Poetizing Ministers: The Sugawara House through the rise and fall of institutionalized poetry banquets in Heian Japan

During the early Heian period members of the Sugawara clan consistently appeared in connection with the composition of poetry in literary Sinitic at events sponsored by the Imperial Household. In this paper, I seek to understand this intimate connection as a phenomenon predicated on the distinct modality of literary production for early Heian institutionalized poetry banquets. I draw on a number of sources to investigate the connections among institutionalized banquets, the Imperial Household, and members of the Sugawara House during the early Heian period. Con- versely, I argue, the relative absence of Sugawara poets in mid- and late Heian literary anthologies reflects the decline of sovereign-sponsored banquets and the appearance of new socio-political and cultural networks, a trend that testifies to both the continuities and the fractures within the Heian literary ecosystem over time.