So this is the first of a series of short posts on my random thoughts reading Genji in the original. I'm on chapter 17, so that's where this is going to start.
This chapter picks up the story from Miotsukushi, where Genji had promised the dying Rokujo lady that he would take care of her daughter and send her to palace service. I think Genji really does regret his treatment of Rokujo and wants to make amends -- he overcomes his own attraction to her daughter and at the beginning of this chapter we see him sending her off to palace service.
However, the complication is that Genji's half-brother, the ex-Emperor Suzaku, has been interested in Akikonomu for a long time, but she's going to be sent to Reizei instead. This little section has great psychological analysis of Genji's feelings towards Suzaku -- he has some resentment for the role Suzaku played in his exile, but at the same time realizes it was mostly his mother. Akikonomu gets some screen time too; she has some feelings for Suzaku but it's not like she gets to pick her own guy.
I also laughed a bit when Genji sees a letter from Suzaku to Akikonomu, and then tries to badger one of Akikonomu's gentlewomen to show him more but she refuses. That's not very nice of him. He also gets shut out of seeing Akikonomu's response to Suzaku at the end.
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