Haikai Poet Yosa Buson and the Basho Revival (Brill's Japanese Studies Library)

Haikai Poet Yosa Buson and the BashÙ Revival

Brill’s Japanese Studies Library Edited by

H. Bolitho K.W. Radtke

VOLUME 27

Haikai Poet Yosa Buson and the BashÙ Revival By

Cheryl A. Crowley

LEIDEN • BOSTON 2007

On the cover : “Have I run into Matabei?” Haiga. ItsuÙ Art Museum. This book is printed on acid-free paper. Library of Congress Cataloging-in Publication data Detailed Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication data are available on the Internet at http://catalog.loc.gov

ISSN: 0925-6512 ISBN-13: 978 90 04 15709 5 ISBN-10: 90 04 15709 3 Copyright 2007 by Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, The Netherlands. Koninklijke Brill NV incorporates the imprints BRILL, Hotei Publishing, IDC Publishers, Martinus Nijhoff Publishers and VSP. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, translated, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior written permission from the publisher. Authorization to photocopy items for internal or personal use is granted by Koninklijke Brill NV provided that the appropriate fees are paid directly to The Copyright Clearance Center, 222 Rosewood Drive, Suite 910, Danvers, MA 01923, USA. Fees are subject to change. printed in the netherlands

To my parents, Kathleen Jones Crowley and Barry Crowley

CONTENTS List of illustrations...........................................................................................viii Acknowledgements ...........................................................................................ix Introduction ........................................................................................................1 Chapter One Buson, the Bunjin (Literati), and the BashŇ Revival...............................14 Chapter Two Buson and His Audience: Anxiety And Transcendence.......................35 Chapter Three Anxiety and the Formation of a Poet: Hokku 1740–1770....................52 Chapter Four An Unarmed Blossom Guard: Hokku 1771–1783.................................93 Chapter Five Resisting Communality: Linked Verse Sequences .............................. 130 Chapter Six Buson and Haiga....................................................................................... 165 Epilogue .......................................................................................................... 244 Appendix ........................................................................................................ 249 Bibliography ................................................................................................... 292 Cited Buson Hokku....................................................................................... 301 Index................................................................................................................ 304

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS Illustrations for this book are taken from Buson zenshş, vol. 6, except for Figures 3 and 4, which come from Haiga no bi: Buson no jidai: Kakimori bunko tokubetsu ten, Haiga no nagare II series, edited by Zaidan HŇjin Kakimori Bunko (Itami: Zaidan HŇjin Kakimori Bunko, 1996); and Figure 10, which comes from Buson ten, edited by Ibaraki Kenritsu Rekishikan (Mito: BenridŇ, 1997). All works are by Buson and all are in private collections unless otherwise noted. 1 “Group portrait of haikai sages.” Hanging scroll. Kakimori Bunko ..40 2 “First dream of the year.” Haiga by Sakaki Hyakusen. Nagoya City Museum ..................................................................................................... 193 3 “Calling ‘cry, cry!’ ” Haiga by Miura Chora .......................................... 196 4 “At the convent.” Illustration from Fourth month principles (Uzuki teikin) ............................................................................................. 208 5 “Ama-no-hashidate.” Hanging scroll.................................................... 212 6 Tanabata haiga by Hyakusen and Buson............................................... 213 7 “The manzai dancers.” Haiga .................................................................. 218 8 “Cause the madwoman of Iwakura.” Haiga......................................... 221 9 “Young bamboo!” Haiga......................................................................... 224 10 “That she walked beneath the blossoms.” Haiga ................................ 228 11 “Have I run into Matabei?” Haiga. ItsuŇ Art Museum...................... 231 12 “Dancing!” Haiga...................................................................................... 233 13 “Willow leaves, fallen.” Haiga. ItsuŇ Art Museum ............................. 238 14 “Narrow road to the interior” scroll, detail. Yamagata Museum of Art 241

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I am very grateful for the guidance and encouragement of my dissertation advisor, Haruo Shirane. Kawamoto KŇji kindly supervised my research in Japan, and I received generous grant assistance from the ShinchŇ Publishing Company. Kira Sueo permitted me to join his seminar on Buson. I thank Ogata Tsutomu, Horikiri Minoru, and Hori Nobuo, who offered a great deal of valuable help on this project. The members of my dissertation committee, Paul Anderer, Lawrence Marceau, Eri Yasuhara, and Shang Wei, gave me many useful suggestions and comments. I would like to also acknowledge the help of friends and colleagues, among them Inoue Yoshiko, Shimizu Tomoe, KŇno Taeko, Okada Akiko, Takeuchi Akiko, Sakaguchi Akiko, Shimizu Hisako, Ogoshi Eiko, Azuma ShŇko, Junko Mackert, KatŇ Yukiko, and Kinugasa Masaaki. I am also grateful to many teachers, among them David Anthony, Linda Chance, William LaFleur, Phillip Yampolsky, Ryuichi Abe, and Barbara Ruch. My colleagues Juliette Stapanian-Apkarian, Elena Glazov-Corrigan, Corrine Kratz, Matthew Bernstein, Joachim Kurtz, Patricia Graham, Suzanne O’Brien, and Anne Commons have given me much good advice. Finally, I thank Kathleen and Kara Crowley and David Mold for many years of wisdom, good humor, and patience.

INTRODUCTION Poet and painter Yosa Buson ਈ⻢⭢᧛ died on the 24th day of the Twelfth Month of 1783. He was sixty-eight. Buson had long impressed his friends as being remarkably healthy and active for an aging man, and in the last years of his life had undertaken frequent trips to places renowned for their natural beauty, including a visit to Gichş-ji ⟵ખኹ at ņmi, the gravesite of the great haikai poet Matsuo BashŇ ᧻የ⧊⭈ (1644–1694). However, towards the end of 1783 he became ill with stomach pains, and after the remedies he tried brought no relief, he took to his bed in considerable discomfort. Tomo, his wife, and Kuno, his daughter, stayed with him, and his most trusted disciples visited and took turns keeping watch. Buson’s chief disciple Takai KitŇ 㜞੗౔⫃ (1741–1789) later described the events leading up to his teacher’s death in “Account of Elder Yahan’s Final Days” (Yahan-Ň shşen ki ᄛඨ⠃⚳Ὣ⸥), the opening section of the memorial anthology Withered cypress needles (Kara hiba ߆ࠄᯫ⪲, 1784). According to KitŇ, at one point it seemed like Buson would recover, and he struggled to complete a preface for an anthology in memory of his friend, Kuroyanagi ShŇha 㤥ᩉถᵄ (1727–1771). However, he abruptly took a turn for the worse, and his disciples began to quietly discuss what they would need to do after his death. Hearing this, Buson rallied again, and chided them for giving up on him too soon. Eventually, though, he began to sense that death was not far off, and he called to Matsumura Gekkei ᧻᧛᦬ᷧ (1752–1811, art name Goshun ๓ᤐ) to bring him a brush and paper so that he could compose his death poem.1 The practice of writing death poems (jisei ㄉ਎) was fairly common in pre-modern Japan. Such poems were thought to reflect the spiritual condition of the writer and to indicate his or her readiness for the next existence; typically, they express a tranquil resignation to the inevitability of life’s end. However, Buson was not at peace as he contemplated his death poem. Despite the severity of his physical suffering, a single

——— 1 Maruyama Kazuhiko and Yamashita Kazumi, eds., Buson zenshş, vol. 7, Hencho tsuizen (KŇdansha, 1995), pp. 316–320. Henceforth Buson zenshş is abbreviated as BZ in the notes.

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thought consumed him—how to write a death poem that was good enough to stand beside that of his poetic predecessor, Matsuo BashŇ: tabi ni yande yume wa kareno o kakemeguru

taken ill on a journey a dream wanders on a withered moor2

BashŇ First Buson composed two verses on the topic of the uguisu or bush warbler: fuyu uguisu mukashi Ň I ga kakine kana

winter warbler long ago, on Wang Wei’s3 brushwood fence4

uguisu ya nani gosotsukasu yabu no shimo

warbler something is rustling in the forest frost5

Neither of these satisfied him, however, and he finally settled on the topic of white plum blossoms (shira ume): shira ume ni akuru yo bakari to nari ni keri

it is now the moment when white plum blossoms lighten into dawn6

Both uguisu (bush warbler) and white plum blossoms are common early spring topics, and as it was very close to the end of the year they are appropriate to the season. The fact that Buson did not live long enough to welcome the new year he anticipates in these verses gives them a special poignance. However, even more compelling than the poems themselves is the description in “Account of Elder Yahan’s Final Days” of Buson’s state of mind as he composed them, a mood of profound

———

2 ņtani TokuzŇ and Nakamura ShunjŇ, eds., Nihon koten bungaku taikei, vol. 45, BashŇ kushş (Iwanami Shoten, 1963), p. 216. Henceforth Nihon koten bungaku taikei is abbreviated as NKBT in the notes. Verses by poets other than Buson, like this one, are indicated with the poet’s name. 3 Wang Wei ₺⛽ (ca. 701–761) was a Chinese poet and painter. 4 Ogata Tsutomu and Morita Ran, eds., BZ, vol. 1, Hokku (KŇdansha, 1992), no. 2412. 5 BZ, vol. 1, no. 2413. 6 BZ, vol. 1, no. 2414.

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disquiet as he labored to write something that could adequately represent him to readers after his death. Buson’s efforts to draft and revise not one but three verses suggest something beyond mere artistic fastidiousness. In fact, KitŇ’s account shows Buson to be distinctly troubled in his relationship with his audience, that is to say, his readers both in the present and those he imagined in the future. Even at the point of death, Buson was haunted not only by the desire to uphold the standard represented by the work of Matsuo BashŇ, but by uncertainty about the kind of reception he could expect from his audience. Such uncertainty—indeed, anxiety—had persisted throughout his life, and had a profound impact on his literary practice, his approach to the profession of poetry, and the creation of his poetic persona.

An Anxiety of Reception Buson’s anxiety in regard to his relationship with readers was common to the poets of the haikai community with whom he associated. These poets believed that their genre was in a state of crisis. Haikai’s popularity had steadily grown since the beginning of the Tokugawa period (1603– 1868), but some of its most vocal proponents in the early- and mideighteenth century, who equated popularization with vulgarization, viewed its very success as problematic, and they began to work to reverse this trend. An offshoot of the elite linked verse form renga, haikai of the sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries relied heavily on allusions to works of classical and medieval literature, and it demanded of the poet a mastery of complicated rules and structures. In its most basic form, haikai was composed in a group. It typically consisted of a hokku ⊒ฏ (starting verse) written in a 5-7-5 syllable pattern by one poet, to which another poet linked a waki ⣁ (“side” verse) of a 7-7 syllable pattern; tsukeku ઃฏ (linking) verses alternating these 5-7-5 and 7-7 patterns were added to make a “chain” poem usually 36 verses long. However, the middle of the seventeenth century saw the rise of a kind of haikai that placed more emphasis on wit than on knowledge of the literary tradition. This was called “point-scoring” or tentori ὐข haikai. Tentori haikai had simplified rules; this made it accessible to a less sophisticated audience. The teachers who specialized in tentori haikai, known as tenja

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ὐ⠪ (verse markers), competed with one another to attract the most students and thus maximize their profits. As a result, by the middle of the eighteenth century haikai became a form of entertainment that was practiced by enthusiasts from a broad segment of society—including many with little literary education—who ignored or viewed as irrelevant the older, more established haikai schools. However, a new group of poets began to emerge in the 1760s. These poets aimed at resisting what they viewed as the negative effects of the spread of tentori haikai: the rise of an unwelcome kind of haikai writerreader whose competence as well as good taste was suspect. Using a strategy that was typical of premodern literary reformers, this group of poets looked to the past for a standard to live up to. They found it in Matsuo BashŇ, the late seventeenth century poet who had made his life’s work the transformation of haikai into a literary genre that was equal to the elite forms waka and renga. Thus, the eighteenth century reform movement came to be called the BashŇ Revival. The BashŇ Revival lasted for about thirty years, and Buson and his Yahantei school ᄛඨ੪ were at its center. However, as Buson’s discomfiture in the final moments of his life indicates, the Revival movement was a source of unease as well as support for its members, and their canonization of BashŇ as a haikai saint brought with it anxiety as much as authority. This anxiety is different from Harold Bloom’s famous formulation of the “anxiety of influence,” where “strong” poets are said to be engaged in a struggle to overcome the legacy of their poetic predecessors. Indeed, as Haruo Shirane has pointed out in his study of BashŇ’s complex relationship with the medieval poet SaigyŇ ⷏ⴕ (1118–1190), “this kind of Freudian approach would seem antithetical to a culture that emphasizes filial piety and to such a communally-oriented literature as haikai.”7 The passage from “Account of Elder Yahan’s Final Days” bears this out, as it shows Buson’s concern to be not with outperforming BashŇ, but with measuring up to his example. In other words, Buson’s concern was not with replacing the poetic predecessor. Indeed, Buson himself was instrumental in imparting to BashŇ much of the reverence in which he was held. Rather, Buson’s disquiet should be viewed as an “anxiety of reception,” Lucy Newlyn’s term that describes the problematic relationship between writers and

——— 7 Haruo Shirane, Traces of Dreams: Landscape, Cultural Memory, and the Poetry of BashŇ (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1998), p. 117.

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their readers in early modernity. She argues that in the eighteenth century, as technological and social changes challenged previous notions of literary authority and tradition, and groups previously excluded from the work of producing and interpreting texts gained a greater sense of entitlement to the process of creating meaning, writers were put on the defensive. As she notes: Anxieties experienced by writers center as much on the future as on the past—not just because an author’s status, authority, and post-humous life are dependent on readers, but because writing exists in a dialogue with others whose sympathies it hopes to engage.8

Newlyn’s argument focuses on the English Romantic poets, but Japanese haikai poets of the eighteenth century like Buson faced a comparable set of conditions, which they confronted with similar strategies. Buson’s struggle was not with his predecessors, but with his audience. Defined in broad terms, Buson’s audience included the whole haikai community: tentori poets, members of other groups such as those founded by haikai’s pioneers—i.e., the Teimon⽵㐷 and Danrin ⺣ᨋ schools—and also his colleagues in the Revival movement, who were rivals at the same time as they were allies. In this context, Buson was careful to create and maintain a public persona, and his haikai verse was one of the means he used to accomplish this. Recent studies have shown how economic and social developments in eighteenth century Europe led to changes in the relationship between writers and their audiences. These developments included advances in publishing technology and a rise in literacy. The marketplace related to the production and distribution of books also changed, leading to a dramatic increase in booksellers, libraries, journals that included book reviews, and public spaces where the discussion of literary works was a central activity. As the number of literate people grew, there were more readers whose interpretive competence was questionable, as many of them had only the rudiments of education. Not only that, one growing group of readers who could claim some expertise—that is, professional critics—included people who were potentially hostile. Such changes led to what has been termed a “paranoia” on the part of authors, who perceived their autonomy in the creation of meaning to be under threat, their writing vulnerable to misinterpretation and inadequate

——— 8 Lucy Newlyn, Reading, Writing, and Romanticism: The Anxiety of Reception (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000), p. vii.

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appreciation, and their control over their work diminishing. This pattern of development has been observed to precipitate a “crisis of modernity” in which the writer “no longer knows for whom he writes” but is instead the victim of economic networks that controlled the fate of published works.9 Thus, a deep divide between writer and audience appeared. This divide was based in an uncertainty about the future reception of texts that was in turn related to authors’ contempt for a public that neglected them and an audience of professional critics who attacked them.10 A similar phenomenon arose in Japan. The seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries in Japan saw a rise of a class of people who had the money, leisure, education, and ambition to aspire to participation in literary practice. It was an era of profound change that saw dramatic increases in the population of cities (estimated at 1,000,000 in Edo, and between 300,000 and 400,000 in Kyoto and Osaka in 1700),11 improvements in transportation and communication, and for significant numbers of people, better education and more disposable income.12 These developments led to the emergence of one of the world’s first examples of popular culture, or as Peter Nosco defines it, “culture that pays for itself”i.e., self-sustaining forms of culture that are “financed by [their] consumers.”13 Increasing numbers of urban commoners (chŇnin ↸ੱ) and wealthy farmers gained access to arts that had previously been restricted to elite classesranging from painting and tea ceremony to flower arrangement and utai singingnot only as consumers, but as producers as well. Central to this new popular culture was literature. The literacy rate at the end of the early modern period has been estimated at 40 or 50 percent for men and around 25 percent for women,14 Reading for pleasure as a pastime even for commoners was established by the end of the seventeenth century,15 and the distribution of printed texts equaled or even surpassed those that were made in Europe.

——— 9 Jean-Francois Lyotard, cited in Andrew Bennett, Keats, Narrative, and Audience: The Posthumous Life of Writing (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994), p. 4. 10 Newlyn, p. xi. 11 Conrad Totman, Early Modern Japan (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1993), p. 153. 12 Peter Nosco, Remembering Paradise: Nativism and Nostalgia in Eighteenth-Century Japan (Cambridge, MA: Council on East Asian Studies, Harvard University, 1990), pp. 18–19. 13 Ibid., p. 16. 14 Ibid., p. 24. 15 Peter F. Kornicki, The Book in Japan: A Cultural History from the Beginnings to the Nineteenth Century (Leiden: Brill, 1998), p. 262.

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These changes had a tremendous impact on haikai. The number of people composing and reading haikai grew steadily from the sixteenth to the end of the seventeenth century. Kyoto publishers alone released 300,000 volumes of haikai.16 Haikai teachers also proliferated: one source, Blossom-viewing carriage (Hanamiguruma ⧎⷗ゞ 1702), lists the names of thirty-nine licensed verse markers in Kyoto, twenty-seven in Osaka, twenty-nine in Edo, and thirty-one in the provinces; there were large numbers of unlicensed teachers as well.17 As this suggests, the growth in popularity was not limited to the rapidly developing urban areas. Due to the itinerant habits of many practitioners, haikai schools claimed many members in the provinces also. As roads improved and restrictions on travel lost force, the haikai community expanded dramatically all over the country. One result of the genre’s rapid growth, particularly among newly prosperous chŇnin and farmers, was increasing friction in the relationship between its producers and its consumers. The situation of Japanese haikai poets was in many respects different from that of their early modern European counterparts. The very nature of classical Japanese poetry—particularly renga and haikai—militated against the formation of the kind of gulf between writers and readers that has been observed in European literary history. For premodern Japanese poets, consciousness of the audience was always necessarily high, as they commonly worked in groups, responding on the spot to verses spontaneously composed by their companions. Verses were typically subject to corrections of teachers or colleagues, and reflect a powerful awareness of an environment exterior to the poem. This environment might include the classical literary tradition, in cases where the verse alludes to an earlier work; or the recipient, when the verse is written for the benefit of a particular addressee. Furthermore, not only was communality intrinsic to the production of haikai, it was integral to the process of publication also. Verses usually circulated by being published in anthologies that included the work of numerous poets. Collections devoted to the work of individuals were relatively uncommon, and even when they were published they almost invariably featured additional texts like prefaces or afterwords contributed by other poets.

——— 16

Shirane, Traces of Dreams, p. 4. ņuchi Hatsuo, Sakurai TakejirŇ, and Kira Sueo, eds., Shin Nihon bungaku taikei, vol. 71, Genroku haikai shş (Iwanami Shoten, 1994), pp. 398–401. 17

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However, in a genre where texts were necessarily provisional and vulnerable to reinterpretation, competing claims to authority presented an especially pressing problem. As the haikai community grew it became more diverse, and the contestation over haikai’s norms and standards intensified. The proliferation of gamelike forms of haikai in the early eighteenth century brought this debate to a peak. The rise of the Revival movement at this stage was a response by an elite group of poets to a threat represented by the emergence of a popular audience whose values were perceived as lower or lesser, who were guilty of neglecting or ignoring them. Revival poets tried to establish a claim to authority and a higher ideal to which haikai practitioners should aspire. They had two interrelated goals: one, to resist the commercialization of haikai that they associated with the tentori poets; and two, to reintroduce an emphasis on high literary ideals inherited from the classical tradition, bringing it beyond the range of possibilities to which the commercially-minded practitioners—like the tentori poets— limited themselves. While the Revival movement gave its members a sense of shared purpose, it was not without its own intrinsically threatening aspect. On the one hand, Revival movement members were in competition with the tentori poets who neglected or ignored them. At the same time, however, Revival poets had another kind of conflict to concern them: while the opposition to popular haikai was the reason for their alliance, Revival poets were also in an adversarial relationship with each other, as they all competed with one another for the students on whom their livelihoods depended.

Buson in Japanese Literary History A key member of the Revival movement, Buson was at the center of early modern cultural development both chronologically and spatially. He began his literary career some fifty years after the end of the Genroku era (1688–1704), the time that historians commonly describe as the cultural height of the early modern period; the years after his death saw the haikai genre enter into what literary scholars call a stage of stagnation and decline. Buson’s life and work took him through Japan’s great cultural centers: Osaka during his childhood, Edo during his young adulthood, and Kyoto during the height of his career.

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The genres in which he specializedhaikai and nanga ධ↹ (Chinesestyle landscape painting, literally, “southern”-style painting)also placed him at the center of early modern cultural development. While they built on the traditions of Japan and China’s elites, both genres reworked these traditions in such a way as to be accessible to segments of society that historically had been excluded from many forms of elite culture, i.e., the lower classes. Both haikai and nanga blend and amalgamate disparate cultural idiomshigh and low culture in the case of haikai, and indigenous and continental painting techniques in the case of nanga. For all of these reasons, Buson’s work provides a useful vantage point from which to begin consideration of the culture and society of early modern Japan. Buson’s reputation as a haikai poet underwent several reversals in the century following his death. During the last years of the eighteenth century and through most of the nineteenth, Buson was better known as a painter than as a haikai poet. His verse was largely ignored in the last years of the Tokugawa period, despite the fact that the number of haikai practitioners continued to grow. It remained relatively obscure in the first decades of the Meiji period (1868–1912) as well. Haikai itself was still popular as a form of recreation, but in the literary and intellectual climate of these years it increasingly drew criticism, and there were even calls to abandon it altogether. Buson was “rediscovered” in the late Meiji period by the poet and literary critic Masaoka Shiki ᱜጟሶⷙ (1867–1902). Shiki responded to criticism of haikai by advocating the reformrather than the abandonmentof the genre. Shiki called modern haikai “haiku,” and eventually settled on Buson as the best classical model for modern haiku poets. Looking at Buson’s work as a painter, Shiki found in Buson the ideal exemplar of shasei ౮↢ (realism) in literature, and called him a forerunner of modern Japanese poetry. While Shiki’s preference for Buson over BashŇ was not shared by most other haiku poets, Buson’s work has continued to be viewed as an important precursor to haiku: progressive, presciently “modern” verse by a poet whose achievements were different from those of the great BashŇ but which nevertheless suggested a potential of haiku that BashŇ’s had overlooked. Shiki’s writing at the turn of the nineteenth century laid the foundations for the appraisal of Buson’s work for most of the twentieth century. His image of Buson as a painter in words has been at the base of much writing about Buson as a “visual” poet. More scholarly readings of Buson’s work have also addressed the question of how Buson’s work

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as a painter made an impact on his verse, most notably by Ebara TaizŇ, Shimizu Takayuki, Okada Rihei, Ogata Tsutomu, Haga TŇru, and Kira Sueo. While other aspects of his work have interested commentatorsespecially the strongly nostalgic tone of much of his later writingviews of Buson as a “poet-painter” and as a proto-modernist have remained extremely influential.18 Buson’s painting has also interested scholars writing in English, and for many years most of the work on Buson available in English was in art history. Two major examples are The Poet Painters: Buson and his Followers by Calvin French (1974), and Haiku Painting by Leon Zolbrod (1982). More recent are James Cahill’s The Lyric Journey: Poetic Painting in China and Japan (1996), which has a long and detailed chapter on Buson’s nanga, and John Rosenfield’s Mynah Birds and Flying Rocks: Word and Image in the Art of Yosa Buson (2003), which looks at two recurrent themes in Buson’s painting and poetry. Two book-length studies in English focus on Buson. Haiku Master Buson (1978), by Yuki Sawa and Edith Schiffert, consists mainly of translations, though it does include a short section on Buson’s biography. In 1998, the noted scholar Makoto Ueda published an insightful monograph on Buson, called The Path of Flowering Thorn: The Life and Poetry of Yosa Buson. This is a valuable resource for information in English about Buson’s work and biography. It includes accurate and highly readable translations of many Buson hokku and several of his linked verse sequences, and contains brief introductions to some of Buson’s most famous paintings. My approach differs in a number of ways from that of Ueda and other scholars in that its examines Buson’s work within the broad framework of the historical and social developments of eighteenth century Japan. My discussion centers on the haikai community in the KyŇhŇ (1716–1736) through the Tenmei (1781–1789) periods, and Buson’s position within that community. Rather than seeking biographical or psychological interpretations of Buson’s work, I consider it in the context of the anthologies in which they were published to show how it

——— 18 See Ebara TaizŇ, Buson, Osaka: SŇgensha, 1943, and Ebara TaizŇ chosaku shş, vol. 13, ChşŇ KŇronsha, 1979; Shimizu Takayuki, Buson no geijutsu, ShibundŇ, 1977 and Yosa Buson no kanshŇ to hihyŇ, Meiji Shoin, 1983; Haga TŇru, Yosa Buson no chiisana sekai, ChşkŇ Bunko Series, ChşŇ KŇronsha, [1986] 1995; Ogata Tsutomu, BashŇ, Buson, Kashinsha, 1978 and Buson no sekai, Iwanami Shoten, 1993; and Kira Sueo, An’ei sannen Buson shunkyŇjŇ, Taihei Bunko 38, Insatsu KyŇshinsha, 1996.

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was shaped by Buson’s efforts to negotiate his relationships with the community of his colleagues and readers. Most hokku were published numerous times, and in my discussion it is usually only possible to consider each verse as it appeared in a single anthology. However, in interpreting Buson’s work, it is important to consider of the goals and concerns of a larger community—those of editors like KitŇ, Miyake ShŇzan ਃቛཕጊ (1718–1801), and sometimes Buson himself—and of the audiences who read them. Furthermore, earlier works on Buson in English tend to treat his work as a poet and as a painter separately. While my study is mainly literary, I also include an exploration on the ways that Buson combined verbal and visual elements in his haikai, the best examples of which are his haiga େ↹, or haikai painting. To this end, I use an approach that recognizes the problematical aspects of Buson’s relationships with his contemporaries, and his concerns about the estimation his writing would receive from readers in posterity. I argue that anxiety was central to Buson’s relationships with his colleagues and competitors, and to his attitudes about the reception his work would meet with from readers both in the present and the past. For this reason my examination begins with an overview of the social and cultural trends current in the intellectual community within which Buson worked, and continues with close readings of his hokku, linked verse, and haiga, to better understand the effects of Buson’s interaction with his audience on his haikai. My study of Buson’s work begins with an exploration of the BashŇ Revival. Although they represented only a minority in the haikai community of the day, ultimately it is the Revival poets and their successors, rather than their more popular rivals, who eventually came to be regarded as the central figures of haikai history. How did this happen? What was Buson’s role in this? To answer these questions, Chapter One discusses haikai’s development from a form of recreation into a serious literary genre. It starts with an overview of an important trend in the intellectual climate of the day: the impact of Chinese learning on artistic and literary communities of the early modern period and the emergence of the literati (bunjin ᢥੱ) ideal. It then traces haikai’s history from its origins to the gamelike forms that became popular in the generation after BashŇ’s death, concluding with the effort of Revival poets like Buson to counter what they saw as the cheapening effect of popularization as a defense not only of haikai’s prestige, but of their own as well. Chapter Two focuses more closely on Buson and his audience. It includes a brief

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biography and introduces several key texts—including letters, poetic prefaces, and haikai prose—that illustrate the complexities of Buson’s relationship with his audience. One of these, the preface to Shundei verse anthology (Shundei kushş no jo ᤐᵆฏ㓸ߩᐨ, 1777), the clearest expression of haikai theory that Buson wrote during his lifetime, argues that there are close connections between haikai, Chinese poetry and painting. It urges haikai poets to aspire to writing verse that expressed elegance at the same time as it embraced the experiences of everyday life. Chapters Three and Four offer close readings of Buson’s hokku, his primary mode of literary self-expression. Rather than following a biographical approach, these chapters present Buson’s hokku in a setting closer to the way a reader of the time might have encountered them, discussing them in the context of the anthologies in which they were published. Chapter Three begins with an introduction to the poetics of the hokku form, then analyzes verses from the first two stages of Buson’s productive life: his period of apprenticeship in Edo (modern Tokyo) and eastern Japan (1738–1750) and his early years in Kyoto, until 1770. Chapter Four focuses on the hokku of the last stage of Buson’s career (1771–1783), showing that while Buson’s position as the leader of the Yahantei haikai school placed him at the forefront of the BashŇ Revival movement, he remained ambivalent about his own abilities and preoccupied with constructing his own public image as an heir to BashŇ’s legacy. Chapter Five looks at Buson’s linked verse. Linked verse, composed by two or more poets, was the earliest form of haikai, and Buson’s work in this form is among the most masterful in the entire genre. The popularity of linked verse was on the wane during his lifetime, but the form’s associations with the BashŇ school made it an important part in the Revival poets’ efforts to return haikai to a higher ideal. This chapter explains Buson’s role in preserving and promoting linked verse in this era when easier, shorter forms competed with it. The chapter begins with a short introduction to the complex procedure of linked verse composition, and then examines three of his kasen ᱌઄ (thirty-six link sequences). Discussion of the first sequence, which dates from his early years, focuses on an excerpt of the sequence; the two other sequences, from the midpoint and last part of his career, are presented in full. Chapter Six analyzes five of Buson’s haiga—paintings that combine haikai texts inscribed in elegant calligraphy with simple, evocative sketches in ink and watercolor, explaining how their juxtapositions of verbal and visual imagery combine to form a single, complete work. The

INTRODUCTION

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images in these verses were not just illustrations; in haiga, text and image interactively created meaning. The book concludes with a epilogue that briefly discusses assesments of Buson by two modern poets, Masaoka Shiki and Hagiwara SakutarŇ ⪤ේᦳᄥ㇢ (1886-1942). Full translations of important Buson texts mentioned in the discussion are given in the appendix. Yosa Buson was an extremely prolific poet. Over 2,800 of his hokku are extant, as well as some 120 linked verse sequences, as well as numerous examples of haiga, three haishi େ⹞—unconventional verses which are a hybrid of haikai and Chinese poetry, and several kanshi ṽ⹞ (poems in Chinese). In addition to compiling eleven anthologies himself, he also wrote many prefaces for collections edited by poets both inside and outside of his school. It is impossible to characterize such a prodigious set of works simply. However, a consideration of the effect that Buson’s audience had on his haikai poetry will help to create a framework from which to understand it better. I will argue that Buson’s view of his audience was shaped by anxiety, an anxiety related to his position in the community. This position was one that he negotiated until the last moments of his life. In the next chapter, we will begin our examination of the community of poets in which Buson worked, starting with an overview of the ideal of the literatus, and continuing with a discussion of the historical background of the BashŇ Revival.

CHAPTER ONE

BUSON, THE BUNJIN (LITERATI), AND THE BASHņ REVIVAL Buson earned most of his income from painting rather than writing, so a good way to start exploration of his work is with a brief consideration his work as a painter. As a painter he was at the center of a development that was to have a powerful impact on his haikai and the discourse of the BashŇ Revival as a whole. This development was the rise of the ideal of the cultivated amateur, or bunjin, which allowed artists to simultaneously work as professionals yet appear to transcend the corrupting influences of profit. In Buson’s case, the ideal of the cultivated amateur was useful in his efforts to build a persona that would enable an outsider like himself to gain support and patronage from wealthy patrons. Indeed, Buson was an outsider, especially as an artist. He learned by studying examples in the collections of his wealthy patrons in the northeast, Tango, Kyoto, and Shikoku, rather than from teachers. In other words, he was not a member of any of the established ateliers or artistic lineages like the Tosa, KanŇ, and Rimpa schools that were influential in the world of Japanese painting. Modern art historians place him in the category of nanga or bunjin-ga ᢥੱ↹(literati painting artists—which also includes painters like Sakaki Hyakusen ᓄၔ⊖Ꮉ (1697–1752), Ike no Taiga ᳰᄢ㓷 (1723–1776), and Maruyama ņkyo ౞ጊᔕ᜼ (1733–1795). Buson’s dual identities as painter and poet were not contradictory. Painting and poetry have always had close ties in Japan, and the contemporary demand for work that reflected the ideals of the Chinese literati painters created an especially hospitable climate for someone like Buson, who had competence in all the arts of the brush, i.e., painting, calligraphy, and poetry. Both the words nanga and bunjin-ga indicate an affinity with the Chinese wenren ᢥੱ (literati; Japanese: bunjin) artists that were active in the Song (960–1279) and Ming (1368–1644) dynasties. In its most idealized form, the Chinese term wenren referred to scholar-officials who—either through misfortune or because of some political conviction—withdrew from circles of power, and spent their time writing poetry, practicing

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calligraphy and painting, and enjoying the company of like-minded friends.1 Wenren did not sell their work, but used it as a means of contemplation and self-cultivation. This ideal was immensely appealing to the Japanese, and the word bunjin that derived from it has a long history in Japan, as does the emulation of the practices with which it is associated. While use of the word itself dates back to the Nara period (710–794), it has a more specific meaning in Buson’s time; it describes a person who—aside from being learned in poetry, Confucian philosophy, and the arts—lived an eccentric, unconventional lifestyle removed from political and economic striving. In its earliest forms, bunjin came from the upper classes, but by the early modern period this ideal began to attract followers among prosperous commoners as well.2 Several factors precipitated the rise of widespread fascination with the bunjin in this period. First, the social restrictions imposed by the bakufu ᐀ᐭ (military government), particularly during the reign of the shogun Tokugawa Yoshimune ᓼᎹศቬ (1684–1751, r. 1716–1745), led to a general mood of disillusionment among intellectuals. The response to this disillusionment was withdrawal into intellectual reclusion, i.e., into the kind of life practiced by the bunjin. Second, Chinese-style products increasingly became available. Many of these came directly from China, like ceramics, furniture, books, and paintings, despite the tight limits the bakufu placed on imports; but there was also a thriving market for Chinese-inspired goods produced domestically. People of means with an interest in the bunjin ideal were able to furnish themselves with the accoutrements that allowed them to create a setting they imagined was conducive to this kind of lifestyle. Finally, eighteenth-century culture, already saturated with Chinese influence due to the bakufu’s endorsement of Confucian philosophy, experienced a blossoming of scholarly and intellectual energy devoted to Chinese studies.3 Indeed, the bakufu took an active part in promoting such scholarship, particularly among samurai. In this age of peace, many samurai were able to devote themselves to the study and teaching of Chinese philosophy,

——— 1 Alan Berkowitz, Patterns of Disengagement: The Practice of Reclusion in Early Medieval China (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2000), pp. 4–5. 2 Ushiyama Yukio, Kinsei no bunjintachi: Bunjin seishin no shosŇ (Kanrin ShobŇ, 1995), pp. 8–14, 16–18. 3 Yoshikawa Chş et al., eds., Genshoku Nihon no bijutsu, vol. 18, Nanga to shaseiga, (ShŇgakukan, 1960), pp. 170–171.

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history, and poetry, and these highly trained people staffed bakufu and domain schools. Demand for education was also rising among commoners. At the forefront of this trend were merchants and artisans who lived in cities, where there was greater access to schools and more incentive to educate children, but it also extended to the many rural people who migrated to the cities because of economic pressures. Education improved even in the countryside, as increasing numbers of farmers embraced agricultural methods that required higher levels of learning. Because Chinese studies was at the foundation of the early modern curriculum, the spread of education increased interest in the ideal of the literatus-scholar throughout the society as a whole.4 One of the many schools of Chinese studies that flourished was that of Ogyş Sorai ⩆↢ᓖᓭ (1666–1728). Whereas many other scholars were primarily interested in Confucian philosophy and ethics, Sorai also emphasized accomplishment in a wide range of artistic pursuits, including poetry and calligraphy. Sorai encouraged achieving a direct understanding of Confucian texts without the encumbrance of commentaries or the special markings (kunten ⸠ὐ) that enabled Japanese readers to understand written Chinese. He taught his students to write in classical Chinese and even to speak it, and to make the tradition present and immediate, a part of everyday life.5 Members of the Sorai school believed that the classical Chinese tradition was not something to be passively memorized, but to be lived out in practice, and the bunjin represented a model to which many of them could aspire. There were close connections between the BashŇ Revival movement and the sinophile groups that gave rise to the idealization of the bunjin. In the first place, many haikai poets also had close affiliations with these groups, particularly those who also wrote kanshi. To take the Yahantei school as an example, as a young man Buson is thought to have studied with Sorai’s successor, Hattori Nankaku ᦯ㇱධㇳ (1683-1759). His close friend and disciple Kuroyanagi ShŇha was also Nankaku’s student, and ShŇha continued his training in kanshi with Tatsu SŇro ┥⨲ᑢ (1715–1792) in Osaka. Another colleague and mentor, Miyake ShŇzan, was a prolific kanshi poet whose collected verse fills several volumes; his Haikai selected old verses (Haikai kosen େ⺽ฎㆬ, 1763), an important

——— 4 Marius B. Jansen, Making of Modern Japan (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press), pp. 191–195. 5 R. P. Dore, Education in Tokugawa Japan (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1965), p. 23.

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Revival collection, was laid out according to the same principles as the seminal Chinese work Tang shi xuan (Selected poems of the Tang period; Japanese TŇshisen ໊⹞ㆬ). Buson’s disciple Matsumura Gekkei became one of the most famous and successful bunjin painters. Finally, there was considerable overlap between Buson’s haikai acquaintances and the clients who bought his Chinese-style paintings and therefore had an affinity for bunjin tastes. Ideologically, there were two main points of intersection between the bunjin ideal and the BashŇ Revival. In the first place, its stress on the value of poetry—writing it as well as reading it—was important to both. For admirers of the bunjin, not only was poetry a pleasure to be enjoyed, it also had a more exalted function: the cultivation of the spirit. Revival poets, who worked to resist haikai’s reversion to a frivolous pastime, were in considerable sympathy with the bunjin valorization of poetry’s higher purpose. The emphasis that the Sorai school in particular placed on studying the writing of the ancient sages without depending on centuries’ worth of interpretive accretions was also attractive to Revival poets. They treated the works of BashŇ as their “classics,” and encouraged disciples to read and internalize their teachings. Buson’s comment that, “If for three days you do not recite the works of BashŇ, thorns will grow in your mouth”6 is a good indication of how much importance the Revival poets placed on familiarity with BashŇ’s writings. The second point of intersection was the contempt for ambition and profit that was common to both the bunjin ideal and Revival poets. Amateurism was the hallmark of the Chinese wenren, who painted for the sake of self-cultivation, unlike the professional court painters who worked to please patrons. This had special resonance for wealthy commoners attracted to the bunjin ideal and Revival haikai alike. Denied access to real elites (i.e., aristocratic status, participation in government) and contemptuous of the excesses of commoner culture, glorification of the amateur was a way for non-elites to aspire to some kind of elite status insofar as it gave them the moral ground on which to stand as they castigated popular tenja for being venal and profit-driven. Of course, Japanese bunjin painters like Buson were not actually amateurs; they exchanged their paintings for money. However, Buson was able to maintain the pose of the bunjin amateur as a poet precisely

——— 6 Ogata Tsutomu and Kazumi Yamashita, eds., BZ, vol. 4, Haishi haibun (KŇdansha, 1994), p. 142.

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because this other source of income allowed him to keep his haikai out of the marketplace—that is to say, apart from the kind of commercialism that he enthusiastically deplored in tentori haikai poets.

Haikai History and the Revival Movement While many aspects of the Revival movement were particular to the historical moment in which it arose, they also demonstrate continuities with debates that have their beginnings in the earliest period of haikai’s formation as a genre. Haikai was at once conservative, as it claimed allegiance to the classical literary tradition, and progressive, as it encouraged poets to make the innovations that distinguished it from its parent genres. To explain how the Revival movement came about, it is necessary to first outline the history of haikai, investigating how the tension between opposing forces—i.e., tradition and innovation, high (ga 㓷) and low (zoku ଶ) culture, and the aesthetic and the commercial—invigorated the genre as it developed, and ultimately became the central issue of the Revival movement. Haikai history begins with waka, the genre of courtly poetry that was typically thirty-one syllables long, written in a 5-7-5-7-7 pattern. Waka enjoyed enormous prestige because of its association with aristocrats and the imperial court of the Nara and Heian periods (710–1185). It was a highly elegant form with a large body of treatises, commentaries, and collections that formed its canon, and a well-developed system of schools that jealously guarded its traditions. Renga, the linked verse genre derived from waka that had its heyday in the medieval period (1185–1600), observed the rules of elegance and propriety that had been set down for waka and likewise developed a canon and an organizational structure to regulate itself and preserve its standards. By contrast, haikai no renga େ⺽ߩㅪ᱌ (literally, nonstandard renga), i.e., haikai, owed its very identity as a genre to the fact that it deviated from the rules of waka and standard renga. As a humorous form, haikai was usually not included in official renga collections in the medieval period. Written in moments of relaxation between strenuous bouts of standard renga, it was viewed as frivolous and ephemeral. Also, the poets that came to prefer this kind of renga were for the most part neither the aristocratic protectors of the classical tradition who practiced waka nor the members of the military ruling elite who aspired to the prestige

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associated with the aristocratic tradition; rather, haikai had the most appeal for commoners. Because haikai began as a lesser form of renga, and because its practitioners usually belonged to people of low social status, haikai’s position relative to other forms of poetry was an issue from the beginning. Another issue was the commercialization of the genre as it became established in the seventeenth century. Some renga masters were able to support themselves through teaching, and this was also true of many people who practiced haikai. However, haikai was far less demanding in terms of time and education, and as the population of well-off farmers and working urban dwellers grew during the long period of peace and stability in the early modern period, the market for haikai also grew. The job of teaching haikai to students and evaluating their haikai eventually became a professional occupation. The professionalization of haikai in the seventeenth century is related to the emergence of the iemoto ኅర or “house” system throughout the artistic community, and its attendant concerns with lineages, authenticity, and small exclusive communities. As was the case in many of the arts of this period, haikai poets and their disciples organized themselves in a structure modeled after a patriarchal family. In the iemoto system, the school’s teachings were passed on directly from master to disciple, organization within the school was hierarchical, leadership was hereditary, and a permit system was set up whereby disciples’ eligibility to become teachers was strictly controlled.7 The transformation of haikai schools into an iemoto-like structure took decades, but from the genre’s earliest beginnings its most serious practitioners were deeply sensitive to matters of artistic lineage, and competition between factions was very strong. Haikai had attained the status of an independent genre around the beginning of the seventeenth century, largely through the work of the followers of Matsunaga Teitoku ᧻᳗⽵ᓼ (1571–1653), the Teimon, who formed the first haikai school. Teitoku was a master of both waka and of standard renga, having studied with two of the most admired poets of the day, Satomura JŇha ㉿᧛⚫Ꮙ (ca. 1525–1602) and Hosokawa Yşsai ⚦Ꮉᐝᢪ (1534–1610). Although as a commoner Teitoku was unable to receive initiation into the esoteric tradition of waka, he

——— 7 Patricia Graham, Tea of the Sages: The Art of Sencha (Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1998), p. 146.

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nevertheless acquired a formidable knowledge of the classical tradition and became well known for his lectures to commoners on literature. Teitoku was a reluctant proselytizer, and indeed he had to be pressured by colleagues into delivering his lectures, but eventually his efforts ended up making accessible to commoners knowledge that had been previously limited to the elite. He also experimented with haikai alongside his composition and teaching of waka and renga, and some of his disciples included his verse in what is regarded as the first haikai verse collection, Puppy anthology (Enoko shş›ሶ㓸,1633). While Teitoku did not take seriously his own forays into haikai, he was instrumental in laying a foundation for the genre in a number of ways. In the first place, his verses, particularly those in Puppy anthology, served as a model for novice poets. In the second place, his treatises, Air and water treatise (TensuishŇ ᄤ᳓ᛞ, 1644) and Gosan ᓮ஺ (1651), later became standard reference texts of haikai theory, thus making for haikai the beginnings of a canon of authoritative documents similar to those that existed for waka, renga and other elite forms of literature. Teitoku’s influence lay in the fact that not only had he opened the literary community to a new form of poetry, but that his own background in the classical tradition led him to begin creating similar institutional structures in haikai to those that existed in waka and renga. From the beginning, issues of legitimacy, lineage, and authenticity were of major importance in the relationships between haikai practitioners. Also important was the balance of ga and zoku. Teitoku acknowledged that the fundamental distinction between renga and haikai was that the latter allowed the use of zoku words, or, as he wrote in Gosan, “In the beginning there was no difference between haikai and renga. Among them, the one that uses gentle language is called renga, and composing verses without despising zoku language is called haikai.”8 Though Teitoku recognized the importance of zoku in haikai, he scrupulously avoided vulgarity, and encouraged his followers to do the same. As a result, Teitoku-school haikai observed high standards of decorum, and while its verses are to an extent comic, the humor involved is subtle and restrained. While Teitoku was deeply ambivalent about haikai, and regarded himself primarily as a waka poet, he did believe that it was something

——— 8 Akabane Manabe, ed., KŇchş Haikai Gosan sakuin hen, vol. 1 (Fukutake Shoten, 1983), pp. 24-25.

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more than just an amusing pastime. In Air and water treatise, he writes, “Haikai is of one body with waka. It is not a Way that should be taken lightly,” arguing that although haikai had been dismissed in the past as being inferior to waka and renga, because it allowed the use of vernacular, non-literary language it was actually the most appropriate one for the present day.9 Even more importantly, despite his own reluctance to actively promote the genre, he attracted energetic disciples who would make his school, the Teimon, a stable and influential force in haikai for decades. Almost as soon as the Teimon established canons and standards, though, some poets set about breaking them. Most successful among these were the members of the Danrin, founded by followers of Nishiyama SŇin ⷏ጊቬ࿃ (1605–1682). Danrin poetry emphasized cleverness, word play, and speed of composition; their verses frequently strayed into earthiness and vulgarity. Making an impression on an audience, either through wit or speed, was a key value.10 For example, Ihara Saikaku ੗ේ⷏㢬 (1642–1693), a Danrin poet as well as a fiction writer, is said to have composed 23,500 solo verses at a haikai event that lasted just a day and a night.11 While poets of the Teimon might have found Danrin poetry tasteless and crude, it had great mass appeal. The Teimon’s efforts to bring haikai more in line with classical poetry by creating a “tradition” for it with the compilation of rulebooks and collections of exemplary verses supported haikai’s claims to legitimacy, and this attracted followers. However, the Danrin’s use of the opposite tactic—breaking the rules and catering to the tastes of lowbrow culture—enhanced haikai’s popularity even more. The lively quarrels between the Danrin and Teimon and their fierce competition for disciples demonstrate how vital and active a genre it had become after the middle of the seventeenth century. Around the time that the Teimon and Danrin poets were competing for dominance in Kyoto and Edo, another phenomenon was unfolding in Osaka that would play a crucial role in the development of haikai—the rise of short form linked verse or maekuzuke ೨ฏઃ. Teimon and Danrin haikai tended to favor long verse sequences that were typically

——— 9

Cited in Kuriyama Ri’ichi, Haikaishi (Hanawa ShobŇ, 1963), p. 75. Kubota Jun, ed., Kenkyş shiryŇ Nihon koten bungaku, vol. 7, Renga, haikai, kyŇka (Meiji Shoin, 1984), pp. 80–82. 11 Konishi Jin’ichi, Haiku no sekai (KŇdansha, 1995), p. 77. This figure is probably exaggerated; it would have entailed composing one verse every 3.7 seconds. 10

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constructed of 36 but sometimes 100 or more links. Maekuzuke, by contrast, was formed by linking just a maeku ೨ฏ (previous verse) and tsukeku. A tenja would set the verse, a go-between would distribute it to students, and then the go-between would deliver the student’s links to the tenja, who would grade them with points. Both the tenja and the gobetween collected fees for their services, and soon this point-scoring or tentori haikai became a very lucrative trade. Tentori haikai attracted a large number of devotees, and quickly spread to Edo, Kyoto, and the provinces.12 As we saw in the introduction, while tentori haikai offered a means for people to make a living off their literary talents, other, more idealistic poets despised it. Point-scoring in itself was not necessarily the problem. The practice of grading students’ verses did not originate with the tentori haikai poets; it actually began in the medieval period when renga teachers would use this system to help students learn the subtleties of linking. In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, also, even poets who had higher ambitions for haikai used points as a pedagogical tool. However, points soon became an end in themselves, as students competed with one another to see who could score highest. Haikai of this kind eventually degenerated into an activity that was little more than a game. Indeed, it actually became a form of gambling, and a law was passed against it in 1723. Also, the competitive side of tentori haikai meant that practitioners were less concerned with the craft of their poetry than with writing something impressive and witty, to dazzle others and win points from the tenja.13 In this sense, tentori haikai strongly favored zoku over ga. The other aspect of tentori haikai that dismayed more high-minded poets was the fact that haikai itself was becoming a commodity, and tenja were more interested in profit than literary quality and made little effort to cultivate taste and sensitivity in their students. Eager to increase their income and maximize the number of students, many were willing to lower their standards in order to make themselves appealing to the largest number of people possible. The growing sophistication of print culture and the greater ease of communication and travel also contributed to the commercialization of haikai, as the accessibility of haikai texts and the ease with which disciples could correspond with and meet even

——— 12 13

SatŇ Katsuaki et al., Renku no sekai (Shintensha, 1997), pp. 89–90. Ibid., pp. 89–90.

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distant tenja put the practice within reach of people in the provincial towns and rural areas.

BashŇ and the BashŇ School The most prominent seventeenth century opponent of tentori haikai was Matsuo BashŇ. At the start of his career, BashŇ worked in the Teimon and Danrin modes, and even found employment as a tenja. Around 1680 he gave up this work because he felt that it compromised his integrity, and instead came to depend on the support of disciples and patrons. He turned away from Danrin haikai, which he had come to consider frivolous and vulgar, and began to try to push haikai beyond the limits that poets of lesser imagination had imposed on it. BashŇ explored a variety of styles during his lifetime, but two in particular were to have a major impact on the development of haikai in the eighteenth century. The first was the style he embraced in the early part of the Tenna period (1681–1684), the kanshibunchŇ ṽ⹞ᢥ⺞ or Chinese style: this was a literary, elevated style that drew on kanshi for its models. The second, karumi シߺ (lightness), which emphasized simplicity and ordinary language and situations, was one with which BashŇ experimented near the end of his life. As the claim to allegiance to one of these two styles became the basis for factional divisions that arose among his disciples, I will examine them in some detail. Scholars regard the verse collection Empty chestnuts (Minashiguri ⯯ᩙ, 1683), edited by Takarai Kikaku ቲ੗౔ⷺ (1661–1707), as the quintessential expression of BashŇ’s kanshibunchŇ period. The following BashŇ verse, taken from this collection, represents this style well. It opens with a headnote in Chinese, a quote from the Tang poet Li Bo ᧘⊕ (701– 762), “In times of sorrow, one learns reverence for wine. In times of poverty, one realizes the sacredness of loose change:” hana ni ukiyo waga sake shiroku meshi kuroshi BashŇ

——— 14

NKBT, vol. 45, p. 52.

under the blossoms, the floating world my sake is white my rice is black14

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The speaker describes his experience of viewing cherry blossoms, which evokes joy tinged with sorrow. Uki means both “floating” and “melancholy,” so uki yo can refer either to a world buoyed up with the effervescence of pleasure, or an ephemeral world of suffering. The speaker is poor, as his sake is milky with lees and his rice has not been adequately milled. The awareness of his poverty causes him to have a keener appreciation of cherry blossoms as emblematic of the sadness of life even as he sits down to his meal. While the sentiment of the verse is not unusual in Japanese poetry, its language is quite striking. Even without the Chinese headnote, its parallel structure (white sake, black rice) recalls kanshi. It is also far more blunt and intellectual than the oblique, highly nuanced verse at which BashŇ excelled in his later years: the meaning of the poem is expressed with little ambiguity, and it offers the reader the challenge of figuring out the source of headnote and the delight of the poet’s cleverness in reworking it into this context. The other style that was to have a major impact on the development of BashŇ-school haikai of the eighteenth century was something that BashŇ arrived at during the last three years of his life, karumi. Verses in this style create profound meaning out of apparent simplicity. It was an ideal of great subtlety, which required poets to leave aside embellishments of language and artifice and express themselves in the plainest terms possible. Karumi verses favor the ordinary and commonplace—the material of everyday life. BashŇ’s last collections, especially Charcoal sack (Sumidawara ὇ୈ, 1694) are landmarks of the karumi style. The following, included in Charcoal sack, is a typical BashŇ karumi verse: Kannazuki hatsuka, Fukagawa nite sokkyŇ

On the Twentieth of the “Godless Month,” composed extemporaneously at Fukagawa:

furiuri no gan aware nari Ebisu kŇ

hawking a wild goose in the streets has poignance festival of the Merchants’ God15

BashŇ The words are restrained but evocative. The wild goose customarily appears in classical poetry as a figure of splendor, a wanderer in the sky returning home after traveling great distances. In BashŇ’s verse it is

——— 15

Ibid., p. 217.

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brought down to earth, carried dead through the streets by a poor poultry seller hoping to earn a few coins. “Poignance” (aware) refers both to the humbled bird and to the miserable man plying his trade in the cold. This small, sad drama is played out with the lively Ebisu Festival as its backdrop, an occasion for the merchants of the town to come forth to pray for prosperity. The verse uses unadorned words to describe an utterly ordinary scene of commoner life, yet it is full of suggestive overtones that make it as evocative of the delicate emotion aware, so often the focus of courtly poetry. BashŇ also considered haikai a legitimate literary form, the equal of waka or renga. More than any of his predecessors, BashŇ was noted for writing verses that resonated with the high standards of refinement of the most admired waka and renga, at the same time as it expressed the emotions of ordinary people and everyday situations. He wrote in the travel diary Rucksack notebook (Oi no kobumi ╅ߩዊᢥ, 1709), “In SaigyŇ’s waka, in SŇgi’s ቬ␧ renga, in Sesshş’s 㔐⥱ painting, in Rikyş’s ೑ભ tea, there is one Way that runs through them,”16 arguing that haikai was heir to these medieval artists’ legacy. Unlike the verse of the Danrin and tentori poets, which emphasized zoku at the expense of ga, BashŇ tried to achieve a balance where both elements complemented each other. “The value of haikai is in rectifying zokugo (ordinary language),”17 he is quoted as saying in Three notebooks (SanzŇshi ਃౠሶ, 1705). In other words, haikai brought a dignity to nonpoetic language and indeed, transformed it into poetic language. However, he also embraced zoku; indeed, he affirmed its role as the foundation of good haikai. Three notebooks also quotes him as having said, “achieve an awareness of the high, but return to zoku.”18 This statement, emphasized that haikai should not just aim for the elegance of classical and medieval poetry, but should be grounded in the realities of daily life. BashŇ did not set out to defy the literary tradition; rather, he moved haikai in a direction where it could absorb a broader range of language and imagery but at the same time preserve its connection with classical poetry. While acknowledging the importance of ga in bringing to haikai a

——— 16 Sugiura ShŇchirŇ et al., eds., NKBT, vol. 46, BashŇ bunshş (Iwanami Shoten, 1959), p. 51. SŇgi (1421–1502) was a renowned renga poet; Sesshş (1420–1506) was famous for his ink painting; Sen no Rikyş (1522–1591) was a founder of the tea ceremony. 17 Imoto NŇichi and KidŇ SaizŇ, eds., NKBT, vol. 66, Rengaron shş, Haironshş (Iwanami Shoten, 1961), p. 437. 18 Ibid., p. 398.

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necessary amount of gravity, he regarded the zoku element as equally important—not for the sake of surprise or amusement, as some of the Danrin poets used it, but rather as a base to which poets should return after having internalized the rich possibilities of the classical heritage.

KyŇhŇ Haikai: Factionalism and Reform At the beginning of the eighteenth century, the haikai community grew increasingly fragmented. The number of its readers and writers continued to grow, and the schools that served them competed fiercely with each other for a share of the profitable market that they represented. Japanese scholars refer to this as KyŇhŇ haikai. The KyŇhŇ period is strictly defined as the years 1716–1736, but the name is also used more generally to refer to the early part of the eighteenth century, especially the reign of Tokugawa Yoshimune. Since it was primarily the developments of KyŇhŇ haikai that triggered the rise of the Revival movement, events of this period deserve our close attention. The KyŇhŇ period was a time of increased social controls, as the shogunate tried to confront the economic problems that had been mounting over decades. Samurai, officially the ruling class, became poorer as inflation eroded the value of their hereditary fixed stipends. Worse still from the shogunate’s point of view, many had lost sight of the virtues of self-discipline and frugality that had been fundamental principles of the samurai way of life since the beginning of the Tokugawa period over a century earlier. Yoshimune’s government implemented a number of measures, later called the KyŇhŇ Reforms, to address these problems. The KyŇhŇ Reforms included higher taxes for the farmers, stricter enforcement of sumptuary laws that denied merchants luxuries, and various policies to encourage samurai to cultivate their martial spirit.19 These changes were seen by many as restrictive and even oppressive, but in spite of them, the arts continued to flourish. One reason for this was the fact that while the bakufu’s policies were supposed to shore up samurai economic power, it was actually the commoners—especially urban merchants but also many farmers—who grew more affluent. As commoners acquired economic

——— 19 Conrad Totman, Early Modern Japan (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1993), pp. 296–304.

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capital, they were eager to increase their stock of what Pierre Bourdieu calls cultural capital—prestige that allowed them a stronger sense of participating in the culture of the people in power.20 Thus they began to demand access to arts that had previously belonged only to those of elite status. Arts of all kinds found a growing, enthusiastic market in the newly wealthy commoners of the KyŇhŇ period, and one of the most successful of these arts was haikai. Haikai appealed to a broad swath of commoner society. It could be practiced as a hobby, as it had been made easy by willing tenja who worked to simplify its rules as much as possible. On the other hand, because of the efforts of poets like BashŇ, it also was seen as a worthy pursuit for those who aspired to more refined aesthetic and literary expression. And so, KyŇhŇ haikai poets were roughly divisible into two categories: those who composed solely for pleasure, and those who were motivated by a more purely aesthetic purpose. The poets of the second category, who looked down on the first, were the forerunners of the Revival movement. Within these two broad categories, the community was further divided into numerous factions and lineages. The Teimon and Danrin, for instance, continued to attract followers, and the tentori schools were growing in both size and number. Most influential of all, though, was the ShŇmon; that is to say, the schools that were founded by BashŇ’s disciples. The ShŇmon itself was divided into two large factions, the urban and the rural. This division was related to the stylistic changes BashŇ’s haikai underwent over the course of his life. The followers that he had attracted earlier in his career remained loyal to him but continued to prefer his older style, while those who joined him as he moved into new directions tended to favor his newer styles. For this reason, while a large number of disciples called themselves BashŇ’s direct successors after his death, they practiced very different kinds of haikai. The most ambitious among them set up schools, claiming to preserve his authentic teachings, and they vied with one another for leadership. The urban ShŇmon flourished in Edo, Kyoto, and Osaka. It was centered around the activities of BashŇ disciples Kikaku and Hattori Ransetsu ᦯ㇱ፲㔐 (1654–1707), though Mizuma Sentoku ᳓㑆ᴩᓼ

——— 20 Pierre Bourdieu, Distinction: A Social Critique of the Judgement of Taste, trans. Richard Nice (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1984), p. 303.

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(1662–1726), who became acquainted with BashŇ’s teachings indirectly though Kikaku, also became a powerful leader in this faction. Urban ShŇmon poets looked to the style of BashŇ’s early years for their model, most importantly the verse of the 1683 collection Empty chestnuts. Urban haikai emphasized sophisticated wit, a taste for novelty, and intellectual complexity and cleverness. Their verses were often obscure and cryptic, more like puzzles than poems, and membership in its interpretive community required a fair amount of knowledge of the literary tradition on the one hand and of fashions and trends then current in the cities. The rural ShŇmon included two main sub-factions, the Mino faction, founded by Kagami ShikŇ ฦോᡰ⠨ (1665–1731) and the Ise faction, associated with Nakagawa Otsuyş ਛᎹਸ↱ (1675–1739, also known as Bakurin 㤈ᨋ). ShikŇ had been a disciple of BashŇ during his later years, when BashŇ was promoting the karumi style, and his followers considered the verse of Charcoal sack to be the epitome of good haikai. ShikŇ was very active in promoting BashŇ’s teachings, which he condensed into simplified versions and even modified for his own convenience.21 While BashŇ’s karumi verses are among his most powerful, few rural ShŇmon poets achieved the same combination of simplicity and expressiveness, and their verse was vulnerable to accusations of being bland and trite. Despite its aesthetic shortcomings, the rural ShŇmon was very influential in the sense that it attracted a large number of followers throughout the country. It promoted verse that was plain, straightforward and immediate, and did not require poets to appear witty and au courant like urban haikai did. It was easily accessible even to people with minimal education who were isolated from the fashions of the urban centers. Almost anyone could write and understand rural ShŇmon haikai, and with such a large number of followers embracing its teachings, it became a powerful force in the haidan as a whole. The ShŇmon was the major source of energy in resisting the commodification and negative influences of tentori haikai. Modern scholars trace the beginning of the Revival movement to the 1731 publication of Ink of five colors (Goshikizumi ੖⦡ა) a verse collection of the works of five poets, most prominent among whom was Sakuma ChŇsui

——— 21 Two of ShikŇ’s most famous treatises were Haikai ten discussions (Haikai jşron, afterword dated 1719) and Twenty-five tenets (NijşkŇ kajŇ, published 1736). In Nihon bungakushi, Kinsei II, ed. Hisamatsu Sen’ichi (ShibundŇ, 1964), pp. 250–251.

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૒ਭ㑆㐳᳓, who is better known by his later soubriquet Ryşkyo ᩉዬ(1686–1748).22 All five received their training with either BashŇ disciples or the urban poet Sentoku. The Ink of five colors poets believed that the commercialization associated with tentori haikai had a cheapening effect on the haikai community as a whole—tentori haikai, they complained, valued style over substance, and wittiness over profundity. They advocated a return to the practice of composing long haikai sequences, not just the shorter, truncated forms that were written solely for the purpose of competing for points. The poets chose a quote from Kikaku for its preface: Haikai has become a matter of points; surely it is not haikai’s original intention to go around the group making judgments according to the evaluation system that this one is “excellent,” that one is “good” or “outstanding,” and so on, is it?....Composing verses in order to please your teacher, and thus planning each verse so that it has outlandish poetic devices, and competing with others over maeku and so on is behavior that is plainly to be regretted.23

A prose passage by Gikş on the same topic is also included in the text: In today’s world there is no one who does not write haikai, but few are those who really dedicate themselves to its Way. People think that as long as they get good points in point-scoring, they are free to do what they want; they think that they are accomplished after only two or three years, they openly praise themselves without knowing the “Four Ways” (i.e. the basics of verse linking). There are many who think that this is all there is to it. It is for this reason that no respected poets have emerged.24

One possible impetus for the Ink of five colors poets’ interest in bringing change to the haidan was related to their own backgrounds: they all came from families with close ties to the shogun, either as gokenin ᓮኅੱ (high-ranking retainers) or merchants who supplied the bakufu. Reasserting the importance of elegance, Ink of five colors stood as a challenge to tenja who were primarily interested in profit, and their disciples, who saw haikai simply as a form of entertainment; it marked the start of a new mood of change in the haikai community.

——— 22 The other Five colors ink poets were Sogan ⚛ਣ (later, BakŇ 㚍శ), SŇzui ቬℰ, Shijaku ຎዤ (later, RyŇwa ኩ๺) and Renshi ⬒ਯ (later, Keirin ⃯℘). Gikş ␧ⓨ wrote the preface. 23 Katsumine Shinpş, ed., Fukyşban haisho taikei, vol. 72, ChşkŇ haikai meika shş (Shunjşsha, 1929), p. 35. 24 Ibid., p. 42.

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As we have seen, the KyŇhŇ period was a time of reform and vibrant development. However, in many respects the haikai of this period became a victim of its own success, and the more followers it attracted the more its quality degenerated. The greed of many tenja, the spread of game-like forms, and the low literary standards that characterized much of the verse being produced at the time caused some poets, Yosa Buson among them, to aspire to greater things.

The Revival Movement and Buson In the years following the publication of Ink of five colors, dissatisfaction with the commercialization of haikai grew, particularly among ShŇmon poets, and they looked to the past for models worth following. BashŇ was an obvious choice for a number of reasons. More than any of his predecessors, BashŇ was able to create haikai that had all of the dignity and resonance of the best waka and renga. He was keenly insightful about everyday life and meticulous in his craftsmanship; his verse was at once reverent and playful, confident of the classical tradition yet boldly innovative; this made it stand out from that of his peers. Most important of all, perhaps, BashŇ was able to attract large numbers of extremely skilled and devoted students whose efforts to secure their own position within the haikai community included energetic promotion of their mentor’s teachings. During the Genroku period, BashŇ’s school was only one of many, and it did not have nearly as many followers as did some others. However, because BashŇ formed networks of devoted followers on his own extensive journeys through the countryside, and through the work of disciples after his death, the number of people who knew of and admired BashŇ was quite large. As a result, there were close links between efforts to curb the excesses of KyŇhŇ haikai and the gradual establishment of the image of BashŇ as the central figure of haikai history. BashŇ died in 1694, and his disciples sporadically published collections of his verse and teachings for decades after his death. Among the earliest were versions of DohŇ’s Three notebooks and Kyorai’s treatise (Kyorai shŇ ෰᧪ᛞ, compiled 1704). However, interest in BashŇ began to pick up in earnest around 1743, five decades later. Several poets published memorial verse collections to mark this occasion, most notably Ink of five colors poet Ryşkyo’s Fiftieth anniversary commemoration of the passing of Elder

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BashŇ (BashŇ Ň dŇkŇ ki ⧊⭈⠃หశᔊ, 1746). Ryşkyo, who had converted from the urban to the rural BashŇ style in the early 1730s, also made a tremendous impact on the haikai community with his 1756 publication BashŇ seven anthologies (BashŇ shichibu shş ⧊⭈৾ㇱ㓸). This was the earliest collection of BashŇ’s anthologies, and was a landmark in the process of defining the BashŇ canon.25 As its editor’s proclivities favored the Mino-Ise style, BashŇ seven anthologies had particular resonance with the poets of this school, and the collection helped to promote the view that rural style was the true, orthodox one. As demand grew for collections of BashŇ’s haikai, so did the fascination with BashŇ as a person. The first biography of BashŇ, Mendicant’s satchel tales of Elder BashŇ (BashŇ Ň zuda monogatari ⧊⭈⠃㗡㒚‛⺆), was published in 1751 by Takebe RyŇtai ᱞㇱᶭⴼ (also known as Ayatari ✍⿷, 1719–1774). BashŇ admirers frequently drew a connection between BashŇ’s lifestyle and the excellence of his work, and were eager to learn more about his life. The idealized image of BashŇ as a saintly traveler single-mindedly dedicated to following the Way of haikai was promoted by ShŇmon poets, and it began to take root. As a consequence, other gestures aimed at honoring BashŇ’s memory became common around this time. For instance, the practice of retracing BashŇ’s path on the Narrow road to the interior journey, and of erecting memorial steles (tsuka Ⴆ) and verse-inscribed monuments (kuhi ฏ⎼ marking sites where BashŇ had visited, started to become popular.26 The reform movement began to reach its peak around the seventieth anniversary of BashŇ’s death. The poets who were active in the movement during this period still claimed allegiance to heirs of either the early rural ShŇmon poets (ChŇmu Ⲕᄞ [1732–1795], KatŇ KyŇtai ട⮮ᥙบ [1732–1792], Hori Bakusui ၳ㤈᳓ [1718–1783], Miura Chora ਃᶆᮠ⦟ [1729–1780]) or those of the urban ShŇmon (Buson, ņshima RyŇta ᄢፉኩᄥ [1718–1787], Tan Taigi ὇ᄥ␧ [1709–1771], KitŇ, ShŇzan). However, they frequently collaborated on projects centered on BashŇ, and their rivalries remained relatively friendly. In the 1760s, around the time of the seventieth anniversary, practices related to the commemoration of BashŇ’s life and work took many forms. One of the most common ones was the compilation of haikai anthologies that reflected some BashŇ-related theme. In 1776, RyŇta and

——— 25 26

Horikiri Minoru, BashŇ to haikaishi no tenkai (Perikansha, 2004), p. 336. Fujita Shinichi, Buson (Iwanami Shoten, 2000), pp. 40–45.

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Buson separately published commentaries on BashŇ’s linked verse, both called Verse linking of Elder BashŇ (BashŇ Ň tsukeai shş ⧊⭈⠃㒝ว㓸). KyŇtai’s collection Autumn day (Aki no hi ⑺ߩᣣ, 1772), which was modeled after the BashŇ school’s Winter day (Fuyu no hi ౻ߩᣣ, 1684) and RankŇ’s Just as it is (Ari no mama ᦭ߩ఑, preface dated 1769) were compiled to showcase verse collected from poets all over the country who lived up to BashŇ’s ideals. The construction of memorial steles continued. In 1763, RyŇta gathered donations from supporters and built a BashŇ memorial stele in Edo. KyŇtai also built a BashŇ stele in this year, and issued a memorial collection Frog call anthology (Atei shş ⰶ໹㓸) to commemorate it. Also, groups and gatherings were organized with the explicit purpose of following BashŇ’s example or celebrating his life. In 1763, the seventieth anniversary of BashŇ’s death, ChŇmu began a custom of holding a series of annual events at Gichş-ji temple, site of BashŇ’s grave. Sankasha ਃ⩻␠, the haikai study group founded in 1766 by Buson and his associates, was also part of this trend, as its participants sought to rediscover the traditions and practices of the past. The number of biographies, verse collections of BashŇ and commentaries on his works grew dramatically in the following years as well. During the decade between the eightieth and ninetieth anniversaries of BashŇ’s death, the movement was at its zenith. The ShŇmon flourished, especially in the provinces. Activities related to the memorialization and even idolization of BashŇ continued and found more enthusiastic participants, as the number of celebrations, construction of memorial sites, and BashŇ-inspired publications increased. One of the biggest events was a series of gatherings KyŇtai and his disciples organized at Gichş-ji temple in 1783. Many of its participants, Buson among them, doubted that they would live to see the real centenary of BashŇ’s death, so they decided to commemorate it ten years early. And indeed, their guess proved correct—by 1794, all of the major figures of the Revival movement were dead. Though the Revival poets were a highly disparate group, we can still draw some conclusions about them. Most importantly, they viewed the haikai of the day as being in a state of crisis. They criticized the popular tentori haikai as unliterary, as it did not require the rigorous, disciplined practice that was necessary to develop mastery in one of the elite literary forms. Moreover, what should have provided an alternative, the ShŇmon groups, were also in need of reform. Urban haikai placed too much emphasis on word play and not enough on the serious expression of

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emotion, but on the other hand, rural haikai was too often simplistic and bland, and pandered to the limited abilities of unsophisticated poetasters with literary pretensions. Another reason that the Revival poets made tentori haikai practitioners their target was that the latter focused on money and profit. Haikai was a source of income for tentori tenja, and they treated it like that, lowering their standards in order to attract students. Of course, the Revival poets also worked as professional haikai teachers, and made a living from their work as poets. However, they used a number of strategies to minimize and deflect the appearance of being merely hacks out to make money, not the least of which was scorning others who did so blatantly. The Revival movement did not die with Buson, KyŇtai, and KitŇ, but actually gained momentum as haikai fell in with the process of institutionalization that most of the arts underwent at this time. By the end of the century, the BashŇ style came to be established as “true” haikai, and BashŇ designated the genre’s “saint.”27 The prestigious NijŇ school of waka poets conferred on BashŇ the title Hana no moto no sŇshŇ (⧎ߩਅቬඅ, literarily, master under the blossoms), their highest honor, bringing haikai into line with long-established courtly poetic traditions of organization and authority. In doing so they finally affirmed the claim that haikai poets since Teitoku had been making—that haikai was the equal of waka and renga.28 Ironically, the Revival movement, which had been sparked by a desire to resist commercialization and professionalism in haikai, concluded with the institutionalization of the ShŇmon as the orthodox school of haikai. Despite its conservative rhetoric of “returning” to the ideals of BashŇ, the Revival movement actually looked forward to new directions in the development of Japanese poetry. As much as the leaders of the Revival movement deplored the popularity of maekuzuke and similar forms that were composed outside the highly-regulated, refereed, and communal setting of a linked verse gathering, their own preference for the hokku gave further emphasis to the development of a style of poetry that placed more emphasis on an individual, rather than a collective, voice. By arguing that language and allusions to ordinary experience had a place in literaturethat zoku could exist comfortably and legitimately within the confines of gathey gave support to the notion that commoners have

——— 27 28

Horikiri, pp. 338–341. SatŇ, p. 97.

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an equal share in the production of literature, something that for most of Japanese history had been the exclusive privilege of members of social elites. Finally, and perhaps most importantly, by making a “return to BashŇ” the centerpiece of their arguments for reform, the Revival poets created the underpinnings of a view of haikai history that has remained basically intact up to the present day, one which regards the work of BashŇ and the BashŇ school as definitive of the entire genre. While in later decades the prestige of haikai rose and fell, BashŇ retained his position of primacy. This was true even despite the zealous efforts of the genre’s most energetic modern reformer, Masaoka Shiki, to gainsay the reverence which his contemporaries showed to BashŇ: in the twenty-first century, most readers continue to regard the work of BashŇ and the BashŇ school as the supreme expression of haikai. In the following chapter, we will take a closer look at the ways that Buson’s efforts to create an identity for himself in the larger community of literati poets and painters helped shape his haikai.

CHAPTER TWO

BUSON AND HIS AUDIENCE: ANXIETY AND TRANSCENDENCE Yosa Buson’s role as a leader of the Revival movement makes him a good subject for a study of the processes that fostered it. Buson found the Revival movement both a source of support and unease, one that he both depended on and resisted. I will start my investigation of Buson’s position within the movement with a brief overview of the events of his life, and then turn to a exploration of his relationship with his audience. I conclude this discussion with an examination of an document that gives insight into the ways that Buson managed his anxiety about this relationship: the preface to the Shundei verse anthology, a text that shows the close linkages between Chinese poetic theory and the Revival movement. Buson was born in 1716 in Kema, now a suburb of Osaka. Around 1735, when he was 20 years old, he moved to Edo. In Edo, he first took up the study of haikai with Edo-school poet Uchida Senzan ౝ↰ᴩጊ (d. 1758) and soon afterward joining the school of Hayano Hajin ᣧ㊁Ꮙੱ (1676–1742), a follower of BashŇ disciples Takarai Kikaku and Hattori Ransetsu. Hajin called his school Yahantei After Hajin died in 1742, Buson spent the next decade or so traveling around northeastern Japan. His base was the home of Yahantei disciple Isaoka GantŇ ⍾ጟ㓵ቪ (d. 1773) in ShimŇsa Province, modern Ibaraki Prefecture, but he also made visits to other poets and art collectors all around the northeast. He once undertook a longer trip to retrace the route of BashŇ’s 1689 journey that was the basis for the haikai travel journal Narrow road to the interior (Oku no hosomichi ᅏߩ⚦㆏). He also made occasional visits to Edo and probably attended lectures on Chinese poetry at the school of Ogyş Sorai disciple Hattori Nankaku. The main focus of his activities during this period was to teach himself painting and sell what work he could, and Hajin’s disciples provided him with a ready-made set of contacts on whom he could rely.1

——— 1 The information in this section comes from several sources: Tanaka Yoshinobu, Yosa Buson (Yoshikawa KŇbunkan, 1996); Yamashita Kazumi, Giyş no haijin Yosa Buson; (Shintensha, 1986); Fujita Shinichi, Buson; and Shimizu Takayuki, Buson no geijutsu.

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Buson left ShimŇsa around 1751, and returned to western Japan. He spent several years in Kyoto trying to establish his painting business. Hajin had spent time in Kyoto and had many disciples there also, so Buson was not without friends. He first took up with senior Yahantei disciple Mochizuki SŇoku ᦸ᦬ቡደ (1688–1766), a Kyoto poet who counted among his other students Miyake ShŇzan and ChŇmu, both of whom were to later play an important role in the BashŇ Revival movement. However, Buson was not able to find a secure foothold in Kyoto immediately, and in 1754 he moved to Miyazu in Tango Province (modern HyŇgŇ Prefecture) in search of more amenable client prospects. He met with success as a painter here, but did not compose much haikai. From 1757 onward Buson lived in Kyoto except for a three-year trip to Sanuki, Shikoku (1766–1769). His painting business grew steadily and he was very active as a haikai poet as well. He married a woman named Tomo; as he took the surname Yosa around this time, scholars have speculated that it may have been hers. Commissions began to grow in number, and several patrons even clubbed together to help him secure the materials to folding screens. (byŇbu-e ዳ㘑⛗) for each of them. In 1766 Buson and several of his acquaintances—including painting clients from this folding-screen club and friends such as Tan Taigi and Kuroyanagi ShŇha—formed Sankasha, a haikai study group whose purpose was to explore poetic topics that had fallen out of use in that time. Partly because of the success of Sankasha, Buson reopened the Yahantei school in 1770, formalizing his succession to his teacher Hajin’s title. The most prominent member of Yahantei was Takai KitŇ, and together the two poets cooperated at various levels to make this group one of the most important centers of haikai activity in the Kamigata area. Buson’s leadership of Yahantei was reluctant at best; he delayed its opening until he was fifty-five years old, and even then he was never particularly aggressive in promoting it. The Yahantei collections that he edited tended to be small and limited to the circle of his own acquaintance. The best example is Blossoms and birds collection (KachŇ hen ⧎㠽▻, 1782) that includes not only the verses of Yahantei school members but also kabuki actors and courtesans. Buson left to KitŇ the work of compiling the group’s major anthologies: Light of the snow (Sono yuki kage ౔㔐ᓇ, 1772), Dawn crow (Akegarasu ޽ߌὖ, 1773) and Sequel to dawn crow (Zoku akegarasu ⛯᣿ὖ, 1776). In contrast to Buson’s, KitŇ’s Yahantei collections were large, comprehensive affairs that included works by large numbers of poets both inside and outside of Yahantei,

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especially those identified with the Revival movement, including KyŇtai, Chora, Bakusui, ChŇmu, Kaga no Chiyo ട⾐ජઍ (1703–1775) and RyŇta. KitŇ was an extremely able publicity manager, and his efforts were instrumental in establishing Buson as his generation’s major haikai poet. Despite his pose of indifference to making a name for himself as a professional poet, Buson was extremely active in the haikai community from the 1770s until the end of his life. In addition to correcting his disciples’ verses and taking part in regular gatherings that were a normal part of any haikai school, he authored numerous prefaces to others’ collections as well. He also composed highly original and unconventional works such as the haishi “Song of the spring wind on Kema Embankment” (Shunpş batei no kyoku ᤐ㘑㚍ႇᦛ) and “Yodo River songs” (Denga ka ᶰᎹ᱌, both published 1777), and compiled the verse and prose collection New flower gathering (Shin hanatsumi ᣂ⧎ߟߺ, 1777) and the remarkable linked verse sequences of Peaches and plums (Momosumomo ߽߽ߔ߽߽, 1780).2 At the same time, Buson was also active in a broader context, taking part in numerous events commemorating BashŇ, including painting scrolls and screens on themes related to BashŇ, haikai gatherings at Gichş-ji temple (the site of BashŇ’s grave), and the construction of the BashŇ Hermitage (BashŇ-an) at Konpuku-ji temple. These reached a climax in the years between 1780 and 1784, in anticipation of the 1794 centenary of BashŇ’s death. Buson was an enthusiastic participant in these activities right up until a few months before his own death in 1783, and BashŇ and his example was very much on his mind as his life drew to a close. As we have seen, even then, at the end of a long and impressive career, Buson remained concerned with creating a poetic legacy that would outlive him, and living up to a standard that would impress his audience in the present and in the future.

——— 2 The appendix include full translations of Buson’s three haishi, the prose portion of New flower gathering, and the Peaches and plums sequence that is not included in the main text.

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Buson and his Audience Who, then, was Buson’s audience? Who were the readers he was conscious of as he struggled to uphold BashŇ’s ideals? Where did he encounter his supporters and detractors, and how did he negotiate his status within the haikai community? I will examine these issues in some detail, first describing the nature of Buson’s audience, and then by discussing several strategies that he used to manage the anxiety that tinged his relationship with it. Buson’s audience included an eclectic group of acquaintances, disciples, fellow poets, and others connected with the haikai industry. In the first place, there were his patrons. These were usually wealthy commoners who provided him with shelter, money, or other compensation in exchange for paintings or tuition. Also, there were close colleagues and disciples with the haikai groups to which he belonged, such as Sankasha and Yahantei. Although the distinction between patrons, disciples, and friends were often blurry, there were some associates for whom Buson had particular affection and a sense of common purpose who served as his mentors and collaborators. Outside of this close group were other poets with whom Buson’s relationships were somewhat more problematic, as they were allies in the Revival movement but rivals nonetheless. Beyond them was a diverse population of publishers, booksellers, and haikai poets from outside Buson’s area. Many of the publications that featured Buson’s work were privately printed and circulated mostly among the poets whose work it contained, but larger collections could hope to attract the attention of readers who had no personal affiliation with the editor or school that produced it. With the exception of mentors and close friends like Hajin, ShŇha, Taigi, and KitŇ, Buson’s views on his audience were generally ambivalent, and ranged from tolerance at one end of the spectrum to antagonism on the other. This ambivalence may account for a number of behaviors that can be viewed as defensive strategies against the power of his audience. First, he was careful to create and maintain a public persona, one that both concealed the facts about his family background at the same time as it established his connections to a literary lineage that reached back to BashŇ. Second, he defended his position by robustly criticizing other poets—professional verse markers, amateur haikai aficionados, even poets who were his allies in the Back to BashŇ movement. Finally, he was very elusive on the subject of his own poetic

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principles, defending his flexibility and changeableness of style as keeping in touch with the times, even as he sought to recreate within his own verse lost worlds of the Chinese and Japanese literary past. In the first place, Buson took pains to conceal the facts of his birth and parentage. While most authors are concerned with their public image, Buson’s efforts to control knowledge of his origins stand out precisely because he has been so closely associated with a mood of longing for a lost past, a reputation established in the early twentieth century by Hagiwara SakutarŇ’s Poet of nostalgia: Yosa Buson (KyŇshş no shijin Yosa Buson ㇹᗜߩ⹞ੱਈ⻢⭢᧛, 1936). References to Buson’s birth and childhood are scant. KitŇ’s brief biography of Buson in “Account of Elder Yahan’s Final Days” was notably circumspect and seems to have been deliberately suppressed information. An early draft states that Buson was born in the area near Naniwazu (i.e., Osaka) in the house of a village elder (mura osa no ie ᧛㐳ߩኅ) but these words were crossed out, the place name changed to Naniwa-e (Naniwa river mouth) and “elder” amended to “villager” (gŇmin ㇹ᳃). The final version omits the reference altogether. KitŇ’s reasons for doing this are not clear, but it seems likely that Buson’s family background lacked prestige. 3 Buson’s reluctance to advertise his family connections may have had a specific cause: Tamiya Chşsen ↰ችખት (d. 1816) writes in the zuihitsu 㓐╩ (miscellany) Random lazy jottings (Okotari gusa 㡆๭⍬⨲ 1806) that Buson left home out of shame after he had squandered his inheritance: (Yoshida) KenkŇ said, “You may know a person’s heart by the furnishings he owns.”4 Indeed, the paintings of this haikai poet Buson are greatly admired. I do not know what to say is the reason. When the ancients cherished paintings, first they spoke of the artist’s virtue, and then they praised his ability. This Buson squandered the inheritance that his father left him, and placed himself in a realm of frivolousness, distancing himself from the gods, Buddhas, and sages, and became a dilettante who threw away his name and dragged himself into vulgarity (zoku).5

Another theory is that Buson left the area because of natural disasters: several floods and famines struck the area between 1721 and 1735.

——— 3

Tanaka, pp. 4–5. Yoshida KenkŇ ศ↰౗ᅢ was the author of Tsurezuregusa ᓤὼ⨲ (ca. 1330). Chşsen refers to Section 10, “Indeed, one can tell the character of a person from the house he dwells in.” Essays in Idleness: The Tsurezuregusa of KenkŇ, trans. Donald Keene (New York: Columbia University Press, 1967), p. 10. 5 Nihon Zuihitsu Taisei Henshşbu, ed., Nihon zuihitsu taisei, vol. 10 (Nihon Zuihitsu Taisei KankŇkai, 1928–1929), p. 236. 4

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However, Buson himself said little about his upbringing and youth, so it is not known whether or not this is true. In any case, he kept his past a secret. His only direct reference to his early life survives in a letter he wrote to two female disciples, Ryşjo ᩉᅚ and Gazui ⾐ℰ, which states that he spent his childhood in Kema, a village in Settsu Province, now a suburb of Osaka. He noted this detail in order to provide a context for his haishi “Verse on the Spring Wind on the Kema Embankment.”6 This poem takes the voice of a young serving woman returning home from Osaka to Kema, and some scholars have speculated that he based its persona on memories of his own mother. Whatever his actual parentage was, no documents exist where he acknowledges it.

Figure 1 “Group portrait of haikai sages,” detail. Hanging scroll. Kakimori Bunko.

———

6 ņtani TokuzŇ et al., eds., Buson shokan shş (Iwanami Shoten, 1992), pp. 188–189. Henceforth Buson shokan shş is abbreviated as BSS in the notes.

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Buson was more keen to create evidence for his poetic ancestry than his biological one. A striking statement of this kind is his earliest extant painting, “Group portrait of haikai sages,” completed while he was in the northeast (Figure 1). The painting depicts a group of fourteen haikai poets from the genre’s beginnings. The earliest are Arakida Moritake ⨹ᧁ↰቞ᱞ (1473–1549) and Yamazaki SŇkan ጊፒቬ㐓 (late fifteenth–early sixteenth centuries); BashŇ and his disciples Kikaku and Ransetsu are also included. The most recent poet represented is Buson’s own teacher, Hajin.7 “Group portrait of haikai sages” is a visual work of genealogy, linking Buson’s teacher Hajin with a set of eminent poetic ancestors. It is an important document in the Revival movement, because it suggests that even at this point, many poets understood haikai’s history as a narrative with BashŇ at its center, setting the stage for a “return to BashŇ.” At the same time, the painting also serves to establish a lineage for Buson himself. While Buson’s own image does not appear, the painting implies that, as Hajin’s disciple, Buson also becomes a successor to an illustrious line. Buson’s statements in memorial volumes in honor of Hajin such as Far in the west (Nishi no oku ⷏ߩᅏ, 1742) and Make the past present (Mukashi o ima ᤄࠍ੹, 1774) also reinforce the relationship between Buson and Hajin. While it was customary for haikai poets to commemorate their teachers with such collections, Buson’s comments to these works suggest a special intimacy with his teacher, and imply that Hajin acknowledged Buson’s extraordinary promise: Not long ago Hajin rescued me from my solitude, and lavished on me an elderly man’s compassion. Surely we had some connection in a previous existence. Now there is nothing to do to ease my sorrow that he has gone away and will never return. My heart is full and I cannot think of anything to say.

waga namida furuku wa aredo izumi kana

my tears may be old but they are still a wellspring8

Aside from trying to conceal his past and create links to a prestigious haikai lineage, Buson was also quite critical of other poets in response to what he perceived as their hostile attitude toward him. For instance, in later life he looked back on his youthful days in Edo and describes them

——— 7 8

BZ, vol. 6, p.42. BZ, vol. 4, pp. 82–83. The hokku is in BZ, vol. 1, no. 9.

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as troubled, as if his poetic style made him unwelcome in the environment in which he found himself. KitŇ’s unpublished manuscript related to the composition of the Peaches and plums sequences quotes Buson as saying: Long ago, I was in Edo, and I searched for the inner teachings of the Master BashŇ, and the verse which I wrote was elegant and refined; mainly, I aspired to the lofty style of Empty chestnuts and Winter day. However, the people of the world did not know that kind of excellence. At that time, I was around 27 years old, not yet past my youth, but because my verse style had the quality of agedness the people of the world looked at me as if I were an enemy. Once someone said to me by way of advice, ‘Haikai is humorous, its main attribute is to make harmony between people and be amusing. The kind of eccentric thing you’re doing deviates from that basic essence. Why don’t you abandon this and give into human feeling?’ I listened to these words, and, coming to a realization, I finally went to the northeast and spent some time traveling around.9

“My verse style had the quality of agedness” (kuhŇ no oitaru o mote ฏᴺߩ⠧޿ߚࠆࠍ߽ߡ) suggests that Buson’s colleagues regard his work as too mature for someone his age to be writing, and not appropriate for a young poet in the trend-conscious city of Edo. The passage continues, saying that on his travels Buson learned to imitate whatever style was fashionable with the locals, but this early bitter experience seems to have lingered with him even after he became an established poet. Buson’s sense that other members of the community regarded him as an “enemy” may explain why many of his early writings contain statements that take an antagonistic posture, attacking the verse of other poets as inferior. A particularly damning statement is included in Buson’s preface to MŇotsu’s Ძ⿧ (dates unknown) Ancient and modern poetry card anthology (Kokon tanzaku shş ฎ੹⍴ౠ㓸, 1751), a collection of verses by poets of the past and present, printed in the form of reproductions of the poets’ original calligraphy: Nowadays those who are prominent in haikai have different approaches to the various styles, castigating this one and scorning that one, and they thrust out their elbows and puff out their cheeks, proclaiming themselves haikai masters. They will flatter the rich, and cause the small-minded [i.e., tentori poets] to run wild, and compile anthologies that list numerous unpolished verses. Those who really know haikai frown and throw them

——— 9

BZ, vol. 7, p. 254.

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away. Indeed, old priest Sainen-bŇ ⷏ᔨဌ uses their verses to patch his paper coverlet at night, and old nun MyŇshin-ni ᅱᔃዦ uses them to label her jars of miso; is this not a disgrace?10

MŇotsu’s collection aimed to reinvigorate interest in the work of haikai poets of the past, giving examples not only of their haikai but also of their handwriting, which shows them to be superior to the common type of haikai practitioner of the day. Buson heartily agrees with MŇotsu, coming down in severe judgment of the currently popular haikai style and of its purveyors, whom he characterizes as self-important, greedy, and ignorant. Elsewhere he castigates traveling verse markers who go from place to place peddling inferior teaching. Buson did not limit his censure to professional haikai poets; he also took a very unsympathetic view of the talentless amateurs around him. For example, in a letter to ShŇzan sent from Tango, Buson declares that, “I haven’t written much haikai since I’ve been here, because I can’t find anyone worth working with.”11 Even the poets of Kyoto, for centuries Japan’s capital of culture and refinement, did not escape Buson’s scorn: In any event, the hearts of people in Kyoto are the worst in all Japan. For a long time I did not think so, but after I started practicing haikai, more and more I find this to be the case. I have traveled over half of Japan, and the merits and faults of the human heart are as clear to me as if I could point to them in the palm of my hand.12

Buson wrote this in a letter to KitŇ, who was the target of some unspecified criticism or blame from other Yahantei members soon after the group formed in 1770. Whatever the circumstances, this letter and others make it clear that Buson felt he had few equals in Kyoto, but that KitŇ was one of them. These statements of superiority should be balanced against the many in which Buson expresses the worry that his haikai is not very good. Whatever his true feelings might have been about his own abilities, there is ample evidence that shows that he regarded almost everyone around him as his inferior. Buson reserves some of his most hostile criticism for poets of rural BashŇ schools; that is to say, the people who should have been his closest allies. Generally speaking, he disapproved most strongly of the poets of the Ise and Mino schools. The following passage appears in his

——— 10 BZ, vol. 4, p. 90. Sainen-bŇ and MyŇshin-ni are typical clerical names; they refer to no one in particular. 11 BSS, pp. 25–26. 12 BSS, pp. 58–59.

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Rules for selection (ShukuhŇ ขฏᴺ, 1771), a set of guidelines worked out to direct procedure at Yahantei meetings: There are those in the world who call themselves ShŇmon (the BashŇ school). In particular they do not know the style of Master BashŇ. The verses that they compose as well as what they theorize about do not get beyond the level of Shibaku (Rural BashŇ school) commonness. There are times when these are called Ise School or Mino School. How can we call them ShŇmon? People in the know call them by the nickname Backwoods BashŇ school. 13

The rural BashŇ poets came in for the most biting criticism in part because they were vulnerable to charges of hypocrisy, as many poets associated with these schools taught a watered-down version of BashŇ’s teachings—simplified so as to appeal to unsophisticated country people. In essence what they were doing was little different from what tentori haikai poets were doing, although as ostensible followers of BashŇ, they should have known better. Another reason for Buson’s hostility was that the rural BashŇ poets were also the rivals of the urban poets, to whose lineage Buson’s teacher Hajin belonged. And though Buson acknowledges that the urban poets were not as good as BashŇ himself (in one document he calls them “half as good”), he thought that the rural school poets were vastly worse—”only one tenth as good” as BashŇ. Buson’s letters also testify to a private ambivalence even towards writers like Ueda Akinari ਄↰⑺ᚑ (1734–1809), Chora and KyŇtai, who were strongly supportive of his aims to bring back haikai to the high standards set for it by BashŇ. While letters addressed directly to these people praise them and express wishes for further cooperation, Buson shows a different side in others. One letter alludes to a rumor going around the community that Buson and Chora both looked down on each other’s verse, and makes haste to deny it.14 Another uncompromisingly refers to KyŇtai as “narrow-minded.”15 The third strategy Buson used to manage his public image was to avoid definitive statements on the subject of his own poetic style. While he did not hesitate to point out others’ mistakes, with one notable exception, the preface to Shundei verse anthology, he was imprecise in his prescriptions for good haikai to the point where it appears that he was afraid of being pinned down by critics. One passage that offers insight

——— 13

BZ, vol. 4, p. 113. BSS, pp. 59–60. 15 Ibid., p. 309. 14

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into Buson’s attitude about the power of the audience to shape a poet’s work through acts of interpretation is included in New flower gathering, in which he warns his readers against being too hasty in setting out in print a definitive edition of one’s work: I think it is better not to publish hokku collections. After a collection is published, one’s reputation always diminishes immediately. One cannot help feeling that works like the Ransetsu anthology (GenbŇshş ₵ፄ㓸) and the Otsuyş anthology (Bakurinshş 㤈ᨋ㓸) did not serve the reputation of their authors. Why should we even discuss those of mediocre poets?16

As this statement shows, Buson was acutely conscious of the power of the reading public to pass judgment on a living author, anticipating that even in the best of cases poets can expect their value to plummet as the reality of their shortcomings is exposed in print. Haikai poets commonly published work in group collections showcasing the work of poets of a single school or compiled for another specific reason by an editor. Individual verse collections were rarer. Buson did not publish an individual verse collection during his lifetime; Buson verse anthology (Buson kushş ⭢᧛ฏ㓸, 1784), edited by KitŇ, came out after his death. Other writings sound like a pre-emptive defense against a charge that his poetic style was somehow inappropriate. He describes his verse as being “in step with the times” or “in response to the setting.” One such example is the inscription to a painting of the famous landscape of Amano-hashidate in Tango. He writes of his friendship with the painter Sakaki Hyakusen, where he almost takes a stance on his own style, but then defers: We both amuse ourselves with haikai poetry, tracing our lineages back to BashŇ. Hyakusen is a disciple of Renji’s ⬒ੑ (i.e., ShikŇ’s) style, but is not a member of the Renji faction. I studied Shinshi’s ᤯ሶ (i.e., Kikaku’s) teachings but do not imitate Shinshi. Thus if we fall in the river let it be so, let’s take one step up from the top of the hundred-foot pole. We are like that, neither of us has any interest in making a name for himself in the haikai world.17

This kind of evasiveness is echoed in other passages. In the memorial anthology Make the past present, Buson puts the words into the mouth of his teacher, “Changing with the times, transforming with the times in a

——— 16 Ransetsu and Otsuyş were prominent poets of the urban and rural BashŇ schools, respectively. BZ, vol. 4, p. 59. 17 BZ, vol. 4, p. 95.

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spontaneous manner, disregarding what has existed before or what may come into being later is the way it should be.”18 Some years later, in the preface to the linked verse collection Peaches and plums, he introduces an unnamed interlocutor to speak for his anticipated critics: At one time, this work consisted of four sequences, one for each of the four seasons. Spring and Autumn were lost, leaving only Summer and Winter. Someone suggested that I should get it carved in wood (i.e., published); someone else cautioned me, saying “It’s been a long time since these sequences were composed, and no doubt they are out of date compared to what is now fashionable.” I laughed and said, “The greatness of haikai is that in truth it has change, and in truth it is without change; for example, it is similar to going around a racetrack, running after people. It is like those running ahead are somehow chasing after those coming up behind. How can one know the difference between “ahead” and “behind” in change? I just express the things in my heart day by day; today it is the haikai of today, tomorrow, the haikai of tomorrow.19

This preface was written at around the same time as KitŇ’s draft cited above, where Buson is quoted as remembering Edo as full of enemies, and so their similarity not surprising. However, all of these passages indicate that Buson is wary of critics who might regard his verse as antiquated, as insufficiently like his teacher’s, or unfashionable. He argues that his verse is unlike most people’s because his ideals are higher than other people’s—he is trying not to stay up to date with what others are doing, but to create an authentic expression of his own experience. Buson’s relationship with the BashŇ Revival was a complex one: he was both apart from the movement and a part of it. On the one hand, for Buson, the pose of returning to BashŇ was not just a matter of slavishly imitating his predecessor’s poetic style. Rather, he responded to BashŇ’s example in a way that was informed by the cultural discourse of the mid-eighteenth century—one that was quite different from that of the Genroku period in which BashŇ was active. Buson’s verse was distinguished by a pervasive nostalgia for both an idealized Japanese past and an imagined China, a sense of gloom and frustration with the social and political conditions of the day—which he, like many of his contemporaries, met with a desire for escape—and a playful delight in the fantastic, the fictional, and the grotesque. On the other hand, Buson shared with other Revival poets some key values: one, an uncompromis-

——— 18 19

BZ, vol. 4, p. 140. BZ, vol. 4, pp. 193–194.

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ing attitude towards haikai as a legitimate form of literary activity, the equivalent of waka or renga; two, (at least nominally) the denial of desire for profit and professional advancement; and three, a careful, scholarly attitude towards creating and preserving a canon of texts—in this case, the works of BashŇ and members of his lineage. The Revival movement had its origins in conflicting pressures that had been central to haikai since its inception: the ongoing efforts of haikai poets to claim legitimacy for their genre, and its steady growth in popularity, which was accompanied by commercialization. These pressures were related to a more aesthetic issue: the friction between ga and zoku that was fundamental to haikai. The interplay between ga and zoku also expressed itself on a social level, as the aspirations of haikai poets—most of whom were commoners—to higher status, despite the fact that their genre was inevitably grounded in the commonplace by language and other generic characteristics. The aspirations of haikai poets were linked to more general trends within the society, particularly to the efforts of a variety of intellectuals to reclaim an idealized past, to create canons of texts that could serve as a source of authority, and to transcend the mundane world through a deep engagement with the arts. This was particularly true of the large numbers of sinophile scholars, artists, poets and connoisseurs who were associated with what can broadly be termed as the culture of the bunjin, or literatus. Despite the fact that haikai was a native Japanese poetic genre, its was closely linked with the world of sinophile intellectuals that flourished in this period, and the BashŇ Revival owed much to the ideas and notions that circulated within it.

Transcending the Ordinary: Buson and the Revival Movement A good way to get a closer look at the ideas behind the Revival movement is to examine one of its most representative texts, Buson’s preface to the Shundei verse anthology that was published in 1777 when the movement was at its height. While Buson’s statements on poetics are numerous, they tend to take the form of short, focused comments on verses that disciples sent to him for correction. He was not in the habit of writing extensive works of abstract theory, nor did his disciples create collections of his teachings like BashŇ’s students did. Thus the Shundei

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verse anthology preface—the closest Buson comes to writing a poetic treatise—is an important document. The Shundei verse anthology was a book of verses collected to commemorate the seventh anniversary of the death of Buson’s friend and disciple Kuroyanagi ShŇha. ShŇha’s son Korekoma edited the anthology, and asked Buson to provide the preface. Of Buson’s disciples, ShŇha was among those with the strongest ties to the literate, sinophilic culture that engendered the ideal of the bunjin. ShŇha’s grandfather had attended the KogidŇ academy of Ogyş Sorai’s mentor, ItŇ Jinsai; his father was a waka poet. ShŇha himself was well educated in Chinese studies through his training with Hattori Nankaku and Tatsu SŇro. He developed an interest in haikai later in life and started working with Buson in the 1760s. ShŇha was also a keen collector of Buson’s paintings, and sometimes acted as a go-between in some of Buson’s business transactions. He died in 1771, soon after Buson established his Yahantei school.20 Shundei verse anthology preface is styled as a series of conversations Buson had with ShŇha in the manner of a mondŇ ໧╵, or Buddhist dialogue. It shows that Buson’s views on haikai were heavily influenced by the discourse of the bunjin ideal; it addresses the question of the haikai community’s factionalization; and it argues that the essence of good haikai is in separating oneself as much as possible from the realm of the commonplace and commercial, valuing in their stead a striving for elegance and transcendence. This last point is what has come to be called Buson’s theory of distancing haikai from the mundane, or rizokuron 㔌ଶ⺰. In the opening, ShŇha asks Buson about haikai, and Buson answers: Haikai is that which has as its ideal the use of zokugo (ordinary language), yet transcends zoku (the ordinary world). To transcend zoku yet make use of zoku, the method of rizoku (transcending the ordinary), is most difficult. It is the thing that So-and-So Zen master spoke of: ‘Listen to the sound of the Single Hand,’ in other words haikai Zen, the principle of rizoku 㔌ଶ.21

Buson argues that the essence of good haikai is in separating oneself from and transcending the zoku realm, but retaining zoku language. Because haikai is intrinsically zoku, Buson’s recommendation is paradoxi-

——— 20 Ebara TaizŇ, “ShŇha,” in Ebara TaizŇ chosaku shş, vol. 13 (ChşŇ KŇronsha, 1979), pp. 294–308. 21 BZ, vol. 4, p. 172.

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cal. This is why he calls it “haikai Zen,” likening it to a kŇan or a riddle that has no solution, a device often used in Rinzai (Chinese Linji) Zen practice to help students get beyond their attachment to rational thinking. In less mystical terms, Buson reminds ShŇha that while haikai can never be without zoku language, that is no reason for haikai poets to sink into vulgarity, either in their work or in their conduct as poets. ShŇha pressed Buson for an explanation of this seemingly selfcontradictory statement, asking if there was not a more direct route to improving his haikai. Buson’s response here, too, is surprising. “Yes,” he answers, “the study of Chinese poetry. You have been studying Chinese poetry for years. Do not seek for another way.” When ShŇha expressed puzzlement, Buson elaborated, drawing on an example from his other area of expertise, painting: Painters have the theory of ‘Avoiding zoku:’ ‘To avoid the zoku in painting, there is no other way but to read many texts, that is to say, both books and scrolls, which causes the ki ᳇ (Chinese qi, life energy) to rise, as commercialism and vulgarity cause ki to fall. The student should be careful about this.’ To avoid zoku in painting as well, they caused their students to put down the brush and read books.22

Here Buson refers to the early Qing (1644–1911) Mustard seed garden manual of painting ⧂ሶ࿦↹વ (Japanese Keshien gaden, Chinese Jieziyuan huazhuan), compiled by Wang Gai ₺᭎ (1645–1707). The Mustard seed garden manual was first published in the late seventeenth century in Japan, and proved so popular that it was reprinted in 1748. It was particularly influential among nanga artists. The passage that Buson paraphrases, “Avoiding the banal” (෰ଶ) emphasizes the destructive influence of commercialism on the ki of artists; reading literary classics, it argues, is the best way to counteract this poisonous force: In painting, it is better to be inexperienced (young in ch’i) than stupid. It is better to be audacious than commonplace. If the brush is hesitant, it cannot be lively; if commonplace, it most likely will produce only banalities. If one aims to avoid the banal, there is no other way but to study more assiduously both books and scrolls to encourage the spirit (ch’i) to rise, for when the vulgar and the commonplace dominate, the ch’i subsides. The beginner should be hopeful and careful to encourage the ch’i to rise. 23

——— 22

Ibid., p. 172. Mai-mai Sze, The Mustard Seed Garden Manual of Painting: Chieh Tzu Yüan Chuan, 1679–1701, (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1978), p. 34. Ch’i is the WadeGiles romanization of qi. 23

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Later, ShŇha asked which of the many haikai factions that were active at the time was the best choice for achieving what he called the “innermost teaching.” This would seem to have offered a self-serving person an opening to promote his own method, but Buson shows much more finesse: In haikai there are no gates and doors... ‘The various painting masters did not divide into gates or build doors. Gates and doors exist in themselves.’ Haikai is just like this too. Learn exhaustively each tradition, and keep these in your mind, and you yourself will choose the best from among them, and make use of it according to the occasion.24

By “gates and doors,” Buson refers to the different factions that were active in the haikai community. The Chinese painting masters, he points out, recognized that loyalty to the teachings and style of any single group restricted an artist’s development. Rather than worrying about upholding a specific literary orthodoxy, Buson says, good haikai poets learn what they can from a variety of sources, and do not let their devotion to a particular tradition cloud their judgment. The notion that one should change one’s style “according to the occasion” frequently occurs in Buson’s description of his poetic goals. That is to say, he makes a virtue of his unwillingness to commit to a particular style. Furthermore, his mention of factions and the desirability of avoiding entanglements with them testifies to the fact that there was a great deal of competition in the haidan, and that poets did well to worry more about their verse than their standing in any one of them. He goes on to say, again referring to the world of Chinese art, that one can learn even from bad examples, thus making clear the Yahantei school’s antipathy towards rural BashŇ poets at the same time as acknowledging that even they provide opportunities for learning. Buson also describes in detail the kind of life a haikai poet should lead. Most importantly, he says, one must choose the right companions. “I mean seeking after Kikaku, looking for Ransetsu, inviting in SodŇ, and accompanying Onitsura,” naming three BashŇ disciples and the idealistic Uejima Onitsura ਄ፉ㝩⽾(1661–1738) as the best friends that a poet could have. Of course, all four were long dead, and Buson is really repeating the recommendation to “read books and scrolls” that he made above, but here the classics are not those of Chinese literature, such as the authors of the Mustard seed garden manual or their Japanese bunjin

——— 24

BZ, vol. 4, p. 173.

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followers would have imagined, but the work of exemplary haikai poets of the past. What is notable here is that in designating these poets as “right companions,” Buson is creating an orthodoxy for haikai, in which the proper models are not poets of classical elite genres. It may seem obvious that aspiring haikai poets should emulate other haikai poets. However, this was a formative phase of the genre’s development, and Buson’s words here are in line with the direction that later forces of canonization would take: these four poets remain central figures in later configurations of haikai history. Afterwards, Buson continues his admonitions, stating that one “should separate oneself from the realm of fame and fortune,” enjoy nature, wine, and witty conversation, and let poems come into the mind spontaneously, without trying to force them. The behavior that Buson describes here is precisely the one that admirers of the bunjin sought for formation themselves; only here he presents it as the most conducive climate for producing haikai. The Shundei verse anthology preface is a significant document because despite its brevity, it touches on a number of issues that were important to the BashŇ Revival movement and indeed to the literary discourse of the late eighteenth century more generally. These issues relate to the identity of the writer in an era when developments in education, publishing, and political and economic structures conspired to create an expanding market of readers whose values and expectations were different from those of the educated elites of the past. Its central message, that excellence in writing was a consequence of withdrawal from competition for commercial success, was a direct response to the popularization of haikai. It suggests that the efforts of Revival poets like Buson to find a standard for their verse that neutralized the effects of zokuthe ordinary, everyday worldwas related to a desire to define an identity that transcended their lower social status. While few haikai theorists after Buson were to so explicitly identify haikai and Chinese art and literature as Buson does in the preface to Shundei verse anthology, the close connection he makes between poetry and painting continued to be one of haikai’s central tenets. In the next chapter, I will begin discussing Buson’s hokku, or seventeen-syllable verse, exploring the ways in which the keen awareness that Buson shows in Shundei verse anthology of pressures on haikai poets affected his formation as a poet and his early forays into hokku.

CHAPTER THREE

ANXIETY AND THE FORMATION OF A POET: HOKKU 1740–1770 Buson’s hokku do not lend themselves well to interpretive approaches that assume a close, transparent connection between the narrative contexts they create and the events of his life. One of the reasons for this is particular to Buson: his distrust of his audience and careful efforts to create a public persona did not create the conditions that might have led to autobiographical poetry. However, the distance between art and life that we see in Buson’s verse is common to that of other haikai poets, and is actually an intrinsic part of the genre as a whole. A major reason that haikai is so poorly suited to biographical analysis is its communality. In its most basic form, the linked verse sequence, it was a collaboration where poets wrote spontaneous responses to others’ compositions. Linked verse demanded a high degree of flexibility, as those working in this form could not predict what kind of verse they would be expected to contribute when their turn in the sequence came. Hokku—originally the starting verse of a sequence—were also composed in group settings, and typically they were written in response on dai 㗴 or topics that were chosen by the group leader either in advance of a gathering or there on the spot. Consequently, even hokku that appear to be expressions of some personal experience often turn out to have been written as one of many on the same topic, in the company of other poets who were all working on it too. For this reason, the emotions expressed within a verse are not a reliable indication of what was going on in its author’s life. Of course, to argue that there is no connection between haikai and the inner life of the people who wrote it would be overstating the case. Nevertheless, in discussing the work of any haikai poet it is important to avoid the assumption that it offers a direct means of access to his or her emotions or psychological states. Furthermore, while the communal and occasional nature of haikai makes a biographical approach problematic in any case, Buson’s deliberate elusiveness on the subject of his personal life makes him an especially poor candidate for this sort of analysis. Because his writing

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makes almost no reference to his natal family or his youth, it is very hard to tease out the relationship between his verse and his experience in the first part of his career. Even in his later years, after he established his reputation as a painter and a poet, the connections between the world created in his verse and the events of his life are indirect at best. Thus, it is possible to view many aspects of Buson’s verse as part of a pattern of deliberate efforts to construct a public identity and control information that might influence the reception of his work. Finally, Buson’s verse constructs an alternate world, in which the everyday realities of life are transformed into a landscape drawn from imagination and the literary tradition. As we shall see in this chapter, a notable characteristic of many Buson hokku is their ability to create the sense of an entire fictional narrative in the brief space of seventeen syllables, transporting the scene to Heian or medieval Japan, or to a setting derived from Chinese poetry or history. Alternatively, other hokku describe landscapes with such remote detachment and apparent objectivity that interpreters of Buson in the Meiji era like Masaoka Shiki, heralded him as a forerunner of objective realism in modern haiku. In short, Buson’s verse demands that readers look beyond the details of its author’s life for possible clues to its interpretation. At the same time, however, it is precisely haikai’s communal nature, which makes it impossible to detach from the social context in which it was written. Buson’s maturation as a poet was informed by the environment in which he worked, and so any discussion of his verse must be mindful of the forces in the community that helped to shape it. Also, while it is not possible to discern obvious shifts in stylistic development over the course of Buson’s lifetime, certain general patterns can still be observed. Thus there is merit to ordering a discussion of his verse chronologically. With this in mind, I structure my exploration of Buson’s hokku in two sections: those he wrote during his time in Edo northeastern Japan and places in and around Kyoto when he was learning the haikai craft and developing a distinctive voice (1731–1770), and those contained in anthologies compiled during the last part of his life (1770– 1784) after he became the leader of the Yahantei school. By viewing Buson’s hokku as part of a social context, it will be possible to discern the effect that Buson’s highly ambivalent awareness of his audience has on his verse.

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Conventions of the Hokku Before beginning our examination of Buson’s hokku, it will help to explain some of the basic conventions of the hokku form itself. “Hokku” means “starting verse;” the word betrays the form’s origins as the first verse in a sequence. While haikai began as a linked form, over the years, composition of the hokku on its own became more widespread. The hokku’s popularity was connected to its convenience—unlike a linked verse sequence, a single poet working alone could compose it. As we shall see, this aspect of the hokku does not exempt it from haikai’s basic convention of communality, but because it could be worked over and revised, it was used first as a pedagogical tool by teachers and eventually became established as a form in its own right. Hokku were seventeen syllables long, with a three-part structure of five syllables in the first section, seven in the second, and five in the last. The 5-7-5 pattern is common in all forms of classical Japanese poetry. Occasionally haikai poets deviated from this convention by including fewer (jitarazu ሼ⿷ࠄߕ) or more (jiamari ሼ૛ࠅ) syllables in order to achieve a particular effect, but this was exceptional. Also, the hokku is expected to include a season word—a kidai ቄ㗴 (seasonal topic or kigo ቄ⺆ (seasonal word)—and these were not chosen at random, but were fixed by tradition. Consciousness of the season is another basic characteristic of classical Japanese poetry, and from the time of the earliest imperial poetry anthologies words referring to plants, animals, meteorological phenomena, human activities such as festivals and other annual observances were all given a place in the poetic calendar of seasonal topics. Connotations of these words, or hon’i ᧄᗧ (original meaning) were set by their appearance in early poems; later, dictionaries and handbooks were compiled that listed the acceptable usage of these words. In the seventeenth century, however, the pioneers of haikai built upon the tradition of waka and renga reference works to create a lexicon of their own. Haikai poets learned classical usages as part of their training, and the impact of a verse depended on their skillful balancing of the conventional meaning, i.e., the hon’i, of a topic with whatever new and startling insight they were able to add to it, typically creating a clash between the worlds of ga and zoku. Whereas waka and renga poets were expected to employ these seasonal topics in a way that demonstrated

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their understanding of the hon’i, haikai poets were expected to create a humorous or startling twist on this accepted meaning. Let us look at an example of the way this works in practice. The following Buson hokku ostensibly describes a natural scene, although its headnote immediately suggests that there is another level of meaning at work: SoŇ no ku o osoite

Inheriting one of our Ancestor’s verses:

furu ike no kawazu oiyuku ochiba kana

the old pond’s frog is growing elderly fallen leaves1

As is typical of hokku, semantically this is made up of two parts. First, we encounter an old pond, and alongside it, a frog. Kawazu (frog) is a poetic word whose hon’i is suggestive of spring; it calls to mind lusty, energetic frogs calling to their mates in the breeding season. However, its appearance here is somewhat puzzling, as it is described as “growing old;” that is, the very opposite of what one might expect. The second part of the verse introduces “fallen leaves” (ochiba) to the scene. “Fallen leaves” is a winter topic that refers to leaves turned dry, brown, and brittle, long after the green of spring and the deep colors of autumn have left them. Thus the season is established as winter, and now everything makes sense: the frog is silent, and time is passing it by, because it is in hibernation under leaf litter that covers the ice in a frozen-over pond. As this example shows, the two parts of the hokku juxtapose seemingly disparate elements to create the effect of surprise. The division of the two parts is usually marked with a kireji ಾࠇሼ or cutting word. Typical kireji include the particles ya and kana, both of which in other contexts are used to mark phrases of high emotion. When no kireji is present, the break is indicated by the syntax. In “The old pond’s” (Furu ike no), the kireji kana follows ochiba, indicating that it has strong emotional value, and sets it off from the phrase that precedes it. The first part of the verse is similar to a question or riddle for which an answer is expected. As kawazu is emblematic of spring, the reader is held in suspense, wondering why an image that implies vigor and youth should be described as growing old. The introduction of the kireji-marked ochiba is like a revelation that solves the riddle, shifting the scene into a setting where everything suddenly makes sense.

——— 1

BZ, vol. 1, no. 2832.

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A second characteristic common to the hokku is its dialogical quality. That is to say, the hokku was fundamentally a greeting to a person or a place. This characteristic is related to the hokku’s original function as the starting verse of a sequence that was composed in the company of several people on a single occasion. The most senior member of the party was given the honor of composing the hokku, and he or she returned the favor by phrasing it as a compliment or aisatsu ᜿ᜦ (salutation) to the host. Even after the hokku came to be composed independently of verse sequences, this “greeting-like” quality persisted. Aisatsu to places were also common. These might take the form of an indirect acknowledgement of a host through praise of the locality in which he or she lived, or an address to the spirit or genius loci of a spot famous for its beauty, sacredness, or literary associations. It was also common for hokku to take the form of “greetings” to poetic predecessors—in effect, parodies that call to mind a source text and rework an old theme in a new setting. This kind of parody occurs frequently in all premodern Japanese poetry, which is highly allusive, in part as a technique to open out a verse’s meaning beyond the thirty-one or seventeen syllables to which poets were limited. Repeatedly incorporating the language of source texts in later poetry reinforced the association of topics with particular meanings, and in this way hon’i were created. As a result, even an extremely short form like the hokku could make a very profound, comic or moving statement by connecting up with a network of associations that had been formed by centuries of usage in literature of the past.2 Furu ike no is a good example of the “greeting-like” characteristic of hokku. Even without the headnote that alludes to “our Ancestor,” i.e., BashŇ, it is clear that the verse is a parody of hokku that was deeply admired by BashŇ’s followers because it is thought to mark his achievement of his mature poetic style: furu ike ya kawazu tobikomu mizu no oto

the old pond a frog jumps in the sound of water3

BashŇ

——— 2 Haruo Shirane, “Aisatsu: The Poet as Guest,” in New Leaves: Studies and Translations in Honor of Edward Seidensticker, ed. Aileen Gatten et al. (Ann Arbor: Center for Japanese Studies, University of Michigan Press, 1993), pp. 89–104. 3 NKBT, vol. 45, p. 37.

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In BashŇ’s verse, the kireji “ya” follows furu ike (the old pond), cutting it into two phrases, “the old pond” and “a frog jumps in / sound of water.” The tension of the verse is created by the juxtaposition of these two phrases: the contrast between the static image of an old pond, evocative of stillness and silence, and the dynamic energy of a living animal, which moves (tobikomu, to jump in) and creates a sound (mizu no oto, the sound of water). BashŇ adds another layer of surprise by using the word kawazu (frog, here acting as the kigo), which by virtue of its hon’i suggests to the reader that the sound it will make will be that of its own voice, calling out to its mate. BashŇ defies these traditional expectations by focusing on the “plop” that it makes jumping into the water. This creates a situation that is considerably less elegant than what one would expect from classical waka, and for this reason the verse is gently comical—a parody of classical poetry that refer to kawazu as expressive of romantic longing. On the surface it might appear to be nothing more than a description of a natural scene that the poet actually observed, but it has another layer of meaning that is accessible through an appreciation of the way that the poet calls on the classical tradition. Buson’s verse is in turn a parody of BashŇ’s, adding its voice to the long ongoing dialogue between Japanese poets and their predecessors. While Buson’s verse perhaps could also be interpreted as an account of something he observed directly, the parallels to BashŇ’s verse are so obvious it seems unlikely that they were not deliberate, and the addition of the headnote makes the connection indisputable. Both share the structure furu ike [particle] / kawazu [verb], which would almost certainly cause the reader to recall the earlier verse, and in inviting this comparison Buson causes the differences between the two to become the focus of the reader’s efforts to interpret his verse’s meaning. Replacing BashŇ’s kireji “ya” with the possessive marker “no,” and placing his kireji in the last section of his verse, “the old pond’s / frog grows elderly” is juxtaposed with “fallen leaves.” As a result, the reader’s experience is not so much the amusement of an expectation comically redirected, as we saw in BashŇ’s hokku; rather, it is more like the relief of a puzzle solved. Read with the knowledge that this verse is a parody of BashŇ’s landmark “The old pond” (Furu ike ya), Buson’s “The old pond’s” (Furu ike no) can be interpreted not as an account of the poet’s observation of a natural scene, but as a form of address to his poetic predecessor. It then becomes possible to read it as a comment on the state of the haikai genre of the day, that is, a statement of frustration and dissatisfaction with the

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popular neglect of BashŇ’s teachings. In other words, a once energetic and youthful animal—BashŇ’s poetic legacy—is now dormant and aging in the frozen barrenness of the contemporary haikai community. Haikai poets’ dialogue with their predecessors was matched by a more immediate form of dialogue in their practice, as their verses were usually composed or at least presented in a communal setting. Haikai groups frequently conducted monthly study meetings where members got together and received instruction from their teachers, or held outings to places famous for their natural beauty at which haikai composition was a central activity. Typically, topics were assigned for these gatherings, and everyone composed on the same ones; the resulting verses were then shared and corrected by the teacher. Haikai was composed in a context of cooperation and understanding between the participants in a given session; as a record of a particular encounter, they have a strong sense of immediacy. The group was a source of more than just instruction: it also afforded a sense of identity and allegiance, and as well as becoming a center of rivalry and competition. Thus, the anxiety of reception was always at the heart of haikai practice, as the very nature of the genre meant that poets were keenly aware of their position within a larger community of fellow writer-readers. This is very true of all haikai poets, but something that we especially want to keep in mind as we read the hokku of Buson.

Buson’s Early Hokku: The Edo Yahantei School Buson arrived in Edo a few years after the publication of the pioneering reform-minded anthology Ink of five colors, and his disdain for commercially minded forms of haikai was evident almost from the time that he got there. Uchida Senzan, with whom he first began to study, was a successor to the Edo-school poet Sentoku, and like him, favored witty flamboyance in his verse. Not long afterward, however, Buson switched to Yahantei, the school of Hayano Hajin, a proponent of a much simpler and more straightforward style than was typical of urban poets. Hajin had studied with BashŇ disciples Kikaku and Ransetsu, though his own work was quite different from theirs. In fact, Hajin was a very unconventional Edo-school poet. Although his training had been with Ransetsu and Kikaku, leaders of Edo urban haikai, he associated with many different poets, including Tantan in

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Kyoto and Gikş, whose verse was included in Ink of five colors. Hajin spent about ten years in the Kyoto area, becoming acquainted with a variety of haikai styles. He returned to Edo in 1737 at the urging of his disciple Isaoka GantŇ, a rich merchant who lived in Yşki, in present-day Ibaraki Prefecture; later, Hajin established a haikai school in Nihonbashi’s Koku-chŇ, and called it Yahantei (Midnight studio). Hajin was a forerunner of the kind of poet that would take an active role in the Revival movement: his approach to haikai was eclectic, openminded, and focused on achieving authentic expression rather than impressing others or copying his teacher. Buson’s description of Hajin in the preface to the memorial volume Make the past present alludes to these qualities: One evening, he sat formally and said, “The Way of haikai is not necessarily a matter of devoting yourself to your teacher’s rules. Change with the times, transform with the times, in a spontaneous manner, disregarding what has existed before or what may come into being later is the way it should be.” Struck by this meditation-master’s rod I had a sudden insight, and have some small understanding of the authentic freedom of haikai. 4

As this passage indicates, Hajin valued responsiveness to the times rather than the imitation of one particular teacher. Buson made this a foundation of his approach to haikai, and he followed this principle until the end of his life. Buson also remarks on Hajin’s indifference to gossip, that is, talking about competitor haikai teachers. It was precisely these values—commitment to authenticity of expression, avoidance of slavish imitation, and a seriousness of purpose that Hajin shared with Revival poets. Despite Hajin’s own relaxed attitude towards poetic lineage, his status as a second-generation BashŇ disciple was an undeniable asset. Even at this stage, Buson appears to have been very aware of the importance of professional lineages in the haidan, and he chose one that connected him, through Hajin, to the famous Kikaku and through him to the paragon of haikai poets, BashŇ. Buson’s preference for the early BashŇ Empty chestnuts style, i.e., one that favored complexity of language and allusions to Chinese literature—rather than the later karumi style that was favored by the rural poets—was one that Hajin shared. A few verses survive that Buson wrote while he was a member of Hajin’s school. They are not literary masterpieces, but they show the

——— 4

BZ, vol. 4, p. 140.

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point of origin of some issues that were common to Buson’s poetry all of his life. Most importantly, it is possible to identify the genesis of a spirit of resistance, that is to say a rejection of the kinds of frivolous verse that were the mainstay of the tentori and commercially-minded urban haikai poets. As we shall see, Buson starts his career with verses that show a delight in the kind of superficial word play that was popular with the urban school, but he also wrote some that suggest the beginning of a desire to transcend the common, popular modes of haikai practice of the day. Indeed, from Buson’s earliest days as a haikai poet, it is possible to discern three consistent themes: first, a stance critical of the haidan, second, a strong tendency to create fictional worlds, and third, frequent allusions to BashŇ and his work. These three themes intertwine, since the desire for escape to an idealized world of the imagination and the valorization of BashŇ’s example are both linked to Buson’s anxiety and rejection of what he saw as the vulgarity of the contemporary haidan. The earliest verse that can be attributed to Buson was included in Fourth month principles (Uzuki teikin ව᦬ᐸ⸠), an illustrated haikai collection edited by Rogetsu 㔺᦬ (1667–1751) that was published in 1737. Buson also contributed a picture—a line drawing of a young woman reading a letter, seated alongside a small pile of plant stems: amadera ya jşya ni todoku bin kazura

at the convent a cosmetic arrives during the Ten Nights’ Ceremony5

Amadera (convent) here refers to TŇkei-ji, the Kamakura “divorce temple” where women could be released from their marriage vows after three years of residence. Jşya means the Ten Nights’ Ceremony, a devotion practiced by Pure Land Buddhist temples from the fifth to the fifteenth night of the Tenth Month. Bin kazura is another word for sanekazura, a kind of vine belonging to the magnolia family. An extract from this plant, a local specialty of Kamakura, was used in arranging the hair. In the classical tradition, sanekazura has elegant connotations that can be traced back to its use in a waka by SanjŇ no Udaijin ਃ᧦ฝᄢ⤿ (Fujiwara no Sadakata ⮮ේቯᣇ, 873–932) that is included in One

——— 5

BZ, vol. 1, no. 1. The illustration is in Chapter Six, Figure 4.

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hundred poets, one poem each (Hyakunin isshu ⊖ੱ৻㚂). In this verse, the persona addresses the vine, asking it to draw his absent beloved to him: na ni shi owaba Osakayama no sanekazura hito ni shirarede kuru yoshi mo gana

if you bear this name vine of Meeting Hill without letting people know could you draw her to me?6

SanjŇ no Udaijin In keeping with the urban style, the hokku is humorous: though the woman is in a convent, her mind is not on her devotions, but on the lover who has sent her the letter. The verse was written on the topic of things associated with Kamakura, and Buson chooses two of them— TŇkei-ji temple and a beauty aid—to make a comic juxtaposition. Other Buson verses of this period also show a taste for light-hearted word play, such as this one from Peaches and cherries (Momosakura ᩶᪉, 1739), Hajin’s memorial anthology honoring the thirty-third anniversary of the death of his teacher, Kikaku: suribachi no misomi meguri ya tera no shimo

the mill grinds miso thirty-three times frost at the temple7

Misomi means thirty-three, and it contains the word miso, soybean paste. Meguri, turns, refers both to the action of the mill turning to grind the soybeans, and the thirty-three times the year has turned since Kikaku’s death. “The mill” (Suribachi no) is a fitting aisatsu to Kikaku, who was fond of using word games in his hokku. While these verses are consistent with the urban style, others suggest that Buson was already developing a desire to avoid its excesses, and to aspire for something a little more aesthetically ambitious. One example is this verse from the Yahantei new year’s day booklet (saitanchŇ ᱦᣤᏭ) of 1738: Fuji o mite tŇru hito ari toshi no ichi

gazing at Mount Fuji people pass by year-end market8

——— 6 7

Haruyama YŇko, Hyakunin isshu, Koten shinshaku shiriizu 18 (ChşdŇkan, 2003), p. 42. BZ, vol. 1, no. 7.

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“Year-end market” (toshi no ichi) is a market that sold goods for the new year; it was open from the middle to the end of the Twelfth Month. In the midst of the crowds at the market, the verse’s persona takes a moment to appreciate the sight of Mount Fuji, clearly visible in the crisp winter air. On one level it is a fairly typical new year’s hokku, bringing together the lofty image of Mount Fuji with the more mundane but still felicitous image of the year-end market. At the same time, as Shimizu Takayuki has argued, it also conveys another meaning: Buson’s feelings of loneliness and isolation within the Edo haidan, where poets were so concerned with profiting financially from their verses that they failed to notice its potential for elegance and grandeur.9 Other very early Buson verses, published under the name SaichŇ ቿ↸ (or ቿ㠽)which he used until around 1744, are similarly bland and conventionalized, like these that were included in new year’s anthologies: ume sageta ware ni shiwasu no hito tŇru

carrying a branch of plum all around me people pass in the year-end rush10

omonoshi no yoake o neiru shiwasu kana

the seamstress still asleep at dawn year-end rush11

Shiwasu (year-end rush) refers to the period just before New Year’s day, when people hurried to pay off lingering debts, tidy the house, and prepare themselves to start the new year with a clean slate. In “Carrying a branch of plum” (Ume sageta) the speaker is surrounded by busy, distracted people, and he alone takes the time to appreciate the beauty of the signs of coming spring—in this case, plum blossoms. In “The seamstress” (Omonoshi no) a young woman, having stayed up late working on the sewing projects she needs to finish in time for new year’s day, is too weary to wake up even though it is daylight. This final very early Buson verse is also in celebration of the new year, though it uses a slightly different strategy:

——— 8

BZ, vol. 1, no. 3. Shimizu, Yosa Buson no kanshŇ to hihyŇ, pp. 431–432. 10 BZ, vol. 1, no. 4. 11 BZ, vol. 1, no. 5. 9

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shirami toru kojiki no tsuma ya ume ga moto

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searching for lice the beggar’s wife under a plum tree12

This is a good example of the way that haikai’s humor derives from its combination of elements of literary elegance with images of ordinary life. Shirami (lice) and kojiki (beggar) belong to the realm of zoku. Plum trees in blossom (ume), on the other hand, are a classical poetic topic. Following the description of a lower-class person engaged in a base physical activity with a reference to the graceful blossoms, which Buson frequently uses as an emblem of purity, creates a sense of dissonance that is gently comic.

Buson in the Northeast Many scholars refer to the years that Buson spent in the TŇhoku (northeastern) area as his period of shşgyŇ ୃᬺ, a word normally used to refer to arduous religious training. Making his base in Yşki in ShimŇsa Province for nearly a decade, Buson took up temporary residence with wealthy commoners throughout the northeast. In contrast to Edo, where, as Buson later wrote, he felt surrounded by enemies, ShimŇsa was a good place for a young, aspiring painter to begin his career. Hajin disciples and friends provided him with contacts through which he was able to find material support and permission to view paintings, as many of them owned collections of art work that Buson could study to improve his repertoire, and they could introduce him to other prosperous local townspeople and farmers who might potentially become clients. The following was written in 1740, soon after Buson first went to ShimŇsa. Its headnote is “Waiting for spring at the foot of Mount Tsukuba:” yuku toshi ya akuta nagaruru Sakuragawa

——— 12 13

BZ, vol. 1, no. 6. BZ, vol. 1, no. 8.

year’s end rubbish goes floating by on the Sakura River13

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This hokku is another good example of the way that haikai brings together the realms of the elegant and the everyday. The Sakura River runs along the south of Mount Tsukuba (in modern Ibaraki Prefecture), and was an utamakura (poetic place name) associated with cherry blossoms. Mount Tsukuba was connected with renga because it is mentioned in the poem exchange between the legendary figures Yamato Takeru no Mikoto ᣣᧄᱞዅ and Keeper of the Fires which is considered the earliest example of the genre: nibari tsukuba o sugite iku yo ka netsuru

After passing Niibari and Tsukuba how many nights have I slept?

Yamato Takeru no Mikoto kaganabete yo ni wa kokonoyo hi ni wa tŇka o

Counting them up of nights there have been nine and of days there have been ten14

Keeper of the Fires The verse also makes another allusion to an altogether different genre: medieval nŇ plays. The word akuta (rubbish) in connection with this river appears in the play Sakura River (Sakuragawa ᪉Ꮉ). Because of its associations in the classical tradition, one would expect to find a reference to this river including cherry blossom petals carried along in the waters, but here, we instead read of the rubbish people have dumped in the river after the year-end cleanup. More significantly, this verse can be read as a conventional aisatsu to the Sakura River, and a prayer for the new year to bring with it fresh new poetry. Like “Gazing at Mount Fuji” (Fuji o mite) that had been published two years earlier, it is possible to view “End of the year” as another statement of Buson’s dissatisfaction with the Edo haidan, and that the river running past renga’s sacred place of origin will cleanse and purify his haikai of Edo’s negative influence.15 ShimŇsa was home to many prosperous merchants and farmers who were able to indulge themselves by studying poetry and collecting books and paintings. It was not uncommon for people from ShimŇsa to travel

——— 14 Mack Horton, Song in an Age of Discord: ‘The Journal of SŇchŇ’ and Poetic Life in Late Medieval Japan (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2002), pp. 196–197. 15 BZ, vol. 1, p. 11.

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to Edo for business, and that way stay in touch with urban trends. Intellectually, too, wealthy ShimŇsa merchants rivaled their urban counterparts, and Buson’s circle of acquaintance included highly educated and literate people. These affluent ShimŇsa commoners were very comfortable in economic terms, and they were eager to acquire the kind of prestige afforded by patronage of artists like Buson. While in the northeast Buson depended on these patrons for financial backing and access to paintings and books that he could study, but they were useful to him in another way: they offered him a community where he could practice his haikai. In return, Buson’s presence brought them the prestige and social recognition associated with being sophisticated supporters of the arts.

The Impact of Chinese Poetry: Buson’s Narrow road to the interior Journey In addition to the financial help and companionship he received from his patrons during this period, Buson also benefited from exposure to their knowledge of Chinese poetry. As we have seen, the early part of the eighteenth century saw a rise in interest in the Chinese classics and the figure of the bunjin. Buson’s frequent allusions to Chinese poetry can be understood as part of this phenomenon, as his patrons in the northeast were interested in the bunjin ideal, and many of them composed kanshi as well as haikai. It is likely that one of his earliest encounters with Chinese poetry was through the teachings of Hattori Nankaku, a disciple of Ogyş Sorai, whose academy of Chinese learning was not far from where he stayed when he visited Edo after Hajin’s death. Though the evidence is slight, most scholars agree that Buson either studied with Nankaku directly or absorbed some of his teachings through his students. Also, GantŇ was acquainted with Nankaku, and would have been able to introduce the two. Nankaku was one of his generation’s most prominent teachers and writers of kanshi. He had originally been in the service of Yanagisawa Yoshiyasu ᩉᴛศ଻ (1658–1714) advisor to shogun Tokugawa Tsunayoshi ᓼᎹ✁ศ (1646–1709) and the founder of the famous Tokyo Rikugien ౐⟵࿦ garden. However, Nankaku eventually left his position with Yoshiyasu to open his own private academy. Like his mentor Sorai, Nankaku emphasized the connection between poetry and virtue and put

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his teachings into practice: living a lifestyle that was an embodiment of the bunjin, transcending the mundane world with poetry and learning. After Sorai died in 1728, Nankaku and his colleague Dazai Shundai took over the leadership of the Sorai school, Shundai teaching the Confucian classics (keigaku ⚻ቇ) and Nankaku lecturing on poetry.16 In addition to the connection with Nankaku, the relationships Buson forged while in northeastern Japan included people with an interest in Chinese painting, and through them Buson became familiar with Chinese art theories, literature and other aspects of Chinese learning. One of the earliest verses that shows Buson’s interest in Chinese poetry is also among his most famous. It is one of the few that can be directly linked to his journey retracing BashŇ’s Narrow road to the interior route. It shows a complex interweaving of allusions to Chinese poetry, medieval Japanese poetry, as well as to BashŇ’s kanshibunchŇ style: yanagi chiri shimizu kare ishi tokoro dokoro

willow leaves, fallen clear stream, dried out stones, here and there17

Buson’s detached, apparently objective depiction of the scene has interested commentators who consider him to be primarily a visual poet18 And indeed, it does appear later in inscriptions on paintings that are spare and simple, like sketches from life. However, Buson contextualizes the verse with headnotes. The verse was published several times, with differing headnotes. In its earliest source, Wastepaper coverlet (Hogo busuma ෻ฎ߱ߔ߹, 1752), it appears with a headnote linking the poem to SaigyŇ, the medieval poet, priest and traveler who had a profound influence on BashŇ. Most later versions of the hokku also make this reference. Some five centuries earlier, SaigyŇ wrote a waka on the theme of willows that later became famous: michinobe ni shimizu nagaruru yanagi kana

by the side of the road along a flowing stream of clear water a willow

——— 16 Yamamoto Kazuyoshi and Yokoyama Hiroshi, eds., Edo shijin senshş, vol. 3, Hattori Nankaku, Gion Nankai (Iwanami Shoten, 1991), pp. 337–344. 17 BZ, vol. 1, no. 12. 18 Masaoka Shiki, for instance, includes this verse as one example of Buson’s “Objective beauty” ቴⷰ⊛⟤ in Haijin Buson, Haikai taiyŇ (Iwanami Shoten, 1955), p. 118.

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shibashi tote koso tachi tomaretsure

67

I paused for what I thought would just be a moment19

SaigyŇ While the willow about which SaigyŇ wrote his verse was one he saw on a painted screen, the waka became the basis of legend. SaigyŇ and the willow became the subject of the NŇ play, The traveling priest and the willow (YugyŇ yanagi ㆆⴕᩉ). A tree in Ashino, in modern Tochigi Prefecture, came to be identified with SaigyŇ’s willow. BashŇ, who admired SaigyŇ, visited it on his Narrow road to the interior journey. He composed this verse: ta ichimai uete tachisaru yanagi kana

a whole field was planted before I left a willow20

BashŇ BashŇ himself went on many journeys to famous poetic sites, and recontextualized them as haikai. Buson’s visit to the site of SaigyŇ’s willow some fifty years later was homage to BashŇ as well as SaigyŇ and the verse he wrote acknowledges and confirms haikai’s links to the classical tradition. However, in the spirit of BashŇ’s kanshibunchŇ style, Buson takes this process a step further, recasting the classical Japanese literary tradition into the context of Chinese poetry, thus making a familiar trope strange and new. Here orthography becomes a particularly effective device. The early printed versions of this verse present it entirely in Chinese characters, and even later versions minimize the use of kana, so that the verse looks very much like a line of kanshi. Buson also uses strict syntactic parallelism: a noun followed by a verb in “yanagi chiri (willow leaves, fallen) / shimizu kare (stream dried out)”—a characteristic of Chinese literary prose and poetry. BashŇ’s hokku “A whole field” (Ta ichimai) takes up the theme of the passage of time so sensitively expressed in SaigyŇ’s waka, and reworks it in a haikaiesque mode by linking it with the ordinary work of farmers planting their fields. Buson takes this reworking another step. Instead of using imagery from the world of common experience to create a contrast with the elegant

——— 19 Hisamatsu Sen’ichi, ed., NKBT, vol. 28, Shin kokin waka shş (Iwanami Shoten, 1958), no. 262. 20 NKBT, vol. 45, p. 85.

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tradition evoked by the reference to the willow—instead he places it in the realm of Chinese poetry, in effect making kanshi in haikai form. As this verse indicates, Buson’s delight in working across generic boundaries was something that began in the earliest period of his work. This is consistent with other developments of the time, specifically the popularizing of kanshi through the efforts of people like Nankaku and the rise of the bunjin. Aside from “Willow leaves, fallen,” two other verses survive that Buson composed while he was traveling the route of BashŇ’s Narrow road to the interior journey. One is a direct reference to BashŇ’s text: Matsushima no tsuki miru hito ya utsuse kai

people are looking at the moon over Matsushima empty shells21

Although Matsushima had been one of BashŇ’s most important destinations on his trip through northeastern Japan, when he finally saw it, BashŇ declares that it was too beautiful to write a hokku about it. Buson does not try to achieve more than his predecessor did. He compares his own experience to an empty shell: hollow and inadequate to the task of responding to the sublime vision of the moon over Matsushima’s islanddotted bay. Moonlight plays a major role in another verse written during this journey. This one is not explicitly connected to the Narrow road to the interior journey, but it is worth noting because of its great charm. The verse is introduced with an extensive headnote: Once I was on my way to Michinoku from Dewa, when it ended up that I was in the mountains when night was falling, I barely managed to get to a place called Yashiyabukuro, and I sought lodgings. All night there was a noise like the sound of something thumping, but when, full of fear, I got up to look, in the garden of the ancient temple there was an elderly custodian, pounding barley with a mortar and pestle. When I went out there for a stroll, the moon shone on the lone peak, a breeze blew through the thousand-bamboo thicket, and there are no words to describe the scenery of the clear night.

suzushisa ni mugi o tsuku yo no Uhei kana

——— 21 22

BZ, vol. 1, no. 11. BZ, vol. 4, p. 84.

in the cool a moonlit night of pounding barley oh, Uhei22

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The interest of this verse hinges on its use of homonyms. Mugi o tsuku refers to the practice of using a large mortar and pestle to grind barley. Tsukuyo is a moonlit night. Therefore, tsuku is a pivot word, simultaneously referring to “grind” and to the moon. Also, “Uhei” is a male personal name, and on the surface it refers to the elderly temple custodian, who has put off the sweaty work of grinding barley until after nightfall, when it is cooler. However, Buson writes his name with the character u ව, rabbit, which sets off another chain of associations. According to popular belief, the shadows on the face of the moon form an image of a rabbit using a mortar and pestle to make mochi. Seeing the man pounding barley in the cool of the evening, the speaker draws a connection to the legend of the rabbit in the moon. In his later years, Buson painted two haiga versions of this poem and its headnote. In these versions, he includes simple sketches of the rabbit and his mortar and pestle. The figure of the rabbit is presented in a very whimsical, endearing fashion, dressed in a man’s jacket and standing on two legs and using his front paws like hands to hold the pestle. The practice of retracing BashŇ’s steps on the many journeys that he recorded in haikai travel diaries like Narrow road to the interior and Record of a weather-beaten skeleton (Nozarashi kikŇ ㊁ߑࠄߒ♿ⴕ, compiled 1685– 1687) became more common as the popularity of BashŇ spread, eventually turning into a kind of pilgrimage route for aspiring poets who came to call BashŇ haisei େ⡛, haikai saint. Buson’s journey in 1743 was in commemoration of the fiftieth anniversary of BashŇ’s death, and the fifty years that were to follow saw an increasing number of observances and events like these that contributed to the positioning of BashŇ and his school as the center of the haikai community. Even at this point, Buson was not a mindless imitator of BashŇ’s style. However, his teacher had been the student of a BashŇ disciple. Furthermore, even fifty years later haikai poets in the area northeast of Edo cherished the memory of BashŇ’s visits and had the highest respect for his travel diaries that elevated their own hometowns—which historically had been viewed as rustic and uncivilized—into literary space. In short, it would have been difficult for Buson to ignore BashŇ’s legacy while he was in the northeast, and indeed, he was able to make use of his connections to it in numerous ways throughout his life.

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Buson in Kyoto and Tango (1751-1757): SŇoku, MŇotsu and ShŇzan Buson returned to the Kamigata (Kyoto-Osaka) area around 1750. Having achieved some level of expertise in painting during his years of practice and study in northeastern Japan, he was now better prepared to try to gain entry into the more competitive Kyoto market. In the first years after his return to Kamigata his primary activity was painting; Kyoto was the site of many private collections there that he could hope to study and emulate, and the relationships he was able to form through haikai allowed him to meet many potential clients. The market for Buson’s paintings in Kyoto was almost exclusively limited to the rich shopkeepers, artisans, brothel owners, publishers, and other businesspeople who found Chinese-style painting more accessible than older styles like the Tosa and KanŇ, which were associated with the ruling elites.23 A verse that Buson composed soon after he arrived in Kyoto makes reference to one of the paintings that he studied at the time: Daitoku-ji nite

At Daitoku-ji

hototogisu e ni nake higashi shirojirŇ

hototogisu sing to the painting the east is blanched white24

The “picture” in this verse is the painting of bulbuls by KanŇ Genshin ⁚㊁రା (or Motonobu, 1476–1559) owned by Kyoto’s Daitoku-ji ᄢᓼኹ temple. “Hototogisu” (cuckoo) is a classical poetic word—its rarely-heard call in summer evokes feelings of quiet melancholy and romance, and it was conventional for poets to declare their eagerness to hear it. The speaker in this poem calls on the hototogisu to out-sing the bulbuls in Genshin’s picture. The verse employs a pun: Genshin’s personal name was ShirojirŇ, and thus shirojirŇ refers both to the whitening of the sky at dawn and to the painter of the picture.25 But “Hototogisu” also does something unconventional: it matches the classical association of the season word not with the word for bulbul, but with an allusion to a picture of bulbuls, evoked by the reference to its painter, Genshin/ShirojirŇ. The verse is an early use of a device that Buson was

———

23 James Cahill, The Lyric Journey: Poetic Painting in China and Japan (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1996), pp. 162–163. 24 BZ, vol. 1, no. 33. 25 Yamashita Kazumi, Buson no sekai (Yşhikaku, 1982), p. 33.

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to use frequently in poetry of his mature period, linking a literary topos with a visual image. Already Buson is experimenting with uses of imagery that will later become the foundation of some of his most innovative works, but at this stage he still has not let go of his youthful interest in the Edo-school style completely. However helpful Buson’s haikai contacts might have been, his early days in Kyoto were not all that successful. Without an affiliation to an established atelier he found it difficult to break into the Kyoto art world, and in 1754 he left to try his luck in a place where the market was less saturated, the Tango area northeast of Kyoto. He stayed there for three years. Since haikai was not Buson’s focus during this period, his productivity was limited. Nonetheless, he established several important connections right away. The first was with senior Yahantei disciple Mochizuki SŇoku, the second was with haikai poet MŇotsu; both of them helped him get settled in those first years in Kyoto The third and most influential was with Miyake ShŇzan, whose prodigious literary output included haikai, kanshi, and fiction in Chinese. Their friendship was to last until Buson’s death, and was one of the most formative of his life. SŇoku probably got to know Hayano Hajin around 1727 during the latter’s visit to Kyoto. He was very active as a poet, tenja, and editor; his memorial anthology for Hajin Far into the west contains verses by Buson. SŇoku was a respected figure in the Kyoto haikai community and as he had been Hajin’s most important disciple it would have been natural for Buson to seek him out. The following hokku was the opening verse of a sequence that Buson wrote with SŇoku and his colleagues, and is included in the collection Walking-stick earth (Tsue no tsuchi ᧟ߩ࿯ attributed to “Buson of TŇbu (Edo):” aki mo haya sono higurashi no inochi kana

autumn already this cicada’s brief life26

The headnote to this hokku is “When I first met FureibŇ ን㋈ᚱ (SŇoku) after coming to the capital.” Higurashi no inochi means “a cicada’s existence,” something that was noted by classical poets for its sad brevity. However, it is homophonous for the phrase “managing to eke out an existence”—the sort of lifestyle that young and inexperienced

——— 26

BZ, vol. 1, no. 27.

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painters like Buson might lead in Kyoto. This is a good example of the hokku’s function in a linked verse sequence: retooling an elegant poetic phrase into something suitable for the occasion, Buson both praises his host and amuses the other guests with its cleverness. MŇotsu was another important early acquaintance in Kyoto. MŇotsu was not the most important of Buson’s associates, and information about him is sparse. However, the two texts that were created in the context of their relationship demonstrate both poets’ commitment to haikai reform, and the sense of solidarity that they felt in sharing this goal. The first is Buson’s afterword to the collection Ancient and modern poetry card anthology of 1751. As we saw in Chapter One, Buson uses the opportunity to lambaste commercially minded poets like tentori aficionados and traveling tenja. Editors of haikai anthologies usually tried to find a prominent poet to contribute introductory pieces for their anthologies, and the fact that MŇotsu invited Buson—who was then an unknown— to write the afterword of Ancient and modern poetry card anthology suggests that he felt some strong affinity with Buson; the fact that they had a common view of the degenerate state of the haikai community clearly influenced his choice.27 The Buson hokku that MŇotsu included in Ancient and modern poetry card anthology is affecting and sweet, rather than critically charged: Yamaga ni yadoru

On taking shelter in a mountain dwelling

sarudono no yosamu toiyuku usagi kana

stopping in on Mr. Monkey in the cold of night a rabbit!28

Buson frequently wrote verses anthropomorphizing animals. The verse “In the coolness,” cited above, is an example, especially when it is read in its haiga versions, where a rabbit is shown standing and working, dressed like a human being. In this verse, the speaker describes an encounter between a monkey and a rabbit in fairytale like terms. The monkey, who is referred to with the respectful prefix dono (mister, sir) represents a recluse living in the mountains, and the speaker identifies himself with a rabbit. This kind of humorous and self-deprecating verse is consistent with the aesthetic of fşga 㘑㓷 (poetic elegance) or fşkyŇ 㘑⁅ (poetic madness) that a polite poet would use in a greeting to a like-minded host.

——— 27 28

Tanaka, p. 53. BZ, vol. 1, no. 24.

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The other text that is connected to MŇotsu is also amusing rather than critical. Like the hokku “Autumn already” (Aki mo haya) above, it makes use of a pun. Here, the reference to the exotic word “quince” (marumero, from the Portuguese word marmelo) is homophonous with the imperative form for “shave the head” in the Edo dialect: marumero wa atama ni kanete Edo kotoba

“quince” also means “shave your head” Edo talk29

The verse is a comic aisatsu to MŇotsu, who like Buson, kept his head shaved in the manner of a priest. The hokku’s headnote is also lighthearted, but contains a suggestion that Buson and MŇotsu shared a sense of idealism about their role in the haikai community: The first thing I did when I arrived in Kyoto was visit MŇotsu. When MŇotsu had traveled to Edo, he and I became harmonious friends. In those days we promised to transform the haikai world together, to take the tonsure, wear priests’ clothes, and extol the moon over the capital. He did not go back on his promise in the least, and recently changed his status to that of a priest, and took the name of Taimu ᄢᄞ. While we were talking about the past, of matters such as how earnest had been our interest in knowing to the utmost the dreams of the floating world, KŇchiku Ⰲ┻ came along carrying quinces (marumero) in his sleeve as a pious offering, and I made up this verse 30

The headnote untangles the meaning of this somewhat cryptic hokku, but more importantly, it is a statement of Buson’s sense of common purpose with MŇotsu in aiming to effect some change in the state of affairs in the haikai world. The most significant relationship that Buson formed during this period, however, was his friendship with Miyake ShŇzan. ShŇzan, a pawnbroker by trade, was active in Kyoto and Edo literary circles for decades. He was an extremely productive kanshi poet: his collected kanshi, ShŇzan kanshi anthology (ShŇzan shishş ཕጊ⹞㓸, preface dated 1789), fills ten volumes. Well-versed in other kinds of Chinese literature, he also wrote tales that were modeled after Chinese vernacular fiction. ShŇzan is also noted for having published several important haikai anthologies, including Haikai selected old verses, Kyoto twenty kasen (Heian nijikkasen ᐔ቟ੑච᱌઄, 1769) and Haikai selected modern verses (Haikai

——— 29 30

BZ, vol. 1, no. 26. BZ, vol. 4, pp. 89–90.

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shinsen େ⺽ᣂㆬ, 1773). Compiled in imitation of the famous Chinese verse collection Tang shi xuan that was at the time a best seller in Japan; Haikai selected old verses brought together exemplary hokku by poets of earlier generations with those of the present day; it bridged the boundaries between Chinese and Japanese poetry, as well as the literary past and present. ShŇzan’s work both as a haikai poet and an editor offers some of the best examples of the fruitful interchange between haikai and kanshi that took place during the middle of the eighteenth century, particularly in the impulse to organize and recapture the classics of the past that was a fundamental part of the teachings of ItŇ Jinsai and Ogyş Sorai. The frequency with which Buson uses imagery related to Chinese literature seems in part due to the influence of ShŇzan.31 Interestingly, his haikai verses do not reflect overt Chinese influence, certainly not to the extent that many of Buson’s do. Here are two examples: kuragari no karei ni yosamu no hikari kana

faint darkness a flounder glints in the light of the lingering chill

ShŇzan ņbaku no ren no karabi ya fuyukodachi

at the ņbaku temple scrolls hang, withered wintry woods

ShŇzan Even the second verse, which alludes to the ņbaku sect of Zenan important source of Chinese learning in the early modern perioduses the words “ņbaku” and “ren” as decorative and distancing. In other words, ShŇzan’s haikai verses are not kanshi written in Japanese. Despite his familiarity with Chinese literature in other contexts, in ShŇzan’s haikai China is a source of romance and exoticism. In any case, ShŇzan was an important mentor for Buson during this part of his career, and Buson was careful to maintain this relationship even when he was working outside Kyoto. A letter Buson wrote to ShŇzan from Tango around two years after he arrived explains one of the reasons that he wrote few hokku while he was there. “In this area,

——— 31

Kiyoto Noriko, “Miyake ShŇzan,” in Kubota, Renga, haikai, kyŇka, p. 307.

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they have changed to the style of TŇkabŇ ᧲⧎ဌ (ShikŇ); it is the haikai of Mino and Owari and the like, and not very interesting.”32 Since haikai poets depended so much on the input of members of their community, isolation from worthy companions was a difficult hurdle to overcome. In the same letter, Buson includes a rare attempt at kanshi, expressing his frustration with and dislike of the Tango area and even the accent of the people who lived there: Sent as a Token to Taku ShŇzan and others in Heian (Kyoto)

As I gaze toward the capital from west of ņeyama, the distance is vast As I listen to the local dialect, it is hard to love this place. But, like the spring clouds, I have a traveler’s spirit; Last night Chang’an was filled with rain. ነቛཕጊ౗ᩃᐔ቟⻉ሶ ᳯጊ⷏ᦸᵡẂ‫ޘ‬G ⡞ㄝ㖸ᗲᱝ࿾㔍 ด᦭ᤐ㔕ૃቴᗧ ᄛ᧪ὑ㔎ḩ㐳቟ Buson’s disdain for the local accent is perhaps not surprising to hear from someone who was trying to gain acceptance in the capital, which was the center of culture and refinement. However, given the antipathy for the area that he expresses here it is not clear why he chose to take Yosa as his surname. The letter to ShŇzan also includes a hokku: KenkŇ wa kinu mo itowaji koromogae

Yoshida KenkŇ surely did not disapprove of silk too day of changing to summer clothes

In haikai koromogae (changing clothes) is an early summer kigo; it refers to the time around the first day of the Fourth Month that was fixed by custom as the day when people put off their winter garments and started wearing summer ones. Like the other Buson hokku from this period that we have discussed, “Yoshida KenkŇ” (KenkŇ wa) also uses homophony for comic effect. KenkŇ written with the characters ⛚ᅢ would mean “silk-loving;” the KenkŇ in the verse is written as ౗ᅢ, and refers to the

——— 32

BSS, p. 26.

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renowned medieval poet and essayist Yoshida KenkŇ ศ↰౗ᅢ (1283– 1352). KenkŇ lived the austere life of an aesthetic recluse, but even he permitted himself a few luxuries. The speaker of the poem wishes for some himself, as he is stuck in a remote country place with little to look forward to. This is not one of Buson’s greatest verses, but it seems to be an example of his efforts to adapt to the style that was current in whatever place he happened to be, even though privately he may have despised it. In Miyazu Buson stayed at KenshŇ-ji ⷗ᕈኹ temple as a guest of its chief priest, Chikukei ┻ᷧ (1715–1779), for three years. While he completed many fine paintings during this period, he was less active in haikai. Years later Buson wrote a number of anecdotes about his experiences in Tango in the prose section of New flower gathering, including a slightly ribald story about Chikukei and a badger. I will discuss this story and its implications in greater detail in Chapter Six. Although Buson respected Chikukei’s verse enough to include one of his hokku in the prose section to New flower gathering, the Tango poets he met generally failed to impress him. One notable hokku from Buson’s years in Tango is the following, which was written as an expression of appreciation to a host: natsugawa o kosu ureshisa yo te ni zŇri

oh, the joy of crossing a summer stream sandals in hand33

The juxtaposition of “sandals in hand” (te ni zŇri) with “oh, the joy!” (ureshisa yo) makes a direct and visceral statement of the speaker’s delight. As the headnote makes clear, Buson is praising the landscape around Kaya not just as being visually appealing, but pleasant in a more tactile way. On another level, the verse recasts the ordinary, unremarkable Japanese setting into a more elegant and exotic Chinese one by alluding to “White Rock Shoal,” a verse written by Pei Di ⵸ㄻ (fl. 720–50), as part of an exchange with Wang Wei: White Rock Shoal On tiptoe, on a rock, again I face the water I have not yet had enough of playing in the waves

——— 33

BZ, vol. 1, no. 36.

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But the sun has set, and the river shoal runs cold Clouds float in paleness, without color. ⊕⍹ἥ 　⍹ᓳ⥃᳓ ᑲᵄᖱᧂᭂ ᣣਅᎹ਄ኙ ᶋ㔕ổή⦡ Pei Di’s verse was part of a series of twenty quatrains that he wrote in response to a series of quatrains written by Wang Wei on the subject of the landscape on the Wang River estate. Buson deeply admired Wang Wei, who was also a poet and a painter, and an exemplar of the bunjin ideal. His reference to this famous exchange between friends in his hokku was high praise to his addressee, as it put their friendship on the same level as that of the famous Chinese poets. Whether this was the direct result of his acquaintance with ShŇzan, or grew out of the exposure to Chinese poetry Buson had in Edo and in Yşki is impossible to establish. However, it seems clear that there was a great deal of crossover between the communities of haikai and kanshi poets.

Kyoto, Sanuki, and the Sankasha Group (1758–1769) Though Buson was to make one other long journey away from Kyoto (1766–1768) his ties to the city were permanent from this time onward, and he began to establish himself as an artist and, more slowly and tentatively, as a haikai poet. Buson’s principal interest remained painting even after his return to Kyoto in 1757. Newly married, he was under even more pressure to make a living, and from this point onward he began to have moderate success as a painter. As a consequence, his work as a poet continued to be intermittent in the earliest years of this period. He did sometimes participate in haikai activities also: for example, verses of his were included in ShŇzan’s Haikai selected old verses, and one of the most powerful hokku he ever wrote was included in Companion (Hanashi aite ߪߥߒ޽޿ߡ), the 1758 collection of Yahantei school member Takai Kikei:

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sararetaru mi o funkonde taue kana

though divorced, she stamps down hard planting rice34

In this psychologically penetrating verse, the persona is a woman whose husband has left her. Nevertheless, in a village whose existence depends on the success of the rice crop, everyone must cooperate in the labor of transplanting rice seedlings. The abandoned wife works alongside her husband, suppressing her feelings as she stoops to bury the roots of the plants in the soil. However, except for a few verses like this, Buson produced little haikai during this period. Nevertheless, as was the case in his days in northeastern Japan, his work as a visual artist actually ended up creating an important opening for him as a poet: in Kyoto, too, most of the clients who were interested in purchasing his paintings were also poets themselves, and he developed a reputation among them for his skill in haikai. The year 1766 was an important turning point. It marked the formation of a new haikai study group, Sankasha. Sankasha brought together some of Kyoto’s most accomplished amateur poets and art connoisseurs, and was to be the prototype of the new Yahantei school that Buson eventually opened some seven years later. Unlike most other haikai groups, Sankasha was independent of established lineages and factions. While the fact that Buson was then using the art name Sanka ਃ⩻ to sign his paintings, and that the group suspended its meetings when he left to spend two years in Sanuki might suggest that he was the Sankasha’s leader, Sankasha’s meetings were run in an egalitarian fashion and equal participation from all its members was welcome. There was no tenja or hierarchical organizational structure; the Sankasha poets came together out of a shared interest in engaging in a refined, cultured pastime.35 The Sankasha poets wrote hokku, rather than linked verse, maekuzuke or the other more gamelike forms that had proliferated in the first half of the century. The practice that they followed was called daiei 㗴⹗, composing on set topics. In other words, rather than choosing the subjects of their verses themselves in response to something that they personally observed or experienced, they all worked on ones that had

——— 34 35

BZ, vol. 1, no. 41. Tanaka, p. 95.

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been assigned. Before each meeting, Sankasha members received five topics (kendai ౗㗴), and on the day of the meeting they brought along the verses composed on these dai for discussion. Sometimes the members also wrote impromptu hokku on topics chosen at random (tandai ត㗴. Their intention was not to amuse themselves with competing over points, but rather to seriously study dai and receive the comments of the other members. While many of the dai that Sankasha members worked on were not unusual, they also were interested in experimenting with dai that had fallen out of favor with contemporary poets. For example, the first month’s choices were “cicada” (semi ⱻ) and “morning glory” (hirugao ᤤ㗻) as well as the less common “melon” (makuwa ⌀᪀), “bamboo mat” (takamushiro ◰), and “Gion festival” (Gion-e ␧࿦ળ). These poets’ interest in archaic topics is related to the trend apparent in the broader intellectual community of the time, that is, the desire to recapture an idealized past through investigation of old texts.36 The verses they produced were not particularly innovative, but are nevertheless interesting as evidence of the experiments of working poets: hanjitsu no kan o enoki ya semi no koe

getting half a day’s rest on a nettle tree cicadas’ buzz37

waga sono no makuwa mo nusumu kokoro kana

though this melon is in my own garden even I feel like stealing it!38

yumitori no obi no hirosa yo takamushiro

narrowness of the warrior’s belt bamboo mat39

The topic of “Getting a half-day’s rest” (Hanjitsu no) is semi no koe, the droning sound that cicadas make at the height of summer that seems to make a hot day even hotter. Buson’s verse makes use of a pun that would be recognized by someone familiar with the work of the Chinese

——— 36 Tanaka, p. 92; Ogata Tsutomu, “Yosa Buson: Kaiga to bungaku,” roundtable discussion with Sasaki JŇhei, Hirai Terutoshi, and Hayakawa Monta, Bungaku 52, 10 (1984): 23. 37 BZ, vol. 1, no. 57. 38 BZ, vol. 1, no. 59. 39 BZ, vol. 1, no. 61.

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poet Li She, whose poem speaks of “getting a half-day’s rest.” In Japanese, this would be pronounced hanjitsu no kan o e. In Buson’s poem, the e (obtain) is also the first sound in enoki, nettle tree. In this context, the phrase “a half-day’s rest” illustrates very well the soporific effect of the cicadas’ buzz. The second verse, “Though this melon” (Waga sono no) is more straightforward: a gardener is so proud of the melon he has produced he can put himself in the position of a thief, as he’d steal it himself if he didn’t already own it. However, this verse too, foregrounds the season word makuwa (melon) as something special and precious. Finally, “Narrowness of” (Yumitori no) expresses the essence of takamushiro (bamboo mat); it emphasizes the cool relaxation that the mat offers on a hot day in summer by describing a crisply attired samurai stretched out across it. As we have seen, the desire to recover the old meanings of words was something that motivated scholars as diverse as the sinophile Ogyş Sorai and the nativist Motoori Norinaga, who together with their followers sought to recover the virtues of the ancients by relearning their words; it was also related to the work of other Revival poets, who looked to rediscover and preserve the excellence of haikai poets of the past, the supreme example of which was Matsuo BashŇ. Originally there were eight members in Sankasha: Tan Taigi, Kuroyanagi ShŇha, TessŇ ㋕௯ (1731–1786),40 Hyakuboku ⊖ა (d. 1815),41 Gabi ጾ⋲, Innan ශධ, and ChikutŇ ┻ᵢ. With the exception of Tan Taigi, none of them were professional haikai poets:42 ShŇha was a retired merchant, TessŇ was a doctor, Hyakuboku was a publisher; not much is known about the others. Members of the community of Kyoto intelligentsia, they were brought together by their mutual interest in haikai. After Buson returned from Sanuki, they were joined by others, including KitŇ, Kakuei 㢬⧷, and Denpuku ↰⑔, again, the majority of them wealthy amateurs. Of the original Sankasha members, two had a particularly marked impact on his poetry: Tan Taigi and Kuroyanagi ShŇha. Taigi was a professional poet (tenja) who had a great deal of experience and knowl-

——— 40

TessŇ was the haikai name of Amenomori ShŇteki 㔎᫪┨ᑩ. Tanaka, p. 93. Hyakuboku’s given name was AndŇ Hachisaemon ౎Ꮐⴡ㐷. He later changed his haikai name to JishŇ ⥄╉. He was the third-generation proprietor of Hachimonji-ya ౎ᢥሼደ, the famous Kyoto printing house. Ibid., pp. 93-94. 42 The distinction between professional and amateur poet is not always easy to draw. Taigi ran his own school and supported himself through his haikai. 41

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edge of haikai; ShŇha’s expertise in kanshi and of Chinese poetics helped to shape the theoretical background of Buson’s work. Both of them were eccentrics, and their example was powerful not just in terms of the poetry they wrote but in the lives that they led, it also had some bearing on Buson’s development of the ideal of transcending the commonplace while remaining part of it—that is to say, the rizoku theory that he outlined in the Shundei verse anthology preface.

Tan Taigi and Kuroyanagi ShŇha: Influential Eccentricity Tan Taigi was a complex and gifted character who followed an unconventional lifestyle—a wanderer for most of his life, he rarely stayed in the same place or stuck with the same haikai style for long. At the same time, however, he was a brilliant poet, and Buson admired him a great deal. For Buson, Taigi was a good example of someone who lived in a zoku environment yet transcended it with the very high quality of the verse that he wrote. Taigi was a poet of formidable, if somewhat eccentric reputation. His tastes were eclectic; his verses appear in the collections of a wide variety of factions,43 and his own approach to haikai was as ambitious as Buson’s. He came under the influence of Ink of five colors poet Gikş, and in 1748, following Gikş’s example, he took the haikai name Taigi, which included the character gi ␧ as an expression of his allegiance to the medieval renga master SŇgi. With the help of a brothel owner, Donshi, he set up a studio in Kyoto’s Shimabara licensed district, Fuya-an ਇᄛᐻ, and supported himself with work as a tenja. He joined Sankasha in 1766.44 Taigi was a prominent supporter of the BashŇ Revival movement, and was active in promoting a return to serious forms of haikai. A collection that he helped to edit was very influential in this regard: Kyoto twenty kasen. This collection, which he worked on together with Buson’s friend ShŇzan and another colleague, Zuiko 㓐ฎ, was published in the same year as the formation of Sankasha, and gives a good indication of the passionate feelings towards BashŇ that had already developed by that

——— 43 44

Yajima Nagisao, Buson no shşhen (Kadokawa Shoten, 1988), p. 10. Horikiri Minoru, “Tan Taigi,” in Kubota, Renga, haikai, kyŇka, pp. 299–300.

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point. Buson’s preface to this collection is like a map to the way of thinking of the Back to BashŇ poets: One day, Taigi and ShŇzan went to visit ChŇshŇka 㐳᧻ਅ (Zuiko), and they opened this text45 and read it, and realizing how profoundly these ancients were involved in the haikai Way, they could not help but ponder on the glorious past, and in the end came to write three-person verse sequences; they had twenty sittings, so created twenty kasen. Nevertheless, theirs was neither an emulation of Kikaku’s style of singing to the moon, nor an imitation of the form of Ransetsu’s longing for the blossoms.46 Neither was it the currently popular, self-styled ShŇmon (BashŇ school), which puts emphasis on substance.47 It is better to simply value following just what is in one’s mind exactly, without stylistic manipulations.48

Buson’s description of the circumstances of the sequences in the collection gives us some insight into what he viewed as important about Taigi and his companions’ project. The three poets were moved to compose the sequences by their discovery of a letter in BashŇ’s handwriting, something that BashŇ Revival poets would view as a precious document. Nevertheless, it is important to note that Buson’s admiration for these poets’ work does not center on their imitation of Kikaku (i.e., urban haikai poets) nor ShŇmon (i.e., the rural BashŇ school). Rather, a genuine way to honor BashŇ is to attend to one’s own personal style. Buson’s very critical judgment of currently popular haikai schools, even of those who claimed to be following BashŇ’s tradition is impossible to overlook here. He praises the work of these three poets because they imitate the example of neither urban school poets, who are too interested in style and form without paying attention to substance; nor do they write like the rural school poets, who overemphasize substance at the expense of style and form. The urban school poets produce impressively clever verses that lack depth; the rural school’s verse is excessively plain and bland. The verses of Taigi and his colleagues, by contrast, are free of both kinds of error; rather than trying to imitate BashŇ’s verses, they try to match his attitude and approach. Buson strove to follow this practice in his own work, and Taigi was an influential mentor and model for him in pursuing this goal.

——— 45

A letter from Kyorai to RŇka ᶉൻ with some lines added by BashŇ. The former suggests Kikaku’s robust style, and the latter, Ransetsu’s sensuous style. 47 That is, a simple, unadorned style. 48 BZ, vol. 4, pp. 103–104. 46

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These three Taigi hokku are especially good examples of his lucid, untrammeled style: hanetsuku ya yo gokoro shiranu Ňmatage

playing hanetsuki unaware of the ways of the world they run boisterously49

Taigi furakoko no eshaku koboruru ya takami yori

bowing in a swing from a height50

Taigi iro iro ni tani no kotaeru yukige kana

from other valleys various echoes: sound of melting snow51

Taigi The first two verses are perceptive and wonderfully sympathetic observations of children at play. In the first, “Playing hanetsuki” (Hanetsuki ya) Taigi describes the behavior of little girls engrossed in a New Year’s Day game where a shuttlecock is batted back and forth with a wooden paddle. The player who keeps the shuttlecock in the air longest wins. The girls in Taigi’s verse are so intent on their play that they forget to act like ladies, and instead shout and run around indecorously. In “Bowing” (Furakoko no) a child seems to dip his or her head, as the swing reaches the top of its arc, much as people do in nodding greetings to one another. Finally, in “From other valleys” (Iro iro ni) the spring thaw causes masses of snow to crack and shift noisily, and water trickles loudly in mountain streams. Neighboring valleys ring with the many sounds of life’s regeneration. Despite the fact that Taigi lived in the licensed district under the patronage of a brothel owner, his verse maintains a serene detachment from vulgarity and worldly concerns. This was what most impressed

——— 49 Abe Kimio and AsŇ Isoji, eds., NKBT, vol. 92, Kinsei haiku haibun shş (Iwanami Shoten, 1964), p. 153. 50 Ibid., p. 153. 51 Kuriyama Ri’ichi et al., eds., Nihon koten bungaku zenshş, vol. 42, Kinsei haiku haibun shş (ShŇgakukan, 1972), p. 236.

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Buson, who was aiming for a similar kind of high-mindedness in his own verse. The other member of the Sankasha group that was to have a profound impact on Buson’s work was Kuroyanagi ShŇha, in whose honor Buson wrote the Shundei kushş preface. Kuroyanagi ShŇha was of a more conservative temperament than Taigi, but was still an eccentric; he retired from his business at the age of 40 to pursue the arts. As we discussed in Chapter Two, ShŇha’s early training had been in Chinese learning, and he was probably instrumental in informing Buson about Chinese literature and thought. ShŇha began to take part in Sankasha meetings in the last few years of the 1760s, and Buson considered him, with Taigi, one of the two leading poets in the group. Often Sankasha meetings were held at his studio, the ShŇhatei ถᵄ੪.52 Like Taigi, ShŇha led a life that was an embodiment of the ideals that Buson was trying to achieve with his theories of rizoku or using the mundane at the same time as keeping distant from it. As Buson tells us in his preface to Five cartloads of wastepaper (Gosha hŇgu ੖ゞ෻᡿, 1783), though he lived in the midst of the city, ShŇha typified the bunjin ideal of detachment and transcendence. Buson describes ShŇha’s son Korekoma’s experience of looking through a collection of his father’s papers posthumously, and notes that it was full of kanshi, unfinished fragments of hokku covered with corrections, and letters from companions inviting him to go cherry blossom- or snow-viewing—everything one might expect to find in a proper bunjin recluse: When Korekoma was observing the thirteenth anniversary of his father’s death, he made a collection and called it “Five Cartloads of Wastepaper.” There was no profound reason for doing so, but naturally he gave it this name because of his father’s verse, “Holed up for the winter.” Furthermore, when he untied the string of the overstuffed bag that was full of the writings he had amassed, there were manuscripts of kanshi exchanges, there were letters of invitation to go cherry-blossom viewing, and there were letters from drinking companions that made invitations like, ‘How about going to look at the snow tonight?’ There were also dashed-off verse sequences, still half-finished, marked here and there with corrections. On the backs of these were written the verses of many other people, and also his own. 53

——— 52 53

Yajima, p. 142. BZ, vol. 4, pp. 225–226.

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Another work, KitŇ’s New random chats anthology (Shin zŇtan shş ᣂ 㔀⺣㓸, 1785), notes that ShŇha retired from commerce early to take up a life of reclusion, but this did not mean he isolated himself in some lonely ascetic setting, but rather that he took great pleasure in wine and haikai and was kept so busy with visitors that he was aware of neither sunset nor dawn: Shundeisha ShŇha’s family name was Kuroyanagi. In the early part of his old age, he retired from his family business, and lived as a recluse at the outskirts of town, assiduously practicing haikai, and enjoying wine. He always had many guests visiting, and it was as if he was not aware of the setting of the sun in spring or the break of day in autumn. In this way, his verses entered into the realm of rizoku, and had the lofty vividness of Ransetsu’s language.” 54

ShŇha’s hokku are varied, but especially compelling are those that are informed by his bunjin ideals: ganjitsu ya kusa no to goshi no mugibatake

New Year’s day! beyond my thatched cottage barley fields55

ShŇha kaidan no ushiro fuke yuku yosamu kana

hearing ghost stories behind me creeps midnight’s chill56

ShŇha The first verse mentions a thatched cottage, a bunjin’s typical dwelling— remote and evocative of genteel poverty. The speaker is spending a quiet, constrained new year, with few material comforts with which to celebrate. However, the barley field across from his house has sprouted, and its gentle green suggests hope for a bright new year. The speaker in the second verse has been staying up late on a summer night sharing scary stories with friends. Suddenly the hair stands up on the back of his neck—is it just a chilly breeze, or has he crossed paths with a ghost? An appreciation for the grotesque is also a hallmark of Japanese bunjin, and

——— 54 Takai KitŇ, “Shin zŇtan shş,” in Shimizu Takayuki, ed., Koten haibungaku taikei, vol. 14, ChşkŇ hairon haibun shş (Shşeisha, 1971), p. 405. 55 NKBT, vol. 92, p. 174. 56 Ibid., p. 176.

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like Buson, ShŇha was fond of describing situations tinged with the supernatural. Two more ShŇha verses that illustrate his bunjin-inspired tastes are: uki koto o kurage ni kataru namako kana

telling melancholy things to the jellyfish sea slug57

ShŇha fuyu gomorite gosha no hŇgu no aruji kana

holed up for the winter I am the master of five cartloads of wastepaper!58

ShŇha While humor is fundamental to all kinds of haikai, the strategy ShŇha uses here is considerably different from the sort of ostentatious puns or scatological jokes favored by many of his contemporaries. Here the comedy is gentle, elevated, even a bit mad. An appreciation for small, cute things—fox cubs in some cases, sparrows, or as in the case of “Telling melancholy things” (Uki koto o), conversational sea slugs—is connected to the bunjin ideal. Likewise, in “Holed up for the winter” (Fuyu gomorite), the speaker’s insatiable mania for poetry has got him almost buried in a flurry of drafts. Both verses are statements of a refined sensibility that sets them apart from the popular, commercially successful haikai of the day.

Sankasha’s Anthology: From Summer (Natsu yori) Sankasha’s first meeting was in the Sixth Month of 1766, and it was held at Tairai-dŇ, a space that belonged to group member TessŇ. The group met twice, and then its meetings were suspended for two years because Buson left for Sanuki, Shikoku. They resumed their work after he returned in 1769, and continued to meet on a fairly regular basis until the group was disbanded in the Ninth Month of the following year and most of its members joined Buson’s newly opened Yahantei school.

——— 57 58

NKBT, vol. 92, p. 176. NKBT, vol. 92, p. 177.

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In total, Sankasha met forty times between the Sixth Month of 1766 and the Ninth Month of 1770. Hokku composed at its meetings were collected into an anthology called From summer (Natsu yori ᄐࠃࠅ). Even though the group’s professed purpose was to recapture the ideals of haikai poets of the past, the From summer hokku bear little resemblance to those of BashŇ and his contemporaries. Buson’s contributions are outstanding, as are many of Taigi’s, and it appears that this is the period when Buson begins to find some confidence in his work as a poet. In general, Buson’s From Summer hokku show characteristics that were to become the hallmarks of his mature style: the suggestion of narrative, often based in classical or medieval Japanese literature, allusions to Chinese poetry, and a facility for building into the restrictive seventeen syllables of the hokku form a sense of vastness in time and space. I will discuss four kinds of verses from Buson’s Sankasha period. The first date from the sessions that met before Buson left for Sanuki, are unambitious, even bland. The verses that Buson wrote after his return, however, are quite different, and show that Buson was finding his own poetic voice. The first type shows Buson’s fascination with classical Japanese and Chinese literature; in the second, Buson describes a scene that is metonymic of a larger narrative. In the third, Buson plays with imagery related to time and space in another way that shows his efforts to overcome the snapshot-like quality of hokku and to convey a sense of nostalgia. Sankasha only met twice in 1766 before Buson left for Sanuki. The following are good examples of the somewhat plain and flat hokku of these first two meetings: hirugao ya machi ni nariyuku kui no kazu

convovulus approaching the town there are a number of signposts59

hatsuka ji no senaka ni tatsu ya kumo no mine

twenty days’ road60 rising at my back a peak of cloud61

——— 59

BZ, vol. 1, no. 62. “Twenty days’ road” refers to the time it took to travel along the TŇkaidŇ highway from Edo to Kyoto. 61 BZ, vol. 1, no. 64. 60

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Both “Convolvulus” (Hirugao ya) and “Twenty days’ road” (Hatsuka ji no) describe the experience of travel, but they are entirely generalized and imaginary. They were written not to celebrate a particular place, but to come as close as possible to capture the hon’i (conventional meaning) of the assigned topic, “convolvulus” (hirugao) and “peak of cloud” (kumo no mine). The following verses were written after Buson’s return from Sanuki, and show a marked change. They are good examples of the type of Buson verse that alludes to an imagined Chinese past: aoume ni mayu atsumetaru bijin kana

under the green plum trees drawing her brows together a beautiful woman62

ayu kurete yorade sugiyuku yowa no kado

you brought some sweetfish but left without stopping midnight gate63

In the first verse, the seasonal topic is aoume (green plum), a fresh, enlivening image of a plum tree in new leaf. Sitting underneath is a beautiful woman, whose brows are knitted. The allusion is to the famous Chinese beauty Xi Shi ⷏ᣉ (Japanese Seishi), whose face was marked by a perpetual frown owing to her sorrow at being sent to serve in a foreign court. Buson’s beauty scowls not out of sadness: green plums are so sour to the taste just looking at them makes her contort her face. “Under the green plum trees” (Aoume ni) makes a humorous twist on a sad, romantic story. Similarly, the second verse alludes to a Chinese setting, this time imagining a relationship between two literati. The gift of sweetfish (ayu), admired for its clean fragrance, would be appropriate when the recipient is a person of discrimination and taste. The giver comes late on a summer night, and leaves without waiting for thanks or praise—precisely the kind of gesture that one refined literatus would extend to another. In the second type of verse, Buson creates the impression of a larger story behind his words. The situations in these verses range from broad, panoramic scenes that could have been taken from an epic telling of history, such as the medieval war narrative Tale of the Heike (Heike monogatari ᐔኅ‛⺆), or they focus on small private scenesthe quiet

——— 62 63

BZ, vol. 1, no. 96. BZ, vol. 1, no. 114.

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sufferings of anonymous individuals. All of them suggest backgrounds and consequences much larger than the space allowed by the hokku’s seventeen syllable structure: Toba dono e gorokki isogu nowaki kana

toward Toba palace five or six riders gallop autumn storm64

kogarashi ya ika ni yo wataru ie go ken

winter wind however do they get through life in these five houses?65

yado kasanu hokage ya yuki no ie tsuzuki

lights where they refused me lodging house after house66

Nowaki is an autumn typhoon, a storm with high winds that occurs in early autumn, the Eighth Month by the lunar calendar, Toba Palace was a residence of retired emperors in the eleventh to the thirteenth centuries.67 While this hokku does not allude to any particular text or historical incident, it suggests gunki monogatari ァ⸥‛⺆ (war tales), a genre that arose in the late Heian period and flourished in the medieval period. “Toward Toba Palace” (Tobadono e) juxtaposes the image of the autumn typhoon with that of the riders hurrying to the palace, evoking a scene of chaos and impending violence. Buson often used numbers, as he does here with “five or six riders” (gorokki) to add a sense of realism and specificity. He employs a similar strategy in the second verse: reference to a weather condition (kogarashi, winter wind), juxtaposed with a human situation. Here, too, the use of numerals suggests that the speaker in the poem is describing a scene he actually witnessed. Finally, “Lights” (Yado kasanu) shows a marked detachment from the events described, as if it were representing the experience of a third person. Buson chooses to focus on the elegance of the lights against the snow, rather than the bitterness of being without lodging on a cold night, idealizing the scene.

——— 64

BZ, vol. 1, no. 196. BZ, vol. 1, no. 298. 66 BZ, vol. 1, no. 324. 67 Retired Emperor Shirakawa ⊕ᴡ (r. 1072–1086). It was also the residence of Retired Emperors Toba 㠽⠀ (r. 1107–1123), Go-Shirakawa ᓟ⊕ᴡ (r. 1155–1158), GoToba ᓟ㠽⠀ (r. 1183–1198), and Go-Saga ᓟᎂጾ (r. 1242–1246). 65

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It is not a hokku about the melancholy of a traveler’s hardships, but of those hardships transformed by an experience of beauty. These verses also create the sense of a larger narrative: yuku haru ya senja o uramu uta no nushi

end of spring the poet resents the poetry judge68

maku majiki sumai o nemono gatari kana

making pillow talk about a sumo match “I shouldn’t have lost!”69

Komabune no yorade sugiyuku kasumi kana

the Koguryo ship passes on without stopping hazy mist70

The first verse juxtaposes two examples of regret. Regret for the end of spring was considered an elegant emotion, particularly appropriate for sensitive poets. Senja mainly refers to an editor or compiler of a poetry anthology. The poet in this hokku has his elegant regret for the end of spring compounded by his more earthy resentment at having his work passed over again by yet another unsympathetic editor. The second verse presents a persona of a different social status, but one who is also disappointed: a defeated sumŇ wrestler chatting gloomily with his wife before falling asleep. Many years later, in 1783, Buson used it as an inscription for a painting that included verses by Ransetsu, Ryşkyo, Taigi, and KitŇ, with the headnote, “Feeling nostalgia for the past,” but in From summer, it appears in a series of verses written on the assigned topic “sumŇ” (sumai). Finally, in the third verse, the spring season word “hazy mist” (kasumi) creates a mysterious, otherworldly atmosphere, blurring the boundaries between the past and the present. Komabune (Koguryo ship) refers to official ships that sailed from the continent to Japan up until the Nara period, a practice that ended almost a thousand years before Buson’s lifetime. The word lends the verse an archaic, storybook quality.

——— 68

BZ, vol. 1, no. 458. BZ, vol. 1, no. 160. 70 BZ, vol. 1, no. 401. 69

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In the third type of verse, Buson represents time and its passing. One way he does this is to show the progression of time by contrasting the present with the past in a single location: ikanobori kinŇ no sora no aridokoro

paper kite in the same place as it was in yesterday’s sky71

kinŇ ini kyŇ ini kari no naki yo kana

here yesterday here today; tonight the geese cry, flying72

hana chirite konoma no tera to nari ni keri

blossoms fallen the space between turned into a temple73

All of these verses share the same point of view: the speaker is looking up at the sky, observing similar phenomena on separate occasions. In “Paper kite” (Ikanobori) it is a kite that appears in the same place as it had on the previous day. Kite flying was an activity for boys, especially during the new year season; in this sense, the kite links the present not only to the immediate past, but to the more distant past of the speaker’s own childhood: it reminds him not only of the kite he saw yesterday, but of those he played with himself as a child. Similarly, in “Here yesterday” (KinŇ ini), the speaker’s observation is of something flying in the sky above—this time, geese flying back to their northern breeding grounds after spending the winter in Japan. While most spring topics are hopeful and convey a sense of optimism, “geese” (kari) is tinged with regret, and filled with the same gentle melancholy as the geese’s farewell calls. As in “Paper kite,” the fact that the situation is identical yesterday, today, and tonight only further serves to emphasize that time, like the geese themselves, is passing by. Lastly, in “Blossoms fallen” (Hana chirite), Buson focuses on a particular detail of the landscape to convey the sense of time’s passing. When the cherry trees were in full bloom, the temple was hidden behind masses of blossoms and the crowds of visitors who had come to see them. Now that the blossoms have fallen, space has opened up between the branches to reveal the temple. The visitors are all

——— 71

BZ, vol. 1, no. 403. BZ, vol. 1, no. 741. 73 BZ, vol. 1, no. 455. 72

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gone too, and the place has returned to its usual state of contemplation and silence. The From summer manuscript is the record of a dedicated, energetic group of poets who met regularly once or twice a month for the better part of two years. Their membership was also steady, and by the last several sessions included thirteen or fourteen people. However, the record trails off with the meeting on the sixth day of the ninth month of 1769—spaces are left blank above the names of several of the poets, as if waiting for verses that were yet to be composed. The end of Sankasha, however, was really a beginning: the attendance roster of the Yahantei school that Buson established the following year shows that at its start the new group was basically Sankasha with a new name. The hokku of Buson’s early years are few in number, but they still demonstrate a certain amount stylistic development. His very earliest hokku show a marked influence of urban school haikai and its delight in impressive displays of word play and cleverness. This tendency becomes muted as Buson begins to associate himself more closely with the rural poets of the northeast. After he moved to Kyoto and began to work towards establishing himself as a painter there, his verse starts to take on many of the characteristics that were to make it distinctive, such as an affinity for Chinese literary models and nostalgia for an idealized past. Buson’s early hokku are most notable, though, for the way that they offer insight into the close relationship that haikai composition had with the community that produced it. The volume of Buson’s haikai fluctuates greatly depending on where he traveled—while his production was relatively large when he was in the northeast, it slowed to almost nothing during his years in Tango—a place where, by his own description, there were few people worth working with. This is also the case when he visits Sanuki. It is not until he begins to gain a foothold in Kyoto and find himself in the company of other talented poets like Taigi and ShŇha that the quality of his verse begins to improve markedly, and he starts to attain a strong and confident voice. However, despite Buson’s growing maturity as a poet, and the standing he gained in the haikai community, he continued to avoid formal engagement with that community. In the next chapter, I will take a closer look at Yahantei and the anthologies it produced, to consider the ways in which Buson negotiated between his public status as a leader of the haikai community and professional painter on the one hand, and his espousal of the bunjin amateur recluse ideal on the other.

CHAPTER FOUR

AN UNARMED BLOSSOM GUARD: HOKKU 1771–1783 In 1770, not long after he returned from Sanuki, Buson assumed the leadership of Yahantei, the haikai school founded by his teacher Hayano Hajin in 1742. Yahantei had been dormant since Hajin’s death, despite the fact that other Hajin disciples could conceivably have reestablished it at some point during the thirty-odd years that intervened. Ultimately, the role finally fell to Buson, who, with considerable reluctance, stepped forward to reopen the school. The event itself took place without fanfare. Ordinarily bundai hiraki ᢥบ㐿 (opening of a haikai school) were elaborate affairs, involving formal visits to local haikai teachers, parties, and the composition of a large number of verses—officially, 10,000. This formality simultaneously allowed the newcomer to show respect to his already established colleagues, and offered him the chance to advertise his name and that of his new school. Buson, however, did none of this. His only reference to the Yahantei bundai hiraki in his surviving correspondence was a laconic statement in a letter to ShŇha, “Also, the party I held to celebrate the opening of my haikai school went off with no trouble, so please do not worry about it. I hope that sometime you will come and join us.”1 The hokku that Buson wrote to mark the occasion also gives us some insight into the kind of event it was: hana mori no mi wa yumi ya naki kagashi kana

the role of a blossom guard a scarecrow with neither bow nor arrows!2

The responsibility of a hana mori (blossom guard) was to protect cherry blossoms from the predations of over-enthusiastic revelers. The guard in this verse has a difficult job to do, not only has he no weapons to back up his efforts: even worse, he is just a scarecrow. Composing this verse in commemoration of his assumption of the Yahantei school leadership, Buson draws a comparison between the scarecrow and himself, saying

——— 1 2

BSS, p. 36. BZ, vol. 1, no. 727.

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that it is as absurd to expect him to do anything worthwhile in this role as it would be to depend on a scarecrow—and an unarmed one at that— to act as a guard. Modesty in a situation like this was a social convention, but given that this is an occasion whose purpose is self promotion, Buson’s pose of humility is an interesting one. On the one hand, it implies that his sense of entitlement was so solid that he felt no need to boast or preen. On the other, keeping in mind the fact that his succession to the Yahantei title was done quietly and without ostentation, we may interpret the self-deprecation in this verse as sincere rather than being simply a formality. A number of factors contributed to Buson’s delay in reestablishing Yahantei. In the first place, several of Hajin’s more senior disciples lived on for many years after his teacher’s death, and Buson was reluctant to put himself ahead of them. One member of Hajin’s Yahantei school with a stronger claim to the position than Buson was SŇoku, a contemporary of GantŇ and the manager of Yahantei in the Kansai area; also, there was KitŇ’s father Kikei, superior to Buson in age and experience. The fact that Buson waited until both of them were dead before reopening Yahantei suggests that, given their seniority, doing otherwise was inappropriate.3 In the second place, as his disdain for tentori masters—whose primary purpose was earning money—shows, Buson drew much of his sense of authority from his amateur status. Keeping the marketplace at a distance, treating his poetry as something other than a professional occupation, was especially important for him because he depended on bunjin painting for his livelihood. As Pierre Bourdieu has demonstrated, cultivating an appearance of disdain for economic pressures is one way to enhance a person’s prestige in artistic and intellectual communities, but the cultural notions surrounding the bunjin made such a withdrawal (or at least the appearance of one) absolutely essential: “...[The] accumulation of a cultural capital (whether or not educationally sanctioned) which can only be acquired by means of a sort of withdrawal from economic necessity...To be able to play the games of culture with the playful seriousness which Plato demanded, a seriousness without the ‘spirit of seriousness’ one has to belong to the ranks of those who have been able, not necessarily to make their whole existence a sort of chil-

——— 3

Tanaka, pp. 114–115.

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dren’s game, as artists do, but at least to maintain for a long time, sometimes a whole lifetime, a child’s relation to the world.4

Bunjin were expected to be above commerce, something that can be linked to the suspicion of profit that was common to both the Confucianist and Taoist ethical systems that informed their ideal. As the thenpopular Mustard seed garden manual of painting puts it, grasping for profit was “vulgarizing, destructive to the ki.” With this in mind, if Buson openly professionalized his haikai persona, it would risk his claim to the cultural capital enjoyed by the amateur. For this reason, Buson, a commoner from a questionable family background who aspired to compose poetry good enough to be called the equal of waka or renga, had to go to some lengths to distinguish himself from what he called “puffed-up tenja” whose chief concern was profit. Buson’s anxieties about his own abilities also may have contributed to the long delay in opening his own haikai school, as his hokku “The role of a blossom guard” (Hana mori no) indicates. However, when he finally did, it was with a very good motive: it gave him a platform from which to launch his efforts to resist the proliferation of “bad” haikai. Within the confines of his own group, Buson and his disciples could work towards a common cause of achieving a return to the ideals of BashŇ. Indeed, despite all of Buson’s reasons for avoiding the issue of becoming the head of a haikai school, when he finally came to do it, his timing was good for the BashŇ Revival movement and for himself as well. In 1770 Buson was relatively secure in his career. He had a strong practice as a painter, having just returned from a successful trip to Sanuki.5 Furthermore, he had reached a turning point in his work as a poet also—his participation in Sankasha brought about a change in his approach to haikai. ShŇha, Taigi, and the other Sankasha members generated a sense of confidence in Buson, and the experience working with them encouraged him to the degree that he was finally ready to put aside his reservations and take over leadership of his teacher’s old school.

——— 4 5

Bourdieu, p. 53–54. Cahill, p. 154–161.

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Yahantei Procedure Yahantei’s meetings, like those of Sankasha, were relatively egalitarian: they were conducted in a discussion format where every member of the group was encouraged to express his opinion. Those who were excessively critical or who flattered others were not invited back. This indicates that even after he re-opened Yahantei, Buson’s ambivalence about the work of a haikai master persisted. Although he was the head of the group, he did not dominate it. Furthermore, much of the work of organizing and editing anthologies for Yahantei he left up to his disciples, mainly Takai KitŇ. We can gain some insight into Buson’s views on Yahantei from Rules for selection, his statement on the school’s procedure and standards of excellence.6 They are particularly valuable given the fact that Buson wrote so few articulations of his poetic theory. 1. All of these styles may be chosen: The powerful ones of Kikaku. The highly-regarded verses of Ransetsu. The straightforward verses of Kyorai. The lighthearted verses of SodŇ. Bakurin (Otsuyş) and ShikŇ’s verse styles are vulgar but both established his own school, and some of theirs may be chosen. 2. What binds all of these poets is Master BashŇ. However, the ones who come close to BashŇ, Kikaku and Ransetsu, are only half as good. Bakurin and ShikŇ are only one-tenth as good. 3. There are those in the world who call themselves ShŇmon (the BashŇ school). In particular they do not know the style of Master BashŇ. The verses that they compose as well as what they theorize about do not get beyond the level of Shibaku7 commonness. There are times when these are called Ise School or Mino School. How can we call them ShŇmon? People in the know call them by the nickname Backwoods BashŇ school.... 5. Knowing the Great Way of haikai is nothing other than this: extolling the moon and appreciating the blossoms, causing your mind to venture outside of the world of dust, always keeping as friends those who dip into the stream of Master BashŇ, Kikaku, and Ransetsu. You should consider escape from the spirit of vulgarity to be the best way.

——— 6 The text is preserved in two versions that were transcribed by his disciples, one, Teramura Hyakuchi’s ኹ᧛⊖ᳰ (1749–1835) Posthumous Buson writings anthology (Buson iboku shş ⭢᧛ㆮა㓸), and the other KitŇ’s Treatise on verse-marking (Ten’in ron ὐශ⺰, 1786). Written in kanbun (the Japanese form of classical Chinese) with Japanese glosses added, the two versions are nearly identical in content. The text of paragraph 4 is quoted in Chapter Two. 7 That is, they are similar to the styles of Bakurin and ShikŇ.

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6. As for the way we select verses: we meet together in a group and all of us speak of our intentions, mainly conducting discussions. We should not pay deference to other schools. Neither will we permit those who curry favor, become intimidated or ridicule others outside the circle to join in subsequent meetings. 8

Having acknowledged that rural school tradition has something to offer, however inferior it may be, Buson tells us that Yahantei poets reject those who follow this style, dismissing them as adherents of a rusticated “Backwoods BashŇ-style.” This reflects the Yahantei school’s roots—its founder, Hajin, was a disciple of Kikaku and Ransetsu and therefore an heir to the urban school tradition. However, as Hajin himself might have taught (judging from what Buson writes in his preface to the Hajin memorial volume Far into the west), the main criterion was that verses should avoid commonness and vulgarity, and aspire to the highest possible standard.9 Also, Buson regarded civility and mutual respect of members as requirements for being accepted into the group. Competition between participants, particularly for points, was not the purpose of its gatherings. Despite the definitiveness of its tone, the Yahantei house rules also demonstrate Buson’s ambivalence about leadership. Verses were not recognized for their excellence by a teacher’s unilateral fiat, but rather by discussion and consensus. This provision suggests that Buson was reluctant to show off his own talents and authority even at this point, despite his long years of haikai practice and new status as the leader of a haikai school with an estimable history.

——— 8 BZ, vol. 4, pp. 113–116. Both versions are given, A) Teramura Hyakuchi’s ኹ᧛⊖ᳰ Buson iboku shş ⭢᧛ㆮა㓸, published in Ogata Tsutomu, “Hairin shŇyş” in BashŇ, Buson, Issa, Kuriyama Ri’ichi, ed. (Yşzankaku Shuppan, 1978); B) KitŇ’s Ten’in ron ὐශ⺰, 1786. Hyakuchi and KitŇ were instrumental in promoting Buson’s reputation after his death. 9 The regard the Yahantei school poets held for BashŇ’s work is also indicated in Buson’s choice of symbols in his school’s system for scoring outstanding hokku. Mediocre verses received no points, but better verses merited scores of seven, ten, twenty, and twenty-five points depending on their quality. Buson used special seals to mark the verses that used phrases that made allusions to famous BashŇ hokku. For example, RobŇ no sumire 〝றᮑ (roadside mallow flower), that referred to Michinobe no mukuge wa uma ni kuwari keri (Mallow flower / by the roadside / eaten by my horse!), denoted seven points; a picture of a frog, referring to furu ike ya /kawazu tobikomu / mizu no oto (the old pond—! /a frog jumps in / sound of water), meant twenty points. Buson’s written responses to disciples work also show that BashŇ represented the group’s standard. He comments on one verse, “this is today’s up-to-date ShŇmon style (ryşkŇtai ᵹⴕ૕);” on another, “you don’t find this in the BashŇ style.” While the Yahantei school was not a typical tentori haikai group, verse-scoring remained an important pedagogical tool.

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Yahantei’s First Anthology: Spring in Meiwa 8 (Meiwa shinbo no haru) The first publication of Buson’s Yahantei school was the new year anthology Spring in Meiwa 8 (1771) (Meiwa shinbŇ no haru ᣿๺ㄆවᤐ). New year anthologies served a function similar to modern nengajŇ ᐕ⾐⁁ or new year cards. They were issued to group members and people of their acquaintance, and served to establish the group’s identity. New year anthologies typically took two forms, new year’s day booklets (saitanchŇ ᱦᣤᏭ) and spring felicitations booklets (shunkyŇjŇ ᤐ⥝Ꮭ). The main difference between them was that new year’s day booklets were published before, and spring felicitations booklets after, the first day of the new year. Both included verses collected from members of haikai schools, typically on celebratory themes. New year anthologies frequently included pictures as well as verses; indeed a popular format for this kind of collection was the surimono ᠁‛ (commemorative prints, literally, “printed things”) that combined poetry and graphics and were printed on costly paper. New year anthologies had a very small distribution; they were mainly circulated among the members of the group whose verses were included, and served as a way of reinforcing a sense of collective identity. Spring in Meiwa 8 was issued as a shunkyŇjŇ, and as was typical of such collections during this period, includes a series of mitsumono ਃߟ‛ (three-link) sequences, two sequences including kasen, and hokku written on topics related to the new year season. Spring in Meiwa 8 was also noteworthy for the fact that Buson compiled and wrote it out himself, as in later years he often left this kind of task up to his senior disciples. Buson’s starting verse for the first mitsumono sequence is bold and playful, and suggests a growing confidence in his role as leader of the group: Katsuragi no kamiko nugabaya ake no haru

if I could only take off the Katsuragi god’s paper robe dawn of spring10

Katsuragi is a mountain in modern Nara Prefecture. Its tutelary god, Katsuragi-hitokoto-nushi-no-kami ⪾ၔ৻⸒ਥ␹, was ashamed of his own ugliness, and would only come out at night. Kamiko is a robe made of stiffened paper, and kami (paper) is homophonous with the word for

——— 10

BZ, vol. 1, no. 840.

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god. Ake no haru is either early spring or a dawn in spring, and here suggests the morning of the first day of the new year. The speaker of the poem imagines the Katsuragi god taking off his paper garment after a long night of hard work, expressing the wish that the new year will similarly bring a new beginning. The paper garment may be emblematic of unpleasant memories, but it also suggests an old, outmoded style that the poet wishes to exchange for a new one—entirely appropriate for inclusion in the first new year anthology of a new haikai school. A verse on a similar theme is: uguisu no sosŇ ga mashiki hatsune kana

the warbler’s inexperienced simplicity is better year’s first song11

The song of the bush warbler, uguisu, was eagerly anticipated as a sign of spring. While it was admired particularly for its distinctive call, the voice of the young uguisu is not fully developed by the time of hatsune, the first birdcall one hears in the new year. As this is the first Yahantei anthology, Buson makes the effort to acknowledge the new group’s lack of experience, but implies that this is actually what makes it most appealing. Other Spring in Meiwa 8 verses rely on references to Chinese and classical Japanese literature, though in very distinct ways—one, delicately romantic, the other, comic: usuginu ni kimi ga oboro ya Gabi no tsuki

in a gossamer robe you are veiled in haziness moon over Mount Gabi12

EnpŇ no kuhŇ

In the style of the EnpŇ period

mochi kyştai no

while shaving the “old bog moss whiskers” of mold off the rice cakes “breezes comb the hair of young willows”13

kabi o kezureba kaze kŇryş no kezuri kake

In “In a gossamer robe” Buson alludes to Chinese poet Li Bo’s verse “Song of the Moon over Mount Emei ጾ⋲ጊ (Japanese Gabi),” that is

——— 11

BZ, vol. 1, no. 845. BZ, vol. 1, no. 843. 13 BZ, vol. 1, no. 844. 12

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included in Tang shi xuan.14 The mountain’s name is homophonous with gabi ⱌ⋲ (literally, moth brows, i.e., crescent-shaped brows), an attribute of beautiful women. “Gossamer robe” (usuginu), a garment worn by women in the summertime, is evocative of Heian romances, 15 “haziness” (oboro) is a spring kigo that refers to mist that forms on humid spring nights, especially moonlit ones; it also recalls Heian literature. Together these words suggest an elegant, mysteriously erotic scene that conflates classical Chinese and Japanese literature, recasting the world of Li Bo into a context drawn from Heian monogatari. The second verse, “While shaving the ‘old bog moss whiskers’” takes a completely different tone—its extreme jiamari (excess of syllables) and obstreperous alliteration underscores the humor of this verse which is a parody of a poem in the 11th century Japanese and Chinese poems to sing (Wakan rŇeishş๺ṽᦶ⹗㓸, 1012) by Miyako no Yoshika ㇺ⦟㚅: the weather clears, breezes comb the hair of the young willows; the ice is melting, wavelets wash the whiskers of old bog moss.16 ᳇㔿㘑᫁ᣂᩉ㜬 ᳖ᶖᶉᵞᣥ⧡㝏 Buson’s verse juxtaposes Yoshika’s very elegant and refined imagery of willows and moss in early spring with the unpretentious, everyday staple of the new year season—mochi (rice flour cakes). Mochi are prone to

——— 14 J. Thomas Rimer and Jonathan Chaves, eds., Japanese and Chinese Poems to Sing: The Wakan rŇei shş (New York: Columbia University Press, 1997), p. 31. Song of the Moon over Mount Emei

A half-circle moon shines on Mount Emei’s autumn Its shadow enters the Pingqiang River’s current. At night, I board a boat at Qing Xi, headed for the Three Gorges. I miss you, moon—you do not shine down on Yu Zhou. ጾ⋲ጊ᦬᱌  ጾ⋲ጊ᦬ඨベ⑺ ᓇ౉ᐔ⟢ᳯ᳓ᵹ ᄛ⊓ᷡᷧะਃ⁜ ᕁำਇ⷗ਅᷬᎺ

Li Bo, in Maeno Naoaki, ed., TŇshisen, vol. 3 (Iwanami Shoten, 1955), pp. 136–137. 15 Yamamoto Kenkichi, Kihon kigo gohyaku sen (KŇdansha, 1991), p. 404. 16 Rimer and Chaves, p. 31; Chinese text is in ņsone and Horiuchi, p. 15.

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attracting mold. In this verse Buson brings together the ordinary, everyday experience of scraping mold off mochi and the elegant world of Japanese and Chinese poems to sing, introducing a collision of ga and zoku (elite and commoner culture) that is typical of haikai. The repetition of “k” sounds in “kabi o kezureba / kaze kŇryş no kezuri kake” also heightens the verse’s comic effect. The headnote, “In the style of the EnpŇ period” points to the fact that Buson is imitating the verse of the BashŇ school’s Empty chestnuts. The list of contributors to Spring in Meiwa 8 is almost identical with that of From summer: it includes ShŇha, TessŇ, and JishŇ; Taigi also contributed, as did his patron, the brothel owner Donshi. Buson invited work from poets outside of Kyoto as well, including his old mentor Baba Songi, as well as Denjo↰ᅚand her husband RŇsen ᭈᎹ, all Edo poets. There were also verses from people closer to home in Osaka and Fukuhara. The prominent position in which the work of Takai KitŇ appears indicates that from his first arrival on the scene he was a powerful force in determining the direction that the Yahantei took. Although the reopening of the Yahantei school moved Buson into a more public phase of his work as a haikai poet, the optimism and playfulness that we see in Spring in Meiwa 8 was dimmed a few months later when the two mainstays of his haikai practice in the Sankasha group, ShŇha and Taigi, died within a few months of each other.17 The loss of ShŇha seems to have hit him particularly hard because he hoped to be able to rely on ShŇha for support in his writing and in his leadership of Yahantei. The Shundei verse anthology passage where Buson describes the moment of ShŇha’s death gives some indication of how traumatic it was to him: Tragically, one day [ShŇha] fell gravely ill, and did not recover. As time passed he grew thin and frail, and there was nothing medicine could do for him. Realizing that the moment had come for him to die, he grasped my hand and said, “What I regret is that I will never be able to write poetry with you again.” He died with tears in his eyes. I wept, saying three times, “My haikai has gone to the west. My haikai has gone to the west.”18

Pure Land Buddhist belief teaches that the Amitabha Buddha’s paradise is in the west. By lamenting that his haikai has gone to the west, Buson claims that his poetic skills have died with ShŇha. Shundei verse anthology

——— 17 18

Taigi died in the Eighth Month, ShŇha in the Twelfth. BZ, vol. 4, p. 174.

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was edited by ShŇha’s son, so the fact that it contains expressions of sorrow and regret is not surprising. However, Buson’s statements about the connection between ShŇha’s presence and his own will to write haikai seem very genuine. Another expression of Buson’s grief over the loss of ShŇha is this 1772 hokku and its headnote, which reveals Buson’s continued lack of confidence in leading a haikai school: I miss Layman ShŇha more today than I did yesterday. He appears in my dreams, and it is as if he is real, and is speaking. This is because he has reason to do so. Given that there is something lacking in my work. ShŇha would have been the main support for my haikai school, and a great help to me, he would encourage me, believing that one day I would attain my dream, forgetting how immature I yet am in the way of haikai. I repeat my senile prattle. Here we have come to the first anniversary of his death:

naki fushite koe koso shinobe take no yuki

prostrate with weeping my voice itself is stifled bamboo in snow19

As we have seen, haikai poets downplayed their own abilities when writing prefaces, headnotes to poems, and other public statements, and his attestation of uncertainty may be no more than a polite convention. Still, Buson and ShŇha had an extremely close bond of mutual admiration, and it seems credible that Buson depended on talented colleagues like ShŇha and Taigi for guidance, so losing both of them just as he was beginning his work as a leader of a haikai school was a heavy blow.

KitŇ’s Yahantei Anthologies The passing of these two strong formative presences in Buson’s poetic universe was a major landmark for Buson, perhaps even more meaningful than the opening of the Yahantei school. After their deaths, another person came to have an even more marked impact on his development as a poet, Takai KitŇ. Buson was acquainted with KitŇ well before the death of ShŇha and Taigi, and in fact ShŇha was a disciple of KitŇ’s father, Kikei. Furthermore, ShŇha and Taigi were instrumental in Buson’s earliest formation of a poetic style, collaborating with him in explorations of the free-wheeling, bunjin-inspired style of both haikai and

——— 19

BZ, vol. 4, pp. 130–131.

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of living that Buson incorporated into his professional persona as an artist and later, as a poet. However it was KitŇ who was most responsible for establishing Buson as one of the most prominent and well-known poets of his generation. This was less because of KitŇ’s abilities as a poet, which to be sure were perfectly respectable; instead, KitŇ brought to Buson and the Yahantei school something that they would have otherwise been missing—a strong, even indefatigable facility for selfpromotion. Given Buson’s profound ambivalence about his own role as leader of a haikai school, KitŇ’s involvement in this regard came at a critical stage. KitŇ was an ambitious and talented haikai poet. His father was the prominent Hajin disciple Kikei, so he learned to practice haikai from a very early age: he had his first hokku published at the age of eight, albeit in his father’s collection Companion. He joined Yahantei soon after Buson reopened it under the condition that he would eventually inherit the group’s leadership, and ran his school, ShunyarŇ ᤐᄛᭈ, at the same time as he participated in Yahantei activities. KitŇ was even more dedicated to the task of promoting Buson and Yahantei than Buson was himself, which, given the condition of his membership, was also an investment in his own future. Nevertheless, he and Buson had a genuinely affectionate relationship. A letter Buson wrote to KitŇ in the early days of Yahantei gives some indication of the deep respect and trust that Buson had for him: Hajin, for instance, even when he was making an anthology, would consult with me about completing all unfinished linked verse sequences, and of course he would discuss each of his solo sequences with me. That was when I was not yet twenty-five or twenty-six, and though I was immature, Hajin thought of me as his right arm and discussed things with me. Your understanding of haikai is even more splendid, and there is no one in Kyoto aside from you with whom I would consult. But that should not make you boastful or arrogant. I would very much like to hear about how things are with you. And if there is something in Yahantei that you do not agree with, I will understand. In any event, the hearts of people in Kyoto are the worst in all Japan. For a long time I did not think so, but after I started practicing haikai, more and more I find this to be the case. I have traveled over half of Japan, and the merits and faults of the human heart are as clear to me as if I could point to them in the palm of my hand. Anyway, please come tonight. We will talk. Do not worry about the matter of asking Ba’nan 㚍ධ (i.e., Yoshiwake Tairo ศಽᄢ㞉 [d. 1778]) to do a ryŇgin ਔี (a verse sequence composed by two people). I asked him because he is a person who knows haikai. Fşryş (i.e., haikai) comes first in

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matters like this. Why would I ask group members like Ka’en นὫ or Raisen ᧪Ꮉ? I just don’t understand the reason any members could be angry with you. We will talk more of this when I see you. 20

As this letter suggests, not all of the Yahantei members had the same high regard for KitŇ as Buson did. Despite this, the privileged relationship Buson had with KitŇ endured for the rest of Buson’s life. And, after his death, KitŇ lived up to his responsibility as chief disciple by publishing commemorative works such as Withered cypress needles and Buson verse anthology without delay, and he presided over Yahantei school activities until his own early death in 1789 at the age of forty-nine. KitŇ’s public relations abilities were immensely valuable to Buson. As much as Buson was concerned about managing his identity as a poet, his work as a painter kept him busy. While Buson did personally compile and edit numerous anthologies for Yahantei, most of these were smallscale affairs in marking of some event, especially new year or memorial anthologies that mainly contained verses by his acquaintances. By contrast, KitŇ’s projects tended to be more elaborate collections that showcased works of poets who were not affiliated with Yahantei as well as those that were. KitŇ was the editor of three of the major Yahantei collections: Light of the snow, Dawn crow, Sequel to dawn crow, and was closely involved in the production of at least two others. KitŇ also compiled Buson verse anthology, a collection of 869 hokku that was published as a memorial the year after Buson’s death. The first verse collection that KitŇ oversaw for Yahantei was Light of the snow, a memorial anthology in honor of his father Kikei, who had belonged to the original Yahantei school. It was supposed to commemorate the thirteenth anniversary of Kikei’s death, although the actual date was not until three years later. While the ostensible purpose of the anthology was a solemn one, i.e., commemoration of Kikei’s life and work, in fact Light of the snow includes a variety of verses, many of them irreverent and comic, especially in the second half of the collection. Thus, in addition to memorializing the life and work of Kikei, Light of the snow was also a promotional piece for the Yahantei school. Buson explains KitŇ’s reasoning this way in his preface: Nowadays, everyone composes haikai, from nobles and daimyŇ to fishers and woodcutters. Making a name for oneself among them as a haikai master is difficult in the extreme. In Kyoto and Osaka one can count them on

——— 20

BSS, pp. 58–59.

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no more than three or four fingers. Of those three or four, Kikei was the main one.21 Kikei had originally practiced haikai with the Hajin studio. However, he did not learn the straightforward style there, so on the side he associated with the members of the Hanji studio (i.e., the school of Matsuki Tantan). Still, he was not converted to its complexity, but alone he used common parlance and ordinary language, and skillfully expressed form and feeling completely. To draw an analogy, his verses were like Chinese novels, whose evocative use of language is more interesting than the excellent prose of many historical records. […] On the thirteenth anniversary of his death his son KitŇ collected a volume of writings to honor his spirit. Unlike the usual memorial collection, it does not contain a lot of pious verses; on the whole, they celebrate the blossoms and extol the moon. It is like mixing fish and meat with herbs as an offering to the deities. I said, this is what your father would have wanted. The Chinese sage (Liu Yiqing ഏખ㓶)22 was in accord with precisely the man (Wang Rong ₺ᚐ) who slept on a chicken-bone mat, with his body growing emaciated and his eyes sunken, rather than the man (He Jiao ࡉ⮙) who stayed shut up in the prayer alcove, practicing assiduously, rosary in hand, chanting the holy phrase conspicuously, giving alms to the clergy and wearing strange padded-out clothes. Does not this work of KitŇ’s come close to the former man’s actions?23

Memorial anthologies usually contained laments for the deceased person composed by his friends. There is only one such verse in Light of the snow; the others are more playful and celebratory of Kikei’s life, or actually have little apparent connection. As justification, Buson points to the example of Wang Rong and He Jiao in the fifth century Chinese collection Shishuo xinyu ਎⺑ᣂ⺆(A new account of tales of the world) who both grieved for their deceased relatives differently: Wang Jung and Ho Ch’iao experienced the loss of a parent at the same time, and both were praised for their filial devotion. Wang, reduced to a skeleton kept to his bed; while Ho, wailing and weeping, performed all the rites. Emperor Wu (Ssu-ma Yen, r. 265–290), remarked to Liu I. “Have you ever observed Wang Jung and Ho Ch’iao? I hear that Ho’s grief and suffering go on what is required by propriety, and it makes me worry about him.” Liu I replied, “Ho Ch’iao, even though performing all the rites, has suffered no loss in his spirit or health. Wang Jung, even though not performing the rites, is nonetheless so emaciated with grief that his bones stand out. Your servant is of the opinion that Ho Ch’iao’s is the

——— 21

Literally, “the thumb.” Liu Yiqing was the compiler of Shishuo xinyu (A new account of tales of the world, ca. 430). 23 BZ, vol. 4, pp. 122–124. 22

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filial devotion of life, while Wang Jung’s is the filial devotion of death. Your Majesty should not worry about Ch’iao, but rather about Jung.”24

He Jiao punctiliously observed the appropriate ceremonies, but Wang Rong did not. Nevertheless, the fact that Wang Rong grew thin and haggard proved the sincerity of his feelings, and Shishuo xinyu author Liu Yiqing (403–444) admired Wang more. In other words, Buson argues that even though KitŇ does not follow the standard memorial anthology pattern, the emotion behind it is even more profound than those whose editors make a conspicuous show of grief. Buson contributed around ten hokku to the collection. Some are somber and evocative, such as: furu ido ya ka ni tobu sakana oto kurashi

old well a fish jumps at a mosquito the sound is dark25

haru no umi hinemosu notari notari kana

spring sea all day, waves rise and fall rise and fall26

“Old well” (Furu ido ya) recalls two BashŇ verses. One is the famous “Old pond / a frog jumps in / sound of water” (Furu ike ya / kawazu tobikomu / mizu no oto). Also similar is the Three notebooks verse “In the barn / mosquito’s buzz is dark / lingering heat” (Ushibeya ni / ka no koe kuraki / zanshŇ kana)27 that, like Buson’s verse, uses synesthesia, describing a sound in terms of darkness. In “Spring sea” (Haru no umi) Buson relies on another technique, the repetition of the onomatopoeic word notari (rise and fall) to create the impression of constant movement over a vast expanse of space—the gentle motion of waves on a calm spring day. Buson composed “Spring sea” at least ten years before Light of the snow, and it had already been included in several anthologies by this time. Other Buson verses KitŇ included in Light of the snow are more humorous, like the following:

——— 24 Wade-Giles romanization in original. Translator’s notes omitted. Liu I-ch’ing, Shihshuo Hsin-yü—A New Account of Tales of the World, trans. Richard B. Mather (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1976), pp. 10–11. 25 BZ, vol. 1, no. 429. 26 BZ, vol. 1, no. 46. 27 BZ, vol. 1, note 109, p. 40.

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sensoku no tarai mo morite yuku haru ya

the footbath tub is also leaking away spring runs out28

gakumon wa shiri kara nukeru hotaru kana

scholarly brilliance issues forth from your bottom firefly29

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Both place an image that is associated with classical elegance in an unpretentious, even vulgar context. “The footbath” (Sensoku no) takes up the topic of “departing spring” (yuku haru) which, as we have seen, implies a sensitive, refined regret for the passing of the season, comparing spring’s departure to the water running out of a bathtub. “Scholarly brilliance” (Gakumon wa) does the same thing with hotaru (firefly), a classical topic suggestive of romance and delicate feeling. Its comic twist turns on the reference to a saying, shiri kara nukeru (comes out one’s bottom), similar to the English expression “In one ear and out the other.” The scholar is diligent and studious, but he lacks the power of retention. Light of the snow also includes several illustrations by Buson. One shows BashŇ, flanked by Kikaku and Ransetsu. The other shows Hajin seated at a desk, gesturing with a fan, while Kikei reads a verse from a poem-slip. These illustrations visually establish the connection between the powerful authority BashŇ and the Yahantei school. BashŇ is shown teaching Kikaku and Ransetsu, who are Hajin’s disciples. Hajin, the founder of the Yahantei school, is shown teaching Kikei. Kikei was the colleague of the present day leader of Yahantei, Buson, and the father of its leading disciple, KitŇ. As we saw in the example of Buson’s painting “Group portrait of haikai sages,” discussed in Chapter Two, the illustrations in Light of the snow are simultaneously a gesture of praise—in this case, of Kikei—as well as an argument for the prestige of the Yahantei lineage. The second major Yahantei anthology that KitŇ oversaw was Dawn crow. Dawn crow was more ambitious than Light of the snow and it was created with a different purpose. Light of the snow was at least ostensibly a memorial anthology for Takai Kikei, whereas Dawn Crow unreservedly advanced a far more public agenda. As the title suggests, KitŇ aimed for

——— 28 29

BZ, vol. 1, no. 459. BZ, vol. 1, no. 906.

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Dawn crow to be like the cry of a crow at daybreak, a compelling call to the haikai world to wake up to the morning of a new era in which the ideals of BashŇ would become its guiding principles. In his preface to Dawn crow, KitŇ cites a comment by Buson calling for haikai reform: Nowadays the style of the age has gradually come to change, and in its current form there is standing still, there is being ahead, and there is being behind. However, they all come to a single point—respect for BashŇ. Yahantei (i.e., Buson) always said, “Now, in the far-off provinces, those groups that only speak of the ShŇmon, praising it, merely study the surface aspects of Master BashŇ’s teachings; they do not know its inner essence. For example, there are few who appreciate the meaning of a verse link like this:

kataki yose kuru mura matsu no koe

‘the enemy is coming’ sound in the pine woods

ariake no nashiuchieboshi kitari keri

at dawn, putting on a hunting cap30

“It looks like we have now arrived at an era of awakening to the eternal Orthodox Style Already, Owari poets31 have striven for the light of Winter day in five verse sequences. In Ise of the Divine Winds, though the school of Bakurin claimed to follow the teachings of BashŇ the Elder, now many people no longer believe it there either.32 In Kaga Province there is a haikai group that reminds me of the Tenna-EnpŇ [1673-1681]. style. In Heian (Kyoto) and Naniwa (Osaka) also, there are many who devotedly follow the true BashŇ style.” 33

KitŇ’s preface makes it clear that not only is Dawn crow intended to serve as a wake-up call to the rest of the haikai community to return to the lofty ideals of BashŇ, he also wants to distinguish what the Yahantei school is doing from the more popular BashŇ schools, i.e., the rural schools of ShikŇ and Bakurin. He quotes Buson’s statement that many

——— 30 Hattori DohŇ ᦯ㇱ࿯⧐, “SanzŇshi,” NKBT, vol. 66, p. 424. The link here is based on the feeling of tension and urgency. The tsukeku introduces the scene of a hunter quickly donning his cap at daybreak, with a sense of excitement similar to that in the maeku, where the persona is unsure whether the sound he hears is that of the wind in the pines, or of a fast-approaching enemy. 31 That is, members of the school of KatŇ KyŇtai in Nagoya. 32 Bakusui and his followers. 33 Takai KitŇ, “Akegarasu,” in Yamashita Kazumi et al., eds., Shin Nihon koten bungaku taikei, vol. 73, Tenmei haikai shş (Iwanami Shoten, 1998), pp. 55–57.

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who call themselves members of the BashŇ school are in fact frauds who know the surface aspects (hiniku ⊹⡺, literally, skin and flesh) of BashŇ’s teachings but fail to grasp their deeper essence (funkotsu ☳㛽, literally, powder bone). In including this quotation KitŇ points to the fact that Dawn crow represents the work of poets from many parts of Japan— Nagoya, Ise, Kaga, Kyoto, and Osaka—emphasizing that the ideal of reclaiming BashŇ’s teachings transcends barriers both of geography and poetic lineage, and was in fact a unifying force in the haikai community. Dawn crow includes both hokku and linked verse, with contributions by 116 poets in all. The highest number of verses belonged to Buson, Taigi, ShŇha, Kikei, KyŇtai, Chora, Bakusui, ChŇmu, and RyŇta; many less well-known poets were represented only by a single verse. Yahantei members, of course, were most prominent, but Dawn crow also includes many verses by poets outside Yahantei. These other poets belonged to groups that in one sense competed with Yahantei, but at the same time they were allies with a common goal, the BashŇ Revival movement. While the presence of KyŇtai, Chora, and Itton was understandable, as Buson frequently collaborated with these poets in linked verse sequences and hokku gatherings, the inclusion of Bakusui is a bit more surprising. Bakusui belonged to the rural school tradition of Bakurin and ShikŇ— the rural “backwoods BashŇ school” that Buson singled out for nearly as much criticism as he did the tentori poets. However, Buson’s statement suggests that Bakusui and his followers had corrected their mentors’ errors, and were worthy colleagues in the task of bringing about haikai reform. KitŇ included both old and new Buson hokku in Dawn crow. As ostensible representatives of the “orthodox BashŇ style,” Buson’s Dawn crow verses suggest that components of this style include at least two elements: powerful, evocative depictions of the natural world, especially famous places; and the recasting of imagery derived from classical Japanese literature into new contexts, such as imagined Chinese settings or situations of daily life. However, despite his avowals of the importance of faithful observation of Buson’s teachings, Buson actually takes a very different approach in his own work. The following are examples of Buson’s landscape verses:

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Fuji hitotsu uzumi nokoshite wakaba kana

Mount Fuji alone is not engulfed young leaves34

nawashiro ni Kurama no sakura no chiri ni keri

flooded fields the cherry blossoms of Mount Kurama have scattered35

“Mount Fuji alone” (Fuji hitotsu) was not a new poem. It had been composed during Buson’s Sankasha era, though it does not appear in the Sankasha collection From summer. Wakaba, a classical season word, means leaves in early summer that still retain the vitality of spring. Lush and irresistible, they almost drown the foreground in green, but in the background Mount Fuji rises, silent and unperturbed. “Flooded fields” (Nawashiro ni), another Sankasha-era hokku, describes squares of rice fields filled with the pale green of new shoots in late spring. Scattered cherry blossoms drift on the dark water that floods them. The lateblooming cherry trees on nearby Mount Kurama have already turned from pink to green, so the speaker concludes that these petals must have been carried down from the mountain on the wind. These two verses point up some obvious differences between Buson’s and BashŇ’s techniques. BashŇ emphasized close personal observation of geography and objects. Much of his life was spent traveling to view famous places for himself, and one of his most often-quoted teachings was “learn about the pine from the pine, learn about bamboo from the bamboo.”36 Buson, by contrast, did not make travel the center of his haikai practice. It is unlikely that either of these verses represent scenes that Buson actually witnessed himself. Instead, he invented them from memories of similar scenes and then juxtaposed them with place-names that had conventional associations to the topic, “fresh new leaves” (wakaba) in “Mount Fuji alone” and “cherry blossoms” (sakura) in “Flooded fields.” An example of the kind of verse that recontextualizes an allusion to classical Japanese is the following, which matches a reference to a Chinese poem in one of the most famous phrases in Heian literature:

——— 34

BZ, vol. 1, no. 525. BZ, vol. 1, no. 486. 36 SanzŇshi, NKBT, vol. 66, p. 398. 35

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Morokoshi no shikaku wa ikkoku no yoi o oshimi, wagachŇ no utabito wa murasaki no akebono o shŇ seri

A Chinese shi poet treasured so much as a quarter-hour of twilight; in our own country a waka poet praised the purple dawn.

haru no yo ya yoi akebono no sono naka ni

night in spring it’s between twilight and dawn37

The “Chinese shi poet” is the Song poet and painter Su Dongpo ⯃᧲ပ (1036–1101), the “waka poet” is the author of the Pillow book (Makura no sŇshi ᨉ⨲ሶ), Sei Shonagon ᷡዋ⚊⸒ (ca. 966–1028). Su Dongpo’s verse “Spring Night” contains the line, “A quarter-hour of spring night is worth one thousand gold pieces.”38 The Pillow book’s opening line is, “In the spring, dawn (is best).”39 Using a headnote to make his sources unambiguous, Buson creates a humorous twist on the classical tradition: juxtaposing the words yoi (evening) and akebono (dawn) with haru no yo (night in spring), he notes that night literally comes between these times so much admired by famous poets, and has an appeal that should also be savored.40 Whereas BashŇ was famous for his ability in elevating the events of everyday life to the level of classical poetry by his skill in juxtaposing the ordinary with the elegant, here Buson blurs the distinction between classical literature and the imported Chinese tradition. The third anthology that KitŇ was involved with was Sequel to dawn crow, which was published three years after Dawn crow. KitŇ regarded it as a continuation of his previous project. He included verses by most of the poets whose work had appeared in Dawn crow, and added some new ones: RankŇ, MuchŇ (Ueda Akinari), Yayş, and Chiyo, and as such, Dawn crow and Sequel to dawn crow represent almost all the major poets of the period. KitŇ planned it as his generation’s answer to one of the central works of the BashŇ school, Monkey’s straw coat (Sarumino ₎⬉, 1691). Although it was a product of Buson’s Yahantei, it was less focused on showcasing Buson’s verse than it was about promoting KitŇ’s image: for example, it includes almost twice as many KitŇ hokku

——— 37

BZ, vol. 1, no. 1027. Cited in BZ, vol. 1, p. 228, note 1027. In Chinese, xiao ኄ has the same meaning as ye ᄛ, unlike in Japanese, where yoi ኄ means twilight and yo ᄛ, night. Thus Buson misunderstood Su Dongpo’s poem: they both praise the same time of evening. 39 Ikeda Kikan et al., eds., NKBT, vol. 19, Makura no sŇshi, Murasaki Shikibu nikki (Iwanami Shoten, 1958), p. 43. 40 Shimizu, Yosa Buson no kanshŇ to hihyŇ, pp. 43–44. 38

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(45) than Buson hokku (17). Also, as the afterword by Akinari indicates, Sequel to dawn crow was also intended to serve as a commemoration of the seventeenth anniversary of the death of Kikei, KitŇ’s father. Furthermore, for a collection that is nominally a Yahantei school anthology, it contains a very large proportion of verses by non-Yahantei poets. As a consequence, rather than functioning as a defining statement of Yahantei style as Monkey’s straw coat did for the BashŇ school, Sequel to dawn crow was more like an index to the major figures of the Revival movement. Of the seventeen Buson verses that KitŇ chose for the collection, only a few allude directly to those of BashŇ, such as: uki ware ni kinuta ute ima wa mata yamine

as I am melancholy beat the fulling block,41 but stop now, it’s enough42

“To my melancholy” (uki ware o) refers to two BashŇ verses, “to my melancholy / add loneliness / cuckoo” (uki ware o / sabishigaraseyo / kankodori) and “beat the fulling block / so I can hear it / priest’s wife” (kinuta uchite / ware ni kikaseyo ya / bŇ ga tsuma). BashŇ’s verses are restrained and sensitive, redolent of the gentle sadness that is associated with sabi, quiet austerity. They reflect the aesthetic of fşkyŇ, something that started to interest BashŇ around 1680. FşkyŇ is a state of being so intoxicated by poetic or artistic sensibility that one is compelled to commit spontaneous, apparently crazy acts. Buson’s hokku, “As I am melancholy” (Uki ware ni), responds to BashŇ’s refined and delicate mood with self-deprecating humor. The speaker starts out with a noble goal: he tries to imitate BashŇ’s example by calling to an imagined listener (i.e., the priest’s wife of BashŇ’s verse) to strike the fulling block. However, he lacks the deep poetic sensibility of someone like BashŇ, and soon has had enough. This verse also invites us to laugh at those who pursue high artistic ideals: waga zukin uki yo no sama ni nizu mogana

I hope my hood doesn’t make me look like a mere playboy43

——— 41 A kinuta (fulling block) was used to beat cloth in order to soften its texture. In classical poetry it was associated with the melancholy and cold of long nights in autumn, as poets wrote of hearing its lonely sound on a sleepless night on a journey, and thinking of loved ones far away (Yamamoto Kenkichi, pp. 527–529). 42 BZ, vol. 1, no. 1285.

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However here the context is clothes, not aesthetic refinement. A zukin was a head covering similar to a hood; the verse refers to a kind of zukin that was at this time a favorite of those who styled themselves bunjin. The speaker here hopes that his zukin will make people think he is a person of taste, and not just a vain dandy who is trying to show off. Another Buson Sequel to dawn crow verse makes a direct allusion to a waka by SaigyŇ, one of the poets that BashŇ most deeply admired. It also reflects the aesthetic of fşkyŇ in the sense that it describes a situation in which the speaker remains devoted to his artistic ideals, despite the fact that he has no one to share them with: RyŇya to fukata mo naku ni toikuru hito mo nakereba

On a moonlit night, since there is nowhere to go visiting, and no one will come to visit.

nakanaka ni hitori areba zo tsuki o tomo

well now, if I am to be alone I’ll take the moon as a friend44

SaigyŇ’s verse is: nagamuru ni nagusamukoto wa nakeredomo tsuki o tomo nite akasu koro kana

gazing idly although it brings no comfort I’ll take the moon as a friend spending the night awake45

SaigyŇ Buson’s hokku lifts the line tsuki o tomo (I’ll take the moon as a friend) directly from SaigyŇ’s waka. Even though the speaker has no one with whom to enjoy the evening, it is too fine to ignore. Being solitary also, the moon makes a perfect companion. In doing so, the speaker makes an aisatsu to SaigyŇ, including him in the circle that contains the night, the moon, and himself, making the loneliness of the night a pleasant one. The pose of regret that one is without a companion to appreciate beautiful scenery is common to Chinese poetry also.46 Here Buson links the worlds of Chinese poetry and waka to create a haikai verse that expresses one of BashŇ’s most important poetic principles, fşkyŇ.

——— 43

BZ, vol. 1, no. 1188. BZ, vol. 1, no. 1435. 45 Ibid, p. 320, note 1435. 46 Susan Bush, The Chinese Literati on Painting: Su Shih (1037–1101) to Tung Ch’i-ch’ang (1555–1636) (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1971), pp. 7–8. 44

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Buson’s Yahantei anthologies While KitŇ’s work as editor played a large and important role in creating a public image for Yahantei and also in furthering the cause of the BashŇ Revival movement, Buson also was involved in the task of compiling anthologies himself. Thus he was also taking an active role not only in composing poetry, but also in setting a standard by using the medium of publication to express allegiances and common purpose. Aside from KitŇ’s large and inclusive anthologies, then, we will look at four in whose production Buson was more closely involved: Make the past present, Midnight music (Yahan raku ᄛඨᭉ, 1777), New flower gathering, and Blossoms and birds collection. Though it is very short and contains only one hokku by Buson, Make the past present is worth some attention, as Buson compiled it for the purpose of linking the new Yahantei to the old one, that is, the group founded by Buson’s teacher Hayano Hajin in Edo some forty years earlier. It was customary for second-generation haikai school leaders to publish volumes memorializing their teachers. Doing so helped to invent a tradition for the group, and created an environment in which the original master’s work and ideas are given the status of classics. In turn, honor rebounded on his followers, who were then marked with a sign of legitimacy and of partaking in an authorized version of the founder’s teachings. Buson contributed a verse in an earlier anthology commemorating Hajin’s death, SŇoku’s Far into the west, when he was still a novice haikai poet, but Make the past present was his only editorial project of this kind. Even so, it is unconventional as a memorial volume, and in the preface Buson goes to some length to defend himself against the criticism he expects to receive for it. The hokku by present-day Yahantei members that it includes are conspicuously unlike those of Hajin. In fact, Buson explains, though one would expect the leader of a group called Yahantei to impart Hajin’s teachings to his disciples, in fact their verses are more a reflection of the sabi and shiori—or austerity and delicacy—characteristic of the verse of Matsuo BashŇ. Nowadays what I teach my haikai students it is not Hajin’s openhearted tone, but chiefly aspire to Elder BashŇ’s austerity and delicacy (sabi, shiori), as I wish to return haikai to its past. This is a matter of turning away from external illusions and responding to inner truths. This is called haikai Zen େ⺽⑎, a dharma that is transmitted directly, from mind to mind. Those

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who lack understanding of this criticize me, saying that turning one’s back on one’s teacher is a terrible sin, and so forth. With this in mind, the two sequences that follow depart from that sabi-shiori style, instead, they earnestly imitate Hajin’s style, and are humbly offered to him.47

He describes Hajin’s verse as having the quality of openheartedness; admirable, perhaps, but not the equal of BashŇ. However, Buson ‘s justification for preferring sabi and shiori—even in a volume dedicated to Hajin’s memory—is quite shrewd. Buson was no mystic, but here he invokes Zen for persuasive effect, explaining that his stylistic preference is in accord with the teaching he received directly, like spiritual insight, from Hajin himself. Buson claims that the real essence of Hajin’s teaching is that haikai has to change with the times, and since the times call for a return to BashŇ, seeming to deviate from his master’s teachings is actually the best way to remain faithful to them. With this argument, Buson simultaneously praises his teacher, defends himself from potential detractors, and aligns the work of the present Yahantei school with the agenda of the BashŇ Revival movement, whose primary goal is returning haikai to its past. The one Buson hokku that is included in the anthology is part of a short series; it is the third of three verses, the first of which is by Ransetsu, and the second by Hajin. Fuke sarinu nioi nokorite hana no kumo

Fuke48 departed but a fragrance lingers clouds of blossoms

Ransetsu GenbŇ kyoshi nioi nokorite hana no kumo

Layman GenbŇ’s fragrance lingers clouds of blossoms

Hajin

——— 47

BZ, vol. 4, pp. 139–140. Fuke ᥉ൻ, Chinese, Puhua (d. 860), was a Buddhist monk and founder of the sect that bears his name. 48

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SŇa kyoshi sanjşsan kaiki seitŇ

Appropriate to the thirty-third anniversary of Layman SŇa’s (Hajin’s) death:

hana no kumo mie ni kasanete kumo no mine

clouds of blossoms lay three times as deep mountains of cloud49

Hajin’s verse expresses his grief for his mentor Ransetsu by reworking one of his own verses: GenbŇ is an alternate name for Ransetsu. Buson takes up this chain of associations with his own verse. “Clouds of blossoms” is a spring topic, and refers to cherry trees blooming in such profusion they could be mistaken for clouds. Buson’s verse moves the setting to summer by changing the topic to “mountains of cloud,” the towers of clouds that form in a clear sky on a hot summer’s day. In doing so, the scale of the verse becomes solemn and grand, underscoring the seriousness of the emotion it depicts. Just as this is the third layer of allusion, the speaker’s sentiment is three times as deep as that of an ordinary verse, and this is appropriate for an anthology marking the thirty-third anniversary of his teacher’s death. It was three years before Buson tried his hand at another anthology; and this one, Midnight music, was, like Make the past present, also small and limited in scope. Midnight music was planned as a saitanchŇ, a new year anthology to be released at the beginning of the first month, but it was not actually distributed until the end of the second month, more like a shunkyŇjŇ. More famous for its two haishi (haikai free verse), it is not a particularly good example of Buson’s hokku, because it includes only one: a starting verse to a kasen that was written by thirty-six of his disciples, who each contributed one verse: saitan o shitari gao naru haikaishi

the New Year taken care of he has a smug look on his face haikai teacher50

The other forty-three hokku Buson includes were written by his disciples on the topic of the coming of spring, which makes it a good example of the function of the new year anthology to document the membership of the group. Far more interesting for a study of Buson’s hokku is New flower gathering, an exceptional collection of verse and prose that he also completed

——— 49 50

BZ, vol. 7, p. 76. BZ, vol. 1, no. 1488.

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in 1777. New flower gathering has an unusual history. Buson did not publish it during his lifetime. In 1784 Matsumura Gekkei added illustrations and an afterword explaining the circumstances under which it was written, but it was not published until 1792. Buson wrote the hokku section of New flower gathering first. In his afterword, Gekkei explains that it was intended as a summer devotion (gegyŇ ᄐⴕ) in memory of Buson’s mother. Buson originally planned to write ten hokku a day for one hundred days. As the title of the collection indicates, Buson found inspiration for his project in the example of Kikaku’s Flower gathering (Hanatsumi ⧎៰, 1792) a hokku collection also written in honor of his mother. Unlike Kikaku, however, Buson gave up a few weeks into the project, claiming illness. Later that year, however, he returned to his notebook and decided to fill it with short essays on various topics in the style of zuihitsu. Most of Buson’s 2,800-odd hokku were composed in the context of meetings or other social exchanges and were published in group anthologies; in other words, they exemplify haikai’s typical collaborative, public aspect. The New flower gathering hokku, however, were different. These were written in a private setting where there was little pressure to outshine rivals or impress students. As a result, they have a quiet, contemplative quality, and occasionally come tantalizingly close to promising a glimpse of Buson’s inner life. Whether or not they are actually biographical, each is given a date and has a place in a sequence that Buson determined, and so it is possible to observe a process taking place that is distinct from what otherwise might be found in more conventional anthologies. In particular, the anthology’s first six poems—those composed on the first day of the project—seem to have a non-fictional cast to them. They are some of the most moving and heart wrenching verses Buson ever wrote. The sequence begins on the eighth day of the fourth month, traditionally observed as the Buddha’s birthday: Eighth day 1. kanbutsu ya motoyori hara wa kari no yado

Buddha’s birthday it’s a brief shelter, the womb

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2. uzuki yŇka shinde umaruru ko wa hotoke

Eighth day of the Fourth Month born dead the child is a Buddha

3. koromogae mi ni shiratsuyu no hajime kana

time for summer clothes a first chance to know the white dew of tears

4. koromogae haha nan Fujiwara uji nari keri

time for summer clothes Mother was surely a Fujiwara

5. hototogisu uta yomi yşjo kikoyu naru

hototogisu I hear a courtesan composing poetry

6. mimi utoki chichi nyşdŇ yo hototogisu

Father has entered the Way, but his hearing is still poor hototogisu51

Given the poverty of information available about Buson’s family and childhood, these six verses have attracted much attention from scholars and other commentators. Speculation tends to center around Buson’s relationship with his mother, since the title of the collection recalls Flower gathering, which Kikaku compiled in memory of his mother. Also, not only do the first six hokku have a nostalgic, grief-tinged mood to them, but four of them describe the experiences of women. Some scholars take Gekkei’s afterword at face value, arguing that New flower gathering that Buson’s 1,000-verse gegyŇ was intended as a kuyŇ ଏ㙃 (Buddhist memorial ritual) for his mother, and that this year marked the fiftieth anniversary of her death—meaning that she died when Buson was thirteen. According to these interpretations, the source for these verses are Buson’s childhood memories: his mother was a tragic figure; perhaps she suffered a miscarriage, or died young; she was a dignified person reduced to straitened circumstances, she was as charming and melancholy as a courtesan, and so on. Another set of interpretations associates the female figures in these hokku with Kuno, Buson’s beloved daughter. Kuno’s marriage was an unhappy one (it eventually ended in divorce); one of Buson’s letters expresses his loathing for her father-in-law, who, he claimed, was a

——— 51

BZ, vol. 7, p. 227.

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greedy man who only wanted her for the money she might bring to his household. According to this interpretation, it is Kuno who lost a child to miscarriage. In any case, the emotion in these verses is so plain that it is hard not to imagine that they directly describe some events in Buson’s life; at the same time, they do not develop a consistent narrative. Instead, like a linked verse sequence, the situations and personae change from verse to verse. Read together, however, something that does remain constant is an overtone of longing and sorrow. Each of the six hokku is like the facets of a jewel that reflect the same complex mood from different angles. Buson began his project on the eighth day of the Fourth Month, which was observed as the Buddha’s birthday, so it makes sense that the verses he composed on that day were spiritual and contemplative. As the second verse, “Eighth day of the Fourth Month” (Uzuki yoka), shows, the word hotoke simultaneously means “Buddha” and “dead person.” A birth implies a future death; the change of seasons marked in the beginning of the fourth month—when one exchanges winter clothes for those of summer—reminds the speaker of the ephemerality of life, and his thoughts turn to the Way of Buddhism. As the days passed, however, Buson’s contemplative mood seems to lift, and he steadily reels off witty and imaginative verses, many of which return again and again to the same topic, such as this excerpt from a series on sushi: Seventeenth day 82. sushi o osu ware sake kamosu tonari ari

at my house we just ferment sushi at my neighbor’s they brew sake

83. sushi o osu sekijŇ ni shi o dai subeku

I must inscribe a poem on the stone sushi press

84. sushi oke o araeba asaki yşgyo kana

rinsing out the sushi tub attracts fish to the water’s surface

85. mashirage no yone isshŇ ya sushi no meshi

a peck of pure silvery white rice for sushi

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86. takujŇ no sushi ni me samushi Kangyotei

the sushi on the table has a chilling effect Fish-Viewing Pavilion52

All of these verses are more or less self-explanatory, though it might help to point out that the sushi Buson refers to here is not the fresh, Edostyle variety that is commonly eaten today, but funazushi or fermented sushi, which was made by layering fish with salted (later, vinegared) rice in a tub, covering it with a stone, and then leaving it for several months to ripen. The impression verses like these create is one of restless creativity, as Buson views his topic from different angles, finding new and often comic insights every time. New flower gathering is exceptional among the group of anthologies that the Yahantei school poets produced. It was not part of Buson’s effort to consolidate the group’s image, or of his own, because the hokku within it were written as a private exercise rather than as part of a public event or communal project. Although a few New flower gathering hokku later appear in other anthologies, Buson did not publish the collection himself; and in fact it did not appear until after his death. So while Make the past present can be included under the broad category of anthologies that were used to promote Yahantei to a wider audience, the New flower gathering hokku section deviates from this pattern, and gives us a glimpse of an introspective, less studied Buson. Blossoms and birds collection was the last anthology that Buson edited. It was published in 1782, the year before his death. Buson had originally planned Blossoms and birds collection as a new year anthology, like Midnight music; however, after a visit to Yoshino, famous for its cherry blossoms, he ended up deciding to create a collection devoted to verses on the topic of cherry blossoms and hototogisu. Blossoms and birds collection was a small but exquisitely designed volume, with illustrations by Buson and elegant calligraphy in his hand. It contains verses not only by Yahantei members, but also Buson’s friends, including courtesans and kabuki actors. While it includes verses by the usual Yahantei members and patrons such as KitŇ, Korekoma, Donshi, Hyakuchi, and DŇryş, there are none by BashŇ Revival poets like KyŇtai, Chora, or ChŇmu that are featured in KitŇ-edited anthologies like Dawn crow. Buson organized Blossoms and birds collection as a way to acknowledge his friends and

——— 52

BZ, vol. 7, p. 232.

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patrons, rather than to reach out to a larger community of haikai poets. KitŇ’s anthologies advertise Yahantei to a larger world, trying to extend its reach, but Buson’s look inward, linking the members of his personal circle to one another. Aside from hokku on the topic of cherry blossoms by Buson and his friends and supporters, Blossoms and birds collection also includes a fragment of a linked verse sequence whose hokku was written by Umejo, the talented and accomplished wife of his close disciple Gekkei, and finishes with a sequence that starts with a hokku by Danrin school founder Nishiyama SŇin on the topic of hototogisu and a waki (second verse) by Buson. Buson uses alternate haigŇ େภ (haikai names) for his hokku, a practice that was not uncommon. Two of them are light-hearted, celebratory of the beauty of the trees and the fun that can be had when going to view them: yuku haru no shunjun toshite osozakura

departing spring seems to hesitate late-blooming cherry trees53

tanomarete sakura mi ni yuku otoko kana

when asked he goes to check on the cherry trees what a guy54

Buson uses the haikai name KinkŇ ㊄▶ for “Departing spring” (Yuku haru no). The verse describes an apparent pause in the process of transition from spring to summer, as the blossoming of the lateblooming cherry trees seem to pull time back to the middle of spring, when ordinary trees normally bloom. The beauty of the trees is so magnificent that it almost arrests the passage of spring itself. “Departing spring” is followed directly by “When asked” (Tanomarete) although Buson uses a different haikai name here, Shunhan ᤐဈ. This verse is also bright and playful; having invited a friend to go cherry blossom viewing, he impresses everyone by going to check on the trees to make sure they will be ready for the party. The third Buson verse is different. It is set off from the others by a long headnote and an illustration, a stylized drawing of a kasa, or travel hat. Buson uses the haikai name Yahan. The headnote and hokku are as follows:

——— 53 54

BZ, vol. 1, no. 2252. BZ, vol. 7, p. 265.

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Not following the aesthetic of rushing off on a journey to Yoshino saying, ‘I want to show the cherry blossoms my travel hat,’ I just stay in my home worrying about the affairs of the mundane world, thinking, I’ll do this, or, why don’t I do that, and the things that I plan never get done, until finally, though the instances of turning away from the beauties of nature are numerous in this world, it is as if I were the only such idiot there is, and I feel I cannot show my face to other people [...]

hana chirite mi no shita yami ya hinoki kasa

blossoms fallen what darkness below my cypress travel hat55

“Blossoms fallen” (Hana chirite) brings the focus to BashŇ, who was so famous for his journeys that the image of the travel hat alone makes us think of him. But more directly, the verse alludes to a famous poem BashŇ wrote about cherry blossoms at Yoshino: Yoshino nite sakura mishŇ zo hinoki kasa

hey, I want to show it the cherry blossoms at Yoshino my cypress travel hat56

BashŇ In contrast to BashŇ’s verse, which is a playful expression of the aesthetic of fşkyŇ, or poetic madness, Buson’s verse is gloomy and selfabnegating. Buson’s poem places the speaker in a time and place after the blossoms of BashŇ’s poem have fallen, in later, darker days. Though he has visited Yoshino, which so entranced BashŇ, the speaker in Buson’s poem does not claim to be equal to the task of appreciating it, and uses the hat to hide his face. “Blossoms fallen” is one of many Buson verses which evoke a BashŇ source poem, only to express a sense of inferiority or humility as a novice might in the presence of a master. In this sense, it is a good example of an expression of Buson’s anxiety of reception: though he is convinced of the rightness of following BashŇ’s lead, Buson is careful to preempt any criticism that might be provoked by leaving himself open to comparison with his brilliant predecessor.

——— 55 56

BZ, vol. 4, pp. 205-206. NKBT, vol. 45, p. 49.

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Five Cartloads of Wastepaper Blossoms and birds collection was the last anthology Buson edited, and almost the last one he was involved with. Just before he died, he wrote the preface for Kuroyanagi Korekoma’s memorial collection in honor of his father, ShŇha, called Five cartloads of wastepaper. The title of the work is taken from the ShŇha hokku cited in Chapter Three, “holed up for the winter / I am the master / of five cartloads of wastepaper!” (fuyu gomorite / gosha no hŇgu no / aruji kana). Despite the fact that it was edited by neither Buson nor KitŇ, Five cartloads of wastepaper is an important collection for the study of Buson’s verse and the context in which it was produced because it is the latest anthology produced within Buson’s lifetime that brings together verses of Yahantei school members. It includes fragmentary and complete linked verse sequences with hokku whose kigo relate to each of the four seasons. Buson wrote over thirty of these. Five cartloads of wastepaper resembles KitŇ’s Light of the snow in that, while it is a son’s memorial anthology for his father, it is less of a tribute to ShŇha’s verse style than a collection of representative verses of the Yahantei school as it defined itself in the early years of the Tenmei period (1781–1789). Five cartloads of wastepaper brings together the work of many poets who were supporters of the Revival movement, basically, the major figures of the period when the Yahantei school was at its height— old members of the Yahantei school like GantŇ and Kikei, contemporaries of ShŇha like Ranzan and Taigi, non-Yahantei colleagues with whom Buson felt a close affinity like KyŇtai, Chora, RyŇtai, even poets like ChŇmu, Chiyo, Bakusui and Otsuni who had significant followings and were important contributors to the haikai community of the period but who were not necessarily close allies with the Yahantei school’s aims. In other words, it was a last reunion of the Yahantei school and its friends. Most of the Buson verses included here were written in the ten years before his death, and show him at his most romantic and nostalgic. Significantly, the themes that dominate them are the same as those that he returned to again and again ever since the days of Sankasha: nostalgia, storytelling, and an imagined Chinese and Japanese past. Nostalgia is the key theme of these verses:

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hana ibara kokyŇ no michi ni nitaru kana

brambles in bloom just like the ones on the road to my hometown57

ureitsutsu oka ni noboreba hana ibara

lost in melancholy when I climb the hill brambles in bloom58

Hana ibara is a thorny vine that blooms in midsummer, with flowers similar to roses; Buson tends to link it with a mood of longing for childhood. The earliest version of this verse dates from 1774; in Five cartloads of wastepaper, it appears with the headnote, “Climbing up the “Eastern Hill.” This headnote refers to a famous poem by Tao Yuanming 㒻ᷗ᣿ (Tao Qian 㒻ẜ, 365–427), also on a theme of nostalgia for one’s childhood, “Return Home!” Tao Yuanming’s poem has the lines: “Climbing the eastern hill, I whistle softly to myself / Gazing at a clear stream, I compose a poem.”59 “Lost in melancholy” (Ureitsutsu) also expresses a sense of nostalgia, and directly mentions the “hill” referred to in the headnote to “Brambles in bloom” (Hana ibara). As we know, Buson left home around the age of twenty, and there is no evidence to suggest that he ever went back. Nevertheless, many of his verses explore this theme. Other Five cartloads of wastepaper hokku suggest that they are fragments of a longer, larger story, such as: tŇasa ni tsuwamono bune ya natsu no tsuki

in the shoals a military ship summer moon60

“In the shoals” (TŇasa ni) is not a particularly remarkable verse, although it stands out as an example of one of Buson’s favorite techniques—using the restricted scope of the hokku to focus in on a particular moment that is metonymic of a broader narrative. Here, the word “military ship” (tsuwamono bune) is juxtaposed with a placid image of the reflection of the

——— 57

BZ, vol. 1, p. 1128. BZ, vol. 1, p. 1129. 59 Tao Yuanming’s lines are: 58

⊓᧲⊤એ⥥ཕ ⥃ᷡᵹ⠰⾮⹞

Cited in Teruoka Yasutaka and Kawashima Tsuyu, eds., NKBT, vol. 58, Buson shş, Issa shş (Iwanami Shoten, 1959), note 541, p. 128. 60 BZ, vol. 1, no. 581.

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summer moon over a shallow sea; a threatening presence looms over what should otherwise be a peaceful scene. The verse refers to no particular historical event or literary work, and Buson did not witness anything like this himself, but the reader is invited to imagine a context to which this scene belongs. It is not surprising that “In the shoals” recalls the much more famous hokku “The Koguryo ship” that we looked at in Chapter Three; it was written in the same year, 1769. Korekoma’s portrait of Buson in Five cartloads of wastepaper is one that is constructed from verses that he wrote during ShŇha’s lifetime. Buson’s use of the hokku to create narrative effects can also take up more ordinary, mundane topics: kiji uchite kaeru ieji no hi wa takashi

he shot his pheasant the sun is high on the road home61

This was written in 1771, a few years after the previous verse, and has a completely different aspect. Instead of a shadowy world of vague foreboding and power, the setting here is sunlit and open. A hunter heads for home, his day’s objective met. The pheasant is a common topic in classical Japanese poetry; its brightly colored plumage made it a spectacular image. Poets also admired the springtime mating calls of the pheasants, the piercing cry of the male and the female’s gentler, plaintive answer. Pheasants were associated with spring because this is the season their haunting calls are most striking. Buson’s verse suggests the pheasant’s call in the repetition of “i” sounds; visually, it also invites the reader to imagine its glossy, iridescent feathers shining in the sunlight as the hunter carries it home on his back. Buson’s Five cartloads of wastepaper verses also show another side of his interest in telling stories: the fascination he had with eerie, supernatural happenings: suisen ni kitsune asobu ya yoi zuki yo

——— 61 62

BZ, vol. 1, p. 1229. BZ, vol. 1, p. 1324.

in the daffodils a fox frolics moonlit twilight62

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West of the capital there was a haunted house that for a long time was totally decrepit. Now, without warning:

harusame ya hito sumite keburi kabe ni moru

soft spring rain smoke leaks from the walls someone lives there63

Foxes were believed to have magical powers, especially to assume the shape of attractive men or women in order to seduce the unwary. Buson wrote many hokku on the subject of foxes, and a story of a fox-haunting appears in the prose section of New flower gathering. Here, in “In the daffodils” (Suisen ni) it is twilight, a time between the realms of day and night. The moon, like the daffodils, is pale yellow; and in the dim light, a fox appears. The verb is asobu, to play, and the season is spring, so it may be that this is a fox cub. The scene is vague, almost ghostly, but it is not frightening; Buson’s depictions of the supernatural like this tend to be restrained, aestheticized, and even comical. “Spring rain” (Harusame ya) is similar: in the season when drenching showers fall frequently but unpredictably, a spooky, seemingly abandoned shack shows signs of life. Like “In the shoals,” this verse was written in 1769. A third characteristic shared by many Buson verses included in Five cartloads of wastepaper is the debt they owe to Chinese poetry. ShŇha, of course, was also a kanshi poet, so hokku that recall Chinese poetry are a particularly appropriate choice for his memorial volume. One such example is “Under the green plum trees / drawing her brows together / a beautiful woman,” the From summer verse that we discussed in Chapter Three. Another is: yuku haru ya omotaki biwa no daki gokoro

departing spring the heavy-hearted feeling of embracing a lute64

In “Departing spring” (Yuku haru ya) the persona holds a biwa, or fivestringed lute. The biwa, similar to the Chinese pipa, was still played in Buson’s day, but in mentioning it here Buson introduces a decidedly archaic and romantic atmosphere. The end of spring (yuku haru) is cause for regret, as we saw in Buson’s Light of the snow verse, “the footbath /

——— 63 64

BZ, vol. 1, p. 437. BZ, vol. 1, no. 1106.

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tub is also leaking away / spring runs out” (sensoku no / tarai mo morete / yuku haru ya). Trying to dispel this mood, the persona picks up the lute to play something cheerful, but it feels heavy in her arms. Buson’s verse alludes to one by Chinese poet Wang Changling ₺᣽㦂 (c. 690–c. 756), “Spring Melancholy at the Western Palace,” and, given that the Chinese poem is written in a woman’s voice, the persona in Buson’s hokku is understood to be female: In the quiet night of the Western Palace, a hundred flowers are fragrant. I thought to roll up the jeweled blinds, but I pass the spring night in sorrow. With a pipa leaning in my arms, I gaze at the moon. Zhaoyang is hidden in trees that are colored in pale, pale light. ⷏ችᤐᕉ ⷏ችᄛ㕒⊖⧎㚅 ᰼ᝬ⃨☄ᤐᕱ㐳 ᢳᛴ㔕๺ᷓ⷗᦬ ᧀᧀ᮸⦡㓝ᤘ㓁 65 “Departing spring” also alludes to the BashŇ verse link: kakaeshi kin no hiza ya omotaki66

knees, across which I held a zither— how heavy it is

Later commentators have praised this verse for Buson’s use of a physical sensation—heaviness—to describe a psychological state, and the skill with which Buson used this device is probably the reason it was included in Korekoma’s anthology. Another Five cartloads of wastepaper verse that refers to Chinese poetry is: hironiwa no botan ya ama no ippŇ ni

a peony in the open garden a corner of heaven67

Buson was very fond of peonies. The word botan (peony) is Chinese in origin, and has overtones of splendor and opulence. Here he matches the

——— 65

Maeno, vol. 3, p. 154. BZ, vol. 1, p. 246, note 1106. 67 BZ, vol. 1, no. 2692. 66

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exotic peony with a phrase from a poem by Su Dongpo’s “First Prose Poem on the Red Cliff,” “I long for my loved one / In a corner of the sky”68—implying a comparison between the flower the speaker sees and a beautiful woman. Both are stately and elegant, and they bestow a special grace on the places they occupy. Over the course of his lifetime, Buson composed over 2,800 hokku, a prodigious output for someone who cultivated the image of an amateur haikai poet. By contrast, BashŇ’s collected hokku number around 980. As we have seen, a large number of hokku found their way into anthologies of Sankasha, Yahantei, and other groups with which Buson had a close affiliation. Others that have not been cited here were published in other, less well-known anthologies. The largest collections of Buson verses, however, are Buson hokku anthology and Buson self-selected hokku anthology (Buson jihitsu kuchŇ ⭢᧛⥄╩Ꮽ). Buson hokku anthology includes 868 verses that were chosen by KitŇ, the preface was written by RyŇta and the afterword by Denpuku. Published in 1784, was simultaneously KitŇ’s memorial to his friend and mentor, and a way to support the launch of KitŇ’s career as Yahantei III, successor to Hajin and Buson. Sadly, KitŇ died only five years after Buson, and the Yahantei school dispersed after his death. Still, looking at the verses that he selected reveals much about his tastes, and gives some indication of what he thought were the definitive expressions of the Yahantei style. Even more revealing is Buson self-selected anthology, a manuscript in Buson’s handwriting that remained unpublished until the twentieth century. Buson made a point of criticizing people who issued collections of their own verses during their lifetimes, complaining that because they invariably contained a large number of mediocre efforts, they always did harm to their authors’ reputations. However, in his later years he put together a selection of some 1,450 of what he considered to be his best hokku. KitŇ probably drew on this when he was assembling Buson hokku anthology, however, a number of verses that he left out were deemed by Buson himself as being of some merit, and some that KitŇ chose were verses that Buson passed over. Japanese scholars have extensively

——— 68 Translation by Burton Watson, in Jonathan Chaves, The Chinese Painter as Poet (New York: The China Institute Gallery, 2000), p. 138.

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analyzed the differences between these two texts, most notably Ogata Tsutomu in Buson jihitsu kuchŇ (1974).69 The next chapter explores Buson’s linked verse, or haikai no renga. While Buson’s concerns about his place in the haikai community had a profound effect on his hokku. This effect was even more pronounced in his work in the linked verse form. While linked verse had lost some of its popularity during the KyŇhŇ period, it was still extremely important, and Buson’s linked verse is among the most masterful of the entire genre.

——— 69

Ogata Tsutomu, ed., Buson jihitsu kuchŇ, Chikuma ShobŇ, 1974.

CHAPTER FIVE

RESISTING COMMUNALITY: LINKED VERSE SEQUENCES Linked verse is a particularly compelling subject of exploration as it offers an intimate glimpse into the way that poets directly negotiated with their colleagues at the site of their practice. Linked verse sequences were usually composed by two or more people in a single session, bringing together the creative energies of poets of diverse backgrounds, training, and factional allegiances. While there were a large number of complex rules governing the composition of linked verse, unpredictability was one of the form’s greatest fascinations. Another was the knowledge that each session was a unique and unrepeatable occasion, contingent on the time, place, and the character of its participants. The practice of linked verse composition was on the wane during Buson’s lifetime. BashŇ had been one of the greatest exponents of the kasen, or thirty-six link sequence, and the linked verse that he and his disciples composed forms the core of the collections that his school compiled. However, even in BashŇ’s day linked verse had to compete with single-verse forms such as the hokku or maekuzuke, and its decline became even more precipitous in the KyŇhŇ period. One reason for this was that the rules of linked verse were very demanding and took a great deal of effort to master. Also, linked verse was extremely timeconsuming and required the participation of other poets. While haikai’s social aspect was always one of its central attractions, as the ranks of haikai practitioners swelled with the presence of less well-educated merchants and farmers, its communality took different forms, and eventually came to center on competition over individual verses rather than collaboration on lengthy sequences. Nevertheless, linked verse did not disappear entirely during the eighteenth century. The inheritors of BashŇ’s legacy were among its most enthusiastic proponents, particularly followers of the rural ShŇmon poet ShikŇ, haikai theorist and systemizer of BashŇ’s teachings. While maekuzuke and other competitive forms flourished in the urban areas, members of ShikŇ’s Mino faction and its close ally, the Ise faction, remained avid supporters of linked verse. Given BashŇ’s strong interest

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in linked verse, it is not surprising that Revival poets also connected the form with the work of returning haikai to his ideals. As early as 1744, poets who admired the BashŇ school’s Twenty kasen of the EnpŇ era (EnpŇ nijikkasen ᑧቲੑච᱌઄, 1680), published Edo twenty kasen (Edo nijikkasen ᳯᚭੑච᱌઄ Like its model, Edo twenty kasen was a collection of solo thirty-six link sequences by twenty poets; its title and format reflect its purpose as a tribute to BashŇ. The rediscovery of BashŇ-related manuscripts was also an impetus to compile linked verse collections. As I mentioned in Chapter Three, Kyoto twenty kasen, edited by ShŇzan, Taigi, and Zuiko, was published after Zuiko found a letter in BashŇ’s handwriting; the collection includes the twenty kasen that the three poets wrote in celebration of this occasion. Similarly, KyŇtai and his disciples wrote four of the sequences included in Autumn day to accompany a previously unpublished sequence with a hokku BashŇ wrote while visiting Nagoya in 1688. However, Revival poets viewed linked verse differently than BashŇ and his disciples did. Despite their avowed interest in following BashŇ’s example, hokku was the mainstay of their practice. Also, as a result of the simplifications introduced by KyŇhŇ-era theorists like ShikŇ, rural BashŇ school poets tended to favor sequences that reflected everyday experience rather than deep knowledge of the classical literary tradition, and this trend came to influence the Revival poets more generally.

Buson and Linked Verse Buson was an extremely accomplished linked verse poet. His verses appear in sequences included in collections from the late 1730s, and throughout his life his letters to friends and disciples contain comments on linking technique. Like other poets in the Revival movement, Buson regarded linked verse as a way to recover the lost grandeur of the BashŇ style. Even more than that, he believed that constant exposure to BashŇ’s linked verse was important for cultivating a poetic voice. He even compiled an anthology, Elder BashŇ’s linking techniques anthology, in order to provide his readers with an easy reference tool to consult. As he remarks in its preface: To learn about haikai verse links, you must first of all memorize the verses of BashŇ, and know the relationship between the three kinds of verses involved in linking. If for three days you do not recite the Elder’s verses,

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thorns will grow in your mouth. However, the Elder’s verses exist in a broad range of anthologies, and are not easy to find. Thus we have taken excerpts, condensed them, and should there be people who are devoted to the Way, we make them available.1

However, compared to the large number of hokku that Buson wrote, his production of tsukeku is relatively small—around 120 sequences in all, many of which are incomplete. Looked at another way, while the anthologies that he worked on throughout his life contain a fair number of sequences, his contributions to them are remarkably sparse. His tsukeku appear only occasionally in sequences published before 1750. Sankasha and Yahantei gatherings focused almost exclusively on hokku, and the Danrinkai სᨋળ, a Yahantei-affiliated group that formed in 1779 with the express purpose of composing linked verse, abandoned the practice almost as soon as it started. Buson’s ambivalence towards linked verse composition may derive from the fact that it obligated poets to relinquish autonomy over their work. After each poet composed a verse, his or her colleague stepped in, considered the various possible meanings of what was deliberately written to be a highly evocative and ambiguous verse, and finally chose one meaning to the exclusion of others. Sensitivities about interpretation of one’s own writing were out of place in linked verse, as the ability to write a tsukeku that made a surprising or unexpected connection was highly valued. Also, as the example of the small and elegant Yahantei anthologies like Blossoms and birds collection shows, Buson was a meticulous craftsman, and the improvisational nature of linked verse did not appeal to him very much. He even resorted to unconventional methods to avoid the need for spontaneous composition. For example, the Peaches and plums sequences—often called the finest example of linked verse of the Yahantei school, and possibly the entire late eighteenth century—were composed by exchange of letters over the span of several months, which allowed him time to carefully revise and rethink his tsukeku. In short, while collaboration in some linked verse sequences was inevitable for a Revival poet, Buson preferred to devote himself to activities like painting and hokku composition where he had more power over their outcomes. Nevertheless, the linked verse that Buson did write is important, not only because of the admiration it attracted, but because

——— 1

BZ, vol. 4, p. 142.

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it is a good example of the Revival-era linked verse in general. My discussion focuses on kasen from three different stages of Buson’s career. The first, “Willow leaves, fallen” (Yanagi chiri), from the anthology Scrap paper coverlet dates from Buson’s years in the northeast. The second, “On the white chrysanthemums” (Shiragiku ni) from Around here: Four kasen in one night (Kono hotori: Ichiya shi kasen ᱝ߶ߣࠅ৻ᄛ྾᱌઄), was composed during his early years as Yahantei school leader. The third, “Peony petals scatter” (Botan chirite), from Peaches and plums, was written near the end of his life.

Conventions of Linked Verse I will begin my discussion of Buson’s linked verse with a brief look at some of the conventions of the form. As a rule, linked verse sequences were composed in a group, in one place, at a single sitting. While in some cases poets wrote all the verses on their own (called dokugin ⁛ี), normally at least two persons worked together. Sequences might also be made up of single-verse contributions from as many people as there were verses. Sequences could be as long as 100, 1,000, or even 10,000 links, but the haikai poets tended to prefer the thirty-six link kasen. The rules governing the composition of individual tsukeku within the sequence were complex, but they originate in simple principles. Variety and change were of utmost importance; at the same time, the rules ensured the creation of a cohesive structure. The development of a consistent line of narrative was to be avoided. Four of the thirty-six links of the kasen have special status: the hokku (starting verse), the waki[ku] ⣁[ฏ] (accompanying verse), the daisan ╙ਃ(third verse), and the ageku ᜼ฏ (uplifting verse). The hokku, waki, and daisan comprised the first three verses of the sequence; the ageku came at the end. All of the other verses were called hiraku ᐔฏ or plain verses. The honor of composing the hokku usually fell to the most senior guest of the party. Just as was the case when it functioned as an independent form, the hokku was supposed to be a flattering greeting toward the host; it mentioned the season and the place of composition, and was light and positive in tone. A courteous, skillful poet would make his or her hokku rich in implications and even ambiguity in order to allow the host to respond with his own link—the waki—without difficulty. The waki picked up and expanded on the situation or setting depicted in the

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hokku. Typically, it referred to the same season as the hokku, and ended in a non-declinable word, such as a noun. The person next in rank to the senior guest composed the daisan. The daisan had a special importance, as it indicated the likelihood of the sequence’s success. Each verse link or tsukeku could only refer to the verse immediately preceding it, i.e., the maeku; the tsukeku had to break with the verse that came before the maeku, which was called the uchikoshi ᛂ⿧or superseded verse. The daisan was the first point in the sequence where this shift happened. If the poet writing the daisan failed to break cleanly from the hokku, its uchikoshi, the sequence as a whole was unlikely to turn out well. The last verse in the sequence, the ageku, was similar to the hokku in that it was expected to be light in tone. Like the daisan, it was also something of a tricky verse to write, because a bad ageku would reflect poorly on the sequence as a whole, no matter how fine were all the verses that preceded it. In addition to these four special verses, certain hiraku or plain verses were assigned mandatory topics: the moon or cherry blossoms. In a thirty-six link sequence, verses in positions 5, 14, and 29 were supposed to refer to the moon; 17 and 35 to blossoms.2 As the moon was an Autumn topic and blossoms a Spring topic, this requirement helped to ensure variation in the sequence. There were other rules. For example, after the introduction of a Spring topic, the next three to five verses had to mention spring. The same was true of Autumn verses. Summer and Winter were supposed to be followed by one to three similar verses. It was common to separate verses that referred to a season with one or more “miscellaneous” (zŇ 㔀) verses so that the transition between the seasons was not too abrupt. Also, “love” was another important topic, and strict guidelines covered its treatment in the sequence: it could not appear in the first six verses; the topic had to continue for the next one to four verses, and so on. Novice poets needed to put a lot of effort into training and practice in order to master these rules. Reading sequences by acknowledged masters

——— 2 Historically, the numbering of haikai verses took into account their place on the sheets of paper used to transcribe them. Two sheets were used to write kasen. Sheet One had six verses on the front and twelve on the back; Sheet Two had twelve on the front and six on the back. Using this system, moon verses came at Number 5 on the front and 8 on the back of Sheet One, and 11 on the front of Sheet Two; blossom verses belonged at Number 11 on the back of Sheet One and 5 on the back of Sheet Two. A detailed discussion of the rules of haikai sequences is in SatŇ, pp. 9–21.

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was one way to do this; studying one of the many handbooks of verse linking technique (called yoriai ነว or tsukeai ઃว) that were available was another.3 The best way to learn, however, was to take part in the activities of a haikai school, where one had a setting in which to work with others and a knowledgeable teacher from whom to receive instruction. Not only was the makeup of the sequence prescribed in detail, the participants’ behavior in the session was also precisely regulated. Formal linked verse sessions involved three roles: the arbiter (sŇshŇ ቬඅ), the recorder (shuhitsu ၫ╩), and the contributing poets (renju ㅪⴐ). The arbiter might be a group’s teacher, though this was not necessarily the case; the recorder had to be a highly competent poet and calligrapher. Sessions were organized by a host, who provided the space, supplies, and refreshments; they could last from six to eight hours in the case of a kasen, eight to ten for a 100-link sequence, and longer ones continued for several days. On the day of the session the host prepared the room by setting up a portable writing desk for the recorder, and placed it in front of the alcove (tokonoma), which was hung with a painted scroll. The scroll was often a portrait of the god of literature, Tenjin ᄤ␹ (Sugawara no Michizane ⩲ේ㆏⌀ [845–903]); or ManyŇshş poet Kakinomoto no Hitomaro ᩑᧄੱ㤗ํ. Alternatively, if the session commemorated the anniversary of the death of a teacher or colleague, a sample of that person’s calligraphy might be displayed; and eventually portraits of Teitoku and BashŇ also became common. Participants were seated according to their rank and function: the most prestigious—the arbiter, the recorder, and the senior guest—sat near the alcove, and persons of lesser status filed out alongside the senior guest.4 Etiquette demanded that participants arrived on time, sober, and in a tranquil frame of mind; during the session they were not supposed to fall asleep or chatter; and at all times they were expected to defer to the judgments of the arbiter and recorder. Before the other participants entered the room, the recorder first organized the materials on the writing desk. When everyone came in and took their places, the arbiter opened the proceedings with a word of

——— 3 The most famous of these was NijŇ Yoshimoto’s Secret treatise on the principles of linking (Renri hisshŇ ㅪℂ⒁ᛞ, 1349). 4 Inui Hiroyuki and Shiraishi TeizŇ, eds., Renku e no shŇtai (Yşhikaku, 1980), pp. 108– 116.

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greeting, and then the recorder dedicated the poetry about to be written to the deity or honored person whose portrait was enshrined in the alcove. The session began with the senior guest’s hokku. The rest of the sequence proceeded in order, with the arbiter evaluating the quality of the verses each participant composed, and the recorder simultaneously making sure that all the rules were properly observed and writing down the verses as they were approved. At the end of session the recorder completed his transcription of the sequence and offered them before the alcove. The session concluded with a party, organized by the host, where all the participants could relax from the rigors of the day’s work. Linked verse offered haikai poets a chance to reinforce connections not only with their allies in the present day but also their counterparts in history. It was not uncommon for poets to start their sequences with a hokku that had been written years before by a long-dead predecessor, whether as a gesture of remembrance to be included in a memorial volume, or an expression of identification with an admired exemplar. Gathering as a group to produce a long, complex work like a verse sequence was also a powerful affirmation of solidarity and cooperation with living colleagues, where participants either put aside their differences—or learned to appreciate them—in order to bring the session to a successful conclusion. The protocols of linked verse sessions made them reenactments of a practice whose origins extended back to the medieval period; in this sense, linked verse composition was a ritual that let its participants imagine that they were actually embodying the past. As such, it had special meaning for the Revival poets who were trying to both establish a community of their own in what they viewed as a decadent age, and to reclaim the old elegance BashŇ represented.

An Early Linked Verse Sequence: “Willow leaves, fallen” (1752) Scrap paper coverlet was published in Edo around the time that Buson left for Kyoto. The collection was edited by Edo-area Hajin disciples Asui 㒙⺕ and GantŇ, Buson’s patron and mentor. Baba Songi 㚍႐ሽ⟵ (1603–1782), using the haikai name Risei ᧘੗, wrote the preface. After Hajin’s death Songi had became a leading figure of Edo urban haikai. Scrap paper coverlet features 129 hokku and five kasen, three of which contain verses by Buson. In all three sequences Buson contributed the

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lowest number of verses of any of the participants (between two and five to his colleagues thirteen, fourteen, or even seventeen verses); however, Scrap paper coverlet is valuable because it offers insight into Buson’s poetic development at a stage where relatively few of his verses—hokku or tsukeku—survive. Buson contributed only two verses to “Willow leaves, fallen” (Yanagi chiri), the first and the fourth. Keeping in mind that the privilege of writing a sequence’s first verse was typically reserved for the group’s most honored guest, the fact that Buson starts this sequence, whose other participants were far senior to him, testifies to the admiration that his colleagues felt for his remarkable hokku. 1. Buson Kannazuki hajime no koro hoi, Shimotsuke no kuni ni shugyŇ shite YugyŇ Yanagi to ka ieru furuki no kage ni, mokuzen no keishiki o mŇshiide haberu:

At the beginning of the Tenth Month, when I was on a study-trip in Shimotsuke, this is the scene I saw before my eyes in the shade of the old tree known as Pilgrim’s Willow:

yanagi chiri shimizu kare ishi tokoro dokoro

willow leaves, fallen the clear stream, dry stones, here and there5

As I mentioned in Chapter Two, this verse alludes to a waka by SaigyŇ, a hokku by BashŇ, and a verse by Chinese poet Su Dongpo to describe a scene on BashŇ’s Narrow road to the interior route; later critics have called it the hokku that marks Buson’s awakening to his mature poetic style. Given the information in the headnote, it is probable that Buson composed this hokku long before the day of the session. While he claims in the headnote to be depicting the scene “before [his] eyes,” his description of the place is filtered through his readings of the works of his literary ancestors, just as SaigyŇ’s was when he wrote the original waka. 2. Risei bajŇ no samusa shi ni hoyuru tsuki

the cold of riding on horseback, a moon to which one declaims Chinese poems

——— 5 Text of the complete sequence is in Maruyama Kazuhiko et al., eds., BZ, vol. 2, Renku (KŇdansha, 1992), pp. 57–61.

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Risei makes Buson’s willow tree part of a nighttime landscape. Because Buson’s verse uses the kanshibunchŇ (Chinese-like style) popular with the Edo school poets, Risei imagines that the rider is a poet, reciting Chinese poetry (shi) to the moon. Specifying the place and the time of day was one technique linked verse poets employed to connect their tsukeku with the maeku—taking in the situation that the maeku presents and amplifying it with more detail. 3. Hyakuman chabŇzu o morŇte kaeru oidashi ni

meeting up with the tea master and heading home at the send-off bell

As this is the daisan or third verse, the pressure is on Hyakuman to link coherently with the second verse at the same time as it breaks with the first. He accomplishes this by reestablishing the place of action. Buson’s hokku describes a scene in the middle of the countryside; the setting of Hyakuman’s daisan is an urban one. Hyakuman places Risei’s rider in a more familiar Japanese context—he is a person of means and prestige. A chabŇzu is a teacher of the tea ceremony, typically one who was in the service of a high-ranking member of a military family. “Send-off bell” (oidashi) marks the location as a licensed quarter: the bell rang early in the morning to let lingering guests know it was time to go home. Here, the tea master has been kept waiting all night by his powerful patron, and they hurry home in the cold of dawn as the bell sounds. 4. Buson zarari zarari to naya no konoshiro

sliding over one another shad in the fish seller’s stall

At the same time as the send-off bell sounds, fish sellers are stacking up the fresh catch to be sold that day. Buson’s verse uses the onomatopoeic expression zarari zarari to—describing slipperiness—to evoke the image of glistening shad slipping over one another as they are handled. The romance of Risei’s verse that described an elegant rider uttering poems to the moon has disappeared; instead, the setting is slightly seedy—the early light shows a less glamorous side of the licensed quarter as fish sellers prepare for a day of work.

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5. Risei Ňshio ni ashida torareshi niwa no omo

wooden sandals taken by the high tide in front of the garden

Risei’s verse picks up Buson’s maritime image, and establishing the place as a yard in front of a house near the beach. It is so close to the sea that during an exceptionally high tide, wooden sandals left outside are carried off by the water. 6. Hyakuman makura kaitsute okosu Kantan

overturning his pillow and awakening this Handan dreamer

Hyakuman accounts for the fact that the wooden sandals were washed away by introducing the figure of the house’s owner, asleep as the tide came in. The verse refers to the Chinese story of Lusheng ⋝↢ (Japanese Rosei), a traveler in Handan ㇏㈚G (Japanese Kantan) who fell asleep as he was waiting for breakfast in a teashop, and dreamed he had lived an entire lifetime before waking to find that the millet for his meal had not even finished cooking. This story was popular in Japan, and even became the basis for the NŇ play Kantan. In Hyakuman’s verse, the sleeper also has a rude awakening: his sandals have been washed away by the rising waves. “Willow leaves, fallen” continues for another thirty verses, but Buson added no more tsukeku.

Four Kasen in One Night Buson compiled and published Around here: Four kasen in one night in 1773. Around here’s four sequences brought together three poets: Buson, KitŇ, Miura Chora and a mutual friend, Ranzan ፲ጊ (d. 1773). Chora was a prominent member of the Revival movement. Born in Shima Province (modern Mie Prefecture), Chora traveled extensively in central Honshş, including Ise and Edo, and also spent a great deal of time in Nagoya and Kyoto. He had numerous disciples, and frequently collaborated with Revival poets like KyŇtai and RankŇ; he was a particularly close friend of KitŇ’s. Ranzan had originally studied haikai with Ink of five

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colors poet Ryşkyo, but he eventually moved to Kyoto and took up haikai with Buson disciple Rosen. In other words, neither Chora nor Ranzan were regular Yahantei members, but that did not prevent them from working together to compose linked verse. The title Around here comes from the hokku Buson wrote for its first kasen, a respectful compliment to Ranzan: susuki mitsu hagi nakaran ya kono hotori

having seen miscanthus surely there is also bush clover around here6

Buson’s preface describes the circumstances that led to the publication of the collection. Chora was visiting KitŇ, and they decided to drop in on Ranzan, bringing Buson with them. Ranzan was seriously ill at the time and confined to his bed. He lived in poverty—his small house in a back street was shabby, and Ranzan himself was unable to care for himself properly. His sickroom was cluttered with dirty dishes and his bedding was tattered, but he welcomed the visit eagerly. The three visitors started their evening by trying to amuse him with ghost stories. Rallying, he suggested that they turn their energy to linked verse composition, and by the end of the evening they had completed four sequences. Ranzan died later the same month, and Around here was published in his memory. As was typical of his hokku since Sankasha, Buson’s tsukeku strongly reflect his preoccupation with Chinese poetry, Heian and medieval tales, and the supernatural. They also allude to BashŇ’s work, though not so often as we might expect given the fact that all four poets were strong supporters of the Revival movement’s ideals. In contrast to “Willow leaves, fallen,” where the young Buson was invited to contribute only two verses, Buson was a full participant in all of the Around here sequences and was an influential presence in all of them. We will look at the second sequence, “On the white chrysanthemums.” 1. Ranzan shiragiku ni okietari tsuyu okietari

on the white chrysanthemums it could gather dew could gather!7

——— 6 The hokku praises the neighborhood around Ranzan’s house, remarking that it is home to plants associated with an elegant appreciation of autumn, which reflects well on the good taste of his host. BZ, vol. 2, p. 244.

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The connection between dew and chrysanthemums is a conventional one. Both words are associated with autumn; dew collected from chrysanthemums on the ninth day of the Ninth Month was thought to prolong life. Ranzan takes this fairly pedestrian association and adds interest to it by a device that is unusual in the compact haikai form: repetition—in this case, okietari (it could gather).8 This creates a mood of lightness and good humor: as this is the hokku, Ranzan expresses his delight in the visit of Buson, KitŇ, and Chora, comparing the dew to himself, and the elegant white chrysanthemums to his visitors. 2. KitŇ nokori somenuru kesa no tsukikage

this morning the moonlight begins to linger

Nokori somenuru (beginning to linger) refers to the appearance of the waning moon, which is visible in the sky after dawn. KitŇ picks up on the hokku’s reference to dew, and fixes the time as early morning. By alluding to the moon in here, KitŇ deviates from the rule requiring a moon topic in Verse 7, but since the sequence starts with an Autumn verse, this is permitted. KitŇ’s link is similar to BashŇ’s famous exchange with Sonome, included in her verse collection Dust on the chrysanthemum (Kiku no chiri ⩵ߩߜࠅ, 1708): shiragiku no me ni tatetemiru chiri mo nashi

gazing at the white chrysanthemum not a speck of dust

BashŇ kŇyŇ mizu ni nagasu asatsuki

autumn leaves carried in the water morning moon9

Sonome While the sequence does not include a large number of allusions to BashŇ’s verse, this and the one that follows it make the connection.

——— 7 The sequence is in BZ, vol. 2, pp. 249–253. This translation also uses references from NKBT, vol. 58, pp. 215–222. 8 NKBT, vol. 58, p. 215. 9 BZ, vol. 2, p. 249, note 2.

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3. Chora kari uma ni aki o suzushiku mata garite

on a borrowed horse he rides out into the chill of autumn

This is the daisan, which breaks with the scene depicted in the first two verses. Chora does this by shifting the scene to a more active one, describing a retainer or possibly a daimyŇ (feudal lord) leaving an inn, with the moon faintly visible in the pale light of a cold morning. BashŇ’s Record of a weather-beaten skeleton includes a similar verse: uma ni nete zanmu tsuki tŇshi cha no keburi

sleeping on horseback a lingering dream, a distant moon, smoke from tea-fires10

BashŇ Both Chora’s link and BashŇ’s hokku juxtapose an early morning rider with the pale, waning moon. 4. Buson kokisake ari to fu no mŇshi keri

“There’s some good wine!” the woman calls out

Buson changes the focus from one in which the rider is visualized in the context of natural surroundings, and changes it to an inn or drinking establishment. As he is on the point of leaving, a waitress or landlady reminds him that he can take along some wine; Buson imagines the rider’s journey as one of pleasure, not business. Buson’s verse is humorous, and brings the mood of the sequence more down to earth with its reference to a commonplace situation. 5. KitŇ oguraki to akaki to shoku no futa tokoro

a dim one and a bright one lamps in two places

Picking up from Buson’s recontextualization of the scene as one at an inn, KitŇ fixes the time of day as evening. It is a rustic setting, and the lamps do not work very well, but the host is courteous in providing two.

——— 10

NKBT, vol. 46, p. 37.

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6. Ranzan tekone no kŇro uchi mamoritsutsu

handling the homemade incense burner very carefully

Ranzan’s verse explains the two lamps by describing a scene in which the artisan who made the incense burner needs extra light to examine his work. It is a solid but unspectacular verse, which leaves a great deal of room for the next poet in the sequence to make an interesting link. 7. Buson kakute yo ni shii to narubeki mi narishio

what a world I, who should have made it to the Fourth Rank

Buson responds to the opening Ranzan gives him with a verse that is a monogatari in microcosm. Using a device called kuraizuke ૏ઃ, or making a link based on the profession or status of the persona in the preceding verse, Buson imagines the man examining the incense burner to be a disappointed courtier, who laments being passed over for promotion to the rank he believes he deserves. 8. Chora Nogami no kimi ga iro ni shizuminu

besotted with the charm of a Nogami courtesan

Nogami refers to a post station on the NakasendŇ highway—an ancient inland route that connected Kyoto with eastern Japan. In the Kamakura period (1185–1333), Nogami was famous for its courtesans. Chora’s verse changes the topic to “love,” proposing that the reason that the persona in Buson’s verse failed to prosper was that he was distracted from his duties by his infatuation with a courtesan. Like Buson does in Verse 4, Chora interjects a little humor here. 9. Ranzan nakagaki no shŇji ni hae no futatsu mitsu

on the partitioning shŇji, two or three flies

Ranzan’s verse depicts the interior of the teahouse where the courtesan in the previous verse works. It is a quiet, hot afternoon; the guests have

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all gone home. A shŇji screen separates the rooms; on it, flies gather, but no one shoos them away. The scene is squalid; the cheap glamour of the evening has disappeared in the light of day. 10. KitŇ chikaku mo kami no todoro narikuru

very close by, thunder approaches, rumbling

KitŇ’s verse picks up on Ranzan’s description of a rundown, decrepit teahouse on a hot summer afternoon. The room is stuffy and close; not even the flies move. Suddenly, the drowsy languor is broken by the sound of approaching thunder, bringing with it a dark, ominous mood of tense expectation. 11. Buson yokisŇ o nosete sarinuru Tsukushi bune

they take on board an esteemed priest, and depart: Tsukushi boat

Again Buson’s tsukeku adds the suggestion of a larger story, by specifying the rank and occupation of his persona, and mentioning a specific place name. Tsukushi is an alternate name for Kyşshş, and Tsukushi boats (Tsukushi bune) carried passengers between Honshş and Kyşshş. The passenger is a distinguished Buddhist priest. The calm dignity of his appearance is in stark contrast to the thunderstorm brewing in KitŇ’s maeku. The boat is in great danger from the storm. 12. Chora Ebisu no midare kiku mo kanashiki

barbarian unrest even hearing about it is troubling

Chora picks up on Buson’s reference to the Tsukushi boat and introduces “barbarian” (Ebisu ᚐ) here a generic term referring to people in the north and west of China. Of the main Japanese islands Kyşshş was the closest to the continent, and was the place many travelers to China would begin their journeys. Thus, he imagines that, after arriving in Kyşshş, the priest on the boat could well be on his way to China. However, rumors of war make the journey an anxious one.

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13. Ranzan yuki ni nite samuu wa aredo mado no tsuki

cold enough to seem like it’s snowed moonlight in the window

In Ranzan’s verse, the speaker sees a gleam outside the window on an autumn night. It’s so cold he assumes that it’s snow, but when he looks he realizes that the whiteness he sees on the ground is actually moonlight. 14. Buson sutebuchi morau sue no aki kana

receiving alms at autumn’s end

Buson picks up on the description of the cold autumn scene in the previous verse by imagining the kind of person who might endure such harsh circumstances. Sutebuchi (alms) took the form of small amounts of rice given to warrior families which had fallen on hard times. Autumn’s end (sue no aki) both intensifies the sense of cold and implies that the person receiving this assistance is coming to the end of his life also. 15. KitŇ omoi ide ukare idetaru ushimatsuri

I remember happily going out to the Cattle Festival

The maeku’s persona is fixed as someone who, having received the benefit of financial assistance, can go out and enjoy a festival. The Cattle Festival (Ushimatsuri) was held on the twelfth day of the Ninth Month at KŇryş-ji Temple ᐢ㓉ኹ in Kyoto. 16. Ranzan ato sarigenaki dobyŇshi no oto

without a care the clash of cymbals

Ranzan picks up on the maeku’s image of the lively festival, and describes the moment of its climax. The hardship described in the uchikoshi, Verse 14, has disappeared; all that is present now is the sound, color and energy of the festival.

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17. Chora chiritsukusu hana hito toki no nagame nite

a brief glimpse of blossoms scattered completely

Chora takes up the implication of the maeku’s ato sarigenaki (without a care) and matches it with the image of cherry blossoms. Viewing them was the matter of an instant; like the cheerful sound of festival music, they quickly fade, leaving behind no trace of their splendor. 18. KitŇ ame harete yaya kure osoki kana

the rain has cleared for the moment dusk comes late

Rain caused the blossoms to scatter more quickly. The sky has cleared late in the day; at this time of year, there are still a few hours left before the sun sets. 19. Buson haru no kaze Gokoku no mitsugi watari kinu

spring breeze the splendors of Cathay coming across the sea

Buson shows his fascination with China in this verse. The breezes of spring, which carry with them the season’s warmth and fresh scents, are compared to envoy ships bringing goods from the Wu kingdom of China that in ancient times had a trading relationship with Japan. Buson is not referring to any specific historical event, he simply refers to the Wu to evoke an atmosphere of exotic riches. 20. Ranzan hana e idetaru shakurŇ no chie

the wisdom of the old timer whose nose is in the air

ShakurŇ (old timer) refers to a local elder, well-versed in lore and tradition. Ranzan playfully depicts his character a self-satisfied person, who has developed an excess of pride in his own knowledge. Even news of visiting ships from China fails to impress him.

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21. KitŇ hitobito no sata to narinuru waga koi wa

it’s become what people are talking about— my love affair

KitŇ changes the circumstances completely from a fairy-tale like scene to one grounded in ordinary life. In his verse, the speaker’s secret love affair has become common knowledge, thanks to the shrewd observation of the local wise man. This verse, and the one that follows it, are on the topic of love. 22. Chora kosode uru to mo yo o uramumaji

not even selling her clothes causes her regret

Chora imagines that the man involved in the affair has become destitute, probably in a dishonorable way. Nevertheless, his loyal lover stints at nothing to help him, even to the point of selling her kimono. She is not concerned by anyone’s disapproval. 23. Ranzan shŇjin no yurishi hotoke wasurarezu

mourning is over, but she will not forget the departed one

The loyal woman in this verse becomes a grieving widow. She has dutifully performed Buddhist austerities for forty-nine days after her husband’s death. Even though the prescribed period is over, her sorrow continues. 24. Buson kyŇ ya kiru beki botan futamoto

two peonies that should be cut today

Buson’s verse refers to peonies, one of his favorite flowers. Cutting the flowers, the speaker thinks of the deceased person mentioned in the maeku.

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25. Chora tekishin no waka no kakimono o nusumi kite

he returns after stealing a poetry text from the enemy encampment

Ideally, warriors were supposed to be as proficient at poetry as they were in martial skills. Here, the warrior’s regard for a waka collection is so great, he is willing to go behind enemy lines in order to capture it. While this verse does not allude to a specific historical incident, it calls to mind stories like that of the warrior-poet Hosokawa Yşsai, famous both for his association with renga luminary Satomura JŇha and his role as advisor to Toyotomi Hideyoshi. When Yşsai was under bombardment in Tanabe Castle, he so feared for his library that he asked a representative of the imperial court to come and rescue it. Assured that it was safe, he kept on fighting until forced to stop by an imperial edict. 26. KitŇ hoshi no hikari no ake chikaku miyu

by the look of the starlight it’s close to dawn

The warrior in the maeku looks to the sky, and finds that the stars are fading. He had better finish his mission: dawn is almost come. 27. Buson ima wa tote funa yşrei ya usenuran

the time has come the ghost ship will disappear

Buson again shows his penchant for the fantastic. Picking up on the liminal time of day in KitŇ’s verse, he imagines a ghostly ship on the edge of reality and imagination, sinking into the waves as the sun rises. 28. Buson kokoro hisomite tachi o itadaku

with reverence in his heart he receives the sword

Buson writes a tsukeku to his own maeku, to ensure variety in the sequence. Responding to the image of the threatening ship, he describes a warrior carefully receiving a powerful sword that will help in defending against the grotesque enemy.

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29. KitŇ kono goro no ame nochi ni hiru miru tsuki nare ya

at last the moon is visible in the daytime now that the rains have stopped

The highly-refined steel of a fine sword is damaged by humidity. KitŇ eliminates the otherworldliness of the uchikoshi, and describes the weather of a day when the sword’s owner can safely take it out to examine its condition. This is the last moon verse. 30. Chora shi no mo ni komoru yama kage no aki

dressed in mourning for his master autumn in the mountain’s shadow

Chora establishes the place from where the persona in the maeku is viewing the moon, and also his station in life. He is a priest at a mountain temple, wearing mourning robes to mark the death of his spiritual mentor. The season, autumn, makes one think of endings and melancholy. 31. Ranzan kurawabaya hyakuri todokishi bushukan o

if I could taste it! the Buddha’s-hand citron brought here from far away

Bushukan or Buddha’s-hand citron (Citrus medica “Sarcodactylis”) is a yellow citrus fruit with long, slender sections shaped like fingers. It is highly aromatic. It contains very little juice, but its rind can be candied and eaten. Ranzan’s verse responds to the maeku’s description of a person in mourning by introducing a fruit whose name associates it with the Buddha. 32. Buson sŇji shimaeba uguisu no kuru

now that the cleaning’s done a bush warbler has come

Busy with the cleaning, the persona in Buson’s verse had no time to think about anything but work. Finally pausing to rest, he or she notices

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the call of the bush warbler, a welcome sign of spring. It is finally time to try the Buddha’s-hand citron preserves. 33. Chora tŇrŇ ni hi no nokoritaru asa kasumi

in the lantern a flame still burns morning fog

Through the light fog that shrouds the garden, the persona can still see the faint light of a flame burning in a stone lantern. Chora imagines the “cleaning” in the maeku to be that which follows an early morning tea ceremony, for which the garden lanterns would be lit. 34. KitŇ hana mono iwazu haru fukaki kami

the blossoms are silent as spring deepens in the place of the gods

This verse alludes to one by Sugawara Funtoki ⩲ේᢥᤨ (899–981) in Chinese and Japanese poems to sing: The peach and plum trees say no word how many nights in spring? the mists and vapors show no trace who perched here in the past?11 ᩶᧘ਇ⸒ᤐᐞ᥵ ᾍ㔰ή〔ᤄ⺕ᭈ Recontextualizing the lantern in the maeku as one on the grounds of a shrine, KitŇ describes the mysterious power of an ancient, sacred place, where even the scintillating charm of cherry blossoms seems overcome with a mood of quiet respect. 35. Buson hito oinu hito mata ware o oi to yobu

people have grown old on the other hand, people call me old too

——— 11

Rimer and Chaves, p. 166. Chinese text is in NKBT, vol. 58, p. 221.

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Picking up on the maeku’s comment about “deepening spring” as a reminder of the passage of time, Buson interjects a humorous comment about the inevitability of human aging. 36. Chora doro ni o o hiku kame no yasusa yo

the ease of a tortoise dragging his tail through the mud

Chora concludes the sequence with a reference to a famous passage in Zhuangzi: Once, when Chuang Tzu was fishing in the P’u River, the king of Ch’u sent two officials to go and announce to him: “I would like to trouble you with the administration of my realm.” Chuang Tzu held on to the fishing pole and, without turning his head, said, “I have heard that there is a sacred tortoise in Ch’u that had been dead for three thousand years. The king keeps it wrapped in cloth and boxed, and stores it at the ancestral temple. Now would this tortoise rather be dead and have its bones left behind and honored? Or would it rather be alive and dragging its tail in the mud?” “It would rather be alive and dragging its tail in the mud,” said the two officials. Chuang Tzu said, “Go away! I’ll drag my tail in the mud!”12

Tortoises were associated with long life, and as such would be an appropriate image for the sequence’s ageku. Chora picks up on Buson’s reference to an old man in the maeku, and adds to it a final link that is like a prayer for the longevity of all the sequence’s participants, but particularly the ailing Ranzan. The Around here kasen stand out as some of the best examples of Revival poets’ collaboration across factional lines. While Ranzan’s training with Five colors of ink poet Ryşkyo and Chora’s eclectic background set them apart from Buson and KitŇ, who shared a similar poetic lineage, the four were united by their common interest in composing verse that reflected a cultivated, disciplined literary sensibility. Still, even in this harmonious company, Buson’s anxiety towards his audience continued to plague him. He made this comment in a letter he sent to KyŇtai, with which he included a copy of Around here: In my haikai, I do not dare try to directly imitate the style of Elder BashŇ, but only to follow my heart, taking pleasure in changing my tastes from

———

12 Burton Watson, Chuang Tzu: Basic Writings (New York: Columbia University Press, 1996), p. 109.

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day to day; in the same way as the physician Bianque,13 I change my manner to conform to the standards of each setting.

Here Buson tries to duck anticipated criticism that his verse is different from BashŇ’s, by saying that his style is as fluid and reactive as the legendary Chinese physician who adjusted his specialty to suit his patients’ needs. His claim to change his tastes “from day to day” is a similar to one he makes in his preface to Make the past present, where he defends himself from critics who complain that his verse is unlike that of his teacher.

A Peaches and Plums Sequence: “Peony Petals Scatter” As I mentioned in Chapter Two, Buson’s preface to Peaches and plums takes a similarly defensive stance in response to an unnamed interlocutor who suggested that the collection’s sequences were perhaps outdated. Buson argues that following fashion is like running around in a circle—it is a constantly changing race where one never knows who is ahead and who is behind. Buson chose the palindrome “momosumomo” for the title of the work to emphasize its circularity. He also asserts that the two sequences are all that remained of a total of four that he and KitŇ composed long ago, but this is not very credible. Rather, it seems likely that Buson invented the story to preempt accusations from his audience that his style was out of step with the times.14

——— 13 Bianque was a physician mentioned in the 8th century Chinese treatise Mengqiu ⫥᳞ (Beginner’s guide, Japanese MŇgyş). When he was in an area that had a lot of children to treat, he called himself a specialist in pediatrics, when he was in an area where there were many elderly people, he changed his speciality to geriatrics. 14 Buson’s declaration about the timelessness of haikai were certainly sincere. However, his claims that the sequences of Peaches and plums were old, and that they represented the only two surviving ones out of a group of four, are not to be believed. For one thing, there is the evidence of the letters with which the composition of the sequence was completed: in them we can see the Summer and Winter sequences taking shape, but no letters making mention of any others exist. One letter makes reference to a summer sequence beginning with the hokku on the topic of hana ibara (flowering brambles): hana ibara flowering brambles kokyŇ no michi ni the paths of my hometown nitaru kana were just like this Buson’s letter reads: botan chirite a peony falls uchikasanarin piling up two, u ni san pen maybe three petals (Buson)

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A letter which KitŇ wrote to his disciple Shunba several years later, with which he bequeathed to Shunba the manuscript of Peaches and plums, gives us insight into Buson’s motivation for initiating composition of these verse sequences. One day in late spring, KitŇ came to visit Buson. Buson said that up to that point he had tried a number of different haikai styles while living in various places, but because he still was not satisfied with what he had produced, he wanted to compose some haikai that he could be proud of, together with KitŇ, who had practiced so assiduously. Composing a hokku for winter and autumn, they started two sequences: Long ago, in 1780 I think it was, one day I went to visit the Master at Yahantei. The time was spring, when the blossoms were falling, and the birds were singing, an evening when even the traces of spring were indistinct. The rain began to fall gently, and when there were no visitors to disturb the quiet, the Master himself lit the lamps, and sitting up straight in his seat said, “[...] I have been amusing myself with haikai for some fifty years, and by and by I am approaching my seventh decade. I still have yet to produce haikai I can be proud of; these days, as I expected, you have already matured in haikai. As an experiment, we two should do a twoperson sequence.” We composed two hokku for summer and winter, and master and disciple we composed more than one hundred verses, and days passed into months until we completed the kasen, making the sequences correct, studying the variations in the sequences, and polishing individual verses.15

The long process of drafting and revising the Peaches and plums sequences over the course of several months sounds very different from the typical procedure of composing all the verses at a single session, and KitŇ’s description gives an indication of the intense perfectionism that he and Buson brought to their work. Significantly, KitŇ manages to interject some words of praise for his own abilities into this tale. Nevertheless, it

——— uzuki hatsuka no on the twentieth of the fourth month ariake no tsuki the moon at dawn (KitŇ) The above waki is very good, so please think of a daisan. It has an unforced, vibrant waki style, and also, I think that as it sounds so much smoother than “hana ibara” it is best to go with “botan.” The reference to a sequence beginning hana ibara may account for the claim that there were originally four, but two had been lost; other than this, no trace of the “lost” sequences remains. It is probable that Buson’s claim that this was a group of four sequences so old that two had been lost was a way to dramatize his point that haikai was ageless. 14 ņiso Yoshio, Yosa Buson (ņfşsha, 1975), pp. 104–105. 15 Ibid., pp. 104–105.

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does appear that there were only two sequences, and that these took several months to complete. “Peony petals scatter” was the first of the two sequences. Since its hokku uses the summer season word “peony” (botan), it is called a summer sequence; the collection also contains the winter sequence “Winter trees” (Fuyu kodachi). 1. Buson botan chirite uchikasanarinu ni san pen

peony petals scatter and pile up two, maybe three

Buson wrote many verses about peonies; the word botan comes from the Chinese, and carries associations of exotic splendor. The hokku uses specific numbers—”two, maybe three”—in a way similar to what he does in “Toward Toba palace / five or six riders gallop / autumn storm” (Toba dono e / gorokki isogu / nowaki kana) and “Winter wind / however do they get through life / in these five houses” (Kogarashi ya / ika ni yo wataru / ie go ken). However, unlike those two hokku, which imply a larger story, “Peony petals scatter” refers to nothing outside the scope of the speaker’s gaze. The almost photograph-like neutrality of verses like this has attracted much notice from commentators who look for evidence of a special “artist’s eye” in Buson’s haikai. Indeed, compared to the allusive complexity of “Willow leaves, fallen / the clear stream, dry / stones, here and there” (Yanagi chiri / shimizu kare ishi / tokoro dokoro), which Buson described as a representation of the scene “before [his] eyes,” “Peony petals scatter” does appear to have a remarkable transparency. 2. KitŇ uzuki hatsuka no ariake no kage

on the twentieth of the Fourth Month in the pale light of dawn

Picking up on the fact that an alternate name for peonies is hatsukagusa, literally, twentieth-day plant, KitŇ’s waki fixes the date as the twentieth of the Fourth Month. The moon was always visible in the sky in the morning during the last ten days of the month reckoned by the lunar calendar. Though this is only the second verse, KitŇ has already introduced an irregularity into the sequence: the character for tsuki in uzuki means moon as well as month; thus this becomes a moon verse, five verses early.

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3. KitŇ suwabukite okina ya kado o hirakuramu

coughing, an old man seems to be opening the gate . . .

Although poets normally took turns when writing two-person sequences, sometimes they composed two links in succession to avoid the possibility that one person composed only 17-syllable links and the other composed only 14-syllable ones. Thus KitŇ adds another tsukeku, envisioning an old man opening the gate to his house under the dim dawn moon. Suwabukite (coughing) suggests that the old man is sick and frail. As it should have, the opulence of the hokku’s peony has disappeared in KitŇ’s daisan. 4. Buson muko no erabi ni kitsuru hengue

a ghost has come to choose an adoptive son-in-law

Buson returns to the sequence with a verse on a topic of which he was especially fond: the supernatural. Ordinarily references to dramatic topics like this were prohibited in the first six verses of a kasen, but Buson ignores this rule. The scene is mysteriously romantic rather than grotesque. Use of the archaic word hengue (ghost, monster) would remind readers of medieval tales. “Adoptive son-in-law” (muko) is a man who has been adopted by his wife’s parents in order to provide the family with a male heir. 5. Buson toshi furishi chimata no enoki ono irete

at the crossroads an old nettle tree is hacked at with an ax

Buson adds a tsukeku to his own maeku, as KitŇ did in Verse 3. This verse also is related to the supernatural world. Nettle trees (enoki) often marked crossroads; it was believed that cutting one down would bring on a curse. This would explain the creepy scene in the maeku. 6. KitŇ hyakuri no kugaji tomari sadamezu

a hundred-ri highway without a fixed abode

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Picking up on the word “crossroads” (chimata) KitŇ envisions a territory stretching out into the distance; the phrase perhaps somewhere in China. Ri is a unit of distance that originated in China; in Japan, one ri is about two and a half miles (3.9 kilometers). KitŇ’s traveler moves through the landscape with no home or destination, passing through a crossroads marked by a broken nettle tree. 7. KitŇ utamakura okori ochitaru kinŇ kyŇ

visiting places famous in poetry he took ill, and has fallen under a fever yesterday and today

Utamakura (places famous in poetry) were place names that accumulated associations from being repeatedly referred to in literary works. Over the centuries, these associations became conventionalized, like the hon’i of season words. Throughout most of Japanese history, travel was such a risky and difficult business that very few people actually saw utamakura sites for themselves, but those that did, like NŇin, SaigyŇ and eventually BashŇ, were deeply admired. KitŇ’s verse establishes the identity of the maeku’s traveler as a poet. Mention of a fever (okori) resonates with troubling uncertainty suggested by the maeku’s phrase “without a fixed abode” (tomari sadamezu). 8. Buson yamada no oda no wase o karukoro

in the mountain farms’ small fields it’s time to harvest the early rice

Buson breaks another rule here: he follows KitŇ’s Summer verse with an Autumn one, omitting the Miscellaneous verse that was supposed to separate the two. He specifies the place and season of the poet’s illness as a mountain village in early autumn. 9. KitŇ yşzuki okurete wataru shijşkara

later than the twilight moon homing swallows fly

This is the second moon verse, again out of place—it should be Verse 14. The time is fixed as dusk. The human presence in the uchikoshi disappears; KitŇ’s focus is entirely on the natural world: swallows swoop

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homeward in the gloom over a mountain village as the moon slowly rises. 10. Buson aki o ureite hitori to ni yoru

filled with autumn’s melancholy approaching the gate alone

Buson’s verse returns us to the human world. The mood of the persona in Buson’s verse mirrors the dark, chill landscape of an autumn twilight. Alone by a gate, he or she pauses to savor the moment’s delicate sadness. 11. KitŇ me futaide nigaki kusuri o susurikeru

with eyes shut tight he swallows down the bitter medicine

KitŇ gives a reason for the discomfort of the persona in the maeku: physical illness. While urei (melancholy) has elegant associations, KitŇ deflates them by his description of the persona’s contorted face as he forces himself to drink a foul-tasting potion. 12. Buson Taima e modosu furoshiki ni fumi

he sends back to Taima a letter in a furoshiki

Interpreting the persona in the maeku as having left home for medical treatment, Buson envisions him sending back the furoshiki (cloth parcelwrapper) his family used to pack him a parcel of supplies or gifts. 13. KitŇ tonari nite mada koe no suru abura uri

next door we can still hear the voice of the oil peddler

KitŇ envisions the person who will deliver the maeku’s furoshiki and letter as an oil peddler. Despite the impatience of the people expecting the parcel, he will not stop talking to the neighbors and be on his way to deliver it.

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14. Buson sanjaku tsumoru yuki no tasogare

three feet of snow piled up in the twilight

Buson shifts the focus to landscape, specifying the setting and the time of day. The snow falls deep here, and the winter night comes early. It would be a good time to welcome an oil peddler, were he not so annoying. His conversation is as long as the snow is deep. 15. KitŇ e ni uyuru Ňkami uchi ni shinoburan

a starving wolf may be hiding inside

A wolf has had difficulty finding food because of all the snow. KitŇ sets a lonely house into the winter landscape of the maeku. The people who live there are as hungry and desperate as the wolf. 16. Buson iguchi no tsuma tada naki ni naku

the housewife with the harelip cries and cries

Buson picks up on the maeku’s reference to an animal, and matches it with another, iguchi (harelip) which is written with the character i ఻ for hare. Imagining the home of the hunter that will kill the wolf in the maeku, Buson implies that woman’s sorrows are a sign of the karmic misfortune that afflicts those who live by killing. 17. KitŇ kanei aru hana no mitera ni kami kirite

at a flower-filled temple where there was a bell-casting she takes the tonsure

KitŇ puts the first blossom verse in the right place here. The maeku’s persona has met with a happy end; to atone for her guilt by association, she becomes a nun at a temple that is filled with blooming cherry trees. 18. Buson haru no yukue no nishi ni katabuku

spring departs sinking in the west

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The end of spring brings with it a sense of regret. Buson associates the temple in the maeku with west, the direction of the Amitabha Buddha’s paradise. As joyful as the cherry blossoms may seem at the moment, they, like the spring, will not last long. 19. Buson Noto dono no tsuru oto kasumu ochikata ni

the sound of Noritsune’s bowstring grows fainter in the distance

Buson adds a tsukeku to his own maeku. He reinterprets “sinking in the west” (nishi ni katabuku) to mean the failure of fortune, introducing the image of the general Noto-no-kami Taira no Noritsune ⢻⊓቞ᐔᢎ⚻ (d. 1185), who, along with the rest of his clan has been driven to the edge of the Western Sea in their war with the Minamoto clan. Noritsune’s great heroism is described in the Tale of the Heike. Buson’s description of the sound of the bowstring becoming faint (kasumu) suggests spring haze (kasumi). 20. KitŇ hakase hisomite toki o uranau

the fortune teller secretly takes a reading of the hour

KitŇ takes Buson’s image of a plucked bowstring and associates it with a fortuneteller. The sound of a plucked bowstring was thought to have supernatural power; it was used to ward off demons or illness, particularly during childbirth. KitŇ may also allude to another scene in the Tale of the Heike, in the “Distant Arrows” chapter: Furthermore, a school of one or two thousand dolphins surfaced and swam from the Genji side towards the Heike. Minister of State Munemori summoned the learned Harenobu. “Dolphins always appear in schools, but we have never seen such numbers as these. Use your divining arts to find out what it means,” he told him. “The Genji will be destroyed if the dolphins stay on the surface and turn back; we will be endangered if they dive and pass us.” No sooner had Harenobu spoken than the creatures passed straight under the Heike vessels. “This is the end for us,” the diviner said.16

——— 16 Helen Craig McCullough, trans., Tale of the Heike (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1988), p. 376.

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21. Buson awa oishi uma taurenu to tori nakite

carrying a bundle of millet the horse stumbled, and just then a bird called out

Buson picks up from KitŇ’s description of the fortuneteller, and visualizes some bad omens—a horse losing its balance at the same time a mysterious bird calls. 22. KitŇ Ňchi saki chiru nawate hatchŇ

sandalwood trees bloom and fade, along the long pathway between the paddies

KitŇ’s verse fixes the season as summer, and the place where the incident in the maeku happened as a farming community. 23. Buson tachiaenu niji ni Asama no uchi keburi

a faintly visible rainbow over Asama’s rising smoke

Buson adds a backdrop to the maeku’s rural close-up. The rainbow and the smoke rising out of the volcano make a dramatic contrast of the delicate and the grand. Mount Asama, near Nagano, is one of the largest volcanoes in Japan. Some three years after Buson and KitŇ wrote this sequence, it erupted disastrously, killing around 2,000 people. 24. KitŇ chokushi no oyado mŇsu ureshisa

the joy of receiving so grand a guest as an imperial messenger

KitŇ’s link is based on mood: the majesty of the great mountain and rainbow after a rainstorm is similar to that of the imperial messenger, and the host receives this guest with great delight. 25. Buson kŇ ni etaru ajika no uo no hara akaki

taken from the river the fish in the basket are red-bellied

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Buson imagines the feast that the maeku’s host puts on for the imperial messenger. KŇ ni etaru (taken from the river) has a stiff, formal feel, and recalls Chinese poetry. 26. KitŇ hi wa sashi nagara mata arare furu

even though the sun is shining hail falls again

“Hail” (arare) fixes the season for the maeku as winter. The weather is uncertain: the sky seems to be clearing, but it starts hailing. KitŇ contrasts the intense red of the fish and the white hail that falls. 27. Buson mishikoi no chigo neri ideyo dŇkuyŇ

“Come out, beloved acolyte!” the temple festival

The topic here is “love.” Picking up on the maeku’s theme of uncertainty, Buson’s verse describes the feeling of waiting for one’s beloved to emerge from the midst of the crowds at a temple festival. He uses direct speech to emphasize the urgency of the emotion, “chigo neri ideyo”(come out, acolyte!). “Acolyte” (chigo) suggests male homosexual love—the love of an older man and a younger one. 28. KitŇ tsuburi ni sawaru hito nikuki nari

how loathsome are people who muss one’s hair-style

KitŇ recasts the maeku’s lover as a girl, looking for the beautiful acolyte at the temple festival but worried lest the jostling of the crowd should dislodge the hairstyle she has put so much effort into perfecting. 29. Buson izayoi no kuraki hima sae yo no isogi

even during the time between sunset and moonrise on the sixteenth day everyone is busy

With the phrase “everyone is busy” (yo no isogi) Buson shifts the scene from the bright realm of romance to the dull, ordinary round of chores and obligations. The persona who does not want her hair to be mussed

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becomes an older woman, pressed with various responsibilities. From the sixteenth day, the moon begins to wane, and likewise, the mood here changes from light to dark. 30. KitŇ shikoro utsu naru Banba Matsumoto

the sound the mallet makes from Banba to Matsumoto

KitŇ picks up on the maeku’s description of a busy scene and specifies the work as cloth fulling. As we saw in Buson’s “as I am melancholy / beat the fulling block, but / stop now, it’s enough” (uki ware ni / kinuta ute ima wa / mata yamine) in Chapter Four, the sound of fulling cloth was associated with loneliness. Both Banba and Matsumoto were place names in ņtsu (modern Shiga Prefecture). 31. KitŇ kago kaki no bŇgumi taranu aki no ame

there are not enough people to carry a palanquin in the autumn rain

KitŇ adds a tsukeku to his own maeku. He picks up on the maeku’s melancholy scene, describing a place so desolate and lonely that there are not even enough people to carry a palanquin. 32. Buson tobi mo karasu achira mukiiru

kites and crows staring into space

With the phrase “staring into space” Buson anthropomorphizes the birds, and interjects a bit of lightness after several dark and dreary verses. 33. KitŇ tatari nasu tanaka no hokora kansabite

under a curse, the small shrine in the fields is forbidding

KitŇ takes Buson’s amusing scene and locates it in a more serious situation: a small shrine out in the fields. It seems to have some mysterious power; no wonder the birds are acting strangely.

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34. Buson sude ni Genba ga kuji mo make iro

it already looks like Genba has lost the lawsuit

The name Genba has the connotations of someone strong and authoritative. Buson implies that the shrine’s curse has brought about the lawsuit’s unfavorable outcome. 35. Buson hana ni utoki mi hatagoya no meshi to shiru

a long way away from cherry blossoms in the lodging house there is rice and soup

A blossom verse. Buson adds a tsukeku to his own maeku. Despite the fact that the cherry blossoms are blooming, it is hard to enjoy them in an inn near the courthouse. The food at the inn is bad, but having lost the lawsuit, the persona hardly has a mind to enjoy anything anyway. 36. KitŇ mada kure yaranu haru no tomoshibi

it is not completely dark yet— lanterns of spring

Cheerful lamps are glowing, though the sky is still light. It is time for the evening’s meal on a fine spring night with the cherry trees in bloom. This is the ageku (uplifting verse). Appropriately enough, KitŇ’s verse is positive in outlook, leaving behind the curses and sorrows of the previous few verses and ending in a bright scene, full of promise. Most commentators would acknowledge that the verse sequences that Buson and his collaborators produced are not as impressive as the greatest of those composed by the BashŇ school. However, Buson’s sequences are generally acknowledged to be among the best of the late period of the heyday of haikai linked verse. The waning of linked verse’s popularity in itself did not end up eliminating the communal side of haikai: poets still met to compose impromptu hokku and receive instruction from a teacher, and other kinds of verse gatherings continued to be popular. However, in part because of the rise of tentori haikai, and in part because of the preferences of the Revival poets’ community for hokku, the practice of linked verse composition went into a decline in the years after Buson’s death.

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For this reason, collections like Around here: Four kasen in one night, and those composed in unconventional circumstances like the sequences of Peaches and plums are extremely valuable sources for the insights they offer into the linked verse of the late eighteenth century, what was to be the genre’s last great age.

CHAPTER SIX

BUSON AND HAIGA Because Buson was also a painter, many commentators have tried to characterize him as a “visual” poet. Some have assumed that his artistic training preconditioned him to observe the world in a painterly fashion, and have looked for ways in which his poems might prove analogous to paintings. This assumption is related to the fact that the artistic genre in which Buson primarily worked, nanga had its origin in Chinese traditions that encouraged interaction between visual and literary expression. Furthermore, haikai is often described as poetry that strives to reproduce the experience of a single moment in the same way that a sketch would do. This “visual” approach presents problems because, as we have seen, Buson’s hokku are extremely diverse. While there are many that seem to offer an immediate, unmediated description of a scene just as it appeared, most are in fact entirely fictional and imaginary, or written in response to a set topic. Looked at as a whole, Buson’s hokku are no more or less painterly than those of other haikai poets. In one sense, Buson’s dual identity as both a painter and a poet was not problematic. In the Japanese cultural tradition, painting, poetry, and calligraphy were viewed as related arts; for instance, literary texts were often inscribed on paintings, poets sometimes composed waka in response to painted landscapes, and it was not uncommon for editors to compile collections of poems illustrated with idealized “portraits” of the poets who wrote them. However, Buson stood out even in this context. Despite the long tradition of linking the literary and visual arts, few people could rival Buson’s abilities in both—even in the eighteenth century, when the ideal of the bunjin flourished. However, the way of thinking that regards painting and poetry as fundamentally separate categories of expression is a relatively modern idea, dating from the Meiji period, when the Japanese modified their taxonomies of the arts to bring them more in line with those of Europe. Buson’s work as a painter did have an impact on his haikai, and this chapter will explore some ways of thinking about how the two forms of Buson’s practice intersected. To start with, because it is important to

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understand the origins of interpretations of Buson as a “painterly” poet that arose during the modern period, the chapter begins with an overview of the most influential visual interpretation of Buson’s hokku, Masaoka Shiki’s reading of Buson as representative of the ideal of shasei, or realism, in haiku. Many of Shiki’s statements about Buson’s poetry are polemical and somewhat extreme, but they are important to look at because the assumption on which they are based—that there is an essential separation of painting and poetry that Buson somehow managed to bridge—underlies readings of Buson as an especially visual poet. In the second and third parts of the chapter, I examine two areas that provide other meaningful contexts in which to consider the interaction of painting and poetry in Buson’s haikai. The first area is Buson’s relationships with his patrons, and the role that his haikai contacts played in helping to secure supporters and customers for his paintings. Texts associated with Buson’s early years in northeastern Japan and in the province of Tango provide rich insight into the complexity of these relationships, and reflect Buson’s careful efforts to manage them so as to promote his professional ambitions. The second area I examine is the intersection of painting and poetry in Buson’s haiga, a genre where haikai’s techniques of juxtaposition, implication, and humor created compositions which blurred the boundaries of verbal and visual expression to a degree that is striking, even in a cultural tradition where works that combine images and texts were common.

Buson as a Visual Poet: Masaoka Shiki and Shasei (Sketch from Life ) The notion that there was a close relationship between Buson’s painting and haikai was at the center of the theories of poet and literary critic Masaoka Shiki, who was the first to call attention to Buson’s work in the modern period. Shiki was a central figure in a movement to reform waka and renga that led to the invention of the modern genres tanka and haiku. When Shiki began writing about Buson in the last decades of the nineteenth century, Buson’s hokku were no longer well known. Buson’s reputation as a poet had flagged after his death, in part due to his own anxiety and ambivalence toward his role in the haikai community. As we have seen, Buson postponed taking on the leadership of the Yahantei

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school until late in life, and left most of the work of promoting that school up to KitŇ. However, KitŇ died in 1789, only a few years after Buson. Even the great energy with which KitŇ laid the foundation of Buson’s reputation as a haikai poet did little to forestall the eclipse of the Yahantei school in the years that followed. One reason for its decline was that KitŇ did not have time to cultivate his own successor. Perhaps more importantly, though, the cult of BashŇ, which Buson helped to promote, took off dramatically in the 1790s, and the haikai “orthodox” tradition (shŇfş ᱜ㘑) gradually became synonymous with the BashŇ tradition (shŇfş ⭈㘑). As so much attention was focused onto the work and teachings of BashŇ, less was paid to that of other poets. In other words, Buson’s haikai fell into relative obscurity after his death in part because of the great success of his generation’s efforts to place BashŇ at the center of haikai history. However, even during the time when the audience for Buson’s haikai diminished, he continued to be admired as a painter. Indeed, it was his reputation as a painter that brought him back into focus a century after his death, and it was the very fact that his verse was unlike BashŇ’s—a difference which was attributed to his identity as a painter—that attracted the attention of people in the Meiji period like Shiki. Shiki was the most influential of the critics who made Buson a centerpiece of efforts to reshape haikai into a genre that was viable in the modern world. Shiki saw that older genres of Japanese poetry, like haikai, were under threat from imported European forms. Haikai’s use of classical language, the stale and clichéd expressions it had acquired from many generations of unimaginative practitioners, and above all, the elaborate and inflexible social structure of schools and lineages that had developed around it, were all contributing to its fossilization. As he worked to revitalize it and transform it into the modern genre he called “haiku,” Shiki’s most immediate target was the cult of BashŇ. Over the years the successors to Buson and his colleagues in the BashŇ Revival had transformed the movement from an effort to set high literary standards for the genre into a stifling system of orthodoxy that enabled large numbers of people to write haikai but made the practice an exercise in banality. For this reason, many innovative poets of the day advocated abandoning it completely. While Shiki acknowledged that BashŇ’s had written many excellent hokku, he argued that many examples by other poets were equally good. One of these was Buson. Buson came to Shiki’s attention with the help

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of fellow poet NaitŇ Meisetsu ౝ⮮㡆㔐 (1847–1926), who came across a copy of Buson verse anthology and introduced it to Shiki’s study group. Shiki found Buson’s hokku especially compelling because he was developing a theory of haikai that treated it as a literary sketch, or shasei (literally, copying life, the Japanese word used to translate the Western art term “sketch from life”). Shiki argued that haiku functions in a way that allows it to capture a scene as it appears in a single instant. In this respect, it resembles a drawing or a photograph—realistic, objective, free of inessential information but able to recreate a moment of experience and communicate it to a reader. Stripped of its connections to anything outside the moment—like references to the literary tradition—and free of the distracting artifice of conspicuous word play, the haiku was well suited to the task of expressing the unprecedented events and experiences of the modern world. Shiki saw the painter-poet Buson as an ideal precursor to this view of haiku; Buson’s work was proof that even in its earliest forms haikai had the necessary attribute that made it relevant to a modernizing Japan: it emphasized objective representation of the exterior world. This is because Shiki believed that the very thing that Buson’s economic circumstances made his focus—his work as a painter—was what that marked him as a visionary and a model worth following for modern haiku poets. At the time, Shiki was very interested in exploring the potential that classical Japanese poetic forms like waka and haikai had in the emerging literature of a modernizing Japan. For Shiki, an important key to this problem lay in figuring out ways that pre-modern literary forms were especially good at realism. In the course of his studies on the subject, he became acquainted with Western theories of art from his friend, the yŇga ᵗ↹ (Western-style) painter Nakamura Fusetsu ਛ᧛ਇ᛬ (1866–1943). Fusetsu introduced Shiki to the Western technique of the sketch from life (shasei). Shiki became convinced that haiku poems were like sketches; poets should express with words the scene or object just as they saw it, similar to the way painters would depict it in line.1 Shiki found his shasei ideal in the painter-poet Yosa Buson, whose artist’s eye, Shiki reasoned, allowed him a special facility with making sketches in words. He argued this in a number of articles, Otter’s den study haikai talks (Dassai shooku haiwa ₯⑂ᦠቶେ⹤, 1892), Master BashŇ’s surprise (BashŇ-Ň no ikkyŇ ⧊⭈⠃৻㛳, 1893), and Miscellaneous talks on

——— 1

Hirai Terutoshi, “Shiki to Buson,” Bungaku 52, 10 (1984): 184.

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BashŇ (BashŇ zŇdan ⧊⭈㔀⺣, 1893) Eventually Shiki came to regard Buson as a figure of major importance—the equivalent in his period to the standard of excellence represented in the Genroku period by BashŇ. Haikai history had two high points, he argues, and the best poet of each is BashŇ and Buson.2 In his most detailed comparison of the poetry of BashŇ and Buson, Haiku poet Buson (Haijin Buson େੱ⭢᧛, 1897), Buson emerges as the opposite of everything Shiki found characteristic of BashŇ. Where BashŇ wrote negative (shŇkyokuteki ᶖᭂ⊛), colorless, and highly subjective poetry, Buson’s was positive (sekkyokuteki Ⓧᭂ⊛), vigorous, and objective. BashŇ was a poet of autumn and winter, Buson of spring and summer. Most importantly, while BashŇ’s aesthetic looked back to the medieval period and East Asian tastes, Buson’s anticipated modern and Western tastes. The biggest reason for this difference was that Buson’s painterly eye predisposed him to a kind of objectivity that was consistent with late nineteenth-century ideas about literary realism. Shiki’s portrayal of Buson as a visual poet, however, overstates the case. As we have seen, few of Buson’s verses were written in response to a particular occasion or experience. Instead, he generally composed his hokku on topics that had been set as a theme for a verse gathering or similar occasion. Likewise, imagery that might seem to reflect the conditions of a given moment turn out to have been chosen on the basis of their usage in the classical tradition. It is true that some early modern haikai poets, especially those who followed the teachings of the rural BashŇ school, created a style that aspired to—but seldom achieved— karumi, the aesthetic of plainness and simplicity that BashŇ espoused in his later years, and this in some respects resembled Shiki’s shasei. However, Buson regarded the rural school style with nearly as much contempt as he reserved for profit-conscious urban tenja who were impressed with shallow verbal cleverness; his hokku are no more or less “objective” than those of other haikai poets. It is possible to find some examples of Buson hokku that support Shiki’s interpretation, but there are many more that contradict it.

——— 2

Shiki, Haijin Buson, in Haikai taiyŇ (Iwanami Shoten, 1955), p. 170.

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Buson and his Painting Clients While Shiki may have overemphasized the visual aspects of Buson’s hokku, the question of how to understand the relationship between Buson’s work as a painter and a poet remains valid. One answer to this question focuses not on the content or style of his verse, but rather on interactions that Buson had with his painting clients and the way these intersected with his work as a haikai poet. Networking with other haikai poets was one of the ways that Buson secured access to clients who bought his paintings, supported his travels to view and study works by Japanese and Chinese artists in various collections, and obtained places to live and work. This was especially true during Buson’s early years, but even after he established himself in Kyoto, haikai continued to provide a context for him to meet visitors from rural areas who both acted as informal brokers for his paintings and sought his instruction in poetry. While an exhaustive examination of Buson’s relationships with his patrons is beyond the scope of this study, I will discuss two periods when haikai played a major role in Buson’s efforts to establish himself as a painter: his ten years in the northeast of Japan after Hajin’s death, and the three years he spent in Tango before settling permanently in Kyoto. Buson’s writings from and about these two periods of his career give us a glimpse into two apparently paradoxical aspects of his relationships with the people who supported him in his work. One was respectful and laudatory: Buson represents his patrons as people of good taste and highly developed poetic sensitivity. Another side of this portrayal, however, is less obviously flattering and for this reason merits more attention: he describes several of his patrons in the context of mysterious visits by supernatural creatures, or in quite undignified and even embarrassing circumstances. As we will see, both aspects were characteristic of people who were especially gifted as poets and connoisseurs. In this sense, by describing his patrons as both tasteful and eccentric, Buson could offer them no higher praise—and no greater thanks—for their generosity in hosting him and supporting his work.

Buson in Yşki and Shimodate Almost as soon as Buson arrived in Edo, he showed himself to be as precociously skilled in social maneuvering as he was at haikai. He quickly

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achieved recognition in a haikai group that was well known both in Edo and in Kyoto, and became the live-in student and secretary for his teacher. Since Hajin had followers in rural and urban areas all over Japan, the special consideration that he gave to Buson proved very helpful. Hajin’s disciples—most prominent among them Isaoka GantŇ in the east and Mochizuki SŇoku in the west, shared Hajin’s high regard for Buson, and for many years their help would prove indispensable to him. GantŇ came from a well-respected family in Yşki. His father, GashŇ ᚒዏ was a haikai poet who, like Hajin, had studied with both Ransetsu and Kikaku; GantŇ’s brother, Shşgo ๟ඦ, also practiced haikai. The haikai community in Yşki and nearby Shimodate was extremely tightknit: GashŇ’s sister (GantŇ’s aunt) married Hayami Shinga ᤯ᚒᣧ⷗ (1670–1745), the haikai poet to whom Buson would dedicate his haishi “Mourning the Sage Hokuju” (Hokuju rŇsen o itamu ർኼ⠧઄ࠍ ޿ߚ߻).3 Shinga’s sons, Momohiko ᩶ᒾ and DenkŇ ↰ᵩ, both practiced haikai. Two members of the Nakamura family of Shimodate who later supported Buson also married into the haikai tradition: Nakamura FşkŇ ਛ᧛㘑▶ (dates unknown) married Fujii Omitsu, who was related to prominent Kikaku disciple Shinryş ᤯ᵹ (1680–1761), and Nakamura Taisai’s ਛ᧛ᄢᷣ wife was GantŇ’s sister. SatŇ Rokyş, with whom Buson edited the Utsunomiya new year’s day booklet (Utsunomiya saitanchŇ ቝㇺችᱦᣤᏭ, 1744), was GantŇ’s son-in-law. The area around Yşki and Shimodate was prosperous—it produced textiles, miso, and soy sauce; it outstripped its neighboring communities in agricultural productivity. Although it was far from any urban center, it boasted a relatively high level of education and cultural sophistication. At the same time, to Buson, who had grown up in a farming village its rustic character was probably much more inviting than was the busy environment of Edo.4 Buson used GantŇ’s home as his base. From late autumn 1742 until the winter of 1743 he traveled, retracing BashŇ’s Narrow road to the interior route: in Shimodate he lived with FşkŇ and Taisai; in Yşki, besides GantŇ’s house, he also lodged with JŇş and stayed at GugyŇ-ji temple. Only a few sources give us information about Buson during this period, and one of the best is New flower gathering In the prose section of this work, Buson describes the patrons he acquired during this period as

——— 3 4

A full translation of this work is included in the appendix. Segi Shin’ichi, Buson: Gahai nidŇ (Bijutsu KŇronsha, 1990), pp. 78–79.

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being of extremely discerning and cultivated taste, people who were dedicated to leading a life appropriate to the bunjin ideal. This is in spite of the fact that they lived far from urban centers like Edo and Kyoto where one might expect to find sophisticated people. Accordingly, in several stories from New flower gathering, connoisseurship becomes the focus of attention. The text opens with a justification for Buson’s decision not to publish a collection of his own hokku because such collections reveal their authors’ limitations too clearly; but after this and two other short comments about haikai he shifts into some stories about art objects and the risks to which people exposed themselves in valuing them. Two of them place Tokiwa Tanpoku Ᏹ⋚Ầർ (dates unknown)—medical doctor, theorist on education, haikai poet and art collector—in the center of the narrative. The first starts out with an anecdote to establish a general background, and then moves into a story that concerns Buson’s own experience: There was certain person who had a passion for the hand guard of a short-sword that was said to have been made from a nail-cover taken from the palace of Xianyang ທ㓁ች;5 he always had it at his waist and cherished it. How much did this antique, inlaid with a bird-and-flower pattern of precious metals, and evoke the splendor of a thousand years! However, asking about what proof was there that this was indeed a nail-cover from the Xianyang Palace is nonsensical talk. Somehow, if he had not claimed it was a nail-cover from the Xianyang Palace, it would have been a wonderful thing, and it is regrettable that he did. Even if it had been wood shavings from Nagara Bridge or the dried frog of Ide, I am sure that the people of today would find it contemptible and dubious. Tokiwa Tanpoku’s Korean (Koguryo) tea bowl had been carefully preserved by the warrior ņtaka Gengo ᄢ㜞Ḯ๋; it was handed down to Tanpoku from that very Gengo, and Tanpoku bequeathed it to me. Indeed it had an eminent history of past possession, but what proof was there? Lest it should become like the nail-cover of Xianyang palace, I quickly gave it away.

The unnamed connoisseur in the first part of this anecdote overstepped himself in admiring his artifact not for the sake of its beauty, but for its putative history; because he did so, he exposed it to the contempt of others because he could not prove that it actually had the illustrious origin he said it did. Buson compares it to a story from the late Heian

——— 5 The palace of the First Emperor of Qin ⒌ (Qin Shihuang ⒌ᆎ⊞), 259–210 BCE, r. 221–210 BCE.

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waka treatise Pouch notebook (Fukuro zŇshi ⴼ⨲ሶ, compiled 1157), about the first meeting between the great poet NŇin ⢻࿃ (b. 998) and Fujiwara Toshinobu ⮮ේ▵ା (dates unknown), in which the two men impressed each other with their good taste by showing off their most prized possessions: NŇin, wood shavings from the long-lost bridge at Nagara and Toshinobu, a mummified frog from the Ide River. Both the Nagara Bridge and Ide River frogs were long celebrated in waka poetry.6 This sets the context for Buson’s extraordinary act of giving away a present from his patron Tanpoku, an item of great value. ņtaka Gengo was one of the forty-seven rŇnin who were required to commit suicide after illegally avenging the death of their lord; he was also a practitioner of the tea ceremony and a haikai poet of the Teimon school. Tanpoku’s gift of this tea bowl—which was not only beautiful in itself, but also had such an illustrious history—was a generous one. Aside from being a cautionary tale that reveals the great importance that “proof” (shŇ ⸽) of an art object’s worth had acquired during this time, the emphasis Buson places on his patron Tanpoku’s magnanimity and also his good taste indicates that within Buson’s circle, both aesthetic refinement and a generous character were markers of people worthy of admiration. A longer story of Tanpoku’s discernment follows the “buried tree” episode immediately. It starts out as a tale of an experience Buson had while retracing Matsuo BashŇ’s Narrow road to the interior journey; Tanpoku accompanied him on the first part of this trip but not as far as Matsushima, where the beginning of the story takes place: Tenrin-in temple ᄤ㤅㒮 of Matsushima is alongside Zuigan-ji ℰጤኹ and is a splendid Zen monastery. Once, when I was a guest there, the head of the temple gave me an old plank that was more than a foot in length and said, “Lord So-and-So of Sendai was a waka poet without compare. He hired a large number of workers, and had them dredge the bottom of the Natori River and they managed to pull out a fossilized log (umoregi). This log was used to make a writing-box, and together with some brushes made from Miyagino bush clover-wood, it was presented to the head of the NijŇ poetry school. This plank is what is left from the log, and is something that should not be treated lightly.” It had a distinct grain like that of zelkova wood. Because it had spent a thousand years on the river bottom, it was black, and as if it had turned to iron, when you tapped it, it made a hollow sound. It weighed only about ten kin ᢹ (thirteen pounds), and even when I bundled it up in a cloth and put it on my back, I barely

——— 6 Shimizu Takayuki, ed., ShinchŇ Nihon koten shşsei, vol. 32, Yosa Buson shş (ShinchŇsha, 1979), p. 47, note 141.

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managed to carry it to Shiroishi ⊕⍹ post station. Because I did not think I could bear the fatigue of carrying it over a long distance, I left it under the veranda of the guesthouse where I spent the night and continued on my journey home. Sometime later, when I mentioned this to Tanpoku at the home of GantŇ of Yşki, Tanpoku scolded me angrily, saying, “What! You dirty priest who throws away treasure! I’ll have it for myself! Is someone around that I can send? Go right away!” and he contacted Shinryş ᤯ᵹ in Sukagawa. Shinryş wrote a letter, and sent a servant with him to visit the lodging-place at Shiroishi. The servant said, “A priest who once stayed here left something or other behind, and I have come to look for it.” The innkeeper fortunately looked around, and found it, and gave it to him, and [Shinryş] took it. Later, GantŇ received it [from Tanpoku], and it was made into the ink stone-cover called “Fishes and Cranes” (Gyokaku, 㝼㢬). It is more than seventy ri7 from Yşki to Shiroishi, and although much time had passed, the object that we obtained and brought home was an exceedingly precious one.

Like the dried frog of Ide and wood shavings of Nagara Bridge, umoregi or wood from “buried tree” is an object that had great value because of its associations in classical poetry. Thus, a piece of this wood had great value for people of literary sensibility; the one that Buson received had been a gift to the temple from someone who was not only a powerful lord, but was also an excellent waka poet.8 Buson’s telling of the story self-deprecatingly (and humorously) exposes his own failure to appreciate the importance of this extraordinary gift—which perhaps he had achieved in exchange for one of his paintings—and because of it Tanpoku’s good taste appears all the more impressive by contrast. This is not just an amusing account of something Buson experienced while he was on the Narrow road to the interior trail. Rather, it is an aisatsu praising both his benefactors Tanpoku and GantŇ for their highly cultivated sensibility at the same time as establishing them as well-informed connoisseurs of fine art, and as such it shows gratitude for their generosity. Buson concludes New flower gathering with another story about the risk attached to valuable objects that chrononologically precedes his experiences in the northeast. This one took place while Hajin was still alive. It is also different because Buson is the hero of the piece—it is he who

——— 7

About 170 miles (273 kilometers). A detailed discussion of umoregi and its significance in this passage is included in Edward Kamens, Utamakura, Allusion, and Intertextuality in Traditional Japanese Poetry (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1997), pp. 10–18. 8

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gives help to a poet in need. Nevertheless, it provides another example of the ways that haikai poets and their associates used precious objects as the currency of social relationships: The officer Umezu Hanuemon ᪢ᵤඨฝⴡ㐷9 was a trusted retainer in a certain household, in his post in Naniwa also his service was excellent, and he received a letter of commendation, and was a person of great fame. Thus his stipend was worth some ten thousand koku, and was a senior retainer in the household. He had a liking for haikai, and as his duties permitted he participated in activities of Kikaku’s school, and took the name Kiteki ౔㔑. He was a poet with many verses in Kikaku’s collections. This person, having completed his work in Edo, was about return home to Akita. Since he was very sad at having to leave Kikaku, he invited him to come along. Kikaku could not go. Kikaku had another disciple by the name of ShikŇ ⚡⚃. Because he was very skilled at haikai, at Kikaku’s recommendation he went to attend Kiteki, and sent him off to Akita. Therefore, Kiteki and Kikaku did not cease exchanging letters, so I heard. Among these was a precious letter written in Kikaku’s own hand. Of course it contained a conventional greeting. After that were included two or three hokku, and in the following paragraph there was this: On a certain day in a certain month, the forty-seven loyal retainers launched a night attack on the enemy stronghold, avenging their dead lord. They ended up Sengaku-ji temple ᴰጪኹ10 with nothing to regret. ShiyŇ ሶ⪲, Shunban ᤐᏔ and the others performed deeds that were completely without parallel. Both of those two were practitioners of haikai in those days, they were young warriors of poetic sensitivity, and above all, their resolve and emotional depth was endless. It was truly a document worthy of great respect, and Kiteki kept it hidden away, like a treasure. At that time there was a person called Fukami ShintarŇ ᷓ⷗ᣂᄥ㇢.11 He was a youth so beautiful he would put even He An ૗ᤲ and Dong Xian ⫃⾫ to shame.12 Kiteki had a great affection for this young man, and they formed a bond that was closer even than that of Su Wu ⯃ᱞ and Li Ling ᧘㒺.13 ShintarŇ was also interested in haikai, and went by the name of JŇshŇ ਂ⩽. He felt that the letter from Kikaku was something

——— 9

(1672–1721). Their graves are at Sengakuji Temple, Tokyo. 11 Died 1692. 12 Chinese youths famous for their handsomeness. 13 Li Ling (d. 74 BCE) and Su Wu (ca. 143–60 BCE) were both captured by the Xiongnu ൱ᅛ, a Central Asian tribe that invaded China’s northern frontier. Li Ling’s poem to Su Wu was included in Wen xuan. Wen xuan, or Selections of Refined Literature, vol. 1, trans. David R. Knechtges (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1982), pp. 35, 42. 10

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he wanted for himself, and even though he did not say anything about it, Kiteki knew what was on his mind, and ended up giving it to him. Among the disciples of Tantan there was a man named Bakuten 㤈ᄤ,14 and he came to Akita from Naniwa and stayed there for some time. JŇshŇ and Bakuten were both devoted to haikai, and JŇshŇ gave the letter to Bakuten. After that Bakuten moved on to Edo, and he lived in a place called Yanagiwara, near Edo Castle,15 and sought out a shabby room and lived there. He had always been poor, and now he had run out of ways to pay for clothing and food; he had no acquaintances, and no relatives that he could rely on, so he was in real trouble. When I realized this, I gave him a little something to help him out of his difficulty.16 I hosted my own monthly haikai meetings, running all over the place making his sales pitch. Because of this, when, starting with people like Hajin, RitŇ, RyŇwa, and Gojaku ඦ኎, people of all kinds joined, eventually the meeting place became filled to bursting with participants, and he had splendid haikai group. Bakuten’s intentions were finally realized when Mokusai Seiga 㤩ᢪ㕍ᚒ became a member of the group. He (Bakuten) took the name Ihoku ᷺ർ, and effortlessly composed linked verse sequences of ten thousand verses, and he safely completed the initiation as a haikai master. His reputation grew naturally, and he participated in many groups, and anyway was very successful. Because he felt great affection and gratitude towards me, his old friend, he told me he would give me the aforementioned Kikaku letter. I replied, “You have only this to treasure. There won’t be another one. How can I accept it? I have no need of it.” I firmly declined his offer.

UkŇ Ihoku ฝᳯ᷺ർ (1703–1755) was an urban-school poet. After the assistance he received from Buson, he became a successful haikai master in Akita and Edo. He helped to edit the influential anthologies Edo twenty verse sequences and Eastern haikai (Azuma buri ᧲㘑ᵹ, published 1756). Buson’s story focuses on a letter in Kikaku’s handwriting. Like Tanpoku’s tea bowl, this object was important because it was connected to a famous person. Letters and other documents in the handwriting of poets were something to be treasured; in Chapter Three we saw how ShŇzan, Taigi, and Zuiko’s discovery of a manuscript in BashŇ’s handwriting was an occasion to be celebrated with the compilation of a volume of poetry, Kyoto twenty verse sequences. In this case, the letter not only was valuable because of the person who wrote it, but because the contents were

——— 14

That is, Ihoku. In modern Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo. 16 Literally, helping the fish stuck in a puddle of water in a wheel-rut. 15

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particularly interesting and because it had previously been owned by interesting people. Buson’s story about the letter is a way of explaining his relationship with Ihoku. Unlike most of the New flowering gathering stories, however, in this one Buson’s own role is almost self-congratulatory—he admits that he was extremely generous to this poet and takes the credit for launching his career. This makes it an exception to most Buson stories about himself. In the end, however, Ihoku emerges as a person of great courtesy—his appreciation of Buson’s help is so great that he is willing to give him his most prized possession. Buson, for his part, again turns away from the opportunity to own something valuable—this time because he recognizes its importance to his friend. The story does, however, share a theme with Buson’s other tales: in his reminiscences about the past, he is careful to present those who supported him as embodiments of bunjin ideals, both in excellence of character and also appreciation for things of great literary and artistic value. However, New flower gathering also contains some other stories whose approbative nature is a little more in doubt. One of these concerns JŇş ਂ⠀: JŇş of Yşki established a second house and had an old man stay there as caretaker. Even though it was in the middle of the town, it was surrounded by trees and luxuriant with plants, and because it was a place where one could escape the hustle and bustle of the world, I myself stayed there for quite some time.

While he was there, Buson spends his time studying haikai and Chinese poetry. As the story continues, however, things take a turn for the weird: in the middle of the night Buson is visited by a badger, who disappears every time he and the caretaker try to find it. Finally, when a hunter shoots a badger in a nearby wood, Buson realizes that this must have been the one that was troubling them, and he feels guilty at having contributed to its death. Another example is an incident that Buson describes as having happened at Nakamura FşkŇ’s house. It is one of the longer tales in New flower gathering: There is a man called Nakamura HyŇzaemon ਛ߻ࠄ౓Ꮐⴡ㐷 who lives in Shimodate, in Hitachi Province. He belonged to the former Yahantei haikai school, and his haikai name was FşkŇ 㘑▶. He was of unequalled wealth, and lived in a fine house of some six acres in size, whose gardens were full of unusual stones and rare plants. He kept a fountain and let

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loose birds, and the scenery of the garden’s artificial mountain surpassed views of nature. He was such an incomparably fine man that sometimes the provincial governor would come to call. His wife’s name was Omitsu 㒙ḩ. She was the daughter of a rich man called Fujii So-and-so, and was skilled at waka and music. She was also a woman of very fine character. Even though this was such a splendid family, at some point the house went into decline, and became extremely lonely, so that even people who had formerly visited now began to avoid it. When the house first began to go into decline, many peculiar things happened.

Buson happened to visit Omitsu while FşkŇ was away, and she tells him that the household would wake to find that mochi (cakes made from rice flour) were inexplicably disappearing from their storage containers. Eventually, very late one night while she was diligently working at her sewing, five or six foxes appeared in the room. They seemed to come out of nowhere, and went away just as mysteriously. Buson was very impressed with her response to this frightening experience: she reacted with exemplary calm and stoicism. While on the face of it these accounts seem to be little more than mildly grotesque tales of haunting, they also have a serious purpose, and can give us insight into a different aspect of Buson’s relationship with his patrons. As in all the New flower gathering stories that describe people whose homes are haunted by supernatural beings, JŇş and the Nakamura family are represented as people of good taste and refinement. This is keeping with what we saw in Buson’s introduction to the Around here: Four kasen in one night, an appreciation for tales of the supernatural was a mark of a cultivated character. In both the story of JŇş and that of Omitsu, the location of the events is the residences of the people concerned. Both places are described in terms of extremely high praise: JŇş lives like a recluse in the city, much as Buson’s great friend and mentor ShŇha did. So does FşkŇ; however, his home is even more splendid—its elaborate garden full of rare plants, stones, and even birds would be appropriate for any Chinese scholar-recluse to live, study, and to entertain friends. He was prominent enough to entertain provincial officials, and even the relative poverty into which the house had declined at the time of Buson’s visit is presented as a case of what a Confucian would regard as honorable poverty. His wife, too, is a woman of industry and dignity; she works late into the night at her sewing, and is stalwart even in the face of a visit from otherworldly creatures. The environments these admirable people inhabit are isolated and run-down, precisely because they have turned their back on striving for worldly

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measures of success and instead devote themselves art and poetry. At the same time, lonely, dilapidated houses invite the attentions of foxes and badgers the way that more fashionable, well-maintained ones would not. Thus the supernatural visits so prominent in Buson’s accounts are actually a form of emphasizing the dedication of his patrons to a life of transcending ordinary, everyday concerns, making them embodiments of rizoku. Buson’s New flower gathering also introduces humor as a way of calling attention to the excellence of his friends. Like the stories associating excellence with the grotesque, his portrayal of patron Hayami Shinga seems on the surface at least ambiguous, if not frankly unflattering. The story begins with Shinga sleeping with the shutters open, the better to hear the affecting sound of the crickets chirping in the night. So far, Shinga’s attitude is suitably tasteful. Next, however, a series of events happen that leave us with a much different impression: At about the Fourth Hour, he suddenly sat up in bed and looked outside, and it was as bright as day from the dazzling moonlight. Several foxes sat in a row on the veranda, waving their bushy tails. They cast very distinct shadows on the shoji, and there are no words to describe how frightening it was. How could Shinga stand it at that moment? He ran toward the kitchen in a panic, and going up to a room where he thought the host was sleeping, he knocked at the fusuma. “Hey, wake up!” he hollered at the top of his voice. This awakened the servants, who made a big commotion, yelling, “Burglars! There are burglars here!” Hearing this, Shinga himself calmed down, and, his eyes fully awake now, he looked at what he was doing. He realized he was knocking on the door of the toilet, shouting, “Sir! Wake up! Help quickly!” Later he spoke of this, and said, “I am a fool, even if I do say so myself.”

This is one of the best examples of how Buson brings together the grotesque and the comic. However, as he does in his other stories, he adds another element: the aesthetic. Buson admired Shinga deeply; when Shinga died Buson wrote what is perhaps his most emotionally raw poetic and powerful work, the haishi “Mourning the Sage Hokuju.” Given that this is the case, and in the context of the other New flower gathering stories, it appears that in Buson’s circle of poets and art collectors who embraced the ideal of literati eccentricity inherent in the bunjin ideal, laughter was to be prized, and people who behaved in a way that elicited laughter were not necessarily ridiculous, but were instead viewed as embodiments of this ideal. The bunjin ideal valued seeing through the meaningless pretensions of conventional society, and people who had

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such insight were to be admired. Shinga’s behavior here was not quite poetic madness; however, he was able to laugh at himself, and this was also something that marked him as someone with a highly developed personal character. However courteous Buson’s stance towards his early patrons and supporters appears in works intended for public consumption like New flower gathering, the private face of his relationships with them is of a somewhat different character. Instead of diffidence and respect, his letters show a side to these relationships that was more direct and emotional. The following is from a letter Buson wrote during his early months in Kyoto to Momohiko, the son of Hayami Shinga. Momohiko was probably in Edo at the time he received this letter, as his family’s sake brewing business had concerns there; his brother DenkŇ, the letter suggests, remained in Yşki. The text is corrupt in several places. To: [...] Yohachi, [....] Sawaragi chŇ Please deliver this to the address above. Kindly affix it to the wall. Please do not forget to deliver it. Please obtain a line of calligraphy by Mr. Hirabayashi, or two or three hanging scroll dipytchs. I would like to hang the in my studio here. And some other people of good taste also definitely would like some. I humbly ask this great kindness of you. This is the favor of a lifetime. I will paint you a picture of Daikoku in return. I’ve been visiting various places in Kyoto. I’ve spent a very interesting time here. Recently I went to Fushimi and stayed there for a while. When I remember the time when [...] danced, I laughed to myself. From time to time I also compose some haikai. I’m still pretty busy and I haven’t much going on. When I have a year or two’s experience of the place I’m looking forward to enjoying myself much more. Above all, I’m asking you for Mr. Hirabayashi’s calligraphy without fail. I am waiting for it eagerly. Oshimi

Viewing mandarin ducks

oshidori ni bi o tsukushiteya fuyukodachi

mandarin ducks replete with beauty: woods in winter

There are many more besides that one, but I’ve omitted the others. How is DenkŇ in Yşki? I feel very nostalgic.

Hirabayashi Seisai ᐔᨋ㕒ᢪ (1695–1753) was a famous Edo calligrapher. Buson’s letter implies that Momohiko knew him, or was in contact with someone who was. Buson asks for an example of his calligraphy not only to copy and learn from it, but also to display it in his own studio.

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Other people in Kyoto—Buson calls them “fşryşka,” people of fşryş, a word he often used as a synonym for haikai—were also interested in Seisai’s work. Buson emphasizes the urgency of his request with the hyperbolic “this is the favor of a lifetime,” and he repeats it in his last lines. In exchange for the calligraphy, he offers a painting of Daikoku, the god of wealth; this was an appropriate gift for a merchant like Momohiko. The letter conveys the impression of a close friendship between the two men. Buson describes how his recollection of one of their acquaintances dancing causes him laugh out loud, and says that the memory of his brother and of Yşki makes him feel nostalgic. This is in contrast to his experience in Kyoto, which he imagines will take him a year or two to get used to. Buson also includes a hokku, despite admitting that he has not had much time to write anything of consequence. All in all, the letter gives us insight into a number of things, but most obvious is the warmth and intimacy of the relationship Buson developed with his patron, and the way that their relationship revolved around the exchange of calligraphy, painting, and poetry. This letter also is evidence of the difficulty that Buson had in getting himself established in Kyoto. Despite the connections he already could depend on by virtue of the his position in Hajin’s Yahantei school, which included many disciples in Kyoto area because Hajin had spent several years there between 1725 and 1737, Buson was still not able to find a secure professional foothold there right away. As a result, he went to Miyazu in Tango Province in search of better prospects.

Buson’s Miyazu Patrons: KenshŇ-ji Temple Miyazu is about 600 kilometers (366 miles) away from Kyoto. Although it was not far in terms of distance, getting there from Kyoto involved a rough journey over some very difficult mountain roads. However, Miyazu was famous for its beauty, and tourism was one of its major industries, in addition to the production of chirimen (silk crepe). Miyazu’s prosperity and its proximity to Kyoto made it a good location to seek painting clients because many of its inhabitants had some exposure to the cultural life of the ancient capital, and had levels of education similar to the people Buson knew in Yşki and Shimodate.

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Buson’s comments about his life during this period are sparse. In Chapter Three we saw the letter he wrote to ShŇzan while in Tango, in which he described its dialect as unpleasant and the locally popular style of haikai as unpalatable. Despite this avowed lack of affinity for the place, for reasons that are not clear, Buson eventually took the name “Yosa” for himself; Yosa is a district not far from Miyazu, so he may have developed a deeper attachment to the place than this letter suggests. Also, while not many of the hokku that he wrote during this time survive, the number and quality of extant paintings from this period are testimony to the fact that his experience here was very good for the development of his artistic skills. Many of the works he completed during this period are very large, including some six-panel screen paintings. Like the paintings he did during his years in the northeast, these reflect the influence of many different styles, but many of them display a level of confidence and certainty evident in few of his earlier paintings. During the three years he spent here, he lived mostly at the Pure Land temple KenshŇ-ji, the guest of a priest there, Chikukei, who was a haikai poet. Buson probably received an introduction to Chikukei from one of the many Pure Land temples in Kyoto. Buson was not deeply religious, though because for several years he sometimes signed himself Shaku Buson ㉼⭢᧛ (Priest Buson) scholars have speculated that he must have received some kind of Buddhist training. However, as we have seen, Buson frequently stayed at temples in places where he was without a more permanent residence. Temples were usually prepared to give lodging to visiting pilgrims, and in a time when inns and other facilities for travelers were still relatively limited, it was not uncommon for people to find accommodation in temples, even while on journeys whose purpose was not actually religious. One source of information about Buson’s time at KenshŇ-ji is the story in New flower gathering, where he describes his experience of being repeatedly awoken in the night by a mischievous badger. In this Chikukei, Buson’s host, is presented in rather undignified, even comic terms. The story begins with Buson falling ill with a fever, and taking refuge in a back room at the temple. One night, getting up to use the toilet, he draws back the sliding door. Stepping into the next room, he is shocked when his foot touches something small and furry. He is even more disturbed to find that the mysterious object almost immediately disappeared. Though he calls for help from the resident monks, they resent

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having their sleep disturbed and complain that his fever is making him hallucinate. Feeling embarrassed because I had been given such a scolding, I too got back into bed. Just as I was drifting off to sleep, I felt as if a heavy stone had been laid on my chest, and I started to moan loudly. The sound of my voice was within the hearing of the Reverend Chikukei, who came over and said, “How extraordinary! What’s the matter?” and saved me by waking me up. When I finally returned to my senses, I told him what I had experienced, he said, “Things like this do sometimes happen. It must be the work of that badger.” He opened the outer doors, and looked out. Dawn was just beginning to break, and in the pale light one could clearly make out tracks, like fallen petals of plum blossoms, leading from the veranda to under the walkway. And so, even those people who before had said I was talking nonsense and scolded me, said wonderingly, “Hm, maybe it really was something.” Perhaps it was because Reverend Chikukei had come in such a hurry to wake me up, but his sash was undone, and the front of his robe hung open. His plump testicles hung like rice-sacks, but since this area was covered in profuse tufts of white hair, one could not see his penis. Saying that this was a result of having had a rash during his youth, he pulled on his testicles, twisting them and scratching them. I thought he looked very strange, and, wondering if perhaps this was what Old Man Shukaku looked like when he had grown tired of reading scriptures, I was shocked and frightened, and drew back from him. Chikukei laughed very loudly, and recited this verse. aki furu ya kusu hachi jo no Kinkakuji

autumn passes, and looking back eight jŇ of camphor in the Temple of the Golden Pavilion

Chikukei

As in the episodes Buson recounts from his journey to the northeast, the focus of this story is the visit of a supernatural being. It is very similar to the tale of Shinga’s experience, involving the invasion of his room by a strange creature and a nocturnal visit to the toilet. The humorous side of things is even more apparent in this story, with the very frank and earthy description of his Chikukei’s private parts. Buson’s story provides a context for Chikukei’s poem—Shukaku was a legendary monk of Morinji temple in Tatebayashi (modern Gunma Prefecture) who seemed to have magical powers and was rumored to be a badger in disguise; an eight jŇ-sized room at Kinkaku-ji was built with camphor wood boards; the testicles (kindama) of a badger were thought to be a prodigious size; kaku means both “pavilion” and “to scratch.” Despite the fact that

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Chikukei’s image is somewhat repellent here, Buson’s story provides a backdrop that showcases his poetic artistry. Also, as we saw in the Shinga story, Buson’s depictions of his friends in a comic light is actually a form of praise, in that it speaks to their connection to the ideal of convention-breaking eccentricity. While Chikukei’s appearance is laughable, he is the only one of his colleagues to understand the true source of Buson’s trouble; likewise, even though the circumstances are completely bizarre, he is ready with the perfect poetic quip. Thus, in spite of its comic tone and earthy content, this story can be read as an expression of gratitude for Chikukei’s three years of hospitality. A picture that Buson painted to commemorate his friendship with Chikukei also exists. Called “Three Haikai Immortal Priests” it is a very rough, almost cartoon-like depiction of Chikukei, Rojş 㔺ච of ShinshŇji temple ⌀ᾖኹ, and RyŇha ਔᏉ of Muen-ji temple ή✼ኹ. Both ShinshŇ-ji and Muen-ji were Miyazu temples. Like Chikukei, Rojş and RyŇha were also haikai poets. The inscription on the picture was badly damaged by fire—what remains of it is enough to suggest that the text was very light and playful in tone, written in informal, almost conversational language. The three priests are shown standing in conversation with one another—RyŇha and Rojş on the right, wearing wooden clogs; Chikukei is on the left, barefoot. To the left of the three men are sotoba, grave markers made from wooden planks. Rojş has a stern look on his face, but Chikukei and RyŇha are laughing. Although it is not a great work of art, “Three Haikai Immortal Priests” is interesting for a number of reasons. It represents the three men in a humorous way that is more charming than disrespectful. As we saw in the case of New flower gathering’s stories of Shinga and of Chikukei himself, a comic depiction actually does honor to its subject by bringing it into the realm of aesthetic eccentricity and humor that was fundamental to haikai. Even though he does not directly praise the poetic skills of his friends, Buson’s portrait shows them to be amusing and unconventional; we can assume that their haikai is much the same. Buson’s writings to and about his patrons are vivid and in many cases highly imaginative and playful. However, his regard and affection was matched by a corresponding degree of dependence. Without the good will of his patrons, Buson would not have prospered: in his early life he relied on them for room, board, and the access to resources he need to equip himself as a painter, and even after he established himself in Kyoto he still needed their constant support. Beneath the drama and charm of

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these texts, then, was anxiety—the need to flatter, cajole, and ingratiate himself with wealthy people enough to earn their patronage. Buson’s career as a painter might have enabled him to shun aggressive selfpromotion as a haikai poet, however, the pressures he faced as a painter remained strong nonetheless.

Haiga: An Introduction These pressures had influence on another area of Buson’s work where painting and poetry intersect: haiga. The majority of Buson’s haiga date from the early 1770s and afterward, from around the time that his position as a Kyoto painter was more secure and he took on the leadership of the Yahantei school. As a form of art that could be produced quickly and cheaply, haiga were a perfect tool for a painter like Buson who was chronically short of funds, even during his most productive years. Haiga are works in which haikai text and image combine to form a single, integrated whole. Haiga were quite different from the pictures that professional artists like Buson typically painted. Most were on a very small scale, often a single hokku paired with a simple sketch. Both inscription and image were supposed to appear spontaneous and immediate—a direct expression of a single moment. Haikai poets were not necessarily brilliant painters. However, regardless of its aesthetic qualities, the calligraphy or painting of a haikai poet had its own value as a visible trace of a person’s character, much as autographs might be viewed today. It was not unusual for editors to compile facsimile collections of poems inscribed in the handwriting of the poets who composed them, like MŇotsu’s Ancient and modern poetry collection, because the handwriting itself was an important object of study, and contributed to the reader’s appreciation of a poem. In the same way, the brushwork of a painting also value regardless of how technically skillful it was. Haiga were informal and dashed off in a hurry, giving the impression of having been created impulsively. In this way they are similar to hokku, which are supposed to seem fresh and spontaneous even though they might have undergone numerous revisions, or verse links that were composed on the spot in reaction to another person’s maeku.

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Haiga resemble hokku and linked verse in other ways, too: most importantly, both create a sense of surprise by bringing together incongruous images. The connection between the images is close enough that viewers can perceive it, but not so close that it seems tediously obvious. Hokku and linked verse accomplish this using words alone. Ambiguity and implication—leaving out information in order to cue their viewers to supply it—are extremely common. Hokku, for example, frequently create multiple layers of meaning expressed through homophony, pivot words, and the like. In linked verse, the writer of the tsukeku seizes on one of several interpretations of a maeku and builds on it to form the next link. Haiga also operate this way, but the inclusion of a visual element places the focus even more on implication. The artist and writer choose exactly the right image to pair with a text, and add no more detail than is absolutely necessary to trigger recognition and insight. The pleasure the reader-viewer has in haiga is that of guessing the connection between the text and the image, and in the most interesting haiga, connections are very subtle indeed. Curator and art historian Okada Rihei calls haiga “something that acts as haikai, in the form of a picture.”17 In Okada’s view, haiga are different from other similar-looking kinds of Japanese art, arguing that they bear only a superficial resemblance to works such as the “Frolicking birds and beasts” (ChŇjş giga 㠽₞ᚨ↹, early 12th c.) attributed to Toba Kakuyş 㠽⠀ⷡ₉ (1053–1140), ink sketches by medieval monks, and cartoonlike drawings by tea masters. Likewise, not every picture painted by a haikai poet is necessarily haiga. The essential distinguishing feature of a haiga, Okada argues, is what he calls “haikai spirit” (haikai seishin େ⺽♖␹). While this is difficult to define, it is related to the fact that the producers of these works were commoners rather than aristocrats, and they tended to infuse their works with humor and a sense of fun. Also, while references to the natural world were common in haiga verses and images, the main focus was on depicting the realities of the daily life of the lower classes. 18 The word haiga did not come into use until the TenpŇ period. Buson did not use this word himself; he referred to his haikai pictures as “haikai rough sketches” ߪ޿߆޿ߩ⨲↹. The first use of “haiga” is attributed to Watanabe Kazan ᷰㄝ⪇ጊ (1793–1841):

——— 17 18

Okada Rihei, Haiga no sekai (TankŇ Shinsha, 1966) p. 1. Okada Rihei, Buson to haiga (Yagi Shoten, 1997), pp. 28–29.

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Haiga is that which takes aesthetic refinement (fşryş) as its first principle. In the Genroku period there were people like ItchŇ ৻Ⲕ (Hanabusa ItchŇ, 1652–1724) and Kyoriku (Morikawa Kyoriku ᫪Ꮉ⸵౐, 1656– 1715); in terms of style, Shinsei ᷓ⋭ (Ogata Kenzan የᒻੇጊ, 1663– 1743) was better. This aesthetically refined taste (fşryş no omomuki) is not an ancient one; it probably started with people like TakimotobŇ Ṛᧄဌ (ShŇkadŇ ShŇjŇ ᧻⧎ၴᤘਸ਼, 1584–1639) and KŇrin (Ogata KŇrin የᒻశ℘, 1658–1716). Among haikai poets RyşhŇ was outstanding. In recent years, Buson and his school have come to be thought interesting. It is important to paint keeping all of these artists in mind. Making everything too perfect is not good; to a certain extent paint badly. To put it in human terms as an example, being clever and shrewd in one’s behavior or a good talker is bad; knowing little of the world and stuttering naïveté is seen as aesthetic refinement (fşryş), and one should try to achieve this and introduce it into one’s work. 19

Few modern commentators would share Kazan’s views in linking haiga with Kenzan, ShŇkadŇ, and KŇrin. Kenzan was a potter, ShŇjŇ was a calligrapher, and KŇrin was a painter; none of them wrote haikai. However, Kazan’s point is that the origins of haiga are in a style that rejects fussiness and perfectionism; if one wishes to paint this way, he or she should first study and learn not only from the example of haikai poets but also that of non-haikai poets who achieved this ideal. The early twentieth-century scholar Ebara TaizŇ offers another definition of haiga, one that gives some insight into the way it creates a relationship between visual and verbal components. Ebara’s argument is similar to Okada’s; he argues that there are two essential qualities of haiga: one, okashimi, or humor; and two, its emphasis on contexts derived from ordinary life. While other kinds of paintings like those done by monks or other painters with literary pretensions may resemble haiga in their simplicity, haiga are marked by this special characteristic combination of both humor and a sense of connectedness to the daily life of commoners. Another genre that also arose in the early modern period, ukiyo-e (“floating-world” pictures) show a similar degree of connectedness with ordinary life; ukiyo-e might also depict its subjects in a humorous way. However, the third and most important aspect of haiga distinguishes it from ukiyo-e as well as other kinds of painting, and this is its reliance on yojŇ ૛ᖱ—overtones or implications. As he argues:

——— 19

224.

Ebara TaizŇ, “Haiga,” Ebara TaizŇ chosaku shş, vol. 13 (ChşŇ KŇronsha, 1979), p.

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Though haiga are usually considered works with abbreviated or rough brushwork, or works that manifest aesthetically refined taste, haiga are nothing other than works that make their primary focus an aesthetic of overtones (yojŇbi). There are various kinds of theories regarding the principle of overtones in waka, renga, and haikai, but basically, it is what expresses meaning by triggering an association or an intuition of the broadest possible time and space that lies behind or within direct expression. Thus some of the many explanations say that it depicts the beauty of what is not revealed in language or does not appear in scenery, or it is an expression of only the trace of the unsaid or unlooked-for (that which is not described according to the logic of causality). The reason Essays in idleness asks, “Are we to look at the blossoms only in full bloom, the moon only when it is cloudless?”20 is because there are no overtones when things are expressed completely.21

YojŇ, then, can be understood as expression that conveys more than what it literally says. Ebara associates overtones with a number of different aesthetic terms: in waka, it is related to yşgen (mystery and depth), in renga, sabi (austerity), hie (chill), yase (slenderness) or fuke (profundity). In the case of the 31-syllable waka, implication was an essential part of expressing the poet’s message, because the shortness of the form itself placed limits on what could be said directly. This became even more important in renga and haikai, which gave poets only 17 or sometimes as little as 14 syllables to work with. Thus, haikai poets had to devise ways to give eloquence to what was left unsaid. This same habit of thought and expression, Ebara argues, transferred itself to a form of painting in which much of the picture space was left open and unpainted. Again, while unpainted space is not uncommon in Chinese and Japanese painting as a rule, haiga’s identifying characteristics remained its focus on the daily life of commoners, and its liberal use humor.22 Ebara’s explanation of yojŇ in haiga points to how completely integrated haiga was with poetry, especially linked verse and hokku. The relationships between haiga’s visual and verbal images follow rules that governed verse sequences. These rules were highly complex and technical, and they varied depending on the historical period and school. The earliest formulation of linked verse rules was that offered in waka

——— 20 Episode 137, “Are we to look at the blossoms only in full bloom, the moon only when it is cloudless? To long for the moon while looking on the rain, to lower the blinds and be unaware of the passing of the spring—these are even more deeply moving.” Keene, Essays in Idleness, p. 115. 21 Ebara, “Haiga,” p. 228. 22 Ibid., pp. 228–229.

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and renga theorist NijŇ Yoshimoto’s ੑ᧦⦟ၮ (1320–1388) HekirenshŇ ௼ㅪᛞ (Bent links treatise, ca. 1345, the basis for Renri hisshŇ), which proposes fifteen different kinds of linking. His formulation was further refined by renga luminary SŇgi, and later, SŇboku ቬ’ (d. 1545) came up with four categories to classify links. Haikai poets also produced their own treatises on the subject, those of Kitamura Kigin ർ᧛ቄี (1624– 1705) and SaitŇ Tokugen ᢧ⮮ᓼర (1559–1647) being most widely read. 23 In the early stages of haikai’s development, the most common ways of creating links in verse sequences were monozuke ‛ઃ, literally, object-link (also called kotobazuke ⹖ઃ, literally, word-link) and kokorozuke ᔃઃ, content-link (also called kuizuke ฏᗧઃ, verse meaning-link). Monozuke can be understood as links that draw connections based on the established associations of a word or phrase, especially those derived from the classical literary tradition. For instance, “Mount Fuji” was associated with “smoke,” partly because of the objective fact that, being a volcano, smoke sometimes rose from its summit; but even more strongly because for centuries writers had alluded to Mount Fuji’s smoke in literature. Likewise, the verb yoru (to twine) was associated with the noun ito (thread).24 By contrast, kokorozuke ignored the established associations of specific words, and instead made a link based on the previous verse’s meaning or content. The following two pairs of examples illustrate the difference: no wa yuki ni karuredo karenu shion kana

under snow, the fields have withered, yet still unwithered is the aster

Sengin taka no egoi to ne oba naki ato

trace of the crying call of a hawk seeking sustenance25

Kigin This pair of verses is taken from a sequence included in Memorial haikai on the thirteenth anniversary of the passing of Elder Teitoku (Teitoku Ň jşsan kaiki

——— 23 Higashi Akimasa, Renku nyşmon: BashŇ no haikai ni soku shite (ChşŇ KŇronsha, 1978), p. 104. 24 A detailed discussion of different types of linking is in Higashi, pp. 104–118. 25 Ibid., p. 20.

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tsuizen haikai ⽵ᓼ⠃චਃ࿁ᔊㅊༀେ⺽). In “Under snow, the fields” (no wa yuki ni) Sengin conveys a sense of grief for Teitoku by making use of the fact that “aster” (shion ⚡⧞) is homophonous with “affection for one’s teacher” (shion Ꮷᕲ). Thus the verse implies that, while the snow has caused the plants in the surrounding fields to die, an aster—and likewise, the speaker’s feeling of gratitude towards Teitoku—still blooms. The relationship between this verse and the one that follows it is built on the principle of monozuke. In the seminal verse-linking handbook Companion boat (Ruisenshş 㘃⦁㓸, 1676) that was widely used by the Teimon and Danrin schools, yuki (snow) is associated with taka (falcon). Thus Kigin matches Sengin’s verse about a snowy field with one that refers to a falcon. In this pair, the start of an early BashŇ-school sequence, the link relies on kokorozuke: ara nan tomo na ya kinŇ wa sugite fukutojiru

nothing much happened yesterday is gone: puffer fish broth

TŇsei (BashŇ) samusashi satte ashi no saki made

the chill has departed even from my feet26

ShinshŇ (Yamaguchi SodŇ) BashŇ (using the haikai name TŇsei) starts off his extravagantly irregular verse with a line from the NŇ play The Reed cutter (Ashigari ⧃⧛), where the title character laments the bitterness of his lonely life: Yesterday was wasted Today has come to an end; Tomorrow will surely be the same. I was merely trying to prolong A life that counts for no more Than a grain of sand on a wave-beaten shore; Here among the stalks wet with soon-vanished dew I have become a cutter of reeds.27

——— 26

Ibid., p. 22 Donald Keene, Twenty Plays of the NŇ Theater (New York: Columbia University Press, 1970), p. 153–154. 27

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BashŇ changes the phrase’s meaning slightly to give voice to a speaker who is relieved to have lived to see another day after having eaten some delicious but potentially poisonous soup made with puffer fish (fugu). ShinshŇ (better known as BashŇ disciple SodŇ) responds with a tsukeku where the speaker describes a sensation of warmth that has penetrated right to his toes—that is, from eating the puffer fish broth mentioned in the previous verse. This is a kokorozuke because the connection is entirely based on the situation portrayed in the preceding verse; it does not rely on the fixed association of one word with another, as does the first example. The BashŇ school poets went beyond monozuke and kokorozuke, and developed a group of verse link categories that can be collectively referred to as nioizuke, or “scent links.” As Haruo Shirane argues in his detailed article “Matsuo BashŇ and the Poetics of Scent,” these are verses in which the tsukeku is connected to the one that precedes it by overtones or shared connotations, rather than by lexical associations (as in monozuke) or content (as in kokorozuke). Shirane quotes Kyorai’s treatise where it explains: The Master [BashŇ] said, “The hokku has changed repeatedly since the distant past, but there have only been three changes in the haikai link. In the distant past, poets valued lexical links. In the more recent past, poets have stressed content links. Today, it is best to link by transference, reverberation, scent, or status.28

The historical development of linking described in this passage is an oversimplification, but it does indicates that BashŇ and his students were conscious of the fact that what they were doing was distinctly different and better than the way that their predecessors wrote haikai. Above all, they wanted to avoid making links that were too close or too obvious. Instead, the kind of linking they preferred is that which opens a space for the reader to step into and fill by recognizing the connection implied by the overtones (yojŇ or yosei) of the maeku and the tsukeku. BashŇ’s terms transference (utsuri), reverberation (hibiki), scent (nioi), and status (kurai) all refer to this kind of subtle technique. Shirane compares this with the cinematic term “montage,” and quotes Sergei Eisenstein’s explanation that calls montage “an idea that arises from the collision of independent

——— 28 Shirane, “Matsuo BashŇ and the Poetics of Scent,” Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies 52, 1 (1992): 78. The translation is by Shirane.

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shots”29 in which the viewer appreciates the connection between seemingly unrelated images by recognizing similarly subtle similarities links between them. It is not necessary to look as far as modern cinematic technique for a visual version of nioizuke. This is precisely the kind of connection that we typically see in haiga. The “scent link,” or more broadly cast, connections based on overtones (yojŇzuke or yoseizuke ૛ᖱઃ) were the basis for the connections between language and text in haiga. In some cases, the picture in a haiga acts like an illustration, providing a visual depiction of an image alluded to by language in the inscription. This kind of haiga, however, is the least impressive. Instead of inviting the viewer’s participation in creating the meaning of the text, it merely elaborates on information already provided. Instead, the most effective haiga follow the principles of nioizuke, juxtaposing images whose connections took some intuition or calculation to uncover. To get a better idea about how this relationship works, let us take a look at two examples. The first is by Sakaki Hyakusen, a pioneer nanga painter and Buson associate (Figure 2). This haiga is the first in a series of small compositions, each on the topic of a different month of the year. The compositions were pasted onto a mounting and made into a folding screen (byŇbu). The painting for the First Month shows a sleeping scholar, his head pillowed on crossed arms resting on the surface of his writing desk. To his left on the desk is a closed book. In a few brushstrokes, Hyakusen indicates that the scholar is Chinese: his clothing appears distinctly continental and the lines of his desk are more ornate than is typical of Japanese furnishings. Otherwise, the picture space is empty. Nothing else that might offer a clue appears in the upper part of the painting: except for the artist’s signature, the only other element is the hokku inscription. What does this scene depict? Reading the hokku makes everything clear: hatsu yume ya chŇ to naritemo mada samushi

first dream of the year even though I become a butterfly I’m still cold30

Hyakusen

——— 29

Ibid., p. 86. Zaidan HŇjin Kakimori Bunko, eds., Haiga no bi: Buson no jidai: Kakimori bunko tokubetsu ten, Haiga no nagare II series (Itami: Zaidan HŇjin Kakimori Bunko, 1996), p. 34. 30

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Figure 2 “First dream of the year.” Haiga by Sakaki Hyakusen. Nagoya City Museum.

Now the context becomes intelligible, as if the unpainted background was suddenly filled in. To start with, “First dream of the year” (hatsu yume) refers to the Japanese custom of taking note of the dream one has in the first three days of the First Month—fortunate ones were believed to indicate good prospects for the rest of the year. Thus, “first dream of the year” is appropriate for a verse or painting whose topic is the First Month. In the second place, the verse also makes reference to a “butterfly.” “Butterfly” is a spring season word, but that is not its function—the season word here is “first dream of the year.” Instead, it serves to associate this “first dream” with what is perhaps the most famous dream

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in the cultural traditions of East Asia—the one described in the Daoist treatise Zhuangzi: Once Chuang Chou [Zhuangzi] dreamt he was a butterfly, a butterfly flitting and fluttering around, happy with himself, doing as he pleased. He didn’t know he was Chuang Chou. Suddenly he woke up and there he was, solid and unmistakable Chuang Chou. But he did not know if he was Chuang Chou who had dreamt he was a butterfly, or a butterfly dreaming he was Chuang Chou. Between Chuang Chou and a butterfly there must be some distinction. This is called the Transformation of Things.31

With that reference, the meaning of the picture becomes clear. The image of a sleeping Chinese scholar huddled over his desk resonates with the reference to butterflies and dreams, and despite the brevity of the verse and the extreme simplicity of the painting, there is enough information here to solve the puzzle. “First dream of the year—” (Hatsu yume ya) works like a hokku in that it both presents a high-culture reference—Zhuangzi’s dream—but undercuts it by referring to the earthy, visceral sensation of the cold, and it does this by the juxtaposition of the picture with the words. Instead of lofty philosophical speculation on the nature of reality, we are presented with the ordinary physical experience of feeling the discomfort of the cold in very early spring. It is so cold, the picture and verse imply, that even the greatest of sages lays aside his studies and bundles up in the warmth of his robe for a nap. The information the verse offers provides an intelligible context for the picture, but it does this through association, rather than direct description. A haiga by Buson’s contemporary and frequent collaborator, Miura Chora, works in a slightly different way (Figure 3). As it shows, instead of complementing the verse, visual images in haiga could also set up a contrast, creating an interesting tension in the composition. In this haiga, the text of Chora’s inscription reads: mono no aware wa aki koso masare

the sorrow of the things in the world is only intensified by autumn

aki no aware wa yş koso are

the sorrow of autumn is something one feels all the more at dusk

——— 31

Watson, Chuang Tzu, p. 45.

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nake nake to ware o semekeri aki no kaze

195

calling “cry! cry!” it assails me autumn wind32

Chora The headnote is derived from two different literary sources. The first is a line from a waka by HenjŇ in the mid-Heian imperial collection, Anthology of waka gleanings (Shşi waka shş ᜪㆮ๺᱌㓸, 1005–7): aki yama no arashi no koe o kiku toki wa ko no ha naranedo mono zo kanashiki

when I hear the sound of a storm in autumn mountains though I am not a leaf on a tree I still sense the sadness of things 33

HenjŇ and the second alludes to Sei ShŇnagon’s Pillow book. In this famous quotation from its opening lines, ShŇnagon’s topic is “the best time of day”: In autumn, the evening. When the bright setting sun has sunk very close to the mountaintops, it is moving even to see crows flying toward their roosts in groups of three or four or two. Still more delightful is a file of geese looking very tiny. Then, too, the wail of the wind and the plaints of insects when the sun has quite disappeared.34

Chora’s verse refers to what by his time had become conventionalized expressions of perceiving autumn’s melancholy when feeling the chill of the wind. However, the picture he matches it with is anything but delicate. Rather, it is a bold depiction of an endearing but still scary demon, holding a menacing stave. Juxtaposed with this image of a demon, the meaning of the words in Chora’s verse “nake nake to” (calling “cry! cry!”) and “semeru” (to bear down on) invites the reader’s imagination to oscillate between recalling an experience of being overtaken by the dreary cold of the wind in a fast-falling autumn dusk, and a childlike thrill of being spooked by the fear of a demon that one knows is not real.

——— 32

Haiga no bi, p. 48. Masuda Shigeo, Kubota Jun, eds., Waka bungaku taikei, vol. 32, Shşi waka shş (Meiji Shoin, 2003), p. 38. 34 Helen Craig McCullough, Classical Japanese Prose: An Anthology (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1990), p. 158. 33

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Figure 3 “Calling ‘cry, cry!’ ” Haiga by Miura Chora.

Both compositions achieve what Okada describes as “creat[ing] haikai in the form of a picture.” They juxtapose references to the classical literary tradition with those drawn from the more commonplace contexts of everyday experience and folk tradition, leaving it up to the reader to recognize and enjoy discovering the connection between them. The inscriptions are not captions that explain the visual images, nor are the

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visual images illustrations of the inscriptions. Rather, both painting and inscription both are essential elements of the work, and together they create a single, seamless whole. Scholars usually date the beginnings of haiga appeared to the latter half of the seventeenth century. The first haikai poets, like Arakida Moritake, and Matsunaga Teitoku, did not accompany their verse with paintings. The earliest haikai poet to experiment with what might be called proto-haiga was Teitoku disciple Nonoguchi RyşhŇ ㊁‫ޘ‬ญ┙࿛ (1595–1669). RyşhŇ was accomplished at painting and calligraphy as well as at haikai, so his compositions were particularly impressive. He is most famous for Poetic immortals at rest (Kyşsoku kasen ભ⿷᱌઄; also called Reclining poetic immortals [Ensoku kasen ஄ᕷ᱌઄])—an illustrated hand scroll that portrays famous waka poets accompanied by a representative verse. This kind of pairing of imaginary portrait with waka poem was a standard subject in Japanese art. However, RyşhŇ’s series anticipates haiga because it depicts its subject in a casual, irreverent way: one is sitting with his sleeve rolled up to the shoulder, another is stretching and yawning, for example. The brushwork is spare, almost careless. RyşhŇ, who grew up in a family of artists, was capable of painting with far more technical skill, but he valued a more amateurish approach; his Memorial anthology (TsuitŇshş ㅊᖬ㓸, 1670) described his painting in these terms: “As for painting and calligraphy, it is as if he had no training, he dashed off pictures in a free, individualistic manner.”35 Danrin poets Nishiyama SŇin and Ihara Saikaku also painted pictures to accompany haikai inscriptions; however, the most significant haiga before Buson’s day was by Matsuo BashŇ. BashŇ was not an outstandingly talented painter, but his haiga attract interest because of his renown as a poet. Many of BashŇ’s haiga survive, but those that are the most visually interesting are collaborations with specialist painters. Nonetheless, BashŇ believed that there was a close connection between haikai and painting, and had a syncretic view of the arts that led him to argue that the same essential quality was common to all of them. As I mentioned in Chapter One, BashŇ declares in Rucksack notebook, “In SaigyŇ’s waka, in SŇgi’s renga, in Sesshş’s painting, in Rikyş’s tea, there is one Way that runs through them.” BashŇ makes the explicit contention that haikai and painting are linked in a discussion he records as having had with Kyoriku, who was his painting teacher as well as his haikai disciple.

——— 35

Okada Rihei, Haiga no sekai, pp. 15–16.

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It was published as a short treatise variously called “Grass-hut farewell” (Saimon no ji ᩊ㐷ߩㄉ) or “Words at parting from Kyoriku” (Kyoriku ribetsu no shi ⸵౐㔌೎ߩ⹖): Last autumn, I happened to meet Kyoriku. In the beginning of the Fifth Month of last year he was returning to his home province, and I felt the sorrow of his departure keenly. When the day of his departure came, he came to visit me at my grass hut, and we talked until sundown. This was a person who liked painting. He loved haikai (fşga). I asked him questions, just to see how he’d answer. “Why do you love painting?” “Because I love haikai,” he answered. “Why do you love haikai?” “Because I love painting,” he answered. Although he studied these two arts, they come down to the same thing. Truly, as it is said, “it is an embarrassment for the cultivated person to have too many accomplishments,” surely treating two arts as if they both come down to the same thing is something to be admired. He was my teacher in painting, and my pupil in haikai. However, his understanding of the spirit of painting went very deep, and he used his brush with great skill. His insight was of such profundity it was beyond my capacity to understand. My haikai is like “a brazier in the summer or a fan in the winter.” Going against the crowd is pointless. However, in the case of Shunzei and SaigyŇ’s waka, even those that were just tossed off spontaneously and experimentally have many moving aspects. Did not even His Highness Emperor Go-Toba say this in his writings things like, “their verse has emotive power as well as truth”? Therefore, if we were to draw conclusions from His Highness’s words, we must follow this narrow path closely, and not lose our way. “Seek not after the ancients, seek what the ancients sought” is something we can see in the writings of Kşkai ⓨᶏ36 also. Haikai is the same, I said, lighting the lantern, and then with only these words as farewell, I saw Kyoriku on his way out of my grass hut.37

This text was included in Kyoriku’s preface to Japanese ‘Selections of fine literature’ (HonchŇ monzen ᧄᦺᢥㆬ, 1706). BashŇ’s comments about the best way to write haikai, culminating in “Seek not after the ancients, seek what the ancients sought” are frequently cited by commentators.38 However, the first part of this text is equally compelling because it sheds light on the way that haikai poets viewed the relationship between poetry

——— 36 Kşkai (774–835), also called KŇbŇ Daishi ᒄᴺᄢᏧ, was one of the most influential Buddhist priests in Japan; he founded the Shingon sect. 37 NKBT, vol. 46, pp. 205–206. 38 A similar phrase appears in Kşkai’s treatise Spirit anthology ᕈ㔤㓸 (ShŇryŇshş, also called Seireishş).

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and painting. BashŇ portrays Kyoriku as someone who makes no distinction between the two arts. While Yoshida KenkŇ, writing in Essays in idleness (Tsurezuregusa ᓤὼ⨲, ca. 1330) criticized people who failed to concentrate seriously on one art form; 39 BashŇ’s view was that it was inappropriate to call this dilettantism because both painting and haikai were essentially the same thing. Inspired by their teacher’s example BashŇ’s disciples like Kikaku, Hattori Ransetsu, Kagami ShikŇ, and of course Kyoriku also made haiga part of their haikai practice. Though, like BashŇ himself, none were outstanding painters, the many haiga compositions that they and their colleagues in other haikai schools continued to produce further served to underscore the close connection between word and image in haikai. In the generation before Buson, several of the better-known haikai poets composed credible haiga, including Five colors of ink poet Sakuma Ryşkyo, and Osaka urban-school leader Matsugi Tantan. But it was not until Sakaki Hyakusen that an artist equally accomplished as a painter and as a poet emerged in the haikai community. Hyakusen came from a commoner background; his family is thought to have originally been Chinese. His parents were Nagoya merchants, and he taught himself to paint. He acquired some proficiency in Japanese styles such as that of the KanŇ school. However, most of his effort was devoted to learning how to work in Chinese styles by studying paintings and woodblock print copies of paintings that were imported through Nagasaki. Not only was Hyakusen a skilled painter, he also wrote haikai, having studied the rural BashŇ school of ShikŇ. Hyakusen was primarily painted Chinese-inspired hanging scrolls and screen paintings, but because of his interest in haikai, he also painted haiga.

Buson as an Artist: Haiga and Nanga However, Buson’s skill in the haiga form outstripped that of all his predecessors, in part because he was one of the few haiga artists who could claim an equal facility in both writing and painting. While technical sophistication was not essential in haiga, some poets were more adept than others at painting. BashŇ, for example, was unquestionably brilliant

——— 39 Episode 122. “Too many accomplishments are an embarrassment to the gentleman.” Keene, Essays in Idleness, p. 105.

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as a poet, but, his paintings are nowhere near as accomplished as is his verse; Hyakusen was better as a painter than as a poet. Haiga was very useful for Buson because it appealed to just the sort of client that he relied on: haikai practitioners with an interest in art. Also, haiga allowed Buson to showcase all the skills as an outstanding haikai poet at the same time as show off his abilities as a painter. Finally, while haiga was not the same as nanga, the two genres both valued amateurism and literary sensibility, as well has having painting techniques in common. Because the market for haiga and nanga overlapped, Buson’s work as a haiga artist contributed to, rather than detracted from, the image of a literatus that he tried to project. Haiga was not the center of Buson’s practice as a painter. His inclinations were mainly toward the style of the Chinese literati school, what in Japan was called nanga, southern painting. We see a reference to the distinction between “northern” and “southern painting” in a letter written to his patron, Ashida Kafu ⧃↰㔰ᄦ (1749–1784), where he asks Kafu’s help in selling some paintings. Kafu ran a distillery in Izushi, Tajima province. Buson got to know Kafu sometime in the 1770s, and the two kept up a lively correspondence. Kafu served as a middleman for Buson in sales of paintings to people living in the Tajima area. Buson’s letters to Kafu were alternately chatty about personal issues and blunt about business. Even years after he settled permanently in Kyoto, the effort Buson put into building a client base in the provinces continued to work to his advantage. The letter starts out with detailed comments about the state of Buson’s health before turning to work-related matters: In this season of extreme heat, I am glad to hear that you are well and prosperous. I would like to tell you that I have been all right, but my elderly body is like an old house—as soon as one thing gets fixed, another falls apart, and I have been spending my days conscientiously trying various kinds of medicine. In particular, over the past thirty days my right hand has been numb, and, worried that it was paralysis, I have been trying one medicine after another. It still does not feel like my hand. The sensation of numbness is such that, even though I pick up my brush, it does not feel good. However all the doctors have said that it is not paralysis, so I am relieved.

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1. Thank you very much for taking care of the fees from Yşkitsu ᦭ᯌ40 and the others the other day and sending them to me. I am much obliged to you for your help with this. This time, about the previous orders of: Hanging scroll triptych: middle: God of Longevity41 left and right: pictures of deer BashŇ portrait I sent these as well as two landscape paintings. In the previous order, you asked for a bird-and-flower painting in intense colors. I have not painted this yet. The other three pieces are not done either. I will send them to you after Bon Festival. 2. As for the two landscape paintings I sent you this time, I painted them in the Northern School style. This is a style I previously had not worked in. For this reason, they do not look the least bit elegant to me. However, they are pieces that really achieve an air of having been painted by a Chinese artist. Still, because this is a style I have not preferred in the past, they lack flair. I will trust to your judgment, so please sell them to the country yokels in your area and send me the proceeds. They took a lot more effort than I thought they would. As for the above-mentioned fee, please do not discuss it with other people; I trust to your discretion.

Buson frequently commented on his age and the state of his health in his personal writing—often it was his stomach that troubled him; here it was his painting hand. His contempt for ignorant provincial clients is very obvious—these were the same sort of people that he described as being not worthy enough to compose haikai with when he was living in Miyazu. For them, apparently, distinguishing between the different schools of Chinese painting that Buson tried to emulate was beyond their capacity. As consumers, they were only interested in the painting’s resemblance to work by Chinese painters in general. That quality alone made these “northern school” works adequate for the market, even though Buson acknowledged that he was not very proficient at this kind of painting. Though does not explicitly mention the term here, the style he preferred was the “southern.” Nanga was a style that came into its heyday around middle of the eighteenth century, and Buson became one of its leading proponents. Nanga developed from ideas of the linkage of painting, calligraphy, and poetry that had a very long history in China. The expectation that

——— 40 41

Kafu’s father. JurŇjin.

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educated people were should be reasonably proficient in all three arts had existed for centuries. While certain artists like Wang Wei and Su Dongpo were admired for their outstanding abilities in both painting and poetry, even ordinary scholars were expected to be able to do a bit of both. A person’s skill with the brush was taken as evidence of the quality of his or her character, and this was true whether the product was a poem, a visual image, or a piece of calligraphy. Furthermore, poems and other texts were often inscribed on paintings, enhancing the power of the visual image through masterful calligraphy and appropriate literary references. In short, the three arts were seen as inseparably intertwined. As Su Dongpo described the artist Wen Tong ᢥห (1019–1079), “Whatever remains unexpressed by his poetry spills out of him as calligraphy, or is transformed into painting: these arts are just the overflow of his poetry.”42 Chinese literati painting got its start in the Song period (960–1279), as scholar-officials began to develop a style of painting that placed more emphasis on skillful, calligraphic brushwork than on the precise realism favored by court painters. The close relationship between calligraphy, painting and poetry continued to be a centerpiece of the Chinese literati tradition that was established during the Yuan (1271–1368) period, as scholar-officials chose to live as recluses rather than serve a government run by foreign conquerors. It flourished even after a new, native dynasty took power during the Ming period. As they were amateurs whose primary goal was self-improvement and individual expression, literati painters saw themselves as distinct from academic artists, particularly those who worked as professionals in the imperial court. Literati painting is intended to appear simple and uncontrived. Volumes, textures and outlines are primarily built up out of ink; colors, if they are used at all, are pale and transparent. Often large areas of the picture space are left empty, creating room for the viewer to participate in the work of completing the picture with his or her own imagination. Like fine calligraphy, literati painting was supposed to record the traces of a highly cultivated character. The state of the artist’s level of spiritual achievement was thought to be evident in the paintings he or she created, and practice with the brush was a means to selfimprovement. As explained by one of the most influential painting texts

——— 42 Maggie Bickford, Ink Plum: The Making of a Chinese Scholar-Painting Genre (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996), p. 101.

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to reach Japan in the early modern period, the Mustard seed garden manual of painting, for the Chinese literatus learning to paint well was not just a matter of acquiring technical skill, but to enter into a process of resolving an almost mystical paradox: Lu Ch’ai says: Among those who study painting, some strive for an elaborate effect and others prefer the simple. Neither complexity in itself nor simplicity is enough. Some aim to be deft, others to be laboriously careful. Neither dexterity nor conscientiousness is enough. Some set great value on method, while others pride themselves on dispensing with method. To be without method is deplorable, but to depend entirely on method is worse. You must learn first to observe the rules faithfully; afterwards, modify them according to your intelligence and capacity. The end of all method is to seem to have no method.43

The distinction between “southern” and “northern” originates with the Chinese artist Dong Qichang ⫃౔᣽ (1555–1637). Dong Qichang divided the Chinese painting world into two parts, and identified them with the “Northern” and “Southern” schools of Chan (Japanese Zen) Buddhism. He linked the Northern School—which taught a way of achieving enlightenment through gradual stages—with the work of professional court painters, whose work emphasized skill, precision, intense coloration, and realism. By contrast, he compared the Southern school of Chan—which emphasized the sudden achievement of enlightenment—with literati painting, which was spontaneous and intuitive. Professional court painters produced their work to please patrons; literati painted to cultivate and express their own inner selves. While the Japanese had admired Chinese painting for centuries, the style called “Southern painting” (nanga) that drew on this distinction emphasized by Dong Qichang began to have its biggest impact in Japan during the eighteenth century. Nanga, also called bunjin-ga (bunjin painting), frequently combined visual images with poetic inscriptions to form powerful artistic expression. Its popularity was part of the widespread increase in interest in Chinese culture that occurred at this time. Many scholars and dilettantes who aspired to the bunjin ideal wanted to purchase Chinese and Chinese-inspired goods, and a consumer market for imported and locally produced literati painting emerged. Nanga was

——— 43

Sze, p. 17.

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the style Buson turned to as he matured as a painter, and he was able to tap into the market for nanga when he eventually established himself in Kyoto from the late 1760s onward. Nanga offered an alternative to established schools of painting like the powerful KanŇ school. However, is hard to completely separate nanga from KanŇ influence, since many artists who later distinguished themselves in the nanga style began their careers as KanŇ school disciples. Even Buson, who was largely self-taught, started out by painting naive imitations of KanŇ style paintings. Because nanga was not identified with any of the established ateliers of the day, it offered outsiders like Buson the opportunity to create a niche for themselves. Furthermore, the patrons of nanga painters were not necessarily members of the shogunal bureaucracy, as KanŇ school patrons frequently were. Nanga painting held its strongest appeal for newcomers to the status of cultural consumers, the well-to-do merchants and farmers; in other words, exactly the group of people who were also drawn to haikai. In short, nanga was aspirational: both its artists and their patrons tended come from social groups outside those that had the highest status. Nanga and haiga had several things in common. Both nanga and haiga brought together visual imagery and poetic inscriptions. Furthermore, many of the same principles—emphasis on simplicity, impressionistic representation, and literary sensibility—were features of both. For instance, the Mustard seed garden manual of painting makes a comment on the power of a few simple brushstrokes to imply great complexity, a point which could apply equally well to haiga: [The style called hsieh i (write idea) is] giving the swiftly drawn impression of an idea. In this style, it is very important that the brush move with speed and vitality. Such was the calligraphy of Chang the Madman, who was expert in ts’ao shu (grass writing), which was more difficult than chên shu (regular writing). That is the reason the ancients said: “If you paint hurriedly, you will not have the necessary relaxed approach to grass writing.” Painting in the grass style (hsieh i) is more difficult than the copyingstroke-by-stroke-style (k’ai hua). That is the reason for the saying “Drawing must be linked with the idea (i), for without meaning (i) the brush cannot function properly.” Figures, even though painted without eyes, must seem to look; without ears, must seem to listen. This should be indicated in one or two touches of the brush. Eliminate details to achieve the simplest expression and the effect will be most natural. Actually there are things which ten hundred brushstrokes cannot depict but which can be

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captured by a few simple strokes if they are right. That is truly giving expression to the invisible.44

However, in other respects nanga and haiga were markedly different. Larger scale, complexity of composition, and a taste for sublime grandeur tended to characterize nanga. Haiga, by contrast, was more playful and lighthearted. It provoked laughter or surprise, rather than a contemplative mood. This is what Okada Rihei called haiga’s “haikai spirit.” In fact, “haikai spirit” was the very quality that gave critics of Buson reason to find fault with his painting—not just his haikai painting, but also even his nanga. Indeed, not all observers regarded the interdependent relationship between Buson’s work as a nanga painter and a haikai poet as an asset. For example, Tanomura Chikuden ↰⢻᧛┻↰ (1777– 1835), writing in A Mountain-dweller’s talks (Sanchşjin jŇzetsu, ጊਛੱ㙷⥠), called Buson’s nanga painting was seriously flawed. He compares Buson’s work to that of his contemporary Ike no Taiga, who also painted in the nanga style: Taiga has a fluid brush style; Buson’s is choppy. Taiga possesses orthodoxy and is without falseness; Buson possesses falseness and is without orthodoxy. However, the two competed with one another throughout their lives; they were friendly rivals.45

Chikuden’s observation that Buson and Taiga were “friendly rivals” was probably accurate. Buson’s letters give the impression that he admired Taiga, and Buson mourned Taiga when he died in 1776. On one occasion the two artists collaborated, albeit indirectly, by jointly produced a 20-page album of paintings based on the “Poems on the ten conveniences of Yi Yuan” દ࿦චଢ⹞ and “Poems on the twelve delights of Yi Yuan” દ࿦චੑቱ⹞ of Li Yu, the scholar and playwright who wrote the preface to the Mustard seed garden manual of painting. The album was probably commissioned by its first owner, Nagoya amateur artist and poet Shimozato Gakkai ਅㇹቇᶏ. However, Buson and Taiga had very different painting styles, and Chikuden’s description of the two painters’ brushwork clearly favors Taiga’s, which is not surprising considering Taiga was greatly admired for his calligraphy. Even more damning is Chikuden’s assertion that Buson’s approach was heretical, in contrast to that of Taiga, which Chikuden calls orthodox:

——— 44 Ibid., p. 250. Hsieh i (pinyin, xie yi): ౮ᗧ; ts’ao shu (cao shu): ⨲ᦠ; chên shu (zhen shu): ⌀ᦠ; k’ai hua (kai hua): ᭃ↹; i (yi): ᗧ. Cited in Ogata, p. 251. 45

Cited in Tanaka, p. 132.

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Taiga faithfully followed the principles of the Chinese literati painting style. By contrast, he called Buson heretical: Chikuden uses the word ketsu ⻼—deceit or dishonesty, accusing Buson of pretending to be something that he is not. While he does not elaborate on his charge, since Chikuden was a Confucian scholar as well as a nanga painter, clearly there was some characteristic in Buson’s painting that made it deviate from the standards represented by its Chinese models. Chikuden’s contemporary, the nanga painter and native studies (kokugaku) scholar Nakabayashi ChikutŇ ਛᨋ┻ᵢ (1776–1853) also criticized Buson by comparing his work to that of Taiga. In his Way of painting diamond mallet (GadŇ kongŇsho ↹㆏㊄೰᧶), ChikudŇ finds Buson’s painting deficient too, but his argument is more explicit than that of Chikuden. ChikudŇ writes that Taiga’s painting distinguished itselfby its “atmosphere of noble-minded openness” (㜞㆙⼸㆐ߩ⿰). Buson’s painting could not compare, because it was diminished by its “haikai spirit” (⺚᳇). Again, given ChikudŇ’s background his critical view of Buson is understandable, but it does suggest two things: one, that there was clearly a distinct “haikai spirit” that could be identified in paintings, and that by the beginning of the nineteenth century there was an idea of nanga “orthodoxy” that was at odds with haikai.46

Origins of Buson’s Haiga Buson’s unorthodox approach to painting may be due in part to his education as a haikai poet. As we have seen, Hajin, his teacher, admonished him to find his own way after learning what he could from the haidan’s different competing factions. Buson later gave his disciple ShŇha similar advice in the Shundei verse anthology preface, advising his friend to ignore the petty distinctions of “gates and doors” (i.e., haikai schools) and learn from even the worst examples. However, Buson’s lack of orthodoxy might also be related to the fact that he trained with no particular painting school or teacher. Of the few texts that refer to Buson’s childhood, only one hints at when he might have started painting. This is a surimono by Buson’s disciple Denpuku ↰⑔, that was written to mark the third anniversary of Buson’s death

——— 46

Fujita, pp. 69–70.

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(1785). Denpuku lived in Ikeda, now a neighborhood in Osaka; it was not all that far from Settsu, where Buson is believed to have grown up: Master Yahan (Buson) came to visit at my lodgings in Ikeda. He was a devoted admirer of the landscape around GokŇ ๓ᳯ (Settsu); moreover, he met with someone who might be called a student, Ishin દା, and swapping stories of childhood fun from forty years earlier, they thoroughly enjoyed themselves; also, that was more than twenty years in the past.47

Sixty years before the date the surimono was published Buson was about eight or nine years old. “Ishin” was the painter Momoda Ishin ᩶↰ દା (d. 1765). Scholars interpret this passage differently. Okada Rihei believes that Ishin was some twenty years older than Buson and served as an early mentor. Tanaka Yoshinobu disagrees, arguing that “childhood fun” ┬ㆆ refers to both Buson and Ishin, and that the two were about the same age and that painting was one of their amusements.48 No other documents that give evidence of Buson’s background as a painter exist. The oldest surviving Buson paintings date from his period in northeastern Japan, when he was in his twenties and early thirties. They are tentative and unsophisticated works that resemble KanŇ school paintings or primitive versions of nanga. The earliest Buson haikai-related picture predates his paintings; it is the one included in the 1737 anthology Fourth month principles to accompany the hokku “at the convent / a cosmetic arrives / during the Ten Nights’ ceremony” (amadera ya / jşya ni todoku / bin kazura) (Figure 4). This would prove the first of many pictures Buson published in anthologies, the most elaborate of which were those in Light of the snow (1771), Anei 3 Buson spring anthology (Anei sannen Buson shunkyŇjŇ ቟᳗ ਃᐕ⭢᧛ᤐ⥝Ꮭ, 1774), and Blossoms and birds collection. Buson also composed a number of surimono that matched haikai inscriptions with pictures. Haiga, strictly defined, are paintings, but many of the picturetext combinations included in Buson’s printed works operate according to the same logic used in haiga, and offer further evidence of the close relationship between text and image in haikai.

——— 47 48

Tanaka, p. 8. Ibid., p. 9.

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Figure 4 “At the convent.” Illustration from Fourth month principles (Uzuki teikin).

Early Haiga (1754–1757) Collected works of Buson (Buson zenshş ⭢᧛ో㓸),49 the most comprehensive and authoritative source on Buson’s work labels 123 of Buson’s paintings haiga. This is in contrast to nearly 600 more conventional paintings (nanga-style landscapes, depictions of historical figures, etc.) and 30-odd small sketches that Buson included in letters and similarly informal settings. Buson often substituted drawings of things in place of words: in one letter, a picture of a mallet replaces the phrase “uchide no kozuchi” ᛂ಴ߩዊ᭵ (lucky mallet),50 in a 1751 letter; in a letter from the 1780s, several diagonal lines of pale ink wash take the place of shigure (winter rain) in a hokku, and in another paragraph, a cartoon of an

——— 49 Ogata Tsutomu, Sasaki JŇhei, and Okada Akiko, eds., BZ, vol. 6, Kaiga iboku (KŇdansha, 1998). 50 Depictions of Daikoku, the god of wealth, show him holding this mallet, which grants wishes when shaken.

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umbrella is substituted for the word kasa (umbrella).51 The overall impression is one of a person who took an almost childish delight in code switching between the language of words and that of visual images. The earliest work Buson zenshş classifies as a haiga reveals a similar sense of playfulness: called “Monster scroll” ᅯᕋ⛗Ꮞ (YŇkai emaki), it dates from the early 1750s. “Monster scroll” is a series of short texts illustrated with fantastic, even ridiculous pictures of weird happenings; like the Chora haiga of a demon that we looked at earlier, the creatures Buson depicts are too charming to really be frightening. In one section, a samurai stares bemusedly at a small army of tiny, baby-like beings massing outside the room where he is trying to sleep. Another depicts a pair of warriors who have melons for heads. A third shows a large, catlike nekomata ₀෶—whose face is twisted into an expression that is half snarl, half deranged smile—and a samurai aiming at it with a gun. The text inscription for this section reads: At the Nagoya mansion of Lord Sakakibara, a nekomata appeared for several nights, meowing, and because this came to vex people, House Retainer Inaba RokurŇ faced one down with a harquebus, and that nekomata, without the least trace of fear, pounded on its belly, saying “Shoot here!” and Inaba, spooked, fired off some fifty rounds randomly, but the bullets bounced off the nekomata’s belly, pretty much missing their target, it is said.52

Alongside the picture of the nekomata, where we might expect to see a speech balloon in a comic strip, are the creature’s words to the samurai, “Try hitting the hide of my belly! Meow! Meow!” This scroll was done around the time Buson was staying at KenshŇ-ji in Miyazu; clearly, the supernatural was very much on his mind at the time. However, Buson’s haiga were more than just amusing depictions of the creepy doings of monsters. An early example of his more sophisticated haiga is one that links him with Sakaki Hyakusen, a painting of the famous Miyazu scenic site Ama-no-hashidate (Figure 5). The painting dates from around the time that Buson first arrived in Miyazu, in 1754. Buson knew about Hyakusen from his reputation as a nanga painter, and it may be that he chose to travel to Miyazu in part because Hyakusen had lived there. However, Hyakusen died in 1752 so their acquaintance would have had to predate Buson’s visit to Miyazu.

——— 51 52

BZ, vol. 6, nos. 1 and 10, pp. 461, 462. Text and images in BZ, vol. 4, pp. 47–56 and vol. 6, pp. 380–383.

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Ama-no-hashidate is a long and narrow pine-studded sandbar that reaches across Miyazu Bay, one of the “three great views” of Japan. Buson’s haiga depicts Ama-no-hashidate with a few simple shapes— mainly just a broad lateral stroke across the width of the painting that indicates the land bridge and some dark and light forms dotted across it to suggest its pine trees. The upper portion of the picture is inscribed with a long prose headnote done in highly cursive calligraphy, in which Buson states his agreement with Hyakusen’s rejection of too-close identification with any single school or teacher, and his indifference to fame and success. A partial quotation is given in Chapter One, below is the full text: Hassenkan Hyakusen ౎ㆫⷰ⊖Ꮉ enjoyed painting and aspired to the style of the Ming (minpş ᣿㘑); I, NŇdŇjin ྙ㆏ੱ Buson, dabble in painting, emulating the Han style (ṽᵹ kanryş).53 We both have been amusing ourselves with haikai poetry, tracing our lineages back to BashŇ. Hyakusen was a disciple of Renji’s style, but was not a member of the Renji faction. I studied Shinshi’s teachings but do not imitate Shinshi. Thus if we fall in the river let it be so, let’s take one step up from the top of the hundredfoot pole.54 We are like that, neither of us has any interest in making a name for himself in the haikai world. A long time ago, when Hyakusen left the place to return to the capital, he wrote: Hashidate o saki ni furasete yuku aki zo

at Hashidate tears of rain fall early autumn is leaving!

The verse I wrote when I made my farewell was: sekirei no o ya Hashidate o ato nimotsu

a wagtail’s tail—at Hashidate left luggage

He, as an advance guard, returned to the west of Kyoto, shoulder to shoulder with six ri’s (23 kilometers’ or 15 miles’) worth of Ama-nohashidate’s pines; I went back home to the eastern part of the capital,

——— 53 BZ glosses minpş as meaning “the nanga style of bunjin painters,” and kanryş as the KanŇ school. Shimizu Takayuki interprets kanryş as meaning Chinese painting in general, as opposed to Japanese painting; Yosa Buson shş, p. 324. Tanaka Yoshinobu agrees with Shimizu that the word refers Chinese painting in general, rather than to that the KanŇ school; Tanaka, p. 71. 54 Thomas Cleary, trans., No Barrier: Unlocking the Zen Koan: A New Translation of the Zen Classic Wumenguan [Mumonkan] (London: The Aquarian Press, Harper Collins, New York: Bantam Books, 1993), p. 201.

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Hashidate’s rear guardsman. Together, chief scoundrels of the Way, are we not making splendid progress? 55

The painting is signed “NŇdŇjin Buson, at KanundŇ 㑐㔕ᵢ.” This refers to the studio of Rojş of ShinshŇ-ji temple, one of the priests that Buson met at Miyazu. Buson describes Hyakusen’s style as that of the Ming, and his own as that of the Han. While both of these terms refer to Chinese dynasties, some scholars have argued that “Han” actually means the style of the KanŇ school, so Buson is saying that Hyakusen espouses Japanese styles of painting while he prefers Chinese styles. Hyakusen did teach himself a form of the KanŇ style, but he was not formally affiliated with the KanŇ school and the paintings for which he is best known are nanga, i.e., no more or less “Chinese” than Buson’s own paintings. It might be more useful to view Buson’s contrast of “Han” and “Ming” as terms of convenience that form a parallel with ShikŇ’s rural school haikai and Kikaku’s urban school. Buson is not really trying to make a definitive statement about his colleague’s painting lineage, but rather arguing that, no matter what differences they might have had in their training, both Buson and Hyakusen shared a sense of contempt for the “gates and doors” of orthodoxy, and instead had the courage to invent their own. His phrase, “the hundred foot pole” comes from a passage in the thirteenth century Zen Buddhist classic The Gateless barrier (Chinese Wumenguan; Japanese Mumonkan ή㐷㑐): Master Shishuang said, “Atop a hundred-foot pole, how do you step forward?” Another ancient worthy said, “One who sits atop a hundred-foot pole may have gained initiation, but this is not yet reality. Atop a hundred-foot pole, one should step forward to manifest the whole body through the universe.”

Unlike BashŇ, Buson was not a Zen disciple; his association with Buddhism was more in line with the teachings of the Pure Land sect. However, he sometimes used references to Zen in his writings in order to make a point, as we see in the Shundei verse anthology preface. Here he compares his friend and himself to people of spiritual accomplishment, whose state of mastery was sufficient to warrant a break from the bounds of scriptures and teachings, and take a step forward into a higher state of practice.

——— 55

Text BZ, vol. 4, pp. 94–95; image BZ, vol. 6, p. 383.

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Figure 5 “Ama-no-hashidate.” Hanging scroll.

The connection between the text and the illustration becomes clearer in the next passage, as Buson describes the circumstances of Hyakusen’s and his departure, and their farewell hokku. Hyakusen’s compares the tears of parting to the cold drops of shigure, the intermittent rains that fall in late autumn and winter. Buson’s compares the memory of his sendoff to the tail of a sekirei (wagtail), implying that both are long, and that his

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feelings for the place will follow him like luggage sent to him after his departure. Hyakusen’s standing as an artist in Miyazu was better than his, and they went home to different sides of the capital, but both of them did well as mavericks on the path of haikai. The inscription and the picture have a very close connection and in that sense are almost too obvious for a haiga. On the other hand, the depiction of Ama-no-hashidate is so abstract as to be barely recognizable, so the viewer is challenged to read more into this composition than the text or the picture directly supply.

Figure 6 Tanabata haiga by Hyakusen and Buson.

Another early Buson haiga is also associated with Hyakusen (Figure 6). The work is a diptych, one panel of which is by Hyakusen and the other by Buson. The diptych’s theme is Tanabata, the night of the seventh day

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of the seventh month, when a pair of celestial lovers, Orihime (the Weaver, associated with the star Vega) and Kengyş (also called Hikoboshi, the Cowherd, associated with the star Altair)—were allowed to meet. The story goes that the Weaver and the Cowherd fell in love and became so engrossed in their affections for one another that they neglected their duties, causing chaos in the cosmos. As a result, the other celestial beings placed the Milky Way between them. Once a year, on the seventh day of the seventh month, they are allowed to meet. If the sky is clear, the boatman of the moon will ferry Orihime to meet her beloved. If it is raining, a flock of magpies meets and the birds join their wings to make a bridge for the two to cross. Hyakusen’s scroll shows a magpie. The inscription reads: kasasagi ya hashi kara sugu watari tori

magpie: when it leaves the bridge it becomes a migratory bird

Hyakusen The speaker in the verse imagines that the magpie, once finished with its responsibility in the heavens, flies back to Japan as an ordinary migratory bird. Hyakusen’s magpie perches on a branch with its wings folded, resting from its long flight home. The connection between the verse and the picture is not all that complicated: the picture shows the magpie mentioned in the verse. Buson’s response, however, is much more complex, and is a good example of the linked verse-like connections between word and image that were so common in haiga. The painting shows five mulberry leaves, cascading from top to bottom in the long, narrow space afforded by the hanging-scroll format. Alongside, Buson wrote: Hyakusen had a verse about a magpie that bridged the Milky Way. He wanted to have another hanging scroll to match it. In response, I took up my brush and wrote the following:

ichi jin wa sakaki ni jin wa kaji no fune

first in position is Sasaki second is Kajiwara: mulberry leaf boats56

——— 56

Verse BZ, vol. 1, no. 53, image BZ, vol. 6, p. 385.

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Together, the verse and image create multiple layers of verbal and visual puns that not only internally unite the different elements of Buson’s painting, but also connect its content to Hyakusen’s painting. On one level, Buson’s hokku refers to two heroes of the Gempei War (1180–1185) whose story is told in Tale of the Heike, Sasaki Takatsuna ૒‫ᧁޘ‬㜞✁ (d. 1214) and Kajiwara Kagesue ᫃ේ᥊ቄ (1162–1200). These men were warriors on the side of the Minamoto clan, who fought in the Second Battle of the Uji River (1184). Challenged by Yoritomo, leader of the Minamoto clan, with the gift of an excellent horse each, they vied with one another to be the first to cross the Uji River to face their opponents, the Taira: The Commander in Chief, Yoshitsune, advanced to the river’s edge and looked out over the water. Perhaps he wished to probe men’s minds, for he said, “What shall we do? Would it be best to go around to Yodo and Imoarai? Should we wait for the river to subside?” [...] Hatakeyama no ShŇji JirŇ Shigetada, who was only twenty-one years old, came forward to speak.... “I’ll test it for you.” Five hundred riders surged forward to align their bridles... Just then, two warriors galloped into sight from the tip of Tachibanano-kojima northeast of the ByŇdŇin. One was Kajiwara Genda Kagasue, the other was Sasaki ShirŇ Takatsuna. Although neither had let his intentions show, each had made a secret resolve to be first across the river. Takatsuna hailed Kagesue, who was about thirty-five feet ahead of him. “This is the biggest river in the west. Your saddle girth looks loose; tighten it.” Kagesue...tightened it. Meanwhile, Takatsuna galloped past him into the river. Kagesue followed, perhaps feeling that he had been tricked. “Look out, Sasaki,” Kagesue cried. “Don’t slip up just because you want to be a hero. There must be ropes on the bottom.” Takatsuna drew his sword, cut the ropes one after another as they touched his mount’s legs, rode straight across the swift Uji River on Ikezuki, the best horse in the world, and ascended the opposite bank. Kagesue’s mount, Surusumi, landed far downstream, forced into a slanting course at the halfway point.57

In Buson’s hokku, “Sasaki” refers not only to the victorious warrior, but it also recalls the word for magpie used in Hyakusen’s, “kasasagi.” “Kaji” has an even more elaborate chain of associations. On the one hand, it is the first part of the name of the warrior Kajiwara. In their race across the Uji River, Sasaki was first, hence: “first in position is Sasaki / second is Kaji(wara).”

——— 57

McCullough, Tale of the Heike, p. 287.

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But kaji has other implications as well. On Tanabata, it was customary to write poems on mulberry leaves and float them down a stream. This verse from the imperial anthology New ancient and modern waka collection (Shin kokin waka shş ᣂฎ੹๺᱌㓸) refers to the practice: Tanabata no towataru fune no kaji no ha ni iku aki kakitsu tsuyu no tamazusa

the rudder of the ferry boat at Tanabata— how many autumns have been written on mulberry leaves in jewels of dew?58

Fujiwara no Shunzei ⮮ේବᚑ (1114–1204) Shunzei’s verse uses the technique of allusive variation (honka dori ᧄ᱌ข)—drawing on a line from an earlier poem on the same topic: amanogawa towataru fune no kaji no ha ni omou koto o kaki tsukuru kana

the rudder of the ferry boat that crosses the river of heaven— I have written out all my feelings on mulberry leaves59

Kazusa no Meoto ਄✚੃Უ (Go shşi waka shş ᓟᜪㆮ๺᱌㓸) In these waka, kaji has two meanings: one, rudder, and two, mulberry. In the phrase “fune no kaji” it refers to the rudder of the boat which ferries Orihime to meet her lover. In the phrase “kaji no ha” it refers to the leaves used by those who celebrated the Star Festival to write poems. Finally, since Tanabata falls on the seventh day of the seventh month, we might expect to see seven mulberry leaves here, but there are only five. The missing two stand for the impetuous warriors Kagesue and Takatsuna, who have already crossed the river. This pair of paintings is a good example of how much haiga rely on yojŇ—overtones, or nioizuke—“scent” links: the linkages between their different elements that are very distant and require a great deal of cultural competence to decode. Unlike the Ama-no-hashidate haiga, which by comparison is very straightforward in its language if spare in terms of pictorial realism, this pair of paintings uses both oblique imagery and

——— 58 59

NKBT, vol. 28, no. 320. Ibid., p. 94, note 320.

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complicated word games, and is as much a puzzle as a work of expressive art or literature.

First Years in Kyoto (1770–1777) Some of Buson’s most interesting haiga were painted between 1770 and 1777, after he settled permanently in Kyoto, started to develop a reputation as a nanga painter, and reopened the Yahantei school. They were done in many different formats, but the most common kind were small paintings on paper that could be mounted as hanging scrolls. Most, but not all of them, follow the principles of nioizuke in linking text and image. Buson worked on them without a collaborator, although in some cases he includes a text by another writer to which his painting and inscription respond. The first haiga from this period that we will look at mentions Sakaki Hyakusen again, but the inscription does not quote from his work (Figure 7). Instead, it alludes to the writing of BashŇ disciple Kikaku and, and to Hattori Nankaku, the Edo-based scholar of Chinese studies who was a successor to Ogyş Sorai. The picture shows a pair of manzai ਁᱦ dancers: itinerant mendicant performers who wandered the streets during the New Year season. They visited from house to house, dancing and reciting prayers for the good fortune of those inside. Typically one member of the pair carries a folding fan, and the other, a small hand drum. Both wear comic masks. Buson shows these performers holding their props—one is dancing, the other keeping time with his drum. The mood of the picture is jolly and appealing, appropriate to the theme of wishing for prosperity in the new year. The inscription reads: Kikaku’s verse: manzai ya kado o nokosanu tsuru no awa

manzai dancers! leave no one’s gate unvisited millet for the crane

Teacher Nankaku’s verse: To their east, a thousand, ten thousand years old There is only the city of Heian

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manzai no fumi katametaru kyŇ no tsuchi

the manzai dancers harden it with their feet earth of the capital60

Buson

Figure 7 “The manzai dancers.” Haiga.

Kikaku’s verse refers to the custom of giving money to the dancers— cranes are lucky birds, symbols of longevity, but their appetites are insatiable, much as is the appetite of the dancers for donations. Both cranes and manzai dances were a common sight during the new year season, though in the case of the cranes it would probably be as a picture or other seasonal decoration, where as the persistent manzai dancers would be present in person.

——— 60

Verse BZ, vol. 1, no. 847, image BZ, vol. 6, p. 391.

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The quotation from Nankaku, written in Chinese, comes from a quatrain included in Nankaku anthology (Nankaku shş ධㇳ㓸). The entire poem reads: The kingdom of Zhou is already reverted to millet; In the capital of the Han, fragrant grasses grow. To their east, a thousand, ten thousand years old; There is only the city of Heian.61 ๟࿖Ꮗ⑰᪛ ṽ੩⧐⨲↢ ᧲ᣇජਁฎ ด᦭ᐔ቟ၔ Because Buson uses the title sensei వ↢ (teacher) after Nankaku’s name (“Nankaku sensei”) it may be that there had been a direct, personal relationship between the two. Buson was living in Edo at the same time that Nankaku was active as a teacher there, so it is not impossible that Buson heard his lectures; however, nothing that Buson or his disciples wrote confirms this. Buson certainly absorbed Nankaku’s teachings through colleagues like Kuroyanagi ShŇha, who had attended his school in Edo, and Nankaku’s ideas were generally well known in Buson’s circle. This haiga does not have the complex layers of wordplay and cryptic connections linking text and image that Buson uses in his Tanabata painting. Instead, it is more of a straightforward illustration of the scene to which the inscribed verses allude. Commentators often describe verse links whose connection is very obvious as betazuke ߴߚઃߌ—clingy or sticky link. In contrast to nioizuke, which requires thought and a literary education to unravel, betazuke is cloying or easily perceptible. Whereas the Tanabata diptych’s elements are held together with overtones as light and subtle as a delicate fragrance, by contrast, the relationship between text and image in the manzai haiga is as strong as if it were reinforced with thick glue. Still, without a doubt, the figures themselves possess great charm, and the poems are all properly celebratory and pleasant-sounding. Kikaku’s verse is good-natured, for all its cynicism. Nankaku’s verse attests to the unshakeable security of the capital that still stands after the great powers of Chinese history have long since fallen. Buson’s suggests that its firm stability has something to do with the weight of the footfalls of the

——— 61

Cited in Fujita, p. 83.

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manzai dancers—ubiquitous and somewhat aggressive, perhaps, but welcome nonetheless. This haiga was painted about the same time that Buson re-established the Yahantei school, and can be interpreted as a wish for success in this city with its long history of cultural giants. The haiga version of a Buson hokku from Light of the snow that we saw in Chapter Four might also be accused of resorting to betazuke: gakumon wa shiri kara nukaru hotaru kana

scholarly brilliance issues forth from your bottom firefly

This painting is in the shape of a fan—a format that lent itself easily to haiga because it was well suited to small, intimate-sized compositions. The picture shows a thatched hut under some pines, and the wistfullooking face of the hut’s inhabitant looking out of his only window. The hut is typical of Buson’s portrayals of the dwelling-places of hermits and literati recluses, particularly Chinese ones; his nanga landscapes are full of them. In fact, it is precisely because this is a stereotypical scholar recluse’s hut that we can easily make the connection between the verse and the image. The headnote that is included also identifies the nature of the hut: “Savoring the pathos of a solitary scholar’s retreat” (ichi shosei no kansŇ o awaremu). While the connection between the verse and the image is very close in the sense that the latter is an illustration of the former, the haiga still leaves certain things up to the imagination. For instance, there is no depiction of a firefly. Even more dramatic is the extreme simplicity and abbreviation of the painting. The image of the hut takes up the right third of the picture space; the lines of the poem and Buson’s signature fill the middle. The left third, however, is completely empty. Despite this, the composition does not seem at all unbalanced. The “empty space” in this picture is active and productive, conveying the impression of a larger landscape. Other haiga from this period show a greater level of complexity, though. One of these shows a hototogisu flying over two clusters of hydrangea flowers (Figure 8). The bird’s wings are spread and its mouth is open, to suggest it is calling out as it flies. The bird is flying towards the hydrangea; the flowers seem to be looking up towards it in greeting. As in “Scholarly brilliance” (Gakumon wa), Buson has stripped the scene down to its absolute minimum, leaving a large area of the picture entirely unpainted, though here he depicts his subject in greater detail. The

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hydrangea is in the lower left hand corner, its leaves and numerous petals carefully outlined. The hototogisu is in the upper right hand corner, given volume and shape by brushstrokes that mark out each of its dark feathers. The hokku is inscribed just below it, in three short lines: Iwakura no kyŇjo koiseyo hototogisu

cause the madwoman at Iwakura to fall more deeply in love o hototogisu62

Figure 8 “Cause the madwoman of Iwakura.” Haiga.

The hokku was written on the fourth day of the fourth month in 1773; it was recorded in Transcriptions (Mimi tamushi ⡊ߚ߻ߒ)—Buson disciple Teramura Hyakuchi’s ኹ᧛⊖ᳰ (1749–1835) handwritten record of hokku he and his associates wrote in the 1760s–1780s—as one of the verses composed for the set topic “hototogisu.” It was also published in Korekoma’s Five cartloads of wastepaper in 1783. This verse is particularly hard to follow without information about its context. In the first place, Iwakura is in Kyoto. During Buson’s lifetime, a waterfall at a temple there, Daiun-ji ᄢ㔕ኹ, was believed to be efficacious for curing mental illness, and consequently was often visited

——— 62

Verse BZ, vol. 1, no. 1052, image BZ, vol. 6, p. 396.

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by patients seeking relief from this condition. Thus there was a close connection between the place name Iwakura and the mentally insane. Beyond this reference, though, are several more literary allusions embedded in the hokku. One clue—not included in the Transcriptions version or the haiga—is the headnote in Five cartloads of wastepaper: “an insignificant person like myself could never be privileged to hear it.” This is a quotation from the 107th episode of Essays in idleness, a story about rivalry between men and women: Few men can give a quick and apt response to a witticism from a woman, they say. During the reign of the Cloistered Emperor Kameyama, some mischievous court ladies made a practice of testing young men who came to court by asking them if they had ever heard a nightingale sing. A certain major counselor answered, “An insignificant person the likes of myself could never be so privileged.” The Horikawa minister of the interior said, “I believe I have heard one at Iwakura.” The women said, “That’s a perfectly good answer. The major counselor’s calling himself insignificant was unfortunate.”63

The hototogisu, or cuckoo, is a shy, elusive bird whose rarely-heard call inspires feelings of love, longing and melancholy. Poets often exhorted it to sing, as in Buson’s early verse “hototogisu / sing to the painting / the east is blanched white” (hototogisu / e ni nake / shirojirŇ); and the BashŇ verse “to my melancholy / add loneliness / cuckoo” (uki ware o / sabishigaraseyo / kankodori). Since its call was so rarely heard but was so evocative of delicate feelings, being able to boast of having had the experience of having heard it gave a person claim to a superior degree of poetic sensitivity. The hototogisu was not emblematic of marital infidelity, as the cuckoo is in the European context. More importantly for a discussion of this verse, its name has none of the associations with madness suggested by the English word “cuckoo.” Nor is the image of the “madwoman” here used to evoke a suggestion of someone behaving violently or repugnantly. Rather, Buson’s Iwakura madwoman should be read as tragic and romantic: she is someone who has been driven out of her mind by love for a man who has abandoned her.

——— 63 Keene, Essays in Idleness, pp. 89–90. Keene notes that Emperor Kameyama reigned from 1260–1272, and was called the Cloistered Emperor until his death in 1305. He also notes that the “Horikawa minister of the interior” refers to Minamoto no Tomomori (1249–1316). He translates hototogisu as “nightingale.”

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This image of the madwoman is common in NŇ plays such as The Well-curb (Izutsu ੗╴), where the ghost of a woman haunts the site of a well where she used to meet Ariwara no Narihira ࿷ේᬺᐔ (825–880), the famous poet and lover associated with the Heian-era collection Tales of Ise (Ise monogatari દ൓‛⺆), or the NŇ play Komachi at Sekidera (Sekidera Komachi 㑐ኹዊ↸), where the great poet and beauty Ono no Komachi ዊ㊁ዊ↸ lives out her days wracked by bittersweet memories of lost love. In Buson’s verse, because of its powerful associations with longing and love, the call of the hototogisu makes the madwoman’s feelings of grief and sorrow more intense, thus adding to her romantic fascination. This information makes the meaning of the hokku more clear. However, the linkage between the hokku and the picture is less obvious. How are Iwakura, a madwoman, and a hototogisu linked with an image of hydrangeas? To understand their relationship, we can look to the conventions of kotobazuke, which allow for connections between words based on fixed associations. In this case, as the modern scholar Ogata Tsutomu has pointed out, the flowers of this plant are associated with romance in poems such as Fujiwara Ieyoshi’s ⮮ේኅ⦟ evocative Fuboku waka shŇ ᄦᧁ๺᱌ᛞ (Japan waka collection, compiled 1310) waka: tobu hotaru hikari mie yuku yşgure ni nao iro nokoru niwa no ajisai

watching the glow of flickering fireflies at twilight love lingers all the more in a garden colored by hydrangeas

Fujiwara Ieyoshi64 This verse presents an image of the hydrangea in a dreamlike context of long, languid summer dusk and the dim, uncertain light of fireflies, thus associating it with romance. Hydrangeas bloom during early summer, the same season when it was customary for poets to wait to hear the elusive cuckoo’s call. As the waka suggests, the sight of hydrangeas is fitting one for just such a melancholy vigil. With this source poem and others like it in mind, the connection that Buson draws between the different elements of his haiga begin to make sense. Much as the unpainted space in the painting is left for the reader’s imagination to fill in, Buson links

——— 64

Ogata, Buson no sekai, p. 271.

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the imagery of the hokku with that of his picture in a way that requires the active participation of a very well informed and well-educated reader.

Figure 9 “Young bamboo!” Haiga.

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A similarly complex haiga also relies on the reader’s knowledge of the classical literary tradition to bridge the gap between the image and the words (Figure 9). On a long, narrow hanging scroll, leafy stalks of bamboo rise from the bottom of the picture two thirds of the way to the top. One or two vaguely sketched huts, not all that different from the one in the “Scholarly brilliance” haiga, are barely visible behind them. In the top right hand corner, in the unpainted space above the tallest of the bamboo, is a hokku and signature written in calligraphy whose taut linearity echoes the straightness of the bamboo: waka take ya Hashimoto no yşjo ari ya nashi

young bamboo! the courtesan of Hashimoto is she still there, or not?65

This hokku appeared in Sequel to dawn crow in 1776. Like Iwakura, Hashimoto is a neighborhood in the Kyoto area. It was a stopover for boats traveling down the Yodo River to Osaka, and as was frequently the case during this period in places where travelers were numerous, it had many brothels. It was also famous for its bamboo. First, the hokku. Hashimoto calls to mind the image of attractive women, something which resonates with the image of the slender “young bamboo!”: seeing so much young bamboo about, the speaker imagines that there must be similarly graceful women living in the houses there also. Also, Hashimoto is thought to be near where Buson’s mother grew up. Buson never makes this explicitly clear in any of his writings, but hints in several sources point to the possibility that his mother’s hometown was near the Yodo River. Thus the poem and the picture together create the suggestion of femininity, mystery and longing, simultaneously nostalgic and erotic. The verse does not make it clear whether the speaker is wondering about one woman in particular, or the many courtesans of Hashimoto, but the phrase ari ya nashi (literally, “there or not”) hints that he is referring to just one. This is an allusion to the Tales of Ise, Episode 9. In this passage, a group of aristocratic travelers are prompted to give voice to their yearning for absent loved ones hearing the name for a bird, called by the locals “capital-bird”: As the travelers continued on their way, they came to a mighty river flowing between the provinces of Musashi and ShimŇsa. It was called the Su-

——— 65

Verse BZ, vol. 1, no. 1265, image BZ, vol. 6, p. 399.

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midagawa. They huddled together on the shore, saddened by involuntary thoughts of home. “We’ve come such a long distance,” they said. The ferryman interrupted their lamentations. “Hurry up and get in. It’s late.” They embarked in wretched spirits, for not a soul among them but had left someone dear to him in the capital. A white bird about as big as a snipe, with a red bill and red legs, was idling on the water, eating a fish. Its like was not to be seen in the capital, and nobody could say what it was. When they consulted the ferryman, he answered, “Why that’s a capital-bird, of course.” Someone composed this poem: If you are in truth what your name would tell us, let me ask you, capital-bird, about the health of the one for whom I yearn.

na ni shi owaba iza koto towamu miyakodori wa ga omou hito wa ari ya nashi ya to Everyone in the boat shed tears.66

Because Buson draws the phrase ari ya nashi ya from this source, readers would recognize that his verse implies a mood of romantic longing. Juxtaposing the rarefied world of the Tales of Ise with the more prosaic setting of the brothels of Hashimoto at once makes a comic parody of the classical source text and elevates a place from the mundane present into the elegant context of waka. Thus “Young bamboo!” (Waka take ya) exists both in the plane of ga and that of zoku simultaneously. To add to this, the picture of the thatched hut brings in another set of associations from the classical tradition: in this case the famous conversation between the poet-priest SaigyŇ and the courtesan of Eguchi. Included in SaigyŇ’s personal verse collection Poems of a mountain home (Sankashş ጊኅ㓸), the story of their encounter—in which the courtesan showed herself to be a more subtle interpreter of the Buddhist law than SaigyŇ was himself—was admired for centuries and was the basis for a famous NŇ play, Eguchi ᳯญ. On the way to the temple called TennŇ-ji, I got caught in the rain. In the area known as Eguchi I asked at one place for a night’s lodging. When refused, I replied as follows: yo no naka o itou made koso katakarame

It is hard, perhaps, To hate and part with the world; But you are stingy

——— 66

McCullough, Classical Japanese Prose, p. 42.

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kari no yado o oshimu kimi kana

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Even with the night I ask of you, A place in your soon-left inn.

The response by a “woman-of-play”: ie o izuru hito to shi kikeba kari no yado ni kokoro tomuna to omou bakari zo

It is because I heard You’re no longer bound to life As a householder That I’m loath to let you get attached To this inn of brief, bought, stays67

The courtesan reminds SaigyŇ of the basic Buddhist teaching that any dwelling place—whether it be a room a traveler borrows for the night, a human identity, or an entire lifetime—is temporary and illusory. The irony of a woman who trades in physical desire teaching the Dharma to a monk who is supposed to have abandoned attachments deeply impressed the generations of people who became familiar with this story. In the NŇ play, Eguchi, the courtesan actually reveals that her true identity is that of the bodhisattva Fugen ᥉⾫ (Sanskrit: Samantabhadra), making her great wisdom a little less surprising, but further serving to underscore the point that the things of the world are illusions. Buson’s hokku and picture pick up on this story, where low (the courtesan) is actually the high (a teacher of the Dharma, a bodhisattva)—a meeting of zoku and ga that is fundamental to what Okada Rihei calls “haikai spirit.” Buson is making a deliberate choice when in depicting the courtesan’s house as more or less indistinguishable from the thatched huts of scholar-recluses that are so common in his other paintings. It is nothing like the contemporary ukiyo-e depictions of courtesans and brothels, which were often dramatic or lurid. What he offers us here is not a depiction of an actual brothel in Hashimoto. Instead, it is just a reference to an imagined literary place: the setting of the NŇ play Eguchi, overlaid with references to the romantic Tales of Ise whose overtones are further emphasized with the addition of graceful stalks of bamboo. Nowhere near as complex, but nevertheless exquisite both for its poetry and its visual imagery, are the many versions of the verse: hana o fumishi zŇri mo miete asane kana

that she walked beneath the blossoms is visible even on her sandals— sleeping late this morning68

——— 67 William LaFleur, The Karma of Words: Buddhism and the Literary Arts in Medieval Japan (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1983), pp. 70–71.

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Figure 10 “That she walked beneath the blossoms.” Haiga.

The most striking are the two fan-shaped haiga that depict a woman, probably a courtesan, seated on the floor with her back to the viewer (Figure 10). In one, she holds a letter up to read. In the other, she just stares into the distance, with the dark shape of her obi sash balancing out the black mass of her upswept hair held in place with an elaborate comb. Another version, in a more conventional painting format, shows nothing but a single sandal, its brocade strap suggesting an elegant owner.69 Each version has a slightly different headnote, a variation on: “Heart taken by the blossoms, one puts aside everything, even to the point of seeming like a lazy person in all things, is this not something that is touching and graceful?” Considered alone, the hokku can be read an aisatsu to a friend who has displayed the proper attitude towards the beauty of the cherry blossoms. When the speaker goes to visit her in the morning, he finds she is sleeping late that day. The sandals left in the doorway explain the reason—they are littered with the pale pink petals of the blossoms that had fallen on the streets she walked through the night before. The verse

——— 68

Verse BZ, vol. 1, no. 1365; images BZ, vol. 6, pp. 400–401. In addition to the haiga versions of this poem, there is also a surimono that has a longer inscription that adds “The above verse is a little ditty I wrote when I went visiting in Kayamachi near ShijŇ, a place where the man from Naniwa is staying…at the time we went from Umejo’s house and wrote out a hokku saying: how can you overlook the spring scenery of the capital?” 69

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makes a reference to a number of Chinese poems, one by Bo Juyi, included in Japanese and Chinese poems to sing: Backs to the candle, together we cherish the moon late in the night. Treading on petals, we share lamentation for the springtime of our youth.70 ⢛ῒ౒ᘿᷓᄛ᦬ 〯⧎หᗂዋᐕᤐ Another is by one of Buson’s favorite Chinese poets, Wang Wei: The blossoms scattered, but the servants have not yet swept them The warbler calls, but the mountain traveler still sleeps on.71 ⧎⪭ኅ௳ᧂ᝹ 㢩໹ጊቴ₈⌁ What might appear to be irresponsible, slovenly behavior in conventional society is actually to be admired: the speaker’s friend is so sensitive to the fleeting beauty of the blossoms that she stays out all night to enjoy them. Moreover, by alluding to Chinese poetry, Buson makes the point that this was behavior that Chinese literati of the past also admired, which further serves to underscore the sincerity of his praise. The relationship between the text and images here are not that complicated. The reader can view the friend the speaker came to visit as a man who enjoyed himself in the company of courtesans as graceful as the one that he pictures. Alternatively, one might interpret the speaker’s greeting as being to a woman herself. Indeed, a surimono version of this hokku actually does associate it with a woman: Umejo, a haikai poet who first made his acquaintance when she was a courtesan. Umejo later married Buson’s disciple, the painter and poet Matsumura Gekkei. Gekkei became famous as an artist in the ShijŇ ྾᧦ school of painting, and Umejo also took up painting herself. The surimono text also mentions Buson’s visit to a “man from Naniwa,” whom scholars identify as Ueda Akinari. Akinari is most famous for stories of the grotesque, like Tales of moonlight and rain (Ugetsu monogatari 㔎᦬‛⺆, 1776), but he also wrote haikai, and in 1774 he asked Buson

———

70 Rimer and Chaves, p. 27. Chinese text is in ņsone ShŇsuke and Horiuchi Hideaki, eds., ShinchŇ Nihon koten shşsei, vol. 61, Wakan rŇei shş (ShinchŇsha, 1983), p. 20. 71 Cited in headnote to verse, BZ, vol. 1, no. 1365.

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to write the preface for a treatise he wrote on kireji, Treatise on ya and kana (Ya yana shŇ ਽຦ᛞ). The picture on the surimono is much different from that on the haiga: it shows a mass of bundled firewood that takes up nearly half the page; to its left is a plum tree, presumably in honor of Umejo (the ume of her name means “plum”). The existence of multiple versions of this hokku, including this surimono using an image completely unrelated to those of the painted ones, is a good indication of the ephemeral nature of haiga and the fact that poems, pictures, and combinations of both were commonly used as tokens of social exchange. One of Buson’s most appealing paintings is a haiga that he did around 1777, showing a laughing, barefooted man in a jaunty red cap, dancing (Figure 11). To his right, towards the bottom of the picture, rolls a gourd—one presumably once full of the sake that has made the man so animated. The hokku and its headnote read: Miyako no hana no chiri kakaru wa, Mitsunobu ga gofun no hakuraku shitaru sama nare

The scattering of cherry blossoms in the capital is similar to the appearance of chalk white flaking off a painting by Mitsunobu

Matabei ni au ya Omuro no hana zakari

have I run into Matabei? blossoms at Omuro at their height72

The chain of associations in this haiga is as complicated as what we saw in “Young bamboo!” It starts with the headnote. “Mitsunobu” refers to Tosa Mitsunobu ࿯૒శା (d. 1522), a member of an aristocratic family of artists who is regarded as the founder of the Tosa School of painting. The Tosa became the official school of the Ashikaga shoguns (1338– 1573) and it remained a powerful force in the world of Japanese art until the middle of the early modern period. The Tosa style involves the liberal use of gold, extremely fine and delicate brushwork, and dazzling, brilliant color. If paint were to peel off a Mitsunobu painting, as the headnote describes, the scattered flakes would be luminous and exquisite, reminiscent of a past age of refined splendor—much like the fallen cherry petals of the ancient capital city.

——— 72

Verse BZ, vol. 1, no. 2633, image BZ, vol. 6, p. 404.

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Figure 11 “Have I run into Matabei?” Haiga. ItsuŇ Art Museum.

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“Matabei” refers to a character in a jŇruri play by Chikamatsu Monzaemon, Courtesan of the spirit-revealing incense (Keisei hangon kŇ ௑ၔ෻㝬㚅, 1708). Matabei had studied with Mitsunobu, but he had not been much of a success. He was working as a painter of ņtsu-e ᄢᵤ⛗, a kind of folk art that originated in the area of ņtsu, near Kyoto. The ņtsu-e repertoire originally consisted mainly of religious images, but later expanded to include animals, heroes, and the like, typically painted on wooden panels in strong, bright colors. Although ņtsu-e were popular, particularly with travelers who visited the region where they were produced, they were not “fine” art, and Matabei, for all his humble origins, aspired to more in life—the recognition of Mitsunobu of the powerful Tosa school. Disappointed at being overlooked as Mitsunobu favored other students, Matabei eventually decides to take his own life. His wife persuades him to paint one last picture—a self-portrait—on the side of a water container. Miraculously, as he does so, an exact copy of his picture appears on the opposite side of the container. Suddenly, Mitsunobu appears, reveals that he has been watching the whole time, and declares that Matabei is indeed a painter worthy of recognition in the Tosa school.73 Finally, Omuro is a place in Kyoto that is famous for its lateblooming cherry trees. A temple there, Ninna-ji ੳ๺ኹ, had once been an imperial palace. The cherry trees there bloom just as they start to come into leaf, and are in full bloom when other trees have already dropped their petals. It was a popular place for hanami—cherry blossom viewing. This haiga, then, brings together historical fact, a fictional character, and the name of a famous place in Kyoto. Taken together, the reason for the dancing figure’s inebriation becomes clear: not only has he been drinking, but also he is buoyed along by the cheerful mood of the rest of the revelers taking in the sight of the late cherry blossoms. The character famous as an ņtsu-e painter has become an ņtsu-e himself, with bold lines delineating his form and flat areas of color—the red of his cap and the black of the jacket that has slipped off his shoulder—suggesting his costume. But the picture is nowhere near as naive or mechanical looking as a real ņtsu-e. Though the composition is simple and spare, the inscription, figure, and gourd are skillfully shaped and perfectly placed.

——— 73 Samuel L. Leiter, Kabuki Encyclopedia: An English-Language Adaptation of Kabuki Jiten (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1979), p. 188.

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The content of the text fills in the details missing from the picture, so despite the fact that there is no suggestion of the background of the scene, it is easy to imagine the crowded grounds of Ninna-ji, filled with the splendid outfits of visitors boisterously celebrating the last blossoms of the season, where all around petals scattered from the trees litter the ground like shining flakes fallen from a magnificent old Tosa school painting.

Figure 12 “Dancing!” Haiga.

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The last haiga from this period that we will look at exists in several different versions, some long and narrow, another more square and horizontal, two others on fan-shaped paper (Figure 12). They show two, three, four, or five figures, dancing in a line. Some have fans, others have their heads covered with hoods, hand towels, or hats. The undulating shapes of their bodies suggest a mood of fun and abandon. Two of the pictures are inscribed with this hokku: nishikigi no kado o megurite odori kana

surrounding the gate where he left the love token dancing!74

One has just this one: shigonin ni tsuki ochi kakaru odori kana

four or five left as the moon sinks down dancing!75

Another includes both. A fifth has four hokku in total, the two above, and these two: hoso koshi no hŇshi suzuro ni odori kana

the slim-waisted priest, as if in a dream, dancing!76

hita to inu no naku machi ni koete odori kana

a dog’s incessant bark the sound carries across the town dancing!77

These five haiga are clearly linked—the figures on them so similar they almost seem to have stepped out of the same painting. Interestingly, the Matabei figure from the previous haiga also looks like he belongs among the dancers, as they too are done in a style that is at once severely abbreviated yet energetic. Furthermore, while the hokku inscribed on these haiga vary, all of them have the same last five syllables, “dancing!” (odori kana). Only first of these verses uses a word with a literary reference: nishigi, literally, “brocade tree.” It was an ancient custom in parts of northern Japan for a young man to signal his interest in a woman by leaving such a

——— 74

Verse BZ, vol. 1, no. 1810, images BZ, vol. 6, pp. 404–406. Verse BZ, vol. 1, no. 137. 76 Verse BZ, vol. 1, no. 1156. 77 Verse BZ, vol. 1, no. 136. 75

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token at her gate. The token, called a “brocade tree,” was an elaborately decorated stick. If the woman was also interested, she took the token into the house. “Brocade tree” is also the title of a NŇ play by Zeami, in which a man who visited his beloved’s house every night for three years, eventually setting out a thousand of them. In the words of the play: From ancient times it has been the custom here for a suitor to make brocade trees as go-betweens, and to stand them before the gate of his beloved’s house. Because they are signs of his courtship, he adorns them beautifully. The woman takes into her house only the brocade trees of the man whom she would have; the others stand unheeded. And the rejected suitor, though he comes for a hundred nights or for three years, leaving the celebrated Thousand Love Charms, comes in vain. In the shade of this mountain is the grave of such a man. Three years he kept his vigil, setting out his love charm every night, and in the end he was buried with the tokens of his love.78

Uncharacteristically of the NŇ theater, the play has a relatively happy ending; after retelling his story in the presence of a wandering priest, the man (really, his ghost) concludes his tale by declaring that he and his lover “have met and pledged our love / with the cup of mother-ofpearl,” and the chorus invites him to dance. Thus, “brocade tree” in Buson’s hokku evokes a romantic image, one associated with joy and dancing. The other three hokku make no such allusions; in “Four or five left” (Shigonin ni) it is the time of the evening when the crowd that has come out for Bon Festival dances—which occur in the middle of the summer as part of ceremonies to celebrate the annual homecoming of the spirits of the dead—starts to thin out. Since Bon Festival is held from the thirteenth to the sixteenth day of the month, the moon was full at midnight, thus by the time it starts to sink its quite late in the evening. The dancers in this hokku, however, are enjoying themselves too much to go home. The next two hokku also describe experiences one might have on Bon festival night: a young, attractive priest is caught up in the hypnotic rhythm and movement of the festival; and across town, in another neighborhood, a dog catches the sound of the drums and flutes of the crowd, and calls out to them. Neither the hokku, the paintings, nor the interaction between them is particularly striking in this group of compositions. However, they show

——— 78

Keene, Twenty Plays of the NŇ Theatre, p. 89.

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the relatively disposable, ephemeral quality of haiga. Completed quickly, using inexpensive materials, and as this example indicates, following a plan or design that could easily be repeated, haiga were ideal for the purpose of making small, inexpensive works that might be sold without much effort. This example bears out the implications of a letter Buson wrote to KitŇ on the eleventh day of the eighth month of asking for his help in selling some haiga, or as he referred to them, “haikai sketches:” Hanging scrolls: 7 Pasted-paper folding screens: 10 All of the above are not the sort of thing I normally paint. They are haikai sketches (ߪ޿߆޿ߩ⨲↹), to which there is nothing similar in the world, I think. It will be a problem for me if they go for too low a price. This is something I’ve told no one else about. I do not hide it from you.79

This letter dates from around the same time that Buson painted the haiga of the dancing figures, and it shows us a number of things. In the first place, Buson used KitŇ as a broker for his paintings. Not only were Buson’s haikai acquaintances his painting clients, but his disciples also served to help him market his paintings. We saw that this was true of relatively distant acquaintances like Kafu, but KitŇ, too, was not only the Yahantei school’s most active promoter, he also assisted Buson as a gobetween in selling his paintings. Secondly, Buson regarded haiga as something distinct from his usual kind of work. He tended to use different art names to sign his haiga than he did in his nanga paintings; in this letter he goes so far as to say that there is “nothing similar in the world” to these paintings. Finally, no doubt related to the fact that these paintings were so unlike what he normally produced, Buson was not too sure of how they should be priced. At least he hoped that they would not be sold off too cheaply; nonetheless, he was so underconfident about what their value was that he left it up to KitŇ to determine. Seen in the context of this letter, the five versions of the Bon Festival haiga start to make sense. The fact that Buson painted so many haiga that so closely resemble each other can only be a consequence of the fact that these were not intended to stand as great masterpieces of originality and seriousness, but were rather light, almost disposable works that he could produce with a minimum of thought. Taking elements of a previous composition and recycling it into another context was something that he

——— 79

Letter to KitŇ, eleventh day of the Eighth Month, 1776; BSS, pp. 145–146.

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did frequently. In some cases it looks like he was trying to work out the best way to present a particular hokku and image pair; in others, it appears that he was producing something that could earn him money without too much effort.

Late Haiga (1778–1783) A large number of haiga from the last years of Buson’s career are extant. They are extremely varied: some are comical, others are atmospheric. One simply shows a broom, painted in thick, powerful brushstrokes. The inscription reads, “departing spring / sweeping off its backside / fallen blossoms” (yuku haru no / shiribeta harau / rakka kana).80 A picture of the great medieval heroes, Benkei and Ushiwaka (the latter better known by his adult name, Yoshitsune) accompanies the hokku “the snow, the moon, and the blossoms / in the end / a bond of three lifetimes” (setsu gekka / tsui ni sanzei no / chigiri kana).81 Other paintings show groups of “haikai immortals,” three in one, eight in another, eleven in a third. In two other haiga, a rabbit pounds mochi, accompanied by the inscription of Buson’s travels through Dewa that we saw in Chapter Three, concluding with the hokku “in the cool / a moonlit night of pounding barley / oh, Uhei” (suzushisa ni / mugi o tsuku yo no / Uhei kana) .82 Two umbrellas lashed together, accompanied by the verse, “viewing autumn leaves / how thoughtful your preparations are / two umbrellas” (momiji mi ya / yŇi kashikoki /kasa nihon).83 A pale silhouette of the peak of Mount Fuji accompanies “Mount Fuji alone / is not engulfed / young leaves” (Fuji hitotsu / uzumi nokoshite / wakaba kana) ,84 a verse that we saw in Chapter Four. The variety and inventiveness of these late haiga show an artist and poet at the height of his powers. We will take a closer look at one. It incorporates “willow leaves, fallen” (yanagi chirite), a very early hokku that he wrote during his journey along BashŇ’s Narrow road to the interior route (Figure 13):

——— 80

Verse BZ, vol. 1, no. 81, image BZ, vol. 6, p. 409. Verse BZ, vol. 1, no. 1023, image BZ, vol. 6, p. 410. 82 Images BZ, vol. 6, p. 443. 83 Verse BZ, vol. 1, no. 2751, image BZ, vol. 6, p. 444. 84 Image BZ, vol. 6, p. 442. 81

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yanagi chiri shimizu kare ishi tokoro dokoro

willow leaves, fallen clear stream, dried out stones, here and there85

Figure 13 “Willow leaves, fallen.” Haiga. ItsuŇ Art Museum.

——— 85

Images BZ, vol. 6, p. 444.

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As we saw in Chapter Four, this hokku was used as the opening verse of the Scrap paper coverlet linked verse sequence that Buson took part in just around the time that he left northeastern Japan for Kyoto. However, in the last years of his career, he also used it as the basis for a haiga, with a different headnote than the one that appeared in the linked verse sequence. The older headnote identifies the willow as the one associated with the SaigyŇ legend. However, the later one cites a completely different source, the “Second Prose Poem on the Red Cliff” by Su Dongpo: All of the “Second Prose Poem on the Red Cliff” is superb, but these lines struck me as particularly good: “The mountains were very high, the moon small The level of the water had fallen, leaving boulders sticking out.” They are like a single bird that breaks away from the flock. Once when I was traveling in Michinoku, I composed this verse while standing below SaigyŇ’s willow tree.86

The “Second Prose Poem on the Red Cliff” tells the story of a man and two friends who decide to enjoy the moonlight together. One friend mentions that he had caught some fish earlier, and the speaker’s wife reminds him that he had put away some wine for a special occasion. Buson’s quotation comes from the passage that describes the scenery of the Red Cliff and the river that ran below it: So we took the wine and fish and went for another trip to the foot of the Red Cliff. The river raced along noisily, its sheer banks rising a thousand feet. The mountains were very high, the moon small. The level of the water had fallen, leaving boulders sticking out. How much time had passed since my last visit? I couldn’t recognize them as the same river and hills!87

Five rocks, painted in dark and light gray ink are scattered across the lower part of the picture more or less horizontally. This creates tension with the inscription, with its bold black calligraphy creating a powerful vertical movement. The rocks are exactly as Buson’s hokku describe them, “here and there” (tokoro dokoro). There is no indication of a willow. However, this is not a depiction of the landscape at the actual site of the willow—far from being a remote, sublime and wild place, such as Su Dongpo’s words describe the scenery of the Red Cliff to be. In fact, the

——— 86 87

BZ, vol. 4, pp. 85–86. Chaves, p. 139.

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willow was in the middle of rice fields, which are filled with water part of the year; there is nothing nearby that resembles the large, imposinglooking boulders of Buson’s painting. Instead, the image is entirely imaginary, and is based on other paintings and pages of The Mustard seed garden manual of painting. This text shows the elements of landscapes: trees, rocks, mountains, huts, and so forth, are presented separately, isolated on the page, so that painting students could practice and master their shapes and afterwards work them into fully developed compositions. The boulders of this haiga are very similar to those printed in the painting manuals. However, there is more to them than that. The inscription is so evocative that it invites the viewer to fill in the empty space of the painting with an entire landscape: a willow, a dry riverbed, the season, the mood of appreciative discovery. It is a particularly good example of the way that haikai uses absence to prompt associations. Willow is a spring kigo, a harbinger of warmth and light that comes into leaf very early in the season. Without its leaves, as Buson describes it in the verse, it is without its most distinctive, identifying feature; also, it is not in the picture at all. The stream, that Buson describes as clear or pure water (shimizu) is completely dried up. Instead, Buson gives us a group of rocks, connected neither to one another nor to the environment that surrounds them. Nonetheless, seen as a whole there is a linkage between the elements of the hokku, its headnote, and in the image; it brings together both absent and present (willow, stream, rocks) and past and present (the landscapes observed by Su Dongpo, SaigyŇ, BashŇ, and Buson himself). Buson also completed a large number of works in the last decade of his career that were more related to haikai than to the nanga that was the mainstay of his painting practice. These were paintings related to Matsuo BashŇ—both “portraits” and versions of two of his travel journals, Record of a weather-beaten skeleton and Narrow road to the interior done as hand scrolls and screen paintings (Figure 14). Buson’s BashŇ-related paintings are exceptions among his haiga in the sense that they deal with texts that Buson did not write himself. However, they belong to the haiga category as they are “haikai, in the form of a picture,” and some of them, particularly the travel journal hand scrolls and screen paintings, are among the finest works Buson produced in his entire career.88

——— 88

Images BZ, vol. 6, pp. 415–418, 420–422, and 424–430.

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Figure 14 “Narrow road to the interior”scroll, detail. Yamagata Museum of Art.

Buson painted these works to order; several of his letters mention requests from patrons for portraits and other kinds of paintings connected with BashŇ. Judging from the dates he completed them, there was a great demand for such paintings starting around the middle of the 1770s, twenty years before the centenary of BashŇ’s death. As we have seen, this was the period when the BashŇ Revival was at its highest. The Yahantei school published Elder BashŇ’s linking techniques anthology in 1776; from that year, Buson’s acquaintance DŇryş began work restoring the BashŇ Hermitage, a small thatched hut that restored in honor of BashŇ that later served as a meeting place for Yahantei poets. The next few years saw the publication of many collections that claimed to be following BashŇ’s example, including Yahantei’s Dawn crow and Sequel to dawn crow, Itton’s Sabi and shiori (Sabi shiori, 1776), Bakusui’s New Empty chestnuts (Shin Minashiguri ᣂ⯯ᩙ, 1777). Gichş-ji, the site of BashŇ’s grave, became the center of BashŇ Revival activities in western Japan, with numerous verse parties and other events taking place there from around 1779. With all this interest in BashŇ developing, haikai poets who admired him were eager to possess texts and other objects that were related to him, and as a talented artist who was also a haikai poet, Buson was in an ideal position to provide them. Ten of the BashŇ “portraits” that Buson painted are extant. BashŇ died some twenty years before Buson was born, so these were not portraits in the literal sense as the two poets never met, but were rather imaginary likenesses that were meant to embody some aspect of what was believed at the time to characterize BashŇ’s “spirit.” Certain markers

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make clear the identity of the paintings’ subject. BashŇ is shown with a round cap and a priest’s robes; he wears a beard, and in some cases carries a walking stick, in others, a satchel, or a sedge hat. He is often smiling, or gazing back at the viewer with a look of good humor. The inscriptions vary, but tend to be elaborate: examples of his hokku are the most numerous, but one includes a long poem in Chinese as well. Buson’s imaginary portraits of BashŇ focus on his persona as a rootless traveler, a kind and benevolent figure. He has much in common with Buson’s nanga paintings of Taoist immortals and various other kinds of Chinese luminaries—wise, gentle, transcending the vulgar but closely in touch with simple humanity. They present BashŇ as the BashŇ Revival poets viewed him, as an embodiment of the ideals of haikai as a literary form that was more than just a frivolous amusement, who took up the example of lofty-minded Chinese literati recluses and traveling poetsaints like NŇin and SaigyŇ. The image of BashŇ as a saintly traveler is also the central theme of Buson’s other major BashŇ-related haiga, the hand scrolls and folding screens that he painted of the haikai prose texts Record of a weather-beaten skeleton and Narrow road to the interior. Only one version of Record of a weather-beaten skeleton exists today, as well as four of Narrow road to the interior; sources suggest that Buson completed as many as ten versions of the latter.89 Buson painted Record of a weather-beaten skeleton in 1778 in the form of a hand scroll; it was later mounted onto a six-paneled folding screen. He abridged the text somewhat, and added eleven illustrations. Most of the pictures are of people that BashŇ passed by or met during his journey, hard at work at various chores, but some of them are of BashŇ himself, resting at an inn, chatting with a host, or moving down the road wearing the distinctive broad, flat hat and straw raincoat of the traveler. The four versions of Narrow road to the interior have many scenes in common. He shows us BashŇ’s farewell to disciples at Senjş, the children who try to follow him after he leaves for Kurobane, the blind biwa-player of Shiogama, the wives of the SatŇ brothers who dressed up in their dead husbands’ armor to pretend to their mother that her sons were still alive, the courtesans at Ichiburi—the most emotionally powerful moments in the story. Most striking about the perspective Buson brings to BashŇ’s narrative is that he concentrates almost entirely

——— 89

Tanaka, p. 207.

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on human beings. While Narrow road to the interior is an account of its author’s visits to famous sites, and is full of descriptions of landscapes and places—many of which Buson actually saw during his own travels around northeastern Japan—Buson depicts it as a journey from relationship to relationship. This does not reflect any limitation of Buson’s skills: he was a master of landscape painting, as nanga’s main focus was on the depiction of the natural world. However, even Buson’s nanga are distinguished by the conspicuous presence of people—they are far more numerous, and big, than in the paintings of most other nanga artists. In his versions of Record of a weather-beaten skeleton and Narrow road to the interior, Buson lets BashŇ’s verbal description of the environment stand on its own; he puts his own energies into emphasizing the emotional and personal aspects of the journey. Buson’s haiga are notable examples of the interconnectedness of verbal and visual modes of expression that has been commonplace in Japanese cultural history. Despite their simplicity, haiga demonstrate a very high degree of literary and artistic sophistication that rely on haikai’s most basic technique, the juxtaposition of apparently disparate elements to create a dynamic, compelling whole. While Buson’s artistic skills made his haiga especially attractive as paintings, it was his sensitivity to implication (yojŇ)—finely tuned from decades of writing hokku and linked verse—that enabled him to create compostions that were witty, amusing and often hauntingly atmospheric.

EPILOGUE Because it is the work of a “poet-painter,” Buson’s haikai promises to shed light on a problem that has long intrigued scholars—whether poets can write verse that is “like paintings,” or painters create visual works that are “like poems.” As we have seen, eighteenth-century haikai poets frequently denied there was a difference between verbal and visual expression. The example Buson offers may have been exceptional: even in his community, artists who possessed his degree of proficiency in both poetry and painting were very few. Still, haikai poets continued to produce haiga and other kinds of works that combined verse with visual images—much of it in a style that recalled Buson’s—until different views on the nature of the visuality of haikai emerged during the beginning of the modern period. One of these views was that of the modern poet Masaoka Shiki—his claim that haiku are like pictures because they capture a single point in space and time or depict a scene just as a witness experienced it. It is true that not even the painter Buson was in the habit of writing hokku this way: his verses were almost always composed on a set topic, and frequently suggest a narrative rather than one focused moment. Nevertheless, Shiki’s argument is compelling, albeit more because of its motivation than its content. Shiki was looking for a way to legitimize haiku as a modern form of Japanese poetry. Calling attention to haiku’s potential for pictorial, photograph-like realism was a central pillar of his defense against critics who condemned the genre as obsolete and out of step with the changes brought by modernization. The practice of sketching from life was a technique that became popular with many visual artists of Shiki’s day, and its origins in a rational, scientific view of the world linked it to other aspects of modernization; therefore, literary forms that involved sketches—even sketches in words—could be viewed as modern. Even if Shiki’s view of Buson as a painterly poet is somewhat exaggerated, his characterization of Buson’s hokku as portentous of the modern is not without merit. In fact, the view of Buson as a classical poet who anticipated modernity was also held by Hagiwara SakutarŇ, a poet and critic who otherwise

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had little in common with Shiki. SakutarŇ was deeply impressed with Buson’s haishi “Mourning the Sage Hokuju,” which begins: You left in the morning. In the evening, my heart is in a thousand shards wondering why you have gone so far away. Thinking of you, I go wandering in the hills. Why are the hills so sad?1

SakutarŇ commented, “if you concealed the name of the author of this poem, and said that it was the work of a young shintaishi ᣂ૕⹞ (newstyle poem) poet of the Meiji period, surely no one at all would doubt it.”2 He added that the poem had much in common with Western Romantic poetry, and reflected an aesthetic sensibility that did not belong to the culture of the Edo period. SakutarŇ was not a haiku poet—he wrote shi ⹞ (modern free verse). He admitted that he disliked BashŇ, and that the majority of haiku held little appeal for him. When reading classical Japanese poetry, he much preferred the waka of the Collection of Ten thousand leaves and New ancient and modern waka anthology eras. However, Buson’s haishi caught his interest, and as he read more of Buson’s work he became even more impressed. While most haiku is essentially dull and restrained, he writes, Buson’s is bright and springlike, “distinct from austere ink painting, close to brightly-colored Western impressionist paintings.”3 SakutarŇ’s interpretation of Buson has some things in common with Shiki’s, but there are important differences. Like Shiki, he makes reference to visual aspects of Buson’s verse, but his emphasis is more metaphorical than pragmatic. SakutarŇ’s Buson is a wistfully lyrical romantic, a “poet of nostalgia” whose verses were as plaintive as lullabies. He writes that Buson’s verse was something that contemporary young people could understand without the knowledge that would be required to appreciate most early modern haiku, because it has more in common with the work of Meiji-era poets than other haiku. Where Shiki saw an objective observer of the external world, SakutarŇ saw an emotional, even passionate storyteller, whose childhood memories and longing for a lost, distant past engendered expressions of eitan ⹗གྷ (admiration) and shŇkei ᙏᙔ (longing).

——— 1

BZ, vol. 4, p. 27. Hagiwara SakutarŇ, KyŇshş no shijin: Yosa Buson (Iwanami Shoten, [1936] 1995), p. 15. 3 Ibid., p. 19. 2

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In calling Buson’s haikai “subjective,” SakutarŇ was drawing on his own views of the primacy of subjectivity in poetry. SakutarŇ emphasized subjectivity in many of his works, perhaps most succinctly in the 1928 treatise Principles of poetry (Shi no genri ⹞ߩේℂ), in which he declared “‘Poetry’ and ‘subjectivity’ are synonyms. Anything that is subjective is poetry, and anything that is objective is not poetry.”4 Principles of poetry also mentions Buson, in the context of arguing that relative to the purely subjective waka, haiku is basically objective, but even haiku achieved the expression of emotion, and thus was poetic. Here SakutarŇ cites the following Buson verse to argue that “there can be no haiku poems that are cold in feeling and of purely contemplative observation:”5 haru no umi hinemosu notari notari kana

spring sea all day long rising and falling rising and falling6

In Principles of poetry, SakutarŇ uses the same kind of rhetoric that Shiki does in Haiku poet Buson, positing clear, binary oppositions in attempting to define the nature of poetry, like “Japanese” and “Western,” and “subjective” and “objective.” However, where Shiki sees Buson’s objectivity, SakutarŇ comes to the opposite conclusion: his Buson is a poet of subjectivity and lyricism. While SakutarŇ allows that in one sense haiku is aligned with the objective, he does not deny that it is poetry; instead, it uses objective description to achieve the expression of emotion, rather than the mimetic depiction of reality. SakutarŇ’s reading of Buson, like Shiki’s, is useful for giving us a starting point for thinking about the relationship between Buson’s haikai and modern Japanese poetry. In the first place, SakutarŇ called attention to Buson’s haishi, which resembled the results of modern Japanese poets’ efforts to create forms of verse that did not adhere to the strict rules of classical poetry regarding appropriate language, content, and syllable count. Buson’s haishi draw on these rules at the same time as they break them, in part by borrowing language and conventions from kanshi, and in part by following the logic of haikai to an extreme. That is to say, while the haishi do not conform to convention in terms of structure and language, they do remain within haikai’s boundaries in that haikai

——— 4 Hagiwara SakutarŇ, Principles of Poetry: Shi no genri, trans. Chester C. I. Wang and Isamu P. Fukuchi (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University East Asia Program, 1998), p. 48. 5 SakutarŇ, Principles of Poetry, p. 129. 6 BZ, vol. 1, no. 46.

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encourages experimentation, surprise, and eccentricity. However, while the haishi are clearly products of their time, SakutarŇ’s reading opens a place for Buson in the modern canon of Japanese literature, at least insofar as he sees its similarities to modern poetry. In the second place, while the “nostalgia” that so fascinates SakutarŇ is very conventional in classical poetry, SakutarŇ’s reading of it links it with it a sense of loss of connection to the past that had strong resonance with early twentieth century writers. In other words, SakutarŇ’s reading more or less ignores the tropes and conceits of classical haikai; instead, he reads Buson’s verse as being transparent and authentic as the poetry he himself tried to write. While in some respects this results in distorted interpretations, it is nevertheless a strong endorsement of the emotive power of Buson’s work. SakutarŇ was concerned with redefining Japanese poetry rather than the defense of haiku, and justifies the place of Buson’s work as poetry that transcends genre, introducing it to a modern readership which may be completely unaware of the somewhat arcane complexities of classical haikai. Shiki and SakutarŇ shared a purpose—the reform of Japanese poetry—and they both looked to Japan’s literary past for precedents that could help guide the formation of its future. Many of the pressures that confronted modern Japanese writers were different than those faced by the BashŇ Revival poets, and the results of their efforts to create a new kind of Japanese poetry were far more radical than anything the Revival poets devised. However, Shiki and SakutarŇ used a strategy that the Revival poets would have recognized: they advocated renewal by calling for a return to some aspect of its past. It is not surprising that poets like Shiki and SakutarŇ were drawn to Buson. If conditions for writerly anxiety existed in the eighteenth century in Japan, they were even more urgently present in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Commercialization and urbanization took place in the Meiji and TaishŇ periods on a far greater scale than it had in the eighteenth century. New kinds of intellectual communities established themselves, and literary criticism flourished as the number of newspapers, journals, and writers groups grew. Older genres and the standards that governed them came under scrutiny, and new genres emerged. In other words, while it was a period of great freedom and promise for writers, it was one of anxiety as well. In this book, I have not concentrated on the formal aspects of Buson’s haikai as did Shiki and SakutarŇ. Instead, I have examined it in the

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context of the urban and rural communities of writers, artists and scholars with which Buson interacted. Rather than reading his work a direct expression of an individual poetic voice, I have viewed it as part of a larger discourse that arose in reaction to the emergence of a new kind of readership in the eighteenth century. While my reading of Buson’s work has focused on different issues than those that interested Shiki and SakutarŇ, it agrees with their views of Buson as a central figure in the literature of the early modern period. Pressured to redefine the identity of the artist by popular responses to economic, technological, and social changes, Buson and his colleagues in the BashŇ Revival reinvented haikai as a serious literary genre, laying the groundwork for its establishment as one of the best-known forms of Japanese literature in the modern period.

APPENDIX Translations Haikai free verse Mourning the Sage Hokuju (Hokuju rŇsen o itamu)

250

Verses on the Topic ‘Spring Wind on the Kema Embankment’ (Shunpş batei no kyoku)

252

Yodo River Songs: Three Verses (Denga ka)

256

Prose Preface to Make the past now (Mukashi o ima)

257

Preface to Elder BashŇ Verse-linking Anthology (BashŇ Ň tsukeai shş )

258

Account of the Rebuilding of the BashŇ Hermitage in Eastern Kyoto (RakutŇ BashŇ-an saikŇ ki)

259

New flower gathering (Shinhanatsumi) Prose section

263

Preface to Shundei verse anthology (Shundei kushş)

275

Linked verse “Rape-flowers—” (Na no hana ya)

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Mourning the Sage Hokuju (Hokuju rŇsen o itamu) kimi ashita ni sarinu yşbe no kokoro chiji ni nan zo haruka naru kimi o omoute oka nobe ni yukitsu asobu oka nobe nan zo kaku kanashiki tanpopo no ki ni nazuna no shirou sakitaru miru hito zo naki kigisu no aru ka hitanaki ni naku o kikeba tomo ariki kawa o hedatete suminiki hege no keburi no ha to uchichireba nishi fuku kaze no hageshikute ozasa hara masuge hara nogaru beki kata zo naki tomo ariki kawa o hedatete suminiki kyŇ wa hororo to mo nakanu kimi ashita ni sarinu yşbe no kokoro chiji ni nan zo haruka naru waga io no amida butsu tomoshibi mo mono sezu hana mo mairasezu sugosugo to tatazumeru koyoi wa koto ni tŇtoki

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You left in the morning. In the evening, my heart is in a thousand shards wondering why you have gone so far away. Thinking of you, I go wandering in the hills. Why are the hills so sad? Among the yellow dandelions, shepherds-purse blooms white. No one else is here to see this. I wonder, “Are there pheasants?” when I hear a mournful cry. I had a friend. He lived on the other side of the stream. An eerie smoke rises, the westerly wind blows violently over moors of bamboo and sedge. There is nowhere to hide. I had a friend. He lived on the other side of the stream; today there is not so much as a pheasant’s call. You left in the morning. In the evening, my heart is in a thousand shards wondering why you have gone so far away. In my small hut, I offer Amida no candles, no flowers. In this twilight, lingering in sorrow I feel a special sense of awe. Shaku Buson

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Verses on the Topic ‘Spring Wind on the Kema Embankment’ (Shunpş batei no kyoku) One day I went to visit an old man in my home village. Crossing the Yodo River, I passed along on the Kema embankment. I encountered a young woman on her way home. For several ri, sometimes I was ahead of her, sometimes behind. We fell to chatting. Her figure was graceful. Her appearance was charming. That is how I came to write these eighteen verses, taking on the voice of a woman. I have entitled them “Verses on the topic ‘Spring Wind on the Kema Embankment.’” Verses on the topic “Spring Wind on the Kema Embankment” Eighteen stanzas yabuiri ya Naniwa o idete Nagaragawa

servants’ holiday— leaving Naniwa, I am at the Nagara River

haru kaze ya tsutsumi nagŇshite ie tŇshi

spring wind— the embankment is long, home is still so far away

tsutsumi yori orite hŇsŇ o tsumeba

Coming down from the embankment to gather fragrant herbs, my path was blocked by briars and brambles. Is it that the briars and brambles envy me, so they tear my hem and scratch my thighs?

kei to kyoku to michi o fusagu keikyoku nanzo tojŇ naru kun o saki katsu ko o kizutsuku

keiryş ishi tenten ishi o funde kŇkin o toru tasha-su suijŇ no ishi ware o shite kun o nurasazarashimu o

The stream is dotted with rocks. Walking on the rocks, I gather wild parsley. I am grateful to the rocks that rise above the water. Thanks to them, my hem will not get wet.

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ikken no cha mise no yanagi oi ni keri

the teahouse’s willow tree —it has grown so old!

cha mise no rŇbasu ware o mite ingin ni buyŇ o ga shi katsu waga shun’i o homu

The old woman in the teashop saw me, and kindly offered compliments on my health and praise for my spring clothes.

ten chş ni kaku ari

There were two customers in the teashop talking in Naniwa1 dialect. Throwing down three strings of coins to pay their bill they left, to make room for me to sit down.

yoku kai su KŇnan no go shusen sanbin o nageuchi ware o mukae tŇ o yuzutte saru

koeki sanryŇke byŇji tsuma o yobu tsuma kitarazu hina o yobu rigai no tori rigai kusa chi ni mitsu hina tobite kaki o koen to hossu kaki takŇshite otsuru koto sanshi

shunsŇ michi sansa naka ni shŇkei ari ware o mukau

at the old post station there are two or three houses— a cat calls to his mate, but his mate does not come Outside the fence, a hen calls her chicks: there’s a lot of good grass outside the fence. The chicks all want to get over the fence but it is high, and they fail three or four times. spring grasses: the road splits into three— the middle one is a shortcut: it welcomes me home

——— 1

Literally, the Jiangnan dialect ᳯධ⺆.

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tanpopo hana sakeri sanzan gogo gogo wa kŇ ni sanzan wa shiroshi kitoku su kyonen kono michi yori su

Dandelions bloom, in threes, in fives: five yellow ones here, there, three white; I remember I walked this path years ago.

awaremi toru tanpopo kuki mijikŇshite chichi o amaseri

I pick some of these dandelions that tug at my heart— their short stems are full of milk

mukashi mukashi shikiri ni omou jibo no on

With a pang, I remember my mother’s kindness, long long ago.

jibo no kaihŇ betsu ni haru ari

In her arms there was a special kind of spring.

haru ari seichŇ shite Naniwa ni ari

I grew up in that spring. Now I live in Naniwa in a rich man’s house by Naniwa Bridge where the plum blossoms are white.

ume wa shiroshi NaniwakyŇ hen zaishu no ie

shunjŇ manabi etari Naniwaburi

I learned the ways of Naniwa’s spring, and took on its airs.

gŇ o jishi tei ni somuku mi sanshun moto o wasure sue o toru tsugiki no ume

For three springs I neglected my home, turned my back on my little brother. I was a grafted branch of plum, forgetting my roots.

kokyŇ haru fukashi yukiyukite mata yukiyuku

Spring is deepening in my old village. I hurry, and hurry more.

yŇryş chŇtei michi yŇyaku kudareri

The embankment road, as long as a willow branch slopes downward at last.

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kyŇshu hajimete miru koen no ie kŇkon

Straining to see, I get my first glimpse of home in the twilight

to ni yoru hakuhatsu no hito otŇto o idaki ware o

Near the gate, someone with white hair is holding my brother;

matsu haru mata haru

she has waited for me, spring after spring.

kimi mizu ya kojin Taigi ga ku

Surely you know this verse by the late Taigi:

yabuiri no neru ya hitori no oya no soba

on servants’ holiday sleeping—she is by the side of her widowed mother

Sha Buson

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Yodo River Songs: Three Verses (Denga ka: Sanshu)2 shunsui baika o ukabe nanryş shite To wa Den ni gassu kinran kimi toku koto nakare kyşrai fune den no gotoshi

tosui densui ni gassu kŇryş isshin no gotoshi shşchş negawaku wa shin o tomo ni shi nagaku Naniwa no hito to naran

kimi wa suijŇ no ume no gotoshi hana mizu ni ukabitesaru koto sumiyaka nari shŇ wa kŇtŇ no yanagi no gotoshi kage mizu ni shizumite shitagau koto atawazu

——— 2

BZ, vol. 4, pp. 11–15.

Plum blossoms drift on the waters of spring. The south-flowing Uji joins the Yodo River. Oh, love, do not cast off your brocade line: the boat will be carried away like lightning in the rushing shoals. The waters of the Uji join those of the Yodo River. They mingle, they become as one body. Please come on board, and lie with me. We could become Naniwa people, and live there for a long, long time. Love, you are like a plum blossom on the water a flower floating on the water that quickly disappears. I am like the willow on the riverbank, a shadow in the water that sinks into the depths, and cannot follow.

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Preface to Make the Past Present (Mukashi o ima), 1774 Our departed teacher Hajin learned the art of haikai from Setsuchş-an Ransetsu, and with Hyakuri and Kinpş3 as the two other feet of the tripod, together they caused a new style of haikai to flourish, and they had an excellent reputation, and many people of the time were strongly influenced by the style of these three, it is said. Each of them was a leader of the current style, and they were geniuses that the average person could not hope to imitate. SŇa used to live in KokuchŇ of BukŇ, in an area from which one could see a bell-tower high in the distance; he lived in simplicity, enjoying reclusion in the center of the town. Waking to the bell on frosty nights, in the melancholic sleeplessness of old age, he discussed haikai with me. If I would gossip of the things of the world he would pretend he was deaf and dull-witted. What a splendid old gentleman he was. One evening, he sat formally and said, “The Way of haikai is not necessarily a matter of devoting yourself to your teacher’s rules. Changing with the times, transforming with the times in a spontaneous manner, disregarding what has existed before or what may come into being later is the way it should be.” Struck by this meditation-master’s rod I had a sudden insight, and have some small understanding of the thusness of haikai. Nowadays what I teach my haikai students it is not Hajin’s unaffected language, but chiefly aspire to BashŇ’s sabi and shiori, as I wish to return haikai to its past. This is a matter of turning away from external illusions and responding to inner truths. This is called haikai zen, a dharma that is transmitted directly, from mind to mind. Those who lack understanding of this criticize me, saying that turning one’s back on one’s teacher is a terrible sin, and so forth. With this in mind, the two kasen that follow depart from that sabi-shiori style, instead, they earnestly imitate SŇa’s style, and are humbly offered to him. And now on the thirty-third anniversary of his death we remember him with deep longing, and as if he turns his eyes to us as he did while still living we feel profoundest reverence, I and his other disciples present this.4 Yahantei Buson

——— 3 Takano Hyakuri (1665–1727) was an Edo poet; Ikutama Kinpş (1666–1726) was born in Settsu but eventually moved to Edo. Hyakuri and Kinpş were Ransetsu’s chief disciples. 4 BZ, vol. 4, pp. 139–140.

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Preface to Elder BashŇ Verse-linking Anthology (BashŇ Ň tsukeai shş), 1774 To learn about haikai verse links (tsugiku ⛮ฏ), you must first of all memorize the verses of BashŇ, and know the relationship between the three verses involved in linking (i.e., the uchikoshi, maeku, and tsukeku). If for three days you do not recite the Elder’s verses, thorns will grow in your mouth. However, the Elder’s verses are to be found in a broad range of anthologies, and are not easy to find. Thus we have taken excerpts, condensed them, and should there be people who are devoted to the Way, we present them. A disciple of my school had this printed, saying that it would save the trouble of copying it by hand.5 Heian (Kyoto) Shiko-an Buson

——— 5

Ibid., p. 142.

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“Account of the Rebuilding of the BashŇ Hermitage in Eastern Kyoto” (RakutŇ BashŇ-an saikŇ-ki), 1776 There is a Zen temple at the southwest foot of Mount Hiei in IchijŇjimura. It is called Konpuku-ji. The local people have given it a name; they call it the BashŇ-an. If you walk twenty paces beyond a stone staircase toward the green mountainside, there is a hill. This is where the ruins of the BashŇ-an are, they say. Of course this is a quiet, secluded place, where it is said that the green moss has buried the traces of human beings for some hundred years, but the deep bamboo grove seems like it is enveloped in the smoke of a tea-fire. Streams flow, clouds linger, the trees are ancient, birds sleep, and the sense of the past is powerful. While it could be said to be some distance from the realm of fame and profit in the capital, it cannot be called altogether separate from the dust of the ordinary world.6 Beyond its brushwood fence is the sound of crowing roosters and barking dogs, cattle drivers and woodcutters go around the path by its gate. It is near the house of a tofu seller, and not far from a wine shop. As a result, it is frequently visited by kanshi and haikai poets, and it is convenient for savoring half a day’s silence, and also offers means for procuring a meal to stave off hunger. First of all, for how long has this place been celebrated as the BashŇan? If you ask the children who gather wild herbs or the women who thresh barley where the BashŇ-an is, they always point to this place. Indeed it has had this name since the distant past. However, nobody knows the reason. I heard confidentially that long ago there was a priest called Tesshş ㋕⥱ [d. 1698], who lived at the temple, but he also kept an outbuilding on this site, and he enjoyed living a simple life doing his own washing and cooking, and he refused all visitors, guarding his seclusion, but, hearing BashŇ’s verses, wept, thinking BashŇ was someone who has escaped the world of illusion and entered into the realm of enlightened practice. The verses were always on his lips. Around that time, BashŇ travelled east and west of Yamashiro on a poetry-journey, cleansing himself of worldly impurities in the waves of Kiyotaki waterfall, appreciating the change of seasons in the clouds over Arashiyama,7 and extolling the pleasure of the “fragrant wind” blowing

——— 6 An allusion to a sentence in BashŇ’s Genjş-an ki ᐛ૑ᐻ⸥ (Record of the Unreal Hermitage, 1690), about having a fondness for silence and solitude. 7 NKBT, vol. 45, p. 68. Rokugatsu ya Sixth Month—

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in from far away to reach JŇzan’s ਂጊ summer robe.8 He visited ChŇshŇ’s 㐳ཕ old tomb, and appreciated the sight of an itinerant priest traveling alone on a cold night; 9 and also wrote, “who honors us with his presence, wearing rush matting;”10 he emulated the poetic taste of Mount Gu-shan in writing “yesterday, was your crane stolen?”11 He hiked with a walking stick at the foot of ņhie (Mount Hiei),12 and brushed the morning mist from the hem of his hemp robe, crossing over Shirakawa Mountain,13 and he gazed over the lake water,14 opening his eyes wide

——— mine ni kumo oku covering its peak in cloud Arashiyama Arashiyama 8 NKBT, vol. 45, p. 74. JŇzan no zŇ: Addressed to a Portrait of JŇzan kaze kaoru fragrant breeze— haori wa eri mo as for his jacket tsukurowazu even the collar is untidy Ishikawa JŇzan ⍹Ꮉਂጊ (1583–1672) was a kanshi poet and bunjin. 9 NKBT, vol. 45, p. 33. chŇshŇ no ChŇshŇshi’s tomb— haka mo meguru ka do you travel here too, hachi tatataki itinerant priest? Kinoshita ChŇshŇshi ᧁਅ㐳ཕሶ (1568–1649) was a waka poet, whose Kyohaku shş ᜼⊕㓸 (Kyohaku anthology, published 1649) has the verse hachi tataki / akatsuki gata no / hito koe wa / fuyu no yo sae mo / naku hototogisu (itinerant priest / your lone voice towards dawn— / a hototogisu / that sings / even on a winter’s night). 10 NKBT, vol. 45, p. 19. komo o kite who honors us with his presence tarebito imasu wearing a straw mat— hana no haru flowery spring Imasu is an honorific verb, suggesting that the person addressed is worthy of great respect. Even though he is so poor he wraps himself in a straw mat, the speaker wonders if he is perhaps a saint. 11 NKBT, vol. 45, p. 39. ume shiroshi plum blossoms are white kinŇ ya tsuru o were your cranes nusumareshi stolen yesterday? The verse refers to Chinese poet and recluse Lin Heqing ᨋ๺㕏 (Lin Bu ᨋㅔ, 967– 1028) who lived on Mount Gu-shan in Hangzhou’s ᧮Ꮊ West Lake ⷏ḓ. He remained in seclusion for twenty years, with only his beloved plum trees and cranes for company. BashŇ’s hokku is an aisatsu, suggesting that his host is so much like Lin Heqing in poetic refinement that the fact that he has no cranes about means that they could only have been stolen. 12 NKBT, vol. 45, p. 25. ņhie ya Mount Hiei— shi no ji o hikite tracing out a line hito kasumi one shred of mist 13 NKBT, vol. 45, p. 63. yamaji kite travelling a mountain road nani yara yukashi somehow so affecting— sumiire a violet

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like Du Fu ᧡↭.15 In the haziness around the pine of Karasaki,16 it seems he had a profound experience of sublime poetic insight. It is likely that, because the place was such a pleasant stroll from the Kyoto, from time to time he took a rest from his journeys here on the stony hill. However, after he passed away, with “a dream on a withered moor” as his death poem, this priest grieved deeply, and gave his hut the name BashŇ Hermitage, no doubt because he admired the Elder’s poetic style, in order that it should not be forgotten after his death. I have heard that there are many examples of cases in China where people would name their hermitages after their pleasure in the rain, and so on. Nevertheless, it is not generally known that this place is called BashŇan. This is not to mention the fact that there is nothing he wrote left even as a relic of his brush, so I do not think it could be proved. The chief priest of Konpuku-ji says, “An extremely learned elderly man who lived here until recently told me that the verse about the melancholy of the lonely hototogisu, ‘I am desolate, but make me even more so’17 was something he (BashŇ) wrote for amusement while he was at this mountain temple. Therefore why is it not recorded in deep-colored ink that will not fade like the dew and frost? Alas, Zen (literally, mukudoku ήഞᓼ, not accumulating merit) practices are strict, and one achieves enlightenment without reference to the written word, so that one abandons and regards as worthless even the holy sutras. Because people very lacking in sensitivity say ‘Why should we keep things like this (i.e., BashŇ’s writings)?’ they thoughtlessly rejected them, and let a place like this fall into a state where it becomes home only to silverfish. It is a shame.” I listened to this kind of talk sadly. In any case, there is no way to seek for such things. Still, because it would be a sin to pointlessly abandon a place so picturesque, that has such a splendid reputation, in the end I talked about it with like-minded people, and we rebuilt the hut in form,18 and at the beginning of the

——— 14

Lake Biwa. Tang poet, 712–770. 16 NKBT, vol. 45, p. 26. Karasaki no Karasaki’s pine matsu wa hana yori more hazy than oboro nite its cherry blossoms 17 NKBT, vol. 45, p. 99. uki ware o I am desolate, sabishigarase yo but make me even lonelier, kankodori hototogisu 18 The BashŇ Hermitage was actually rebuilt in 1781. 15

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Fourth Month, when one waits to hear the call of the hototogisu, and the end of the Ninth Month, when the stag bellows, we meet at this temple without fail, and try to emulate the poetic style of BashŇ. DŇryş was the leader of the rebuilding project. DŇryş’s great-grandfather was Tan-an မᐻ with whom BashŇ had studied Chinese literature, it is said. That is why DŇryş was left with the project now—more than anyone else he had a karmic connection to it. The thirteenth day of the Fifth Month of 1776. Recorded by Yahantei Buson of Kyoto 19

——— 19

BZ, vol. 4, pp. 155–158.

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New flower gathering (Shin hanatsumi) Prose section20 Five origins anthology (Gogenshş ੖ర㓸)21 consists of Kikaku’s own selections, and from the first he wrote it out in his own handwriting and gave it to the publisher, intending it as a thing to be propagated among many people, so naturally even his selection principles must have strict. However, when you actually inspect this anthology, you find it for the most part contains verses that are merely difficult to understand; verses you would consider good are very few. The verses among these that are popular are all light and easy to understand. Thus, even among verses which the poet himself felt pride in, thinking “these are well-written,” those which are very difficult and not easily comprehensible are like fine brocade worn in the dark, and could be considered useless. When you read the verse collections of various poets, for the most part they are those that have been published posthumously. Only Five origins anthology was compiled during the poet’s lifetime. I think it is better not to publish hokku collections. After a collection is published, one’s reputation always diminishes immediately. One cannot help feeling that works like Ransetsu anthology and Ransetsu anthology did not serve the reputation of their authors. Why should we even discuss those of mediocre poets? What one would call a good verse is very difficult to achieve. Kikaku is called the Li Qinglian ቄ㕍⬒ (i.e., Li Bo) of haikai poets. But, out of the numerous verses that even he wrote, one does not think to deem even twenty of the excellent. Still, though there are a very large number of overly complex verses in Kikaku’s anthology, every time I read it I feel intrigued. This is where Kikaku is a superior poet. In general; one thinks that his uncluttered style is good. In collections like Otsuyş anthology there are some good verses but as you keep reading you eventually find it tiresome.

——— 20 Shimizu Takayuki shows that there are close connections between Shinhanatsumi’s stories of the supernatural and those in Uji Collection tales ቝᴦᜪㆮ‛⺆ (Uji shşi monogatari); in particular, the tale of Chikukei and Buson’s encounter with a badger while staying at KenshŇ-ji in Tango has many similarities with one in the Uji collection. He points out that Buson’s tales are quite different from those of Ueda Akinari, who became famous for his Tales of moonlight and rain, a collection of stories about ghosts and monsters, in that Buson’s stories, unlike Akinari’s, are presented as if he or one of his friends had personally experienced the events described. Shimizu and Kuriyama, Buson, Issa, pp. 225–226. 21 Published 1749.

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Five origins anthology was something that Kikaku intended to publish during his lifetime; he personally chose the verses, and then wrote them out himself properly on fine-quality paper, but at last, when it was at the point of being sent to the woodblock-carver he died without having his intentions realized. A certain shrine cleric hid Kikaku’s manuscript and would not circulate it, and it was only after a friend of mine called Hyakuman-bŇ Shigen ⊖ਁဌᣦේ paid a high price, went to a lot of trouble and effort, and one way or another he somehow convinced him to part with it. Right away he he discussed it with me, saying, “Please copy this out without changing anything.” While I agreed to do this without hesitation, even before I had started to work on it something happened,22 and I left Edo, and went to stay with GantŇ of Yşki as my host in ShimŇsa, and day and night we practiced haikai; by chance, I met Ryşkyo, who was on a pilgrimage to Tsukuba, and participated in haikai meetings here and there; and I accompanied Tanpoku on a journey to KŇzuke, and we stayed at inns in various places; we travelled around the bay at Matsushima and were swept away by the splendid scenery; we stayed overnight at Soto-no-hama, and as in the story of the pearls of Kappo, forgot to return home, and while I visited many other places, more than three years went by. This being the case, how could Hyakuman wait for me to return to Edo? Eventually he had Kisei ੉ᚑ copy the manuscripts, had it carved in wood [i.e., to have it published], and at last it was published. That was what we now know as Five origins anthology. If you compare it to the original, there is not the least difference, and it has lost none of the distinct character of Kikaku’s own hand. Now, the original is preserved by Umitomo Gyokuga ᶏ෹₹ጾ. The first object of training is to be able to distinguish between a hokku and a hiraku. It is not something one can be careless about. A verse that resembles a hiraku but is actually a hokku:23 nabe sagete yodo no kobashi o yuki no hito

carrying a cooking pot over the Yodo River bridge someone in the snow

This is a hiraku that resembles a hokku:24

——— 22

That is, the death of Hayano Hajin in 1742. Because it lacks a kireji. However, it is a fully developed verse that captures the scene succinctly and completely, and so therefore is a good hokku. 23

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ņmi no ya te no hira hodo na kumo okoru

265

at ņmi clouds come up like they could fit in the palm of one’s hand

SetsudŇ 㔐ၴ Inscribed on a painting of Ezo (Ainu), by Maruyama Mondo ਣጊਥ᳓: kobu de fuku noki no shizuku ya sakki ame

on the eaves thatched with seaweed drops of Fifth Month rain

Mondo There was certain person who had a passion for the handguard of a short-sword that was said to have been made from a nail-cover taken from the palace of Xianyang; he always had it at his waist and cherished it. How much did this antique, inlaid with a bird-and-flower pattern of precious metals, and evoke the splendor of a thousand years! However, asking about what proof was there that this was indeed a nail-cover from the Xianyang Palace is nonsensical talk. Somehow, if he had not claimed it was a nail-cover from the Xianyang Palace, it would have been a wonderful thing, and it is regrettable that he did. Even if it had been woodshavings from Nagara Bridge or the dried frog of Ide, I am sure that the people of today would find it contemptible and dubious. Tokiwa Tanpoku’s Korean tea bowl had been carefully preserved by the warrior ņtaka Gengo; it was handed down to Tanpoku from that very Gengo, and Tanpoku bequeathed it to me. Indeed it had an eminent history of past possession, but what proof was there? Lest it should become like the nail-cover of Xianyang palace, I quickly gave it away. Tenrin-in temple of Matsushima is alongside Zuigan-ji and is a splended Zen monastery. Once, when I was a guest there, the head of the temple gave me an old plank which was more than a foot in length and said, “Lord So-and-So of Sendai was a waka poet without compare. He hired a large number of workers, and had them dredge the bottom of the Natori River and they managed to pull out a fossilized log. This log

——— 24 Because it has a kireji. However, it does not have a kigo, it does not make reference to ņmi’s conventional associations, and it lacks the suggestive overtones that characterize a good hokku.

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was used to make a writing-box, and together with some brushes made from Miyagino bushclover-wood, it was presented to the head of the NijŇ poetry school. This plank is what is left from the log, and is something that should not be treated lightly.” It had a distinct grain like that of zelkova wood. Because it had spent a thousand years on the river bottom, it was black, and as if it had turned to iron, when you tapped it, it made a hollow sound. It weighed only about ten kin, and even when I bundled it up in a cloth and put it on my back, I barely managed to carry it to Shiroishi post station. Because I did not think I could bear the fatigue of carrying it over a long distance, I left it under the veranda of the guest-house where I spent the night and continued on my journey home. Sometime later, when I mentioned this to Tanpoku at the home of GantŇ of Yşki, Tanpoku scolded me angrily, saying, “What! You dirty priest who throws away treasure! I’ll have it for myself! Is someone around that I can send? Go right away!” and he contacted Shinryş in Sukagawa. Shinryş wrote a letter, and sent a servant with him to visit the lodging-place at Shiroishi. The servant said, “A priest who once stayed here left something or other behind, and I have come to look for it.” The innkeeper fortunately looked around, and found it, and gave it to him, and [Shinryş] took it. Later, GantŇ received it [from Tanpoku], and it was made into the inkstone-cover called “Fishes and Cranes.” It is more than seventy ri from Yşki to Shiroishi, and although much time had passed, the object that we obtained and brought home was an exceedingly precious one. Matsuki Tantan did not belong to the company of frivolous poets. A long time ago, I asked Tantan to add and inscription to a painting of BashŇ, Kikaku, and Ransetsu. Tantan responded with: momochidori inaŇsetori yobukodori

plovers rice-birds and cuckoos25

Tantan

——— 25 These were the three birds of the Ancient and modern poetry collection (Kokinshş) secret tradition (momochidori, inaousedori, yobukodori). Tantan compares the three haikai poets to these birds.

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This painting is now in the possession of Shumei ⃨᣿ of NikkŇ in ShimŇsa.26 JŇş of Yşki established a second house and had an old man stay there as caretaker. Even though it was in the middle of the town, it was surrounded by trees and luxuriant with plants, and because it was a place where one could escape the hustle and bustle of the world, I myself stayed there for quite some time. The old man had nothing to do there other than keep the place clean. One time he spent the long autumn night telling his beads in the light of a single lamp, while I stayed in the back room, working on my haikai and my Chinese poetry. Eventually I grew tired, and I spread out the blankets and pulled them over my head. But just as I was drifting off to sleep, there was a tapping sound on the shutters by the veranda. There must have been some twenty or thirty taps. My heart beat faster, and I thought, “How strange!” But when I got out of bed, and quietly slid open the shutter to take a look, there was nothing out there. When I went back to bed and pretended to be asleep, again there was the same tapping sound. Once again I got out of bed and took a look, but there was nothing there. “How very eerie,” I thought, and consulted the old caretaker. I asked, “What should we do?” The caretaker said, “It’s that badger again. The next time it starts tapping like that, quickly open the shutter and chase after it. I’ll come around from the back door, and it will probably be hiding under the fence.” I saw that he was holding a switch. I went back to bed and once more pretended to be asleep. Again there was the sound of tapping. When I shouted, “Aha!” and opening the shutter and running out, the old man came out too, yelling, “Gotcha!” But there was nothing there. So we both got very angry, but even though we looked in every corner of the property, we still couldn’t find a thing. This went on for some five nights running. Wearied by it all, I had finally come to the conclusion that I could no longer stay there, but then a servant of JŇş’s house came and said, “You will not be disturbed tonight, sir. This morning one of the villagers shot an old badger in a place called Yabushita. I believe that there can be no doubt that all of that fuss and trouble was the work of this badger. Rest well tonight.”

——— 26

Nikko is actually in what was KŇzuke Province.

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And indeed, from that night on all of the noises ceased. I began to think sadly that this animal which I had thought of as a nuisance had really offered my some comfort from the loneliness of a traveler’s night, and I felt pity for the badger’s soul, and that we had formed a karmic bond. For that reason I called upon a cleric named Priest Zenkş, made a donation, and for one night chanted nembutsu in order that the badger might eventually achieve Buddhahood. aki no kure hotoke ni bakeru tanuki kana

late in autumn transformed into a Buddha —the badger

A badger came to the door to visit, and it seems that people said he made tapping sounds with his tail, but that was not the case. In fact, he pressed his back against the door. A long time ago, I stayed at a temple called KenshŇ-ji at Miyazu in Tango Province for more than three years. In the beginning of autumn, I suffered from fever for some fifty days. There was a reception room in the rear of the temple that was very large, and because all the shoji were shut tight, there was not a single crack left open for the wind to blow through. The room next to it was turned into my sick-room, and the fusuma sliding doors between the rooms were closed up tight. One night, at about the time of the Fourth Hour,27 because there was a slight break in my fever, thinking I might go to the toilet, I got out of bed and staggered off. The toilet was down the veranda walkway alongside the reception room in the northwest corner. The lamps had been extinguished by now and it was terribly dark, so I opened the fusuma that closed off my room from the other, and when first I went to put my right foot into the room, to my surprise I stepped on something furry. I was terrified, so I instantly jerked back my foot, and though I listened intently for some time, there was no sound at all. Although I was full dread and shocked, I patted myself on the chest to calm my heart, and this time with my left foot, thinking, “This must be about the right place,” I made a sudden kick with my left foot. However, I felt absolutely nothing there. Now I was even more perplexed, and every hair on me was standing on end. Trembling, I went toward the refectory kitchen, and woke up some of the priests from sound sleep, and when I told

——— 27

The Fourth Hour started at two a.m.

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them what had happened, they all got up and came with me. When we went to look inside the reception room with lamps blazing, all the fusuma and shoji were shut tight as usual, with no openings for anything to escape, of course there was nothing unusual there. The priests said, “Mister, your fever has made you muddle-headed, and you’re talking nonsense.” Furious, they all went back to bed. Feeling embarrassed because I had been given such a scolding, I too got back into bed. Just as I was drifting off to sleep, I felt as if a heavy stone had been laid on my chest, and I started to moan loudly. The sound of my voice was within the hearing of the Reverend Chikukei, who came over and said, “How extraordinary! What’s the matter?” and saved me by waking me up. When I finally returned to my senses, I told him what I had experienced, he said, “Things like this do sometimes happen. It must be the work of that badger.” He opened the outer doors, and looked out. Dawn was just beginning to break, and in the pale light one could clearly make out tracks, like fallen petals of plum blossoms, leading from the veranda to under the walkway. And so, even those people who before had said I was talking nonsense and scolded me, said wonderingly, “Hm, maybe it really was something.” Perhaps it was because Reverend Chikukei had come in such a hurry to wake me up, but his sash was undone, and the front of his robe hung open. His plump testicles hung like rice-sacks, but since this area was covered in profuse tufts of white hair, one could not see his penis. Saying that this was a result of having had a rash during his youth, he pulled on his testicles, twisting them and scratching them. I thought he looked very strange, and, wondering if perhaps this was what Old Man Shukaku looked like when he had grown tired of reading scriptures, I was shocked and frightened, and drew back from him. Chikukei laughed very loudly, and recited this verse. aki furu ya kusu hachi jŇ no Kinkakuji

autumn passes, and looking back— eight jŇ of camphor in the Temple of the Golden Pavilion

Chikukei There is a man called Nakamura HyŇzaemon who lives in Shimodate, in Hitachi Province. He belonged to the former Yahantei haikai school, and his haikai name was FşkŇ. He was of unequalled wealth, and lived in a

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fine house of some six acres in size, whose gardens were full of unusual stones and rare plants. He kept a fountain and let loose birds, and the scenery of the garden’s artificial mountain surpassed views of nature. He was such an incomparably fine man that sometimes the provincial governor would come to call. His wife’s name was Omitsu. She was the daughter of a rich man called Fujii Somebody, and was skilled at waka and music. She was also a woman of very fine character. Even though this was such a splendid family, at some point the house went into decline, and became extremely lonely, so that even people who had formerly visited now began to avoid it. When the house first began to go into decline, many peculiar things happened. Among them, something that would make one’s hair stand on end happened one year during in the Twelfth Month, during preparations for the New Year, when a great many mochi rice-cakes were set inside tubs to keep. When mochi started disappearing in the middle of the night, they assumed that a thief had been coming, and put a lid like the door of a gate over every tub, and on top of the lids they lay heavy stones. The following morning, when they fearfully looked inside the tubs, they found that although the lids had been completely undisturbed, more than half the mochi were missing out of each. At that point, FşkŇ went to Edo on official business. During this time Omitsu looked after the household very carefully, and she treated everyone with great compassion; people pitied her and wept sympathetic tears. One night, while she was sewing a fine robe in preparation for the New Year, because she was going to stay up late, she told all the servants to go to bed before her. She closed herself up alone in a room, with all the doors and windows shut tight, where there would have been no place for anything to hide. The lamps were brightly lit, and she worked at her sewing with a tranquil mind. Just at the time that the sound of a water clock made her think, it must be about the Fourth Hour, suddenly five or six old, decrepit-looking foxes with dragging tails walked right past where Omitsu was sitting. The fusuma and the shoji where still closed tightly, and because there was not so much as a crack left open, it was as if they had drilled their way in. Thinking this was very strange, she did not take her eyes off them, but they came and went just as if they were passing through a field with no obstructions, and then they disappeared. Omitsu went right on sewing as if she had not found anything particularly surprising about this. The following day I went to the house to visit her. Hoping to offer some words of comfort, I asked, “How are you doing? You must have a

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lot on your mind, since your husband is so slow in returning.” Omitsu looked even more radiant than usual, and told me quite calmly, “A mysterious thing happened last night,” and described what had happened. I listened, nodding, I moved closer to her, sliding on my knees, and said, “How amazing! When something that strange happened, why didn’t you wake the servants, why did you stay there all alone? You are extraordinarily steadfast.” She answered, “Oh no, I just didn’t think it was all that frightening.” For someone who says that sometimes even the sound of the rain and the wind in the miscanthus grass is so scary she covers her head, the fact that she was not afraid that night is something that is truly unexplainable. Also there was the old man called Shinga, a disciple of Kaiga. One night, Shinga was spending the night at FşkŇ’s house, and he was sleeping in the library. It was the eighteenth night of the Ninth Month. The moon was clear and dew was cool, and there was the sound of insects chirping in the grass, and because it was so affecting, he slept with the shutters open and only the shoji closed. At about the Fourth Hour, he suddenly sat up in bed and looked outside, and it was as bright as day from the dazzling moonlight. Several foxes sat in a row on the veranda, waving their bushy tails. They cast very distinct shadows on the shoji, and there are no words to describe how frightening it was. How could Shinga stand it at that moment? He ran toward the kitchen in a panic, and going up to a room where he thought the host was sleeping, he knocked at the fusuma. “Hey, wake up!” he hollered at the top of his voice. This awakened the servants, who made a big commotion, yelling, “Burglars! There are burglars here!” Hearing this, Shinga himself calmed down, and, his eyes fully awake now, he looked at what he was doing. He realized he was knocking on the door of the toilet, shouting, “Sir! Wake up! Help quickly!” Later he spoke of this, and said, “I am a fool, even if I do say so myself.” Then there was the case of the swordsman Akimoto Gohei ⑺ᧄ੖౓ⴡ, who was a retainer for Matsudaira Yamato no Kami ᧻ᐔᄢ๺቞, Lord of Shirakawa Castle. Having had some differences with his master, he withdrew from service, moved out of the province,28 and changed his name to Suigetsu ㈮᦬. He had a liking for haikai, and

——— 28

Iwaki Province, now in Fukushima Prefecture.

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travelled around YasŇ (i.e., the provinces of KŇzuke, Shimotsuke, Kazusa, and ShimŇsa) as a haikai poet, staying at the homes of the wealthy here and there. Just like duckweed floating in a stream, or mugwort blown about by the wind, he had no home of his own, but was truly a poetic man (fşryş no okina 㘑ᵹߩ⠃). He tells this story. One time when this poet was spending the night in FşkŇ’s back guest room, he heard soft voices, like a group of three old ladies were gathered underneath the veranda, talking into the night. He wondered what they were saying, but though he listened closely he couldn’t make out a word. They just went on talking, and thinking that this was very sad and touching, he was awake until dawn, he said. It is good to get the things that you want even if you have to fight for them. It is good to see the things that you want to see after making an effort to do so. You must not be careless, thinking that there will surely be an occasion when you can get or see this again. It is very difficult to realize your intentions more than once. The officer Umezu Hanuemon was a trusted retainer in a certain household, in his post in Naniwa also his service was excellent, and he received a letter of commendation, and was a person of great fame. Thus his stipend was worth some ten thousand koku, and was a senior retainer in the household. He had a liking for haikai, and as his duties permitted he participated in activities of Kikaku’s school, and took the name Kiteki. He was a poet with many verses in Kikaku’s collections. This person, having completed his work in Edo, was about return home to Akita. Since he was very sad at having to leave Kikaku, he invited him to come along. Kikaku could not go. Kikaku had another disciple by the name of ShikŇ. Because he was very skilled at haikai, at Kikaku’s recommendation he went to attend Kiteki, and sent him off to Akita. Therefore, Kiteki and Kikaku did not cease exchanging letters, so Ieard. Among these was a precious letter written in Kikaku’s own hand. Of course it contained a conventional greeting. After that were included two or three hokku, and in the following paragraph there was this: On a certain day in a certain month, the forty-seven loyal retainers launched a night attack on the enemy stronghold, avenging their dead lord. They ended up Sengakuji temple with nothing to regret. ShiyŇ, Shunban and the others performed deeds that were completely without parallel. Both of those two were practitioners of haikai in those days, they

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were young warriors of poetic sensitivity, and above all, their resolve and emotional depth was endless.

It was truly a document worthy of great respect, and Kiteki kept it hidden away, like a treasure. At that time there was a person called Fukami ShintarŇ. He was a youth so beautiful he would put even He An and Dong Xian to shame. Kiteki had a great affection for this young man, and they formed a bond that was closer even than that of Su Wu and Li Ling. ShintarŇ was also interested in haikai, and went by the name of JŇshŇ. He felt that the letter from Kikaku was something he wanted for himself, and even though he did not say anything about it, Kiteki knew what was on his mind, and ended up giving it to him. After that a few years passed. Among the disciples of Tantan there was a man named Bakuten, and he came to Akita from Naniwa and stayed there for some time. JŇshŇ and Bakuten were both devoted to haikai, and JŇshŇ gave the letter to Bakuten. After that Bakuten moved on to Edo, and he lived in a place called Yanagiwara, near Edo Castle, and sought out a shabby room and lived there. He had always been poor, and now he had run out of ways to pay for clothing and food; he had no aquaintances, and no relatives that he could rely on, so he was in real trouble. When I realized this, I gave him a little something to help him out of his difficulty. I hosted my own monthly haikai meetings, running all over the place making his sales pitch. Because of this, when, starting with people like Hajin, RitŇ, RyŇwa, and Gojaku, people of all kinds joined, eventually the meeting place became filled to bursting with participants, and he had splendid haikai group. Bakuten’s intentions were finally realized when Mokusai Seiga became a member of the group. He (Bakuten) took the name Ihoku, and effortlessly composed linked verse sequences of ten thousand verses, and he safely completed the initiation as a haikai master. His reputation grew naturally, and he participated in many groups, and anyway was very successful. Because he felt great affection and gratitude towards me, his old friend, he told me he would give me the aforementioned Kikaku letter. I replied, “You have only this to treasure. There won’t be another one. How can I accept it? I have no need of it.” I firmly declined his offer. Afterwards I left Edo, and Ihoku became an old man. And as for the letter, I am still troubled with wondering whose collection it ended up in.

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Afterword

The above was written by Master Yahantei himself. One summer, the master decided he would like to write a series of hokku. He prepared a draft notebook, and calling it Sequel to flower gathering (Zoku hanatsumi ⛯⧎៰), and planned to write ten verses each day. At the end of the Fourth Month, he had to suspend the work, still unfinished, because of illness. Around the middle of the Sixth Month, thinking that abandoning writing something every day was not what he wanted, and after recovering from his illness, he took to recording his thoughts in an unstructured way, and after that he neglected it for a long time, and finally gave up on it altogether. After he passed away, I took apart the notebook, and made its pages into a handscroll, adding some of my own illustrations of the meaning of the texts. I testify that the handwriting is authentically that of the master. Fourth Month, 1784, The Buddha’s Birthday29 Gekkei

——— 29

The eighth day of the Fourth Month.

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Preface to Shundei verse anthology (Shundei kushş) Ryş Korekoma edited the manuscript he had inherited from his father, and asked me to write a preface for it. The preface is as follows. I went to visit Shundei-sha ShŇha at his second house in the west of Kyoto. ShŇha asked me a question about haikai. I answered, “Haikai is that which has as its ideal the use of zokugo, yet transcends zoku. To transcend zoku yet make use of zoku, the principle of rizoku, is most difficult. It is the thing that So-and-So Zen master spoke of: ‘Listen to the sound of the Single Hand,’ in other words haikai zen, the principle of rizoku.” Through this, ShŇha understood immediately. He then continued his questions. “Although the essence of your teaching must be profound, is there not some method of thought that I could put into use, by which one might seek this by oneself? Indeed, is there not some shortcut, by which one might, without making a distinction between Other and Self, identify with nature and transcend zoku?” I answered, “Yes, the study of Chinese poetry. You have been studying Chinese poetry for years. Do not seek for another way.” Doubtful, ShŇha made so bold as to ask, “But Chinese poetry and haikai are different in tenor. Setting aside haikai, and studying Chinese poetry instead, is that not more like a detour?” I answered, “Painters have the theory of ‘Avoiding zoku:’ ‘To avoid the zoku in painting, there is no other way but to read many texts, that is to say, both books and scrolls, which causes the qi to rise, as commercialism and vulgarity cause qi to fall. The student should be careful about this.’ To avoid zoku in painting as well, they caused their students to put down the brush and read books. Less possible still is it to differentiate Chinese poetry and haikai.” With that, ShŇha understood. Another time he asked, “From ancient times, the many haikai poets have divided, each to his own gates and doors, and their poetic styles differ. From which of these gates may I enter into the inner teachings?” I answered, “In haikai there are no gates and doors. Only what we call the gate of haikai itself is what acts as the gate. Again, painting theory says, ‘The various painting masters did not divide into gates or build doors. Gates and doors exist in themselves.’ Haikai is just like this too. Learn exhaustively each tradition, and keep these in your mind, and you yourself will choose the best from among them, and make use of it according to the occasion. There is no other way but being introspective about the state of your mind. However, do take care to always choose

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those companions, because if you do not interact with those them, you will not be able achieve this ideal.” ShŇha said, “What do you mean by ‘those companions’?” I answered, “I mean seeking after Kikaku, looking for Ransetsu, inviting in SodŇ, accompanying Onitsura. Renewing acquaintance with these Four Elders every single day. Above all, separating yourself from the realm of fame and fortune a little; wandering in the garden, and holding your poetrygatherings in nature’s midst. Drinking wine, having witty conversations, and when you write poems, just letting them come to you, without forcing them. Doing this day after day, one day one meets the Four Elders. Be always in quiet contemplation of the natural landscape with a poet’s spirit. Close your eyes, and earnestly compose your poem, and when you have done it, open them again. The Four Elders are gone. Now alone, you wonder, ‘where did they go?’ pausing, entranced. That is when you smell the sweet fragrance of cherry blossoms, and see the moonlight reflecting off the water. That is the answer to your question about the method to haikai.” ShŇha responded with a little grin. He ended up becoming a member of my poetry circle and composed thousands of verses. He had a particular contempt for the work of Bakurin and ShikŇ. I told him, “Even though the tone of Bakurin and ShikŇ may be called vulgar, they are skillful at describing human emotions and ordinary situations. For this reason, imitating their work might not be entirely unhelpful sometimes, if you treat it as a poetic technique. It is the same for Chinese poetry: one has no objections to Li ᧘ and Du ᧡,30 but still, learn what one can from Yuan ర and Bo ⊕.”31 ShŇha said, “But, Master, do not confuse me with this phony zen. Painters view Wu ๓ and Zhang ᒛ32 as the devils of painting. Bakurin and ShikŇ are like them, nothing but devils of haikai.” He criticized Bakurin and ShikŇ more and more, went straight ahead without getting distracted by trivial things, and attained the level of haikai excellence. Tragically, one day he fell gravely ill, and did not recover. As time passed he grew thin and frail, and there was nothing medicine could do for him. Realizing that the moment had come to die, he called for me

——— 30

Li Bo and Du Fu. Yuan Zhen రᘅ (779–831) and Bo Juyi. They were mid-Tang poets credited with bringing about a revival of yuefu (Music Bureau) poetry. 32 Wu Wei ๓உ (1459–1508; hao ภ, Xiaoxian ዊ઄), and Zhang Lu ᒛ〝 (1464–1538, hao, Pingshan ᐔጊ), were both Ming court painters. This alludes to the disdain that literati felt for court painters. 31

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and grasped my hand, and said, “What I regret is that I will not be able to join you in the new style (ryşkŇ).” He died with tears in his eyes. I wept, saying over and over again, “My haikai has gone to the West. My haikai has gone to the West.” The above comes from a volume called Yahan chats over tea (Yahan meiwa ᄛඨ⨏⹤). Yahan chats over tea was a book that I myself edited, a record of discussions between various people. And I do not use it here as the introduction to this collection without a very good reason. This text shows how pure and uncluttered ShŇha’s work was, and I hope that by knowing about his character readers will appreciate his verse as being without artifice. That he was not to be compared to a sheep who drapes itself in a tiger’s skin is what, I, Old Buson, aged sixty-two, write at the Midnight Studio in the capital, 1777, the seventh day of the Twelfth Month.

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Linked Verse Sequence “Rape-flowers—” (Na no hana ya) 1. Buson na no hana ya tsuki wa higashi ni hi wa nishi ni

rape-flowers— the moon in the east the sun in the west

In a field of blossoming rapeseed plants that blankets the landscape in yellow, the full moon rises in the east as the sun sinks into the west. Scholars have pointed out the similarity between this verse and the second of Tao Yuanming’s “Untitled Poems:” The white sun sinks into the western slopes, the pale moon rises over the eastern peaks. For ten thousand leagues the light shines, Over a great distance the sky is bright33 ⊕ᣣ᷍⷏㒙 ⚛᦬಴᧲Ꭸ ㆔㆔ਁ㉿ノ ⭡⭡ⓨਛ᥊ It is also alludes to this verse by Kakinomoto no Hitomaro: himugashi no no ni kagiroi no tatsu miete kaerimisureba tsuki katabukinu

I watch the sky grow lighter over the eastern fields; turning around I see the moon has dropped down low. 34

Man’yŇshş, vol. 1, no. 48 Na no hana ya inverts the scenery of the Tao Yuanming verse. The Chinese verse presents a common-sense narrative of day giving way to night, by mentioning the sun first and then the moon. Buson has reversed the order, looking first to the east to describe the position of the moon, and then to the west, where the sun is disappearing.

——— 33 Cited in Teruoka Yasutaka, Za no bungei: Buson no renku (ShŇgakukan, 1978), p. 123. For a complete English translation of the Tao Yuanming poem, see James Hightower, The Poetry of T’ao Ch’ien (Oxford: Clarendon, 1970), p. 187. 34 Takagi Ichinosuke et al., eds., NKBT, vol. 4, Man’yŇshş I (Iwanami Shoten, 1957), p. 35.

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Since the hokku merely names the elements of the scene without adding much extra detail, many later commentators, especially those writing about this hokku as a verse independent of the sequence, have labeled this as being in the shasei style. Although Buson hokku anthology has “Spring scene” and Iwama Otsuni’s ጤ㑆ਸੑ (1756–1823) Buson’s hokku explained (Buson hokku kai ⭢᧛⊒ฏ⸃, 1833) includes the headnote “Scenery outside the capital,” later critics have tended to ignore these.35 However, others, like Teruoka Yasutaka, believe that the headnote does indeed have real meaning, and was added to give a kanshilike overtone to the verse.36 In any case, when this verse was used as a hokku to begin a sequence, there was no headnote. As we saw above, this hokku was not composed specifically for this sequence, and so it does not seem to be functioning as an aisatsu complimenting the host or the location. However, it is properly hokkulike in being light in tone and sublime in scale. 2. Chora yama moto tŇku sagi kasumi yuku

at the foot of a mountain, distantly herons grow misty

The waki, by Chora, continues the description of the scene begun by the hokku. He adds to its wide panorama-like view some living creatures— herons, whose forms are growing indistinct in the mist as the light fails. The hokku’s brightly colored landscape starts to fade a bit. Nomura Kazumi suggests that this verse alludes to one by Go-Toba: miwataseba yama moto kasumu minasegawa yşbe wa aki to nani omoi kemu

when I gaze out to where mist covers the foot of the mountain at Minase River why did I think “in autumn, it is the evening”?37

——— 35 In Lectures on Buson’s hokku (Buson kushş kŇgi ⭢᧛ฏ㓸⻠), NaitŇ Meisetsu ౝ⮮㡆㔐 does not take into account the headnote, writing, “This refers to no more than simple spring scenery.” Masaoka Shiki writes, “[The headnote] was added to avoid a pedestrian (tsukinami ᦬ਗ) overly logical interpretation.” Mizuhara ShşŇshi ᳓ේ⑺᪉ሶ (1892–1981) comments, “In this instance, it must not have any particular meaning. It is simply put there as a means of adding weight to the verse.” Cited in Teruoka, Za no bungei, p. 123. 36 Ibid., p. 123. 37 NKBT, vol. 28, no. 36.

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3. KitŇ watashibune sakate mazushiku haru kurete

ferry boat— his tip is a poor one late in spring

Because this is the daisan, the situation it describes is supposed to be different from that existing in the linked hokku and waki, and KitŇ’s verse accomplishes this. From a panoramic scene of natural landscape, inhabited only by herons, the focus pulls in on a human figure—a ferry captain in his boat—and a very human emotion. The season is still spring, but haru kurete makes it late spring, unlike the reference to na no hana in the hokku, which bloom in early spring. The end of spring is supposed to evoke an elegant pang of regret in the hearts of persons of poetic sensibility. Here there is a feeling of regret at the end of spring, but it is more pragmatic: the ferry captain is disgruntled over the stinginess of his passengers. This is the third spring verse. As is typical of a daisan, the verse ends in a -te (continuative) form. 4. Buson okuni gae to wa aranu soragoto

“Transferred to another province?” a baseless lie!

The quietly evocative landscape of the waki has disappeared, and now the scene is completely concerned with human affairs. Buson offers an explanation for the paucity of the tip: okunigae—the forcible transfer of a daimyŇ to another fief. Okunigae were one of the Tokugawa shogunate’s strategies of keeping the daimyŇ under control, preventing them becoming too rich or powerful. Besides being disruptive, okunigae were extremely expensive, and if it were the case that the samurai passenger was serving a daimyŇ under a transfer order, it would account for his parsimoniousness. However, the ferry captain here does not believe the explanation, as he has not heard about it before. As it does not contain a kigo, this is classified as a miscellaneous verse. 5. Chora wakizashi o koshiraetareba haya umishi

when he wore his sword at his waist he quickly lost interest

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The ferry boat and its captain have disappeared, and now the focus is on an individual samurai. Having expected the transfer, he has put his sword on, and readied himself for possible trouble. But, once he realized that this was only a rumor, the sword seems like an inconvenient burden. Normally this would be a moon verse, but since the hokku makes reference to the moon, it is not necessary to do so here. 6. KitŇ mino kite izuru yuki no akebono

he goes out dressed in a straw cloak— a snowy dawn

This verse offers a different reason for the samurai’s disenchantment with his sword: poetic intoxication. Waking at dawn and realizing that snow has fallen in the night, he is seized with the elegant desire to see it. A sword is just a nuisance to someone who is going snow-viewing in a straw coat. As Teruoka points out, a straw coat worn in the rain seems shabby and sad, but when worn in the snow has a special elegance. A hokku by Buson makes this clear: ame no toki mazushiki mino no yuki ni tomeri

the straw coat, poor when it rains is rich in snow38

7. Buson Ninnaji o Komatsu no sato to tare ka iu

Ninna-ji— some call it Komatsu Village

Buson takes another view of the elegant person in the maeku, imagining that his journey through the snow takes him through the area around Ninna-ji, the temple near Kyoto, in Omuro that he alludes to in the hokku “have I run into Matabei? / blossoms at Omuro / at their height (Matabei ni / au ya Omuro no / hana zakari). Emperor KŇkŇ శቁ (r. 884– 887) was buried here, and as he was also called the Komatsu Emperor, the land nearby got the name Komatsu-no-sato.

——— 38

BZ, vol. 1, no. 1190.

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8. Chora koishiki hito no uma tsunagitari

the beloved one walks leading a horse

Ninna-ji evoked associations with male homosexual love—the love between a chigo ⒩ఽ (page) and his older patron. In the 1676 dictionary of haikai word associations, Companion boat (Ruisenshş 㘃⦁㓸), there is the entry, “chigo—Ninna-ji.” So the link here is made by describing a man who has gone to the temple on horseback and is met by his lover, a young acolyte. This verse may allude to the Tale of the Heike story of Taira Tsunemasa ᐔ⚻᡽, who as a child served Ninna-ji’s Imperial Abbot KakushŇ HoshinnŇ ⷡᕈᴺⷫ₺. Just before he is to leave the capital, Tsunemasa rides his horse to bid farewell to his former master. Tsunemasa presents the Abbot with his biwa lute, named Seizan 㕍ጊ, and the two exchange poems.39 The verse may also allude to another incident in the Tale of the Heike, when “Lord Komatsu (Taira Shigemori ᐔ㊀⋓) had a saddle put on a good horse, and had it brought to Nakatsuna, saying, “Indeed, you actions the other day were excellent! This is a very fine horse. When night falls, and you leave the barracks to visit your lady, please make use of it.”40 9. KitŇ fuki watasu ayame ga noki o shinoburan

placed in the thatch the irises seem to languish over the eaves

This verse fixes the time of year as around the fifth day of the Fifth Month. Leaves of iris were put into the thatched eaves of homes as far back as the Heian period. They were thought to dispell evil spirits as well as harmful insects. Shinobu has multiple meanings: to hide, to visit a lover secretly, to long for or remember, to endure suffering. The identity of “beloved” person in the maeku is changed—it now seems to be a young woman, for whom the person who decorates his thatch with irises is longing.

——— 39 Takagi Ichinosuke et al., eds., NKBT, vol. 33, Heike monogatari II (Iwanami Shoten, 1959–60), pp. 105–106. 40 Takagi Ichinosuke et al., eds., NKBT, vol. 32, Heike monogatari I (Iwanami Shoten, 1959–60), p. 293.

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10. Buson ame ni mo narazu yagate hi tomosu

it has not rained— finally, they light the lamps

The Fifth Month is the beginning of the rainy season, and the maeku’s reference to the Fifth Day of the Fifth Month Festival (Tango no sekku ┵ඦߩ▵ฏ, celebrated as Children’s Day in the modern period) prepares us to imagine a day of rain. Toward the end of the day the rain has stopped, and the lamps are lit. Teruoka notes that the fifth day of the Fifth Month was also called “Medicine Day” ⮎ᣣ. 11. Chora shakuhachi no keiko kururi to narabi ite

at shakuhachi practice they are lined up in a row

Chora imagines the quiet evening scene of the maeku as the setting for shakuhachi practice. It seems likely, given the direction that the following verse takes, that the shakuhachi students here are monks, possibly komusŇ ⯯ή௯ monks of the Fuke ᥉ൻ sect. 12. KitŇ zoku torae yo to Ňyake no fure

“catch the criminals!” says the official notice

KitŇ recasts the scene as one in which an official government order has come, urging those present to catch a criminal. KomusŇ monks wore large basket-shaped hats to cover their faces, and were frequently rŇnin, or samurai who had committed criminal acts and joined the priesthood to atone for them. Because their lifestyle meant that they could travel around the country anonymously, they were sometimes used to track down criminals.41 13. Buson wase karite okute mo etaru kokoro nari

——— 41

Teruoka, Za no bungei, p. 127.

the early harvest gathered and the feeling of the late harvest in as well

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Buson takes the “official notice” as an announcement of the rate of the annual tax. Here, the person who has received the notice, the village leader perhaps, is relieved because the early crop of rice was a good one, and the second crop is safely in as well. The maeku’s injunction, to “take” (torae) the criminals has been realized in the tsukeku’s wase karite (the early rice brought in) and etaru kokoro—a feeling of having achieved something. This is an autumn verse. 14. Chora tenki no tsuzuku Ňmi-ji no aki

autumn on the Ňmi Road where the weather is holding

A light verse, which specifies the location of the maeku’s action, and opens out into a description of landscape. The second autumn verse. 15. KitŇ monzen no fune toki idasu tsuki no kure

untying the boat before the gate and departing— the setting moon

The ņmi road runs near Lake Biwa, and this verse introduces a scene that takes place at the lakeside. Monzen can mean, “in front of the gate of an ordinary house,” though it also has the implication that the gate belongs to a temple. Tsuki no kure, setting of the moon, can also mean “a moonlit evening.” This is the third autumn verse. It is also a moon verse, which would ordinarily belong at Number 13. 16. Buson deshi no sŇzu wa yoki koromo kite

the disciple priests wearing fine robes

Buson imagines the boat’s passengers as a disciple priest ᒉሶߩ௯ㇺ (deshi no sŇzu) and his master. SŇzu is a relatively high priestly rank, so the disciple priest’s master must be quite a grand personage. The implication here is that master and disciple are travelling together. There is an element of humor in the contrast between the priests’ fine clothes and the rickety boat.

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17. Chora hana no naka kachş-no-shş ni yukiainu

amid the blossoms he runs into the daimyŇ’s retainer

Chora expands on the suggestion of colorful finery in yoki koromo, and adds a scene of a cherry-blossom viewing party. Someone, perhaps a townsperson, runs into first the priests in their splendid vestments, then a local samurai, out enjoying the beauty of the blooming cherry trees. This, a blossom verse, is in its proper position. 18. KitŇ kabuki no mane no hayaru kono haru

this spring, with kabuki imitation so popular

The priests have disappeared, and KitŇ now makes the scene into one in which the crowds out for cherry-blossom viewing are gathered around a small stage to watch amateur kabuki. The real performers all came from professional kabuki families, but fans often learned their favorite parts and performed them for their own amusement.42 In KitŇ’s Diary of a journey (Yado no nikki ኋߩᣣ⸥, 1776), the verse ended in the words kono goro (at this time). However, since a spring verse like the maeku was supposed to be followed by at least two more verses, kono haru (this spring) is a stronger choice. 19. Buson nagaki hi ya makie no chŇdo itowashiki

long spring day— the lacquered furnishings are extremely hateful

One interpretation of this verse suggests that both the kabuki imitation and one’s richly decorated lacquer furnishings are distasteful on a long spring day, which was assumed to be accompanied by a feeling of tiredness.43 Another states that being stuck inside all day with one’s fancy

——— 42 Buson himself was very fond of kabuki. Tanomura Chikuden tells this story in Toseki sasa roku ዼ⿒ℴ‫ޘ‬㍳ (completed 1834): Once one of Buson’s painting disciples went to visit him, and found his house dark. Hearing a strange noise coming from within, the friend feared there was some catastrophe taking place. After forcing his way inside, he found Buson alone, acting out the part of one of his favorite kabuki characters. Cited in Tanaka, p. 236–237. 43 Teruoka, Za no bungei, p. 129.

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furnishings is hateful if one would really rather be outside enjoying the kabuki performance on a long spring day.44 This is the third spring verse. 20. Chora minori no michi ni kokoro yosetsutsu

one’s mind is drawing close to the Way of the Sacred Law

Chora proposes that the reason the person in the previous verse has come to find his lacquer furnishings distasteful is that he has awakened to the truth of the Buddhist law. Buddhism teaches that all the things of this world are illusions, and an enlightened person is indifferent to luxury and glamor. 21. KitŇ furusato no tsuma ni fumi kaku sayo fukete

spending the night writing a letter to his wife at home

KitŇ describes behavior that might be expected from someone who has taken up Buddhist practice. Perhaps it is a pilgrim who is writing to his wife, or a member of some devotional group, like the hachi tataki, itinerant mendicants who wandered through the countryside beating on gourds or bowls and asking for alms. Although an enlightened person is supposed to be free of attachments, he still feels the need to stay in touch with his wife. 22. Buson waka daishŇ ni tanomareshi mi no

receiving orders from a young general

The identity of the letter-writer is changed to that of a samurai, on whom a young commander relies. He is writing the letter because he does not know when he will be able to return home again. Or perhaps he wants his wife to do something for the sake of his commander. Buson’s verse is suggestive of some larger narrative, but does not appear to allude to any particular literary work or historical event.

——— 44

Nomura Kazumi, Buson renku zenchşshaku (Kasama Shoin, 1975), p. 185.

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23. Chora sake itto botan no sono ni sosogi keri

a barrel of wine was poured out in the garden of peonies

The solitary letter writer has disappeared, and now we are introduced to a lively party in a peony garden. Peonies were greatly admired in China, and mention of them evoked associations of rich, voluptous color and an exotic atmosphere. Sake itto comes from a poem by Chinese poet Du Fu, that said that Li Bo drank a gallon of wine (㈬৻᢯) and wrote a hundred poems (⹞⊖▻).45 24. KitŇ hi wa kakuyaku to yoki sumi o suru

when the sun is glittering he grinds fine ink

The word kakuyaku ⿗ᅂ (shining, glittering) has strong kanshi-like overtones and continues the Chinese theme of the maeku. Here we are to imagine the delicate scent of fine ink as it is being ground on the inkstone on a brilliantly sunny day. The persona in the first might be an actual historical figure like KŇbŇ Daishi, famous for his calligraphy, who spent time in China studying Buddhism. Alternatively, it might be an imaginary bunjin, readying himself for a painting or a poem. 25. Buson asu wa haya Fudaraku-sen o tachiiden

tomorrow, early I will leave Mount Fudaraku

Fudaraku ᥉㒚⪭ (Sanskrit, Potalaka) is the sacred realm of the bodhisattva Kannon ⷰ㖸 (Sanskrit, Avalokiteshvara). It is also the name of a Tendai sect ᄤบቬ temple in Kii. A holy man has gone to the sacred realm—or to the temple—to practice austerities. Having completed his work there, it is time to depart. 26. Chora tŇfu ni akite kuu mono mo naku

——— 45

Teruoka, Za no bungei, p. 120.

except for this boring tofu there’s nothing to eat

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Chora suggests, humorously, what might be on the mind of the person who realizes it is time to leave Fudaraku. Fudaraku represents a place a pilgrimage to which a layperson has gone, and now wishes he or she could leave. Buddhists were prohibited from taking life, and so tofu was a major source of protein in temple meals. The persona here is probably a layperson, whose commitment to Buddhism is not enough to make monks’ cuisine palatable. This is the last verse published in Sequel to dawn crow. 27. KitŇ waga sode wa sukoshi no zeni ni omotakute

in my sleeves a few small coins are feeling heavy

KitŇ supplies another reason why the maeku’s persona has been eating nothing but tofu: poverty. Here he describes someone who normally has so little money that even a few zeni ㌛ (very low-value coins) feel like a lot to him. Kimono have no pockets, so people sometimes used their sleeves to carry or conceal small items. 28. Buson umi yaya chirite46 ishi o yuku kawa

the sea is even closer now the river flowing over the stones

Buson reads the maeku’s persona as a traveler, who keeps his money in his sleeves to conceal it from highwaymen. The link describes the landscape he is travelling through. As a river approaches the sea, the water-level drops, and rocks are visible jutting out from the riverbed. 29. Chora tobu tsuru no ha ni kage utsuru asa no iro

the light reflects from the flying cranes’ feathers— color of morning

Chora’s tsukeku continues the description of landscape, and just as he does in the waki, he expands on it by adding an image of birds, this time cranes.

——— 46 Scholars believe that “chirite” (fallen) is a textual error; “chikaku” (close) makes more sense here. BZ, vol. 2, p. 279. The translation follows the assumption that “chikaku” is correct.

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This should be a moon verse, but this one does not explicitly mention the moon. It is possible to read kage (light) as moonlight. However, the verse is classified as miscellaneous, so it does seem that the verse violates the rules. 30. KitŇ kami ni tsukauru oi no mi no aki

the weary lot of a man grown old in the service of the gods

KitŇ adds a person to the maeku’s early-morning scene, a shrine-keeper who finds old age a bitter experience. Despite his years of devotion to the gods, he has been forgotten by everyone. The phrase mi no aki can be read either “the autumn” or “the weariness” of one’s position. Autumn’s chill was said to mi ni shimu—penetrate one’s being,47 just as this shrinekeeper’s feelings of forlornness have penetrated his. The Chora hokku that we saw in Chapter Six, “calling ‘cry! cry!’ / it assails me / autumn wind” (nake nake to / ware o semekeri / aki no kaze) similarly refers to the overpoweringly invasive quality of the autumn wind. 31. Buson tsuyushimo no furu karakasa o sute kanetsu

hard to part with an old umbrella covered with frozen dew

A karagasa is a large paper-covered umbrella. Furu can be read two ways, as part of the phrase furu karagasu: “old umbrella,” or as part of tsuyushimo no furu: “frozen dew falls.” Buson’s verse contrasts the old shrinekeeper’s sense of abandonment with the sentimental attachment one feels toward an object that has served one long and well. Teruoka points out another example of this kind of link in Buson’s verse sequences: ware mo isoji no haruaki o shiru

I, too, know fifty springs and autumns

KitŇ

——— 47

ņoka Makoto et al., Daisaijiki, vol. 2 (Shşeisha, 1989), p. 51.

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nanji ni mo zukin kishŇ zo furu hioke

I should wrap you, too in a zukin hood! —old brazier

Buson He was also very fond of umbrellas, and often painted them. Several of his hokku mention umbrellas: bakesŇ na kasa kasu tera no shigure kana

the mysterious umbrella I borrow— temple during winter rains48

furukasa no basa to shigururu tsuki yo kana

old umbrella glistening in a winter shower tonight the moon wears a halo—49

harusame ya monogatari yuku mino to kasa

spring rain— chatting as they go along, a straw coat and umbrella50

32. Chora kane o kasuga no sato e yado gae

to borrow money, a change in dwelling-place to Kasuga-no-sato

Chora builds on the image of the old umbrella in the maeku, adding the figure of a man down on his luck. Kasuga is an ancient place-name with many elegant associations—it is the site of Kasuga Shrine, for instance. Here the poet plays off these overtones by making a pun. Kasu means to lend. So the persona here has decided to move to Kasuga not because of its rich tradition in poetry, but because he has rich friends there who might lend him money. 33. KitŇ oki idete rakushu yomikudasu okashisa yo

——— 48

Dated 1771. BZ, vol. 1, no. 960. Dated 1777. BZ, vol. 1, no. 1920. 50 Dated 1782. BZ, vol. 1, no. 2213. 49

how funny! getting up and going to recite rakusho satires

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A rakushu is a verse of rakusho, satirical poetry. KitŇ describes the behavior of the ne’er-do-well of the maeku, who enjoys composing satirical verse. 34. Buson cha ni kumu mizu no asakute ni sumu

the shallows of water drawn for tea clear in the hand

Buson recasts the character of the maeku’s rakusho enthusiast as a man of cultivation and taste. When he goes to the well to draw water for tea, he finds it shallow but clear. Nomura argues that there has been a transcription error here. Rather than asaku te ni (shallowly in the hand) the verse should read asaku ni te (in the shallows). He posits that the connection between the verses is fluidity: that of the water is similar to the recitation of rakusho verse, its fresh taste as bracing as the pointed satire.51 35. Chora naka naka ni kaze no naki hi o chiru sakura

cherry trees lose their blossoms faster on a day when there is hardly any wind

The maeku’s actions are given a season and a backdrop. Cherry trees lose their blossoms quickly, and this seems to happen faster when there is no wind, although one might think otherwise. This is a light verse, making the composition of the important final verse less challenging. It is a blossom verse, as the fifth verse of the second sheet is supposed to be. 36. KitŇ kure ososhi to te obashima ni tatsu

thinking, sunset comes late standing by the railing

The ageku is suitably felicitous and light. In the setting sun of a late spring day, the persona leans against the railing to watch it, and reflects on how long the days last now, this late in spring.

——— 51

Nomura, p. 186.

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CITED BUSON HOKKU aki mo haya sono higurashi no inochi kana, 71 aki no kure hotoke ni bakeru tanuki kana, 268 amadera ya jşya ni todoku bin kazura, 60, 207 aoume ni mayu atsumetaru bijin kana, 88 ayu kurete yorade sugiyuku yowa no kado, 88 bakesŇ na kasa kasu tera no shigure kana, 290 botan chirite uchikasanarinu ni san pen, 154 Fuji hitotsu uzumi nokoshite wakaba kana, 110, 237 Fuji o mite tŇru hito ari toshi no ishi, 61 furu ido ya ka ni tobu sakana oto kurashi, 106 furu ike no kawazu oiyuku ochiba kana, 55 furukasa no basa to shigururu tsuki yo kana, 290 fuyu uguisu mukashi ņ I ga kakine kana, 2 gakumon wa shiri kara nukeru hotaru kana, 107, 220 hana chirite konoma no tera to nari ni keri, 91 hana chirite mi no shita yami ya hinoki kasa, 122 hana ibara kokyŇ no michi ni nitaru kana, 124 hana mori no mi wa yumi ya naki kagashi kana, 93 hana no kumo mie ni kasanete kumo no mine, 116 hana o fumishi zŇri mo miete asane kana, 227 hanjitsu no kan o enoki ya semi no koe, 79 haru no umi hinemosu notari notari kana, 106 haru no yo ya yoi akebono no sono naka ni, 111 harusame ya hito sumite keburi kabe ni moru, 126 harusame ya monogatari yuku mino to kasa, 290 hatsuka ji no senaka ni tatsu ya kumo no mine, 87 hironiwa no botan ya ama no ippŇ ni, 127 hirugao ya machi ni nariyuku kui no kazu, 87 hita to inu no naku machi ni koete odori kana, 234 hoso koshi no hŇshi suzuro ni odori kana, 234 hototogisu e ni nake higashi shirojirŇ, 70 hototogisu uta yomi yşjo kikoyu naru, 118 ichi jin wa sakaki ni jin wa kaji no fune, 214

302

CITED HOKKU BY BUSON

ikanobori kinŇ no sora no aridokoro, 91 Iwakura no kyŇjo koiseyo hototogisu, 221 kanbutsu ya motoyori hara wa kari no yado, 117 Katsuragi no kamiko nugabaya ake no haru, 98 KenkŇ wa kinu mo itowaji koromogae, 75 kiji uchite kaeru ieji no hi wa takashi, 125 kinŇ ini kyŇ ini kari no naki yo kana, 91 kogarashi ya ika ni yo wataru ie go ken, 89 komabune no yorade sugiyuki kasumi kana, 90 koromogae haha nan Fujiwara uji nari keri, 118 koromogae mi ni shiratsuyu no hajime kana, 118 maku majiki sumai o nemono gatari kana, 90 manzai no fumi katametaru kyŇ no tsuchi, 218 marumero wa atama ni kanete Edo kotoba, 73 mashirage no yone isshŇ ya sushi no meshi, 119 Matabei ni au ya Omuro no hana zakari, 230 Matsushima no tsuki miru hito ya utsuse kai, 68 mimi utoki chichi nyşdŇ yo hototogisu, 118 mochi kyştai no kabi o kezureba kaze kŇryş no kezuri kake, 99 na no hana ya tsuki wa higashi ni hi wa nishi ni, 278 nabe sagete yodo no kobashi o yuki no hito, 264 nakanaka ni hitori areba zo tsuki o tomo, 113 naki fushite koe koso shinobe take no yuki, 102 natsugawa o kosu ureshisa yo te ni zŇri, 76 nawashiro ni Kurama no sakura no chiri ni keri, 110 nishikigi no kado o megurite odori kana, 234 omonoshi no yoake o neiru shiwasu kana, 180 saitan o shitari gao naru haikaishi, 116 sararetaru mi o funkonde taue kana, 78 sarudono no yosamu toiyuku usagi, 72 sekirei no o ya Hashidate o ato nimotsu, 210 sensoku no tarai mo morite yuku haru ya, 107 shigonin ni tsuki ochi kakaru odori kana, 234 shira ume ni akuru yo bakari to nari ni keri, 2 shiramu toru kojiki no tsuma ya ume ga moto, 63 suisen ni kitsune asobu ya yoi zuki ya, 125 suribachi no misomi meguri ya tera no shimo, 61 sushi o osu sekijŇ ni shi o dai subeku, 119 sushi o osu ware sake kamosu tonari ari, 119

CITED HOKKU BY BUSON

sushi oke o araeba asaki yşgyo kana, 119 susuki mitsu hagi nakaran ya kono hotori, 140 suzushisa ni mugi o tsuku yo no Uhei kana, 68, 237 takujŇ no sushi ni me samushi Kangyotei, 120 tanomarete sakura mi ni yuku otoko kana, 121 tŇasa ni tsuwamono bune ya natsu no tsuki, 124 Toba dono e gorokki isogu nowaki kana, 89 uguisu no sosŇ ga mashiki hatsune kana, 99 uguisu ya nani gosotsukasu yabu no shimo, 2 uki ware ni kinuta ute ima wa mata yamine, 112 ume sageta ware ni shiwasu no hito tŇru, 62 ureitsutsu oka ni noboreba hana ibara, 124 usuginu ni kimi ga oboro ya Gabi no tsuki, 99 uzuki yŇka shinde umaruru ko wa hotoke, 118 waga namida furuku wa aredo izumi kana, 41 waga sono no makuwa mo nusumu, 79 waga zukin uki yo no sama ni nizu mogana, 112 waka take ya Hashimoto no yşjo ari ya nashi, 225 yado kasanu hokage ya yuki no ie tsuzuki, 89 yanagi chiri shimizu kare ishi tokoro dokoro, 66, 137, 238 yuki toshi ya akuta nagaruru Sakuragawa, 63 yuku haru no shunjun toshite osozakura, 121 yuku haru ya omotaki biwa no daki gokoro, 126 yuku haru ya senja o uramu uta no nushi, 90 yumitori no obi no hirosa yo takamushiro, 79

303

INDEX Akinari. See Ueda Akinari Ama-no-hashidate, 45, 209, 210, 212, 213, 216 Ancient and modern poetry card anthology (Kokon tanzaku shş), 42 Arikida Moritake, 41, 197 Around here Four kasen in one night (Kono hotori Ichiya shi kasen), 133, 139, 140, 151, 164, 178 Ashigari. See The reed cutter BashŇ Revival, 4, 5, 8, 11, 12, 14, 16– 18, 26, 27, 28, 30, 32–38, 41, 46, 47, 51, 59, 80–82, 95, 109, 112, 114, 115, 120, 123, 131, 132, 136, 139, 140, 151, 163, 167, 241, 242, 247, 248 BashŇ school. See ShŇmon BashŇ seven anthologies (BashŇ shichibu shş), 31 BashŇ shichibu shş. See BashŇ seven anthologies (BashŇ shichibu shş) BashŇ-an, 37, 249, 259, 261 Blossoms and birds collection (KachŇ hen), 36, 114, 120, 121, 123, 132, 207 bunjin (wenren), 11, 14–17, 47, 48, 50, 51, 65, 66, 68, 77, 84–86, 92, 94, 102, 113, 165, 172, 177, 179, 203, 210, 260, 287 bunjin-ga. See nanga Buson jihitsu kuchŇ. See Buson self-selected anthology Buson kushş. See Buson verse anthology Buson self-selected anthology (Buson jihitsu kuchŇ), 128, 129 Buson verse anthology (Buson kushş), 45, 104, 168, 279 Charcoal sack (Sumidawara), 24, 28 Chikukei, 76, 182–184, 263, 269 Chiyo-ni. See Kaga no Chiyo ChŇmu, 31, 32, 36, 37, 109, 120, 123 Chora. See Miura Chora ChŇsui. See Sakuma Ryşkyo

Chuang Tzu. See Zhuangzi Danrin, 5, 21, 23, 25–27, 121, 190, 197 Dawn crow (Akegarasu), 36, 104, 107– 109, 111, 120, 241 Dazai Shundai, 66 Denga ka. See Yodo river songs DohŇ. See Hattori DohŇ Dong Qichang, 203 Du Fu, 261, 276, 287 Empty chestnuts (Minashiguri), 23, 28, 42, 59, 101, 241 Enoko shş. See Puppy anthology Essays in idleness (Tsurezuregusa), 39, 188, 199, 222 Far into the west (Nishi no oku), 41, 71, 97, 114 Five cartloads of wastepaper (Gosha hŇgu), 84, 123–127, 221, 222 Flower-viewing carriage (Hanamiguruma), 7 From summer (Natsu yori), 86, 87, 90, 92, 101, 110, 126 Fujiwara Shunzei, 198, 216 FşkyŇ (poetic madness), 72, 112, 113, 122 Fuyu no hi. See Winter day Ga (elegance) and zoku (vulgarity), 18, 20, 22, 25, 26, 33, 39, 47–49, 51, 54, 63, 81, 101, 226, 227, 275 GantŇ. See Isaoka GantŇ Gekkei. See Matsumura Gekkei GenbŇshş. See Ransetsu anthology Genroku period, 30, 46, 169, 187 Gichş-ji, 1, 32, 37, 241 Gikş, 29, 59, 81 Gosan, 20 Gosha hŇgu. See Five cartloads of wastepaper Goshikizumi. See Ink of five colors Hagiwara SakutarŇ, 13, 39, 244, 245, 246 Haiga, 165, 185–188, 192, 193, 195– 197, 199, 200, 205–208, 218, 221, 224, 228, 231, 233, 237, 238

INDEX Haikai kosen. See Haikai selected old verses Haikai selected old verses (Haikai kosen), 16, 73, 77 Hajin. See Hayano Hajin Hanamiguruma. See Flower-viewing carriage Hattori DohŇ, 30, 108 Hattori Nankaku, 16, 35, 48, 65, 66, 68, 217, 219 Hattori Ransetsu, 27, 35, 41, 45, 50, 58, 82, 85, 90, 96, 97, 107, 115, 116, 171, 199, 257, 263, 266, 276 Hayami Shinga, 171, 179, 180, 183, 184, 271 Hayano Hajin, 35, 36, 38, 41, 44, 58, 59, 61, 63, 65, 71, 93, 94, 97, 103, 105, 107, 114–116, 128, 136, 170, 171, 174, 176, 181, 206, 257, 264, 273 Heike monogatari. See Tale of the Heike HenjŇ, 195 Hirabayashi Seisai, 180 Hogo busuma. See Scrap paper coverlet Hokuju rŇsen o itamu. See Mourning the sage Hokuju Hori Bakusui, 31, 37, 108, 109, 123, 241 Hosokawa Yşsai, 19, 148 Hyakusen. See Sakaki Hyakusen Ihara Saikaku, 21, 197 Ike no Taiga, 14, 205, 206 Ink of five colors (Goshikizumi), 28, 29, 30, 58, 59, 81, 140 Isaoka GantŇ, 35, 59, 65, 94, 123, 136, 171, 174, 264, 266 ItŇ Jinsai, 48, 74 Japanese and Chinese poems to sing (Wakan rŇei shş), 100, 101, 229 Jieziyuan huazhuan. See Mustard seed garden KachŇ hen. See Blossoms and birds collection Kaga no Chiyo (Chiyo-ni), 37 Kagami ShikŇ, 28, 45, 75, 96, 108, 109, 130, 131, 175, 199, 211, 272, 276 kanshi (poetry in Chinese), 13, 16, 23, 24, 65–68, 71, 73–75, 77, 81, 84, 126, 246, 259, 260, 279, 287 kanshibunchŇ (Chinese style haikai), 23, 66, 67, 138 Kara hiba. See Withered cypress needles Karumi (lightness), 24 Kasen (Thirty-six link sequence), 139

305 KatŇ KyŇtai, 31, 32, 33, 37, 44, 108, 109, 120, 123, 131, 139, 151 Kema, 35, 37, 40, 249, 252 KenkŇ. See Yoshida KenkŇ Kenzan. See Watanabe Kenzan Keshien gaden. See Mustard seed garden Kidai. See Kigo (seasonal word) Kikaku. See Takarai Kikaku Kikei. See Takai Kikei KŇbŇ Daishi, 198, 287 Kokon tanzaku shş. See Ancient and modern poetry card anthology Konpuku-ji, 37, 259, 261 Korekoma. See Kuroyanagi Korekoma Kuroyanagi Korekoma, 48, 84, 120, 123, 125, 127, 221, 275 Kuroyanagi ShŇha, 1, 16, 36, 38, 48– 50, 80, 81, 84–86, 92, 93, 95, 101, 102, 109, 123, 125, 126, 178, 206, 219, 275–277 KyŇhŇ haikai, 26, 27, 30 KyŇhŇ period, 26, 27, 30, 129, 130 Kyorai, 82, 96, 191 Kyorai shŇ. See Kyorai's treatise Kyorai's treatise (Kyorai shŇ), 30 Kyoriku, 187, 197, 198, 199 Li Bo, 23, 99, 100, 263, 276, 287 Light of the snow (Sono yuki kage), 36 Maekuzuke, 21, 22, 33, 78, 130 Make the past present (Mukashi o ima), 41, 45, 59, 114, 116, 120, 152, 249, 257 Makura no sŇshi. See Pillow book Maruyama ņkyo, 14 Masaoka Shiki, 9, 13, 34, 53, 66, 166– 170, 244–247, 279 Matsumura Gekkei, 1, 17, 117, 118, 121, 229, 274 Matsunaga Teitoku, 19, 20, 33, 135, 189, 197 Matsuo BashŇ, 1–4, 9–12, 14, 16, 17, 23–25, 27–38, 41–47, 50, 51, 56–60, 66–69, 80–82, 87, 95–97, 101, 106– 115, 120, 122, 127, 128, 130, 131, 135–137, 140–142, 151, 152, 156, 167–169, 171, 173, 176, 189–191, 197–199, 201, 210, 211, 217, 222, 237, 240–242, 245, 247–249, 257– 262, 266 Meiwa shinbŇ no haru. See Spring in Meiwa 8 Minashiguri. See Empty chestnuts

306 Mino faction, 28, 31, 43, 44, 75, 96, 130 Miura Chora, 31, 37, 44, 109, 120, 123, 139–144, 146– 151, 194–196, 209, 279, 280, 282–291 Miyake ShŇzan, 11, 16, 31, 36, 43, 70, 71, 73–75, 77, 81, 82, 131, 176, 182 Miyako no Yoshika, 100 Miyazu, 36, 76, 181, 182, 184, 201, 209, 210, 211, 213, 268, 296 Mizuma Sentoku, 27, 29, 58 Mochizuki SŇoku, 36, 70, 71, 94, 114, 171 Momosumomo. See Peaches and plums MŇotsu, 42, 43, 70, 71, 72, 73, 185 Moritake. See Arikida Moritake Motoori Norinaga, 80 Mourning the sage Hokuju (Hokuju rŇsen o itamu), 171, 249, 250 MuchŇ. See Ueda Akinari Mukashi o ima. See Make the past present Mustard seed garden (Jieziyuan huazhuan, Keshien gaden), 49, 50, 95, 203, 204, 205, 240 Nakabayashi ChikutŇ, 206 Nakagawa Otsuyş (Bakurin), 28, 45, 96, 108, 109, 263, 276 nanga, 9, 10, 14, 49, 165, 192, 200, 203–211, 217, 220, 236, 240, 242, 243 Nankaku. See Hattori Nankaku Narrow road to the interior (Oku no hosomichi), 31, 35, 65, 66, 67, 68, 69, 137, 171, 173, 174, 237, 240, 241, 242 Natsu yori. See From summer New account of tales of the world (Shishuo xinyu), 105 New flower gathering (Shinhanatsumi), 37, 45, 114, 116–118, 120, 126, 171, 174, 177–180, 184, 249, 263 NijŇ school, 33 Nishi no oku. See Far into the west Nishiyama SŇin, 21, 121, 197 NŇin, 156, 173, 242 Nozarashi kikŇ. See Record of a weatherbeaten skeleton Ogyş Sorai, 16, 17, 35, 48, 65, 74, 80, 217 Oi no kobumi. See Rucksack notebook Okotari gusa. See Random lazy jottings

INDEX ņkyo. See Maruyama ņkyo Onitsura, 50, 276 ņshima Ryota, 31, 37, 109, 128 Otsuyş. See Nakagawa Otsuyş (Bakurin) Peaches and plums (Momosumomo), 37, 42, 46, 61, 132, 133, 152-164 Pei Di, 76, 77 Pillow book (Makura no sŇshi), 111, 195 Poetic madness. See FşkyŇ Point-scoring. See Tentori haikai Puppy anthology (Enoko shş), 20 RakutŇ BashŇ-an saikŇ-ki. See Account of the rebuilding of the Basho Hermitage in eastern Kyoto Random lazy jottings (Okotari gusa), 39 Ransetsu. See Hattori Ransetsu Ransetsu anthology (GenbŇshş), 45 Ranzan, 123, 139–141, 143–147, 149, 151 Record of a weather-beaten skeleton (Nozarashi kikŇ), 69, 142, 240, 242, 243 Renga, 3, 18-22, 25, 64, 74, 81, 130136, 166, 188, 189 Revival. See Basho Revival Rucksack notebook (Oi no kobumi), 25, 197 RyŇta. See ņshima RyŇta Ryşkyo. See Sakuma Ryşkyo (ChŇsui) SaichŇ, 62 SaigyŇ, 4, 25, 66, 67, 113, 137, 156, 197, 198, 226, 227, 239, 240, 242 Saikaku. See Ihara Saikaku Sakaki Hyakusen, 14, 45, 192, 193, 199, 200, 209–215, 217 Sakuma Ryşkyo (ChŇsui), 28, 30, 90, 140, 151, 199, 264 Sankasha, 32, 36, 38, 77–81, 84, 86, 87, 92, 95, 96, 101, 110, 123, 128, 132, 140 Sanuki, 36, 77, 78, 80, 86–88, 92, 93, 95 SanzŇshi. See Three noteooks Satomura JŇha, 19, 148 Scrap paper coverlet (Hogo busuma), 66, 133, 136, 239 Sei ShŇnagon, 195 Sentoku. See Mizuma Sentoku Senzan. See Uchida Senzan Sequel to dawn crow (Zoku akegarasu), 36, 104, 111, 113, 225, 241, 288

INDEX Sesshş, 25, 197 Shasei (realism), 166 Shiki. See Masaoka Shiki, See Masaoka Shiki ShikŇ. See Kagami ShikŇ ShimŇsa, 35, 36, 63, 64, 225, 264, 267, 272 Shinga. See Hayami Shinga Shishuo xinyu. See New account of tales of the world ShŇha. See Kuroyanagi ShŇha ShŇmon, 12, 27, 28, 30–34, 43–45, 82, 96, 97, 101, 108, 109, 111, 130, 131, 169, 191, 199 ShŇzan. See Miyake ShŇzan Shundei kushş, 12, 84, 249, 275 Shunpş batei no kyoku. See Spring wind on the Kema Embankment Shunzei. See Fujiwara Shunzei SŇa. See Hayano Hajin SodŇ, 50, 96, 190, 191, 276 SŇin. See Nishiyama SŇin Sono yuki kage. See Light of the snow Sonome, 141 SŇoku. See Mochizuki SŇoku Sorai. See Ogyş Sorai Spring in Meiwa 8 (Meiwa shinbŇ no haru), 98, 99, 101 Spring wind on the Kema Embankment (Shunpş batei no kyoku), 37, 249, 252 Su Dongpo (Su Shi), 111, 113, 128, 137, 202, 239, 240, 298 Su Shi. See Su Dongpo Sumidawara. See Charcoal sack Taiga. See Ike no Taiga Taigi. See Tan Taigi Taira no Noritsune, 159 Takai Kikei, 77, 94, 102–105, 107, 109, 112, 123 Takai KitŇ, 1, 3, 11, 31, 33, 36, 38, 39, 42, 43, 45, 46, 80, 85, 90, 94, 96, 97, 101–112, 114, 120, 123, 128, 139– 142, 144–163, 167, 236, 280–291 Takarai Kikaku, 23, 27, 29, 35, 41, 45, 50, 58, 59, 61, 82, 96, 97, 107, 117, 118, 171, 175, 176, 199, 211, 217– 219, 263, 264, 266, 272, 273, 276 Takebe RyŇtai (Takebe Ayatari), 31 Tale of the Heike (Heike monogatari), 88, 159, 215, 282

307 Tales of moonlight and rain (Ugetsu monogatari), 229, 263 Tamiya Chşsen, 39 Tan Taigi, 31, 36, 38, 80–84, 87, 90, 92, 95, 101, 102, 109, 123, 131, 176, 255 Tang shi xuan, 17, 74, 100 Tango, 14, 36, 43, 45, 70, 71, 74, 76, 92, 166, 170, 181, 182, 263, 268, 283 Tanomura Chikuden, 205, 285 Tao Qian. See Tao Yuanming Tao Yuanming, 124, 278 Tatsu SŇro, 16, 48 Teimon, 5, 19, 21, 23, 27, 173, 190 Teitoku. See Matsunaga Teitoku Tentori haikai (Point-scoring haikai), 3, 22 The reed cutter (Ashigari), 190 Three notebooks (SanzŇshi), 25, 30, 106, 108, 110 Tokugawa Tsunayoshi, 65 Tokugawa Yoshimune, 15, 26 Tomo, 1, 36 Tsunayoshi. See Tokugawa Tsunayoshi Tsurezuregusa. See Essays in idleness Uchida Senzan, 35, 58 Ueda Akinari, 44, 111, 229, 263 Umejo, 121, 228, 229 Urban ShŇmon, 28 Waka, 18, 195, 226 Wakan rŇei shu. See Japanese and Chinese poems to sing Wang Changling, 127 Wang Gai, 49 Wang Wei, 2, 76, 77, 202, 229 Watanabe Kenzan, 187 wenren. See bunjin Winter day (Fuyu no hi), 32 Withered cypress needles (Kara hiba), 1, 104 Xi Shi (Seishi), 88 Yahantei, 4, 12, 16, 35, 36, 38, 43, 44, 48, 50, 53, 58, 59, 61, 71, 77, 78, 86, 92–94, 96–99, 101–104, 107–109, 111, 114, 115, 120, 123, 128, 132, 133, 140, 153, 166, 177, 181, 185, 217, 220, 236, 241, 257, 262, 274 Yamazaki SŇkan, 41 Yanagisawa Yoshiyasu, 65 Yodo river songs (Denga ka), 37, 249, 256 YojŇ (overtones), 188 Yoshida KenkŇ, 39, 75, 199

308 Yoshimune. See Tokugawa Yoshimune, See Tokugawa Yoshimune Yşki, 59, 63, 77, 170, 171, 174, 177, 180, 181, 264, 266, 267 Zhuangzi, 151, 194

INDEX Zoku. See Ga (elegance) and zoku (vulgarity) Zoku akegarasu. See Sequel to dawn crow Zokugo. See Ga (elegance) and zoku (vulgarity)

BRILL’S JAPANESE STUDIES LIBRARY ISSN 0925-6512 1. Plutschow, H.E., Chaos and Cosmos. Ritual in Early and Medieval Japanese Literature. 1990. ISBN 90 04 08628 5 2. Leims, Th.F. Die Entstehung des Kabuki. Transkulturation Europa-Japan im 16. und 17. Jahrhundert. 1990. ISBN 90 04 08988 8 3. Seeley, Chr. A History of Writing in Japan. 1991. ISBN 90 04 09081 9 4. Vovin, A. A Reconstruction of Proto-Ainu. 1993. ISBN 90 04 09905 0 5. Yoda, Y. The Foundations of Japan’s Modernization. A Comparison with China’s Path Towards Modernization. Transl. by K.W. Radtke. 1996. ISBN 90 04 09999 9 6. Hardacre, H. and A.L. Kern (eds.) New Directions in the Study of Meiji Japan. 1997. ISBN 90 04 10735 5 7. Tucker, J.A. Ito Jinsai’s Gomo- Jigi and the Philosophical Definition of Early Modern Japan. 1998. ISBN 90 04 10992 7 8. Hardacre, H. (ed.) The Postwar Development of Japanese Studies in the United States. 1998. ISBN 90 04 10981 1 9. Hanashiro, R.S. Thomas William Kinder and the Japanese Imperial Mint, 18681875. 1999. ISBN 90 04 11345 2 10. Teitler, G. and K.W. Radtke (eds.) A Dutch Spy in China. Reports on the First Phase of the Sino-Japanese War (1937 – 1939). 1999. ISBN 90 04 11487 4 11. Mortimer, M. Meeting the Sensei. The Role of the Master in Shirakaba Writers. 2000. ISBN 90 04 11655 9 12. Scholz-Cionca, S. and S.L. Leiter (eds.) Japanese Theatre and the International Stage. 2000. ISBN 90 04 12011 4 13. Saltzman-Li, K. Creating Kabuki Plays. Context for Kezairoku, “Valuable Notes on Playwriting”. 2003. ISBN 90 04 12115 3 14. Ozaki, M. Individuum, Society, Humankind. The Triadic Logic of Species According to Hajime Tanabe. 2001. ISBN 90 04 12118 8 15. Bentley, J.R. A Descriptive Grammar of Early Old Japanese Prose. 2001. ISBN 90 04 12308 3 16. Higashibaba, I. Christianity in Early Modern Japan. Kirishitan Belief and Practice. 2001. ISBN 90 04 12290 7 17. Schmidt, P. Capital Punishment in Japan. 2001. ISBN 90 04 12421 7 18. Foljanty-Jost, G. Juvenile Delinquency in Japan. Reconsidering the “Crisis”. 2003. ISBN 90 04 13253 8 19. Tomida, H. Hiratsuka RaichÙ and Early Japanese Feminism. 2004. ISBN 90 04 13298 8 20. Ueda, M. Dew on the Grass. The Life and Poetry of Kobayashi Issa. 2004. ISBN 90 04 13723 8 21. Beckwith, C.I. Koguryo: The Language of Japan’s Continental Relatives. 2004. ISBN 90 04 13949 4

22. Parker, H.S.E. Progressive Traditions. An Illustrated Study of Plot Repetition in Traditional Japanese Theatre. 2005. ISBN 90 04 14534 6 23. Eckersall, P. Theorizing the Angura Space. Avant-garde Performance and Politics in Japan, 1960-2000. 2006. ISBN-10: 90 04 15199 0, ISBN-13: 978 90 04 15199 4

24. Gramlich-Oka, B. Thinking Like a Man. Tadano Makuzu (1763-1825). 2006. ISBN-10: 90 04 15208 3, ISBN-13: 978 90 04 15208 3 25. Bentley, J.R. The Authenticity of Sendai Kuji Hongi. A New Examination of Texts, with a Translation and Commentary. 2006. ISBN-10: 90 04 15225 3, ISBN-13: 978 90 04 15225 0

26. Orbaugh, S. Japanese Fiction of the Allied Occupation. Vision, Embodiment, Identity. 2007. ISBN-10: 90 04 15546 5, ISBN-13: 978 90 04 15546 6 27. Crowley, C.A. Haikai Poet Yosa Buson and the BashÙ Revival. 2007. ISBN-10: 90 04 15709 3, ISBN-13: 978 90 04 15709 5