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Concept
The Tale of the Heike
Summary
The Tale of the Heike is an epic account compiled prior to 1330 of the struggle between the Taira clan and Minamoto clan for control of Japan at the end of the 12th century in the Genpei War (1180–1185). Heike (平家) refers to the Taira (平), hei being the on'yomi reading of the first kanji and "ke" (家) means family. Note that in the title of the Genpei War, "hei" is in this combination read as "pei" and the "gen" (源) is the first kanji used in the Minamoto (also known as "Genji" which is also pronounced using on'yomi, for example as in The Tale of Genji) clan's name.
It has been translated into English at least five times, the first by Arthur Lindsay Sadler in 1918–1921. A complete translation in nearly 800 pages by Hiroshi Kitagawa & Bruce T. Tsuchida was published in 1975. Also translated by Helen McCullough in 1988. An abridged translation by Burton Watson was published in 2006. In 2012, Royall Tyler completed his translation, which seeks to be mindful of the performance style for which the work was originally intended.
Historical novelist Eiji Yoshikawa published a prose rendering in Asahi Weekly in 1950, with the title New Tale of the Heike (Shin Heike Monogatari).
The Tale of the Heikes origin cannot be reduced to a single creator. Like most epics (the work is an epic chronicle in prose rather than verse), it is the result of the conglomeration of differing versions passed down through an oral tradition by biwa-playing bards known as biwa hōshi.
The monk Yoshida Kenkō (1282–1350) offers a theory as to the authorship of the text in his famous work Tsurezuregusa, which he wrote in 1330. According to Kenkō, "The former governor of Shinano, Yukinaga, wrote Heike monogatari and told it to a blind man called Shōbutsu to chant it". He also confirms the biwa connection of that blind man, who "was natural from the eastern tract", and who was sent from Yukinaga to "recollect some information about samurai, about their bows, their horses and their war strategy. Yukinaga wrote it after that".
Official source
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