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I THE MEANING OF HAIKU

The great appeal of haiku poems seems to result mainly from two qualities: their dependence on the reader's power of awareness, bringing him closer to simple, elemental truths; and their capacity to grow in meaning as they are read and reread. Before discussing at length the background and elements of haiku, it is interesting to note briefly the origin of the form as it developed from waka, renga and renku. A short history of the growth of haiku may clarify points which follow in later chapters. An introduction to Basho, Buson, Issa and Shiki as the four undisputed masters of haiku and a description of the variation of haiku known as senryu, as well as an overview of developments in English haiku, are necessary preliminaries to any study of the form.

According to Miyazaki Toshiko,¹ the word "haiku" comes from haikai renga no hokku (the introductory lines of light linked verse). The name "haiku" was not given to the form until the late nineteenth century, when the poet Shiki, using the Japanese genius for telescoping words, invented it. A haiku is actually the first part of a waka, a highly conventionalized syllabic verse of five lines arranged in a sequence of 5-7-5-7-7 syllables, also known as a tanka or uta; the tanka and uta date back to the eighth-century poetry anthology, the Manyoshu. By the time the Shinkokinshu was written in the Kamakura period (1185-1333), the waka was beginning to decline and the renga was becoming popular.

Renga, or linked verse, is a sort of poetic dialogue, a succession of waka in which the first three lines of 5-7-5 syllables are composed by one person, the next two lines of 7-7 by another person, the following three lines of 5-7-5 by a third person, and so on; in this way, a group of four or five people sometimes composed renga of a hundred verses or so. Of these long composite poems, the first three lines, called hokku, are always the most important and the best known, much in the same way that the first verse and chorus of a popular song are often well known and the other verses ignored except by a very few.

Renga were composed at verse-capping meetings, according to rules reputedly laid down in 1186 by Fujiwara Sadaie (1162-1241) and Fujiwara Sadatake (1139?-1202). Iio Sogi(1421-1502), a poet of the Muro-machi period (1392-1568) is credited with raising haiku to the level of literature by his cultivated and artistic renga. (Sogi is known as "the best composer under heaven.") He, as well as Yamazaki Sokan (1465-1553), Nishiyama Soin (1605-1682) and others rebelled against the conventions of the court renga which followed the stilted waka rules. They began to include words from any type of vocabulary, and to insinuate humor into their poetry. In other words, they retained the renga form, but discarded the waka spirit. This earthier type of linked verse was called renku but the first three lines were still called hokku. The new renku was also known as haikai renga, and gradually the word haikai by itself came to have the same meaning as hokku. Thus, haiku before the time of Shiki (18671902) were known as hokku or haikai.

The best renga and waka teachers had the habit of composing hokku ahead of time to have them ready when they might be needed for a linked-verse party. Hokku were probably among the world's shortest poems, so it was all the more necessary to try very hard to blend artistic content and form. It was Matsuo Basho (1644-1694) who succeeded in raising haikai from mere vers de société to the level of real literature expressing a meaningful reaction to reality beyond simple wit and humor.

Matsuo Basho was born in Iga province (Mie prefecture). As a youth he was the companion of the son of his feudal lord in Kyoto. Here he learned the tea ceremony and studied haikai with the poet Kitamura Kigin (1623-1705). After the death of his young friend and patron, Basho moved to Edo (Tokyo) where he built his "banana-tree (basho) hermitage" in Fukugawa, and worked seriously at writing haikai. Wishing to taste deeply of nature and of human life he observed them carefully, finally finding his own independent voice in a subjective type of haikai which revealed his feelings through sound, form and image. His haikai are noted for their melancholy content (called wabi, a term from the tea ceremony applied to the aesthetic beauty of humble things) and for their quiet tone (called sabi, a term meaning the subdued elegance found in old, worn things).

Basho's style of haikai is called shofu haikai, from sho, the second syllable of his name, and fu (style). The belief that nature is the realm par excellence of poetry is the fundamental tenet of shofu haikai.

Throughout his life, Basho made many journeys in search of material for his haiku, at the same time becoming increasingly aware of nature. Of his many travel diaries, Sarashina Kiko (A Visit to Sarashina Village) and Oku no Hosomichi (The Narrow Road to the Deep North) are important, among other things, for their nature essays and haiku. He is called the Shakespeare of haiku because of his great contribution to the form. After the death of Basho, the art of haikai declined momentarily, but it was renewed and revivified by Buson, Issa and Shiki.

Taniguchi (or Yosano) Buson (1715-1783) was born near Osaka. Little is known of his life, but his love of painting is revealed in his picturesque, objective imagery. In his personal reserve as an artist and in his attention to his craft he might be compared to Alexander Pope, the neoclassical eighteenth-century poet, but in his penchant for experimentation he is closer to the romantics. Feeling no necessity to reveal his own emotions, he nevertheless often wrote with a warm human touch.

Oikaze ni

Susuki karitoru

Okina kana

An old man

Cutting pampas grass

The wind behind him.*

The picture of the old man bowing as the grass is bowing is clear-cut, yet sympathetically presented.

If Buson resembles the Augustans, there is no doubt that Kobayashi Issa (1763-1827) may be termed a romantic. Born in the village of Kashiwaba, north of Tokyo, he was orphaned early in life. This tragedy, however, failed to embitter him. Rather, it gave him a sense of kinship with small animals and insect life. He is noted for the personal quality of his poetry, for his spirit of rebellion against poetic and religious convention and, above all, for the simple diction of his haiku and their depiction of ordinary human affairs.

Koromogae

Kaete mo tabi no

Shirami kana

The change of clothes;

Changed, yes,

But the same lice of my journeying.

It is a familiar and disheartening experience, in an overcrowded country, that it is difficult to get rid of lice.

Next in time to Issa comes the modern poet Masaoka Shiki (1867-1902). Born in Matsuyama, Shiki worked for a newspaper after graduating from Tokyo University. Although he had earlier contracted tuberculosis, he fought in the Sino-Japanese war (18941895). Returning with his illness aggravated, he worked from his sickbed on the renewal and improvement of waka and haiku, editing the famous haiku magazine Hototogisu (Cuckoo). Shiki is the first poet to use the term "haiku." He gives new characteristics to the form—greater variety of subject matter and increased objectivity. That he is an admirer of Buson's descriptive haiku may be seen by the following:

Iriguchi ni

Mugi hosu ie ya

Furu-sudare

Barley drying

In front of the door:

Old bamboo blinds hanging.

This poem presents an objective, almost harsh picture of a farmhouse.

In recent times, with the recommendation of a freer verse style by the poet Ogiwara Seisensui (b. 1884), the new tendency towards greater freedom in haiku begins. Experiments are made with titles, with two-line haiku or with longer lines. For example, the following haiku has 24 syllables divided into 10, 6 and 8 syllables to the line.

Hibari tenjo de naki

Daichi de naki

Nakinagara nobori

The lark sings in heaven

Sings on earth

Sings as it rises.

Blyth remarks that the rhythm of this verse by Seisensui "expresses the flight of the bird and its song."² Each of the four great haiku writers illustrates a certain style of haiku, and each (with the exception of Issa) left a school of followers to continue his work. One of the early developments was senryu.

Senryu is the satirical form of haiku originated by Karai Senryu (1718-1790) in Edo. As mock haiku, it allows greater liberty of diction including the use of vulgarisms; it also permits more obvious humour, moralizing and philosophical comment. More than haiku, perhaps indeed in opposition to haiku, it expresses the incongruity of things. The tone is less elevated than that of haiku. As Geoffrey Bownas states, "it stops short at the particular and deals in distortions and failings, not in the beauty of nature."³

When she wails

At the top of her voice,

The husband gives in.

This senryu contains a universally humorous situation, indicating human failings on the part of both persons. Mothers-in-law, the clergy, shrewish wives, women of easy virtue and bachelor life are favorite targets of senryu. Would-be writers of English haiku are often dismayed to have their Japanese friends remark, "Your poem is more like senryu. It is too philosophical." It is not surprising, therefore, that senryu appeals strongly to Western readers. The Western tradition of logic rather than intuition makes senryu in some respects easier to write than haiku.

Having traced the growth of haiku from waka to the modern free haiku, and keeping in mind above all the haikai of Basho, a tentative definition of haiku may be attempted at this point. A haiku is a 17-syllable poem arranged in three lines of 5, 7 and 5 syllables, having some reference to the season and expressing the poet's union with nature.

Haiku is short; the Japanese like to call it "the first in the world for shortness." Seventeen syllables, for reasons which will be clarified later, is judged to be the number usually most suitable for haiku; similarly the three-line form is found best to support the imagery of haiku. The season word adds a whole atmosphere to the poem, thus permitting brevity without loss of significance. The raison d'être, the whole purpose of the poem, is to express the poet's union with nature, his flash of intuition concerning the objects which his senses perceive. The same definition will be seen to apply equally well to English haiku.

Once Japan was opened to the West in 1868, envoys from England became interested in translating and studying haiku. Later, Ezra Pound and the Imagists were influenced by the short poems. At present there is a growing interest in the form, as evidenced by the fact that in North America there are at least four "little magazines" devoted to the publication of haiku in English. Translations of Japanese haiku are very popular; Miyamori Asataro, R. H. Blyth, Harold G. Henderson, Peter Beilenson and Yuasa Nobuyuki are among the better-known translators. Although the translators have used a variety of forms, those who write English haiku have been, on the whole, faithful to the three-line form. Greater freedom is taken with regard to the 17 syllables.

The haiku form has been in existence in Japan for centuries and is still vigorous there. Whether or not the genuine haiku will take root and flourish in English-speaking countries remains to be seen. There is no doubt, however, that a knowledge of haiku has been found to be an enriching experience which the West seems to be welcoming with increased respect.

Footnote

* Where no other translator is identified, all translations and romanizations from Japanese and Chinese in this volume are by R. H. Blyth.