Baroness Murasaki was a Japanese writer and court figure. She wrote the
celebrated romantic novel Genji-monogatari (The Tale of Genji,
completed a.d. 1003), one of the first great Japanese works of fiction,
and considered to be one of the world's earliest novels. Genji traces
the lives of the fictional Prince Genji, his wives and their children,
and subtly delineates a complex society.
Her written work, "Genji Monogatari" ("The Tale of Genji") is widely
considered to be the world's first novel.
Shikibu Murasaki is not her real name, which is unknown. "Shikibu" was
a government title that her father held at one point, while "Murasaki"
was the name given to one of the characters in her work, "The Tale of
Genji".