The kana-prose language of the literature of narrative [monogatari] and diaries [nikki] produced in the Heian period is substantially identical for both genres. So much so that attempts, which are frequent enough, to distinguish monogatari from nikki by the presence or absence of the factor of "fiction" are bound to yield very little appreciable results. No more satisfactory are distinctions which appeal to the differrences between alleged prototypes such as uta(poetry/song) or katari(narration). The problem seems to consist rather in the way the space and time of the language of each work is delimited. More concretely, the mode of existence of the characters of nikki and monogatari, hinges on the extent to which they are "theatrical" persons. This would appear to be the mode in which the fictionality of the literary work could be measured. With the exception of the Tosa Nikki, the confusion or interplay of Heian nikki literature with monogatari is a function of the clarity with which the authors of such works perceived this problem. And it was, certainly, the extreme clarity with which the authors of the "Hotaru" chapter of the Genjimonogatari understood this problem that enabled her to compose the seminal discourse on narrative/fiction contained in that chapter.
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