“Someone who butts in when you're talking and smugly provides the ending herself. Indeed anyone who butts in, be they child or adult, is most infuriating.” — Sei Shōnagon Copy Share Image
There is nothing in the whole world so painful as feeling that one is not liked. It always seems to me that people who… — Sei Shonagon Copy Share Image
“ 134. Letters are Commonplace Letters are commonplace enough, yet what splendid things they are! When someone is in a distant province and one is worried about him, and then a letter suddenly arrives, one feels as though one were seeing him face to face. Again, it is a great comfort to have expressed one's feelings in a letter even… — Sei Shonagon Copy Share
“If writing did not exist, what terrible depressions we should suffer from.” — Sei Shōnagon Copy Share Image
“71. Rare Things -- A son-in-law who's praised by his wife's father. Likewise, a wife who's loved by her mother-in-law. A pair of silver tweezers that can actually pull out hairs properly. A retainer who doesn't speak ill of his master. A person who is without a single quirk. Someone who's superior in both appearance and character, and who's remained… — Sei Shōnagon Copy Share
“Equally disagreeable is the man who, when leaving in the middle of the night, takes care to fasten the cord of his headdress. This is quite unnecessary; he could perfectly well put it gently on his head without tying the cord. And why must he spend time adjusting his cloak or hunting costume? Does he really think that someone may… — Sei Shōnagon Copy Share
A man who has nothing in particular to recommend him discusses all sorts of subjects at random as if he knew everything. — Sei Shonagon Copy Share Image
“ In spring it is the dawn that is most beautiful. As the light creeps over the hills, their outlines are dyed a faint red and wisps of purplish cloud trail over them. In summer the nights. Not only when the moon shines, but on dark nights too, as the fireflies flit to and fro, and even when it rains,… — Sei Shônagon Copy Share
“ 64. Surprising and Distressing Things While one is cleaning a decorative comb, something catches in the teeth and the comb breaks. A carriage… — Sei Shonagon Copy Share Image
A good lover will behave just as elegantly at dawn as at any other time. — Sei Shonagon Copy Share Image
There is nothing in the whole world so painful as feeling that one is not liked. — Sei Shonagon Copy Share Image
Pleasing things: finding a large number of tales that one has not read before. Or acquiring the second volume of a tale whose first… — Sei Shonagon Copy Share Image
If letters did not exist, what dark depressions would come over one! When one has been worrying about something and wants to tell a… — Sei Shonagon Copy Share Image
