The Heian period has been referred to as the golden era of art and literature in Japan.[3] During this era, literature became centered on a cultural elite of nobility and monks.[4] The imperial court particularly patronized the poets, most of whom were courtiers or ladies-in-waiting. Reflecting the aristocratic atmosphere, the poetry was elegant and sophisticated and expressed emotions in a rhetorical style. Editing the resulting anthologies of poetry soon became a national pastime. The iroha poem, now one of two standard orderings for the Japanese syllabary, was also developed during the early Heian period.
Genji Monogatari (The Tale of Genji), written in the early 11th century by a woman named Murasaki Shikibu, is considered the pre-eminent novel of Heian fiction.[citation needed][5] Other important writings of this period include the Kokin Wakashū (905), a waka-poetry anthology, and Makura no Sōshi (The Pillow Book) (990s). The Pillow Book was written by Sei Shōnagon, Murasaki Shikibu's contemporary and rival, as an essay about the life, loves, and pastimes of nobles in the Emperor's court.[6]Another notable piece of fictional Japanese literature was Konjaku Monogatarishū, a collection of over a thousand stories in 31 volumes. The volumes cover various tales from India, China and Japan.
The 10th-century Japanese narrative, Taketori Monogatari (The Tale of the Bamboo Cutter), can be considered an early example of proto-science fiction. The protagonist of the story, Kaguya-hime, is a princess from the Moon who is sent to Earth for safety during a celestial war, and is found and raised by a bamboo cutter. She is later taken back to her extraterrestrial family in an illustrated depiction of a disc-shaped flying object similar to a flying saucer.[