Sei Shōnagon was a member of the Japanese Imperial court, back in the very old times, the times betwen 966 and 1017 CE.
Wikipedia will have more information than I can provide
We don’t even know her real name. Shōnagon was the post held by a relative of hers. Sei is a name derived from her clan.
She would have lived a life and then vanished into the vortex of history, unknown to us a thousand years later, if it weren’t for her Pillow Book.
Her Pillow Book is a collection of gossip, of observations, of tales about the day-to-day life of the Royal Family and the Imperial Court, as well as a collection of lists.
Many lists. Some of them poetic, some of them thoughtful, some of them just… mundane. I like lists. I’ve wanted a Pillow Book of my own for a very long time. This is it.
