Message from aronan

There's a 1996 film called "The Pillow Book" that uses Sei Shonangon's book of the same title as both inpsiration and segue. The main character, Nagiko, is played by Vivian Wu. She's close to her father, who is a writer. Every year on her birthday, he paints calligraphy on her face, while telling her the story of creation. As a young girl, Nagiko's aunt reads to her from the Pillow Book, and she decides to being a Pillow Book of her own. The story follows her through her life as a model and writer, searching for men to write on. While much of the story is very sexy, and possibly not appropriate for even older students, there are segues in the film that show "Sei Shonangon" writing the Pillow Book. At the beginning of the film there's an spoke excerpt from the book, with visual pictures of duck eggs, ice cream in silver bowls, young children eating strawberries, etc. These parts of the film could be shown in conjunction with lessons on the Pillow Book.