of my time as well.
Shonagon’s writing isn’t always gentle, she can be pretty cruel, like in her list titled ‘Things That Have No Redeeming Qualities’ she says, bluntly: “Ugly people with disagreeable personalities.” But she is real, she is alive, her lists are astonishingly contemporary despite the years that stretch between them and us, which makes me think in essence diarists are the same, aren’t they? Whether it’s Samuel Pepys or Bridget Jones or Sei Shonagon or you or me. If you’re a writer, or desire to be one, get your hands on this book. You’ll be doing yourself a favour.
The columnist is an author