Comparative Literature
Genji Lab
Multiple translations of a thousand-year-old masterwork existed in isolation from each other and from the centuries of art, commentary, film, and adaptation that surround them. Scholars and students had no single place to read across translations, see how they diverge, and explore the living cultural record that connects them all.
What changed
Students and researchers can now read the original and translated texts side by side while exploring — and contributing to — a growing layer of multimedia annotations that connect the work to a thousand years of cultural response.
Annotated reader
A web application that presents the original Japanese text and its English translation side by side, overlaid with rich, multimedia annotations — texts, images, video, paintings, comics — that situate the work in its full cultural history.
Rich cross-document linking
Users can link documents to each other or to external resources across the internet.
Durable data
A data model designed to outlive the system, with flexible, text-based data storage ensuring that the information will go on even when Genji Lab reaches end-of-life.