Quote by Murasaki Shikibu: “Whatever the heart knows, it knows only through sorrow.”

True emotional understanding — real empathy, real wisdom about being human — comes from having suffered. You don't learn about love, loss, or the human condition from comfort. Grief is a brutal teacher, but it's often the only one that goes deep enough.

Murasaki Shikibu wrote The Tale of Genji and her diary during the height of the Heian period, when Japanese aristocratic culture placed enormous emphasis on emotional sensitivity and aesthetic refinement. The Buddhist concept of mono no aware — a bittersweet awareness of impermanence — suffused the literature and worldview of her era.

Japanese author and court lady of the early eleventh century, widely credited as the author of The Tale of Genji, considered by many scholars to be the world's first novel. She served at the court of Empress Shoshi in Heian-era Japan and also kept a personal diary, the Murasaki Shikibu Diary, which offers a rare first-person account of court life. Little else is known of her life with certainty.