Abstract

This thesis examines the story collections written in the eighth through twelfth centuries in Japan. The thesis questions the traditional scholarly assumptions concerning who wrote the story collections and why. I question the argument that the story collections were written by the Buddhist clergy to encourage the folk lay population of Japan to listen to Buddhist sermons. The story collections are not limited to Buddhist tales nor are the authors limited to monks or priests. I suggest instead that the story collections were written by a variety of different authors for a variety of different reasons.