The distant isle : studies and translations of Japanese literature in honor of Robert H. Brower 0939512726

Citation preview

M ichigan M onograph S eries J apanese S tudies N umber 15

in

C enter for J apanese S tudies T he U niversity of M ichigan

4

The Distant Isle Studies and Translations of Japanese Literature in Honor o f Robert H. Brower Edited

by T homas

Hare, Robert Borgen, AND ShARALYN ORBAUGH

Ann Arbor Center for Japanese Studies The University of Michigan 1996

© 1996 by the Regents o f the University o f Michigan All rights reserved Published by the Center for Japanese Studies, The University o f Michigan, 108 Lane Hall, 204 S. State St., Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1290 “Botan” by Yukio Mishima © 1955 Yukio Mishima Library o f Congress Cataloging in Publication Data The distant isle : studies and translations of Japanese literature in honor of Robert H. Brower / edited by Thomas Hare, Robert Borgen, and Sharalyn Orbaugh. p. cm. — (Michigan monograph series in Japanese studies ; 15) Includes a selected bibliography of Robert H. Brower. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 0-939512-72-6 (alk. paper) 1. Japanese literature—History and criticism. 2. Japanese literature—Translations into English. I. Brower, Robert H., 1923-1988. II. Hare, Thomas Blenman, 1952. III. Borgen, Robert, 1945IV. Orbaugh, Sharalyn. V. Series. PL705.B66D57 1996 895.6'09—dc20

96-13926 CIP

Composed by Jackson Typesetting Co., Jackson, Michigan Printed and bound by Cushing-Malloy, Inc. © The paper used in this publication meets the requirements o f the ANSI Standard Z3 9.48-1984 (Permanence of Paper). Printed in the United States o f America

Contents

Abbreviations

vii

Preface

ix

J o jin A zari no H aha no Shu, A Poetic Reading Robert Borgen

1

“Seeking W h at the M asters Sought”: M asters, Disciples, and Poetic E nlightenm ent in M edieval Japan Steven D. C arter

35

“Peonies” by M ishim a Yukio T ranslated by Anthony H. Cham bers

59

“M ystery and D epth” in Japanese C o urt Poetry Edwin A. Cranston

65

“T raditional Approaches to L earning” in Japan: M ichi and the Practice of C alligrap hy in Jap an ’s M iddle Ages G ary D eCoker

105

K itahara H ukushu’s “Katsushika Com positions in T ran q u illity”: L yrical Structure and the Religious Experience C harles Fox 125 Noh and Its Antecedents: “Jo u rn ey to the W estern Provinces” Jan et Goff

165

VI

CONTENTS

A Separate Piece: Proprietary Claim s and Intertextuality in the Rokujo Plays Thom as H are

183

N orinaga on the T ranslation of Waka: H is Preface to A Kokinshu T elescope T . J. H arper

205

T h e W rite r Speaks: L ate-M eiji Reflections on Literature and Life M arvin M arcus

231

T h e Shinkokinshu: “Poems on Sakyam uni’s Teachings (Shakkyoka)” Robert E. M o rrell

281

Context in T w o Episodes from H eike M on oga ta ri C linton D. M orrison

321

Extending the Lim its of Possibility: Style and Structure in M odern Japanese Fiction Sharalyn O rbaugh

337

Point of V iew in the Clause: A Rhetorical Look at K ak ari-M usubi Charles J. Q uinn, J r.

371

Yosano Akiko on Poetic Inspiration L aurel Rasplica Rodd

409

A Selected Bibliography of Robert H. Brower

427

Contributors

431

Index

435

Abbreviations

GM GSIS GSS IM JC P KKS MYS NKBD NKBT NKBZ NKGT NST SCSS SIS SKKS SKT SM SSZS

szs T

Genji monogatari Goshiiishu Gosenshu Ise monogatari Robert H. Brower and Earl Miner. Japanese Court Poetry. Stan­ ford: Stanford University Press, 1961 Kokinshu Man 'yoshu Nihon koten hungaku daijiten. Ed. Nihon koten bungaku daijiten Henshu Iinkai. 6 vols. Iwanami Shoten, 1983-85 Nihon koten bungaku taikei. 100 vols. Iwanami Shoten, 1957-67 Nihon koten bungaku zenshu. Ed. Akiyama Ken. 51 vols. Shogakkan, 1970-76 Nihon kagaku taikei. Comp. Sasaki Nobutsuna and Kyusojin Hitaku. 4th ed. 10 vols., 5 supplementary vols. Kazama Shobo, 1977-81 Nihon shiso taikei. Comp. Hayashiya Tatsusaburo et al. 67 vols. Iwanami Shoten, 1970-80 Shinchokusenshu Shuishu Shinkokinshu Shinpen kokka taikan. Ed. Shinpen kokkan taikan Henshu Iinkai. 9 vols. Kadokawa Shoten, 1983Shotetsu monogatari Shinsenzaishu Senzaishu Takakusu Junjiro and Watanabe Kaigyoku, eds. Taisho shinshu daizokyo. 85 vols. Taisho Issaikyo Kankokai, 1924-32

Throughout this work, the place of publication for a book published in Japan is Tokyo unless otherwise noted. vii

Preface

The papers in this volume were written by students of Robert H. Brower, and were originally intended to celebrate his career in the study of Japanese literature in commemoration of his retirement from the University of Michigan. Professor Brower’s untimely death, however, transformed them from a sheaf of congratulatory papers into a memorial collection, and the writers all feel sad that Professor Brower has not lived to see their publication. At the same time, we are confident that some of the celebratory air of our original intention remains in these papers, because in putting them together we have all experienced anew the sense of pleasure of working with Bob Brower, and realized yet again what an outstanding scholar and teacher he was. Roughly two-thirds of the papers collected here are concerned with the languages and literatures of “premodem” Japan; the other third, then, concern “modern” Japanese literature and language. But those terms “premodern” and “modem” probably obscure more than they illuminate, because in drawing together a group of texts for chronologi­ cal reasons, they give historical narrative the overriding role in textual production and engagement. W e hold no pretensions toward an overall historical narrative in assembling these papers, and would recall to the reader the practice of renga poets who communed in poetic inspiration, finding an organizational principle in association rather than in narrative. They felt as comfortable moving backward in time as forward, and in­ deed, questioned the temporal constituents of experience, even as they adhered to strict formal conventions about season and seasonality. Although we can lay no claim to the high formal discipline of renga poets, we hope, all the same, to offer the reader some sense of intellec­ tual coherence across a range of concerns from paper to paper, in each case engaging questions of how to read Japanese. Some of these ques­ tions are posed at the grammatical level, as in Charles Quinn’s paper on the meaning of the kakari-musubi particles; others might be characterized

IX

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PREFACE

as hermeneutic, as in Robert Morrell’s paper on the Buddhist poems in the Shinkokinshu. Generic conventions are among the reading concerns Robert Borgen engages in his paper on an eleventh-century “diary”— or is it a “poetry collection”?—and reading in translation (from tenthcentury Japanese to eighteenth-century Japanese), in Thomas Harper’s examination of Motoori Norinaga’s Kokinshu tokagami. Edwin Cranston investigates the conventions of critical reading through an examination of the difficult, if ubiquitous, term yugen. The relation between the text and the writer, how a reading is implicated in a human identity, has been a perennial concern of Japanese writers, but is perhaps most explicitly foregrounded in the quasi-autobiographical fiction and poetry of the early twentieth century. Here, these issues are most directly addressed by Charles Fox, Marvin Marcus, Sharalyn Orbaugh, and Laurel Rodd. A contrasting approach to reading, this time concerned with how one text reads, or is read, as another, is at the heart of papers by Janet Goff and Thomas Hare, both focused on texts in the performing tradition of Noh. Reading and the materiality of writing, in calligraphy, are central concerns for Gary DeCoker, whereas Steven Carter’s attention is drawn to the triangular relationship between a reading, a master, and a disciple. Clinton Morrison, like Charles Quinn, takes a linguistic approach to the issues involved in reading, concentrating on contextual interactions. Finally, in a change of pace, we include a reading in translation, by Anthony Chambers, of a story by Mishima Yukio. Although Professor Brower rarely published outside the field of his own expertise in waka poetry, he inspired his students to a diversity of interests and critical approaches. For this reason, it is difficult to contain the papers offered here in his memory under any rubric narrower than that of “reading” itself. W e feel that Bob Brower’s encouragement to study the broad spectrum of Japanese writing was one of the many virtues of his teaching, and we offer these papers in his memory in that spirit. As the title of this collection of papers, we have chosen words from a waka poem translated by Robert Brower and Earl Miner in their epoch-making Japanese Court Poetry (p. 202). The poem and full transla­ tion are reproduced below: Honobono to Akashi no ura no Asagiri ni Shimagakureyuku Fune o shi zo omou.

Dimly, dimly In the morning mist that lies Over Akashi Bay, M y longings follow with the ship That vanishes behind the distant isle.

W e would like to thank Robert Danly for his support and encour­ agement and Bruce Willoughby for his patient commitment to this project

PREFACE

xi

and his many contributions to its readability and clarity. W e also offer thanks to the anonymous reader who lent valuable advice on each of the papers and how they might better come together within the scope of a single volume. The Editors

Jojin Azari no Haha no Shu

,

A Poetic Reading R

obert

B

o rgen

A man tells his widowed mother that he is planning to leave her for a journey overseas. The mother is distraught at the prospect of being forsaken by her beloved son, for she is convinced she will not live to see his return. If only she were less reserved, she sighs, she might have the courage to scream, wail, and make such a scene that her son would change his mind and stay by her side; but, alas, she would be too easily embarrassed for such a public display of emotion. Instead, she weeps quiedy and expresses her true feelings only in her poetry, which she preserves in a private journal. There she tells of her attachment to her son and her dismay at the possibility of being abandoned. Her son, sadly for her, does leave. She continues her writing, but eventually her worst fears come to pass, as she dies, never seeing her son again. This may sound like a plot fragment from a soap opera, hardly worth retelling. Some added details, however, make the trite tale more remarkable than the bare outline of events would suggest. First, the story is true. It took place in ancient Japan. The son was the Buddhist monk Jojin who had vowed to complete a pilgrimage to the holy moun­ tains in China that were particularly revered by his Tendai sect. In 1068, he invited his mother to stay at his monastery in the suburbs of Kyoto, and the following year he revealed his plan to her. He actually left for China in 1072, accompanied by seven disciples, and he remained there until his death in 1081. The mother, a member of the aristocratic Minamoto family, her given name no longer known, presumably died some time shortly after the fourth month of 1073, the last dateable event that she recorded. She was, at the time, eighty-five years old. Her beloved Jojin had left her behind in the care of another son, also a monk, but clearly not her favorite. Jojin, at the time of his departure, was already sixty-two years old. This is a remarkable tale of geriatric maternal love. The story may be fascinating in itself, but, to the student of Japa­ nese literature or history, its significance derives from our having two

1

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valuable works that record it. One is the diary that Jojin kept during the first sixteen months of his travels in China. Although he never re­ turned to Japan, he did send five of his disciples back, and they brought with them his diary, San Tendai Godai san ki (The Record of a Pilgrimage to the Tiantai and Wutai Mountains), a precious source of information regarding eleventh-century Chinese history, religion, and relations with Japan.1 In terms of its content, it might be classified as a travel diary, but, in literary taxonomy, its subject matter is less consequential than its language, for the major division in early Japanese diaries is between those written in the native language and those written in kanbun. Kanbun refers to classical Chinese, regardless of provenance or quality, and the kanbun used by Heian courtiers in their diaries was often far from the Chinese norm.2 In general, kanbun diaries, kept by noblemen who stayed home, offer laconic daily accounts of events, adorned only rarely by artistic flourishes and meant to be used as a record of the past for at least a limited audience. Grist for the historian’s mill, they are not nor­ mally treated as works of literature. Jojin’s specimen belongs to a small subspecies, the kanbun diary of the monk traveling to China. Three other examples survive, one incomplete, and they differ from the more conventional kanbun diaries in their exotic setting, but not in their lan­ guage, format, or purpose. In addition to Jojin’s diary, we have his mother’s text. Although it describes the same event, it presents the taxonomist with a more subtle problem. The difficulty first appears in the title, Jojin azari no baba no shu, which literally means “the poetry collection of the mother of the Buddhist teacher Jojin” (subsequently, Haha no shu). This does not mean that the mother’s grief inspired her to compile an anthology of poems. Rather, she wrote a highly subjective account of her personal feelings and—to a much lesser extent—activities in a style that tightly integrates prose and poetry. In English, we do not have a good term to describe a personal narrative that mixes prose and poetry, since such a form of writing does not exist in the language. In Japanese, however, the style is quite common, particularly so in classical Japanese. But, curiously, Japanese too lacks a distinctive name for this genre that it finds so congenial. Works belonging to it are variously labeled “diaries” (nikki), “poetry collections” (shu), or occasionally “tales” (monogatari). And, as if to confirm that distinctions are not clear, the same work may have alternate titles placing it in different categories.3 “Rectification of names,” a Confucian concept, does not seem to have concerned early Japanese writers or literary critics. Haha no shu would seem to be a typical example of the confusion in nomenclature, as a brief textual and critical history of the work will reveal. On the earliest extant manuscript, itself of unknown provenance,

JO JIN AZARI NO HAHA NO SH U

3

the title by which the work is now known appears in the hand of the great poet Fujiwara no Teika (1162-1241), who presumably had acquired the manuscript and then added the title, along with a few other notes. The source of the tide, however, remains a mystery. It could be the creation of Jojin’s mother, of her literary executors—or their Heian equivalents—or of Teika himself. Whatever its origin, the title was ac­ cepted and the text did not sprout variant names, at least until modern times. The lack of alternate titles may be explained by the text’s relative obscurity. Clearly, it was once known among certain court poets, for seventeen poems from it appear in later anthologies, starting with Senzaishu (Collection of a Thousand Years), completed around 1188 by Fujiwara no Shunzei (1114—1204), Teika’s father, and then the great Shinkokinshu (New Collection of Ancient and Modern Times), com­ pleted circa 1206, with Teika responsible for selecting one poem from Haha no shu. Subsequently, other poems from it appeared in anthologies compiled by members of the conservative Nijo school, the last one being the final imperial anthology, Shinzokukokinshu (New Collection of An­ cient and Modern Times Continued), which was completed in 1439. Teika’s manuscript apparently was preserved by that fine of poets, and around the turn of the eighteenth century, a copy was made for the library of the imperial family. After that, the diary disappeared from sight until 1930, when the distinguished poet and scholar, Sasaki Nobutsuna, came upon the manuscript in the imperial library and produced its first modern edition. Five years later, he published his discovery that the earlier manuscript was still preserved in the private library of the Reizei family, descendants of Teika. These remain the only known manuscripts.4 Their very paucity points to a limited circulation. Sasaki did more than merely publicize the work; he also changed its name. Since, in his opinion, it was more of a diary than a poetry collection, he published it as The D iary o f the M other o f the Buddhist Teacher Jojin (Jojin azari no haha no nikki). Although his name change did not stick, his idea did. Scholars may no longer tamper with the title, but some continue to assert that it is really a diary. Others, however, label it a “personal poetry collection” (shikashu), and the compromisers call it a “diary-like private anthology.”5 Although it lacks the familiar daily entries of a diary and much of it consists of reminiscing over past events, still, in a Japanese literary context, it might indeed be labeled a diary, for these are features it shares with many Japanese literary diaries. Like The Gossamer Years (Kagero nikkt), it is a first-person narrative focusing on a single aspect of its author’s emotional life that begins by recalling events of the past and, as it progresses, shifts to telling of recent incidents. In form, the significant

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difference is only that Jojin’s mother preserved more poems. In that respect it resembles, for example, The Diary o f Izumi Shikibu {Izumi Shikibu nikki), which is customarily called a diary, even though it is written in the third person and may not even be the work of Izumi Shikibu. In its layout too, Haha no shit resembles a diary, for, in the extant manuscripts, the poems are set off in separate lines from the prose and are indented. This is the typical format for works regarded as principally prose. In anthologies of poetry, it was the prose introduc­ tions to poems that were indented. Although die work may not be what we would call a diary, it seems to fit reasonably well into the familiar classical Japanese genre of “poetic diary.” On the other hand, it was the master poet Teika himself who per­ sonally wrote the title on our oldest manuscript labeling it a shu (poetry collection). Surely he had his reasons for not adopting the equally famil­ iar term “diary,” as Sasaki did 700 years or so later. Because modern critics have been drawn so to the expressions of maternal love and other diary-like aspects of Haha no shii, they have tended to overlook its ties to poetry collections. In fact, however, we know that other “diaries” were based on poetic models. Helen McCullough has shown how Ki no Tsurayuki (d. 945) patterned A Tosa Jou rn al (Tosa nikki) on the chapter of travel poems in the archetypical poetry anthology, Kokinshu, and, similarly, Janet W alker has pointed to the affinities between The Diary o f Izumi Shikibu and the conventions of courtly love presented in that anthology.6 Haha no shii, however, had no such obvious models to follow. “Part­ ing,” for example, was the theme of a chapter in Kokinshu, but the poems in it focused on the act of leave-taking itself, and thus it did not offer a framework upon which an extended narrative could be constructed. Parental love too was a familiar literary concern. One poem on the subject by Fujiwara no Kanesuke (877-933) appeared in Gosenshu, the second imperial anthology commissioned in 951, and subsequently be­ came extraordinarily popular: Hito no oya no Kokoro wa yami ni Aranedomo Ko wo omou michi ni Madoinuru kana.

A parent’s heart, M ay not be darkness But I lose my way On the path O f concern for my child.

One measure of its popularity is that it subsequently became the poem most frequently alluded to in The Tale o f Genji.1 Curiously, no hint of it can be found in Haha no shii. Jojin’s mother thus avoided the most familiar literary expression of parental love in her day. Perhaps she ne­ glected it because it was an isolated example from the anthologies, in which parental love was not established as the theme of sequences that

JO JIN AZARI NO HAHA NO SH U

5

lent themselves to further elaboration. More likely she did so because the poem is based on the Buddhist view that love of a child is an undesir­ able worldly attachment, an obstacle to spiritual cultivation. Despite the author’s deep faith in Buddhism, through most of the text she unabash­ edly proclaims her desire to stay close to her son. Only once does she hint that her attitude may be a hindrance, and this suggestion serves to introduce an elaborately constructed series of poems based on essential Buddhist sutras. Unfortunately, Jojin’s mother did not share the perspec­ tive offered by the obvious literary archetype for expressing parental love. Lacking a suitable model for expressing her concerns, she began by loosely adapting from Kokinshu various structural devices, including the order of themes and methods for linking poems. Although she gradu­ ally strayed from the established arrangement of poetic themes, to the end she continued to employ traditional techniques for joining poems into the tightly bound sequences of the anthologies. Thus, although the content of her work is diary-like, many of its forms and techniques are borrowed from the anthologies. The question of generic affinity is not merely academic quibble. As a diary, we are apt to read Haha no shii as nonfiction, subjective to be sure but none the less a reliable account of how the author at least perceived actual events. On the other hand, make it an anthology of poetry and we presume a higher degree of fictionalizing in the name of creativity or poetic license. In fact, the canons of poetic anthologizing led Jojin’s mother to add poems extraneous to her story and to rearrange others for artistic effect. The result remains a fascinating work, even if in places its literal veracity may be open to question, as the analysis that follows will demonstrate. CRITICAL SUMMARY

The manuscript of Haha no shu starts with a date, the thirtieth day of the first month in the fourth year of Enkyu (1071), which is the day of the first event described, but, since dating was not the author’s forte, critics consider it a copyist’s interpolation. The date is when Jojin’s mother moved, most reluctantly, from Jojin’s monastery, Daiunji, to Ninnaji, the residence of his brother Rishi.8 The text proper begins: I felt bewildered by my move to Ninnaji. Outside my room, which faced the south, a plum tree was blossoming splendidly and a warbler cried: Nakunaku mo Aware naru kana Edaeda ni Kozutau ham no Uguisu no koe.

Though it too cries incessandy, How touching it is! From branch to branch Announcing the spring: The warbler’s call.

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Also, as a petition that I hoped to send to the palace: Kumo no ue zo Nodokekarubeki Yorozu yo ni Chiyo kasanemasu Momoshiki no kimi.

Above the clouds, May you live in peace And to your ten thousand years Add years by the thousands, Lord o f the hundredfold palace!

(13) Haha no shu thus begins on a very auspicious and highly formal note. First it alludes to the imperial anthologies of poetry, which also begin with poems celebrating the arrival of spring, and then it invokes the emperor himself. The initial poem and its brief prose introduction employ the standard images found in the opening poems of Kokinshu-. spring (mentioned in the first six Kokinshu poems), the warbler (in poems four and five), and plum branches (joining the warbler in poem five). The key difference is that whereas Kokinshu begins at the beginning of spring—the first day of the first month—Jojin’s mother starts at the end of the month, but she still has a warbler announcing the spring to us and so begins her “collection” on the right foot. Poetry collections, whether public or private, customarily began this way with poems on the spring, the beginning of the year in the traditional lunar calendar. The poem also hints at the general tone of the work. The Japanese language, like English, has a verb—naku (to cry)—that can refer to both the calling of a bird and the shedding of tears. Thus, the warbler is simultaneously announcing spring and suggesting the mood of the author. The second poem, wishing the emperor a long life, is even more auspicious and public than the first. Although modern readers are apt to skip over them, poems celebrating imperial reigns or significant anni­ versaries were a familiar category in the traditional repertoire of poetic themes, and, in the imperial anthologies, they are grouped under the topic “felicitation” (ga) that appears immediately after the four seasons. Topically arranged private collections, however, usually proceed directly from the seasons to love. Since the emperor’s longevity was a fitter topic for public than for private anthologizing, this poem seems out of place in Haha no shu. Some confusion has resulted. Most commentators have taken the poem’s introductory line of prose to mean that the author wanted to send her son, not her poem, to the emperor. If Haha no shu is regarded as a factual narrative, not a poetic anthology, this seems incongruous and has led to the suggestion that the whole first section is out of place and properly belongs at a later point in the story. Instead, perhaps these poems should be treated as announcing that we are about

JO JIN AZARI NO HAHA NO SH U

7

to begin reading a work that aspires to the level of seriousness—and literariness—of an imperial anthology. After her poetic introduction, Jojin’s mother shifts to an autobio­ graphical mode, explaining: Although, in the years and months that had passed so fleetingly, I had countless interesting and unusual experiences, nothing had occurred that merited writing down for people to see. When I reached my eighties, however, a truly remarkable event took place, and, rather than keep it to myself, I thought I might try to record it briefly. (13) Thus we know that our author is a woman who has taken up her brush late in an impressively long life because now she has something to tell that might be of interest to an audience. Her writing may be highly personal and subjective, but it is not private. This is in keeping with the diaries of her age, if not with what a modern reader expects of one. Jojin’s mother then tells us of her two sons. Both are distinguished clerics, but Jojin is her favorite. Boastfully, she describes how he had to rush back and forth to perform rites first for the recovery of the chancel­ lor Fujiwara no Yorimichi (992-1074), who was convalescing in his villa at Uji about ten miles from the capital, and then for Emperor Go-Reizei (1026-68), who lay ill in the palace. Our author is so impressed by her son’s important role that at one point she narrates his activities with an honorific verb. Despite his fervent efforts, Jojin’s prayers proved effective only for Yorimichi; the emperor died in the fourth month of 1068. Three months later, after Jojin had retired—exhausted by his struggle— to his monastery in the foothills northeast of the capital, he invited his mother to stay with him. The next year, he revealed that after preparing himself with three years of religious austerities, he planned to embark on a pilgrimage to China’s holy mountains, a dream he had cherished since his youth. He promised to return to see his mother or meet her in paradise, a vow his mother recalls time and again. Jojin’s unexpected announcement left his mother speechless, and she hoped only to die soon rather than experience the parting from her son. The years passed and Jojin’s preparations began, driving from his mother’s mind her long-cherished thoughts of salvation. Potent rites that Jojin performed on her behalf offered no consolation. On the last day of the first month in 1071, he suddenly had her taken to his brother’s monastery, the event mentioned in the opening line of Haha no shu. She explains that she had wished to cry, scream, and create such a ruckus

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that Jojin would be forced to change his plan and let her stay with him. Unfortunately, she felt embarrassed by the presence of many eminent monks and so left, miserable but quiet. She arrives unhappily at her new quarters and sends Jojin a sequence of eleven poems: Shinobedomo Kono wakareji o Omou ni wa Karakurenai no Namida koso fure.

Although I endure it, As I think of parting ways With this child, In Chinese crimson My tears fall.

Shibashi zo to Matsu hodo mo naki Inochi ni wa Kono yo no kari no Wakareji zo uki.

“I will not be long,” But for a life That cannot linger on In this uncertain world Sad is parting ways with my child.

Michishiba ni Suteokarenuru Tsuyu no mi wa Hachisu no ue mo Ikaga to zo omou.

On the roadside grasses Abandoned is my body, Ephemeral as the dew. Will I achieve, I wonder, The lotus of Paradise?

Shikishima o Kogihanaru tomo Yuku sue ni Komahoshiku naru Kokoro tsukenan.

From these scattered isles You may row away, But at journey’s end, In Korea may your heart Wish to return home.

Morokoshi mo Arne no shita ni zo Ari to kiku Kono hi no moto wa Wasurezaranan.

Far Cathay too Lies under the same heaven, I hear: Please do not forget This Land of the Rising Sun.

Kano kishi ni Hodo naku koso wa Yukite kome Kokoro ni kanau Nori no ikada wa.

To that shore Swiftly go, But then return On the raft of the Law That is in our hearts.

Kuruma zo to Koshirauredomo Hi no ie ni Madou kokoro wa Yamazu zo arikeru.

You say you will return, But despite the cart luring me From this burning house, My bewildered heart Knows no calm. ( 30)

JO JIN AZARI NO HAHA NO SH U

9

At this point, Jojin’s mother inserts the phrase, “I shall go to Ninnaji,” and concludes with four more poems that continue to lament her sad state. Here we have returned to the realm of anthologies in which poems are arranged into aesthetically integrated sequences.9 In this case, the poems, were they to have appeared in imperial anthology, might have been placed under the heading “Parting.” In fact, this be­ comes a dominant theme of Haha no shu. In Kokinshu this topic follows immediately after “Felicitations,” and thus again we find Jojin’s mother imitating the arrangement of that model anthology. After passing through token gestures at the seasons and felicitations, she has arrived at one of her principal concerns: parting. The first poem in this group establishes the general theme, the specific situation, and the tone for those that follow in the sequence— indeed for Haha no shu as a whole—by incorporating the words “parting of ways” {wakareji), “China” {Kara), and “tears” {namida). The second poem builds on this foundation. It borrows some of its language from the first poem, the words “parting of ways” {wakareji) and “child” {ko) being repeated. In addition, it also alludes to Jojin’s promise to return soon, mentioned in the previous prose section, and, more importantly, hints at Buddhist teachings, a second major focus of the work. The adjective “sad” {uki) is conventionally used in Buddhist writings to de­ scribe the state of the human condition, the ukiyo, which in the Heian period meant the “sad world,” not the “floating world” of Edo popular culture. A more literal translation of the last two lines might be “sad indeed is an uncertain parting of ways in this world;” with the uncer­ tainty more in the world than in the parting. Thus they allude to the fundamental Buddhist concept that our everyday world of mundane exis­ tence is not only sad but also unreal and short lived {kart), and so, presumably, a parting in it too is temporary. The poem quotes only half of Jojin’s promise, but its last two lines hint at the remainder: if he does not return to see his mother in this world, they will meet in the next. The third poem further develops the established imagery and themes. The image of the road, suggesting travel, appears in the first two poems half-buried as the suffix j i (road) in the word wakareji, which has been rendered as “parting of the ways,” to bring out the image, even though the original is a commonplace noun that had come to mean little more than simply “parting.” Now, however, that normally dead image is brought to life with the word “roadside grasses” {michishiba), which clearly refers to a road and thus ties this poem to those that precede it. The principal concern of this poem, however, is Buddhist salvation, a theme hinted at in the poem before it. The idea that one’s life is transitory as the morning dew is a standard Buddhist metaphor,

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and, conventionally, lovers wished to be reborn on the same lotus in Paradise. Here, instead of lovers, we have a reference to a son’s vow to meet his mother in Paradise. In the previous poem his mother doubted that she would meet him in this world, as he also promised, and now she questions whether she will see him even in the next world, presum­ ably because her attachment to him in this world interferes with her spiritual cultivation. The fourth poem puts aside religion in favor of travel and suggests that Jojin’s journey has progressed from its initial overland start to its most perilous stage, the voyage to China. The poem begins with a poetic word for Japan, Shikishima, translated somewhat loosely as “scattered isles,” and Koma, the Japanese name for the Korean state of Koryo, is embedded in komahosbi (wish to return). The focus also shifts from con­ cern for the author’s own welfare in this world and the next to the question of her son’s intention: he must remember to return home to Japan. The next poem continues the geographic progression of the jour­ ney. Having passed through Korea, Jojin now has arrived safely in China, here referred to by a different poetic name, Morokoshi. The author repeats the wish that he not forget his home. Just as the previous poem began with a poetic name for Japan, this one starts with a poetic name for China. During World W ar II, the poem was included in Patriotic Poems by a Hundred Poets (Aikoku hyakunin isshu) because of its imphed unity between China and Japan.10 The sixth poem seems to begin similarly by referring to “that shore” (kano kisht), which at one level means China. The final two lines, however, complicate the poem with an imperfect metaphor. The Bud­ dha’s teachings (“law”) were often compared to a raft that would carry believers across treacherous waters to “that shore” of salvation. Jojin’s mother seems to be saying that she wishes his ship to be as safe, as reliable, as the raft of the Buddha’s law that carried the faithful to salva­ tion. Of course, in Buddhism, once one achieved “that shore,” one nor­ mally did not return. Here, the faulty metaphor proved prophetic, for in fact, once Jojin reached China, he showed little desire to go back to Japan. The final poem in the sequence again begins with Jojin’s vow to return and then introduces a Buddhist parable from the Lotus Sutra. Children in a burning house, innocent of their danger, will not leave until, to entice them out, their father promises them various carts to play with. Once they are safe, he gives them each a single splendid cart. The burning house is a metaphor for the world of human affairs, the toy carts are lesser Buddhist teachings offered as “expedient devices” to lure people to faith, and the splendid carts represent Mahayana, the

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11

Great Vehicle expounded in the Lotus Sutra. Jojin’s vow to return ought to be comforting, like the promise of salvation. Alas, his mother’s heart is so distraught that Jojin’s words can not calm it, and so, as she noted earlier, her worldly attachment to him may interfere with the promise of salvation. Here, Jojin’s mother has composed a sequence of poems resembling those found in imperial anthologies under the topic of parting. She follows the basic rules of association and progression that were employed to arrange poems in such collections. Her application of these principles may not be quite so rigorous or the final result so aesthetically pleasing as one would find in Shinkokinshu, compiled over a century later, but the sequence holds together well enough by the standards of her day, those of the earlier Kokinshu. By this point, the author has established the basic formal structure of Haha no shU: an alternation of poetic and prose passages. As in all classical Japanese literature, one rarely finds prose or poetry unalloyed: short prose introductions are interspersed in sequences of poems, and a stray poem may find a home in a prose passage. Still, a general pattern is clear. The poetry in Haha no shu follows the style associated with Kokinshu in its high degree of verbal complexity and attention to logical argumen­ tation. Jojin’s mother commonly employs all the complex linguistic tricks available to compress a remarkable amount of meaning into a thirtyone-syllable poem. Many of her poems require a skilled reader—or the help of a good annotator—to be fully intelligible. Linguistically less complicated poems are apt to be based on logical conceits. For example, it is because China is under the same heaven that Jojin should not forget Japan. The resulting poems may seem rather artificial to some tastes, but they are typical of their age. In contrast to the almost overwrought poems, most of the prose is prosaic indeed. Jojin’s mother lavished great care on her poetry, but she seems to have written most of her prose in haste. The content may be interesting but the language is unpolished, except in scattered instances when the poetry overflows into the prose, with impressive results. Following the sequence of poems discussed above, Haha no shu re­ verts to prose, telling us that, only two days after sending his mother to his brother’s monastery, Jojin left the capital. He sent a message ex­ plaining that he departed late at night—a common practice at the time— and so could not come to say good-bye in person. Some modern critics find this behavior inexcusable, but Jojin knew his mother better than they do. She repeats that she should have made such a scene that he would not be able to leave, and perhaps he had anticipated that a stealthy departure offered his only chance of avoiding her tantrum. The passage concludes with a transition back to poetry:

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My eyes filled with tears, and, since I could not see clearly: Shiite yuku Funaji o oshimu Wakareji ni Namida mo e koso T odomezarikere.

How I regret Your willful voyage. On that parting o f ways, M y tears too I cannot hold back.

In Kyushu, I hear there is a place called Iki no Matsubara [The Plain of Living Pines]: Oto ni kiku Iki no Matsubara Na ni shi owaba Yukikau hito mo Yorozu yo zo hen.

I hear rumors O f Iki no Matsubara: If true to its name, Men who pass there W ill live ten thousand years.

Because there is also a place called Mount Kamado [Cook­ ing Fire]: Omoiyaru Kokoro o shiraba Kamado yama Harukeki michi mo Teri zo wataran.

If you know M y heart’s anguish, Mount Kamado, On his long journey Illumine the way.

When people said that he is probably in Tsu Province: Ashima yuku Fune mo sawarazu Kogidenu to Kikeba Naniwa no Urameshiki kana.

W hen I hear The ship rowed out unimpeded Through the reeds, How I hate Naniwa Bay!

[A poem is omitted here because seven of its syllables are miss­ ing from extant manuscripts, rendering it largely unintelligible.] Three or four days later, when people said that by now he probably is at Kojima [Child Island] in Bizen Province: Sono kata ni Kogiyuku fune no W are naraba Kare wa Kojima to Nagusametemashi.

W ere I the ship Rowing off In that direction, I would be comforted By Child Island.

I remembered his words, “I will surely return; you must preserve your life till then!” and:

JO JIN AZARI NO HAIIA NO SH U Kari nite mo Mirume nagisa no Tsurakereba Shiboriwabinuru Ama no sode kana.

Pained, Though the parting be brief, Tears fill her eyes: The nun cannot wring dry Her soaked sleeves. [Simultaneously also meaning: Pained that she finds No sea grasses to harvest; On the shore, The fisherwoman cannot wring dry Her soaked sleeves.]

Similarly, on reading the letter from the Princely Buddhist Teacher, I felt: Kawa to kiku Namida ni ukabu Kanashisa ni Oritatsu mi o ba Seki zo kanetsuru.

You speak o f a river: Amidst the sadness floating on my tears He who departed on it Or I who would drown in it Cannot be stopped."

The Princely Buddhist Teacher, Intendant of Tennoji, had sent Jojin a letter that contained many deeply moving things and concluded: Kanashimi no Namida no kawa ni Ukabu kana Nagare awabaya Nori no umi nite.

On a river O f tears o f sadness I am floating! May we drift back together On the sea o f the Law.

Jojin replied: Kanashimi no Namida o yosuru Nori no umi no Hitotsu kishi o ba Sumi mo hanareji.

By the sea o f the Law W here pound the waves O f tears o f sadness, On that shore with you W ould I dwell forever.

Here at Ninnaji, the wind in the pine blows eternally, and I feel all the more sad: Wakareji no Kokoro ya sora ni Kayouran Hito matsu kaze no Taezu fuku kana.

A parting o f our ways: Have my feelings been conveyed T o the heavens? The wind, pining for him, Ceaselessly rushes the tree.

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Thus I recited to myself. Although days have passed, I remain sad and wish only to die: Inochi dani Kokoro ni kanau M i nariseba Tozakari yuku Hikazu hemashi ya.

If I were one Whose life followed the wishes O f her heart, W ould I endure these days As he goes further from me? (39-4 5 )

This sequence recalls the previous one by starting out on the theme of parting. Its second poem, however, changes the focus to travel, the logical sequel to parting, and also the next section in Kokinshu. Travel poems commonly incorporate puns on place-names, as do the second through fifth poems in this group (not counting the omitted, corrupt poem). Geographically, these poems are out of order. The first two are set in Kyushu, where Jojin was to board his ship for China, but the next two mention places Jojin would have passed through on his way to Kyushu. The explanation is that here again, as in the beginning of Haha no shu, the author wants to begin on an auspicious note. Perhaps to exorcise the very real dangers of travel, she begins with a place-name that suggests longevity, Iki no Matsubara, The Plain of Living Pines. Pines are natural symbols of long life; “living pines” all the more so. The next poem also uses a pun on a place-name in Kyushu, Mount Kamado, to wish Jojin a safe voyage. The pun suggests that the “cooking fire” in the name of the mountain illumine Jojin’s voyage. But “Kamado” offered more than the opportunity for word play since it was also a holy mountain in Shinto tradition, and so the poem also implied that the god dwelling there should protect Jojin. The concluding poems with placenames revert to what one would expect: they are in the proper order that a traveler would visit them on his way from the capital to Kyushu, and they contain familiar puns on the place-names mentioned. These poems anticipate the highly developed literary travel descriptions (michiyuki) that came to flourish in medieval times. The remaining six poems in the sequence fit in thematically, but their topic is no longer clearly travel. Although they continue to employ images related to travel, they focus on details of Jojin’s departure. Also included among them are poems exchanged by Jojin and another aristo­ cratic monk, along,-with his mother’s reaction. The first of these poems is a linguistic tour de force. After a group of poems with simple puns on place-names, this one features four puns that simultaneously give the poem two very different meanings. The poem once again alludes to Jojin’s promise to return, and, although it abandons place-names, it still

JO JIN AZARI NO I LAI I A NO SH U

15

keeps us by the shore. The poem also introduces a clerical image: ama, meaning both fisherwoman and nun. Having used a pun to juxtapose the seashore and the clergy, our author then offers a poem she sent to a monk in response to one he had written earlier to Jojin. The water imagery is maintained, and, where in the previous poem she merely had her sleeves drenched in tears, now she has reached the point of threatening to throw herself into the river. Next, she introduces the exchange of poems that inspired her own. These poems incorporate images of tears, the sea, and, in the first of them, a river. But unlike the poem by Jojin’s mother, they offer hope of salvation by the Law, the teachings of Buddha. These three poems are out of their chronological order. That by Jojin’s mother should come last, not first, and so some commentators have rearranged the three poems on the theory that the text is corrupt.12 W ere Haha no shii a true diary, that would seem reasonable. If it is an anthology, however, such temporal considerations need not dictate the arrangement of the poems. Aesthetic concerns would come first. Here, we have a well-ordered group of poems, starting with wishes for a safe journey, proceeding to the despair of an abandoned mother contemplating suicide, and reaching a climax of sorts in the solace offered by Buddhism’s promise of salvation. The final two poems in the sequence, not closely linked to those that come before, return to the author’s current situation, waiting in the monastery of Jojin’s brother and longing for Jojin’s return—or her own death. After the promise of salvation, we are back to more mundane concerns. By the end of this sequence, Jojin’s mother has drifted away from her topic of “travel,” and thus also from the Kokinshu model that she had been following. This transition was inevitable, since the next topics in Kokinshu are “names of things” and then “love,” a major topic with five chapters devoted to it. Jojin’s mother could have easily worked in a poem about the name of a “thing,” typically a poetic thing such as an admired bird or blossom, but love would have been a bigger problem, since the love of Kokinshu was romantic, not maternal, love. In fact, Jojin’s mother does borrow the vocabulary of romantic love to describe her attachment to her son. For example, at one point she describes it as “unrequited love,” using the term kataomoi (Haha no shu, 51), which first appeared in Man'yoshu and remains in use today among disconsolate Japanese youths whose affection for a member of the oppo­ site sex is not returned. It is not the normal term for the feeling of a parent toward an ungrateful child. If one lifted some of her poems out of their original context and placed them in a sequence of love poems from a more conventional anthology, no one would suspect that they describe the emotions of an octogenarian mother left behind by her

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already elderly son. For example, although the following poem from the second chapter of Haba no shu is based on allusions and verbal complexi­ ties that need not be discussed here, on one level, at least, it could pass for the sad statement by a person forlornly hoping that his or her be­ loved will return this day: Itsuka to mo Shiranu koiji no Ayamegusa Ukine arawasu Kyo ni koso arikere.

On this very day, Just as the iris in mud reveals its root, Ignorant of the occasion, I too weep openly on the path o f love, Not knowing when he will return. ( 162)

This poem was written on the fifth day of the fifth month, the date of the Iris Festival, when iris roots and leaves were variously employed to ward off disease. A key pun is on the word koiji, meaning both “mud” and “the path of love.” In its latter sense, it normally referred to feelings for one’s lover, not one’s child. A year later, on the same date, another very similar “love poem” appears in the diary, employing the same tropes (Haha no shu, 216). Thus we see how events in the ritual calendar could work together with literary conventions to produce poems that fit neatly into what seems to be a highly personal and subjective “diary.” After Jojin’s mother has put aside the Kokinshu arrangement of top­ ics, she offers a short prose passage followed by thirty-seven poems, interrupted only occasionally as she briefly recounts a few incidents: Jojin’s brother advises her to concentrate on her prayers; a letter from Jojin states that he will be boarding a ship for Kyushu; and once she dreams of him. The poetry is much like that which has already been discussed. In carefully linked verses, the author laments her sad plight and wishes to die. Buddhist lore is conspicuous. The following is one example, typical in its content, but noteworthy for its form, a long poem (ichoka) of fifteen lines: Amidabu to Omoite yukeba Suzushikute Sumiwataru naru Soko yori zo Kokono shina nite Hachisuba o Oinoboru naru Uwaba koso Tsuyu no waga mi o Okiten to Omou kokoro shi

The Buddha Amitabha: Invoking that name I shall pass my days In cool serenity, As from the depths, The lotus petals In nine stages Grow upward. I wish to rest M y dewlike body On the topmost petal. This longing o f my heart,

17

JO JIN AZARI NO HAHA NO SH U Fukakereba Kono yo no tsuraki Koto mo nagekanu.

So deeply felt, I grieve not The suffering o f this world.

(63) Toward the end of the first book, Jojin’s mother offers one more long, rambling, and truly remarkable prose passage (Haha no shu, 73-75), beginning with the explanation: “Although this is probably something that I should not write, if Jojin should return, I want him to know how I felt.” What follows is startlingly candid: Among both the noble and the common, a mother’s feelings for her child are different from a father’s. While the child is in her womb, she suffers and knows no comfort, either awake or asleep. Still, she thinks nothing of herself, praying only that her child will be superior to others in its appearance and in all other respects. She ignores the pain of childbirth. Once the baby is born, if she fails to nurture it with love, how can it grow into true maturity? Jojin’s mother goes on to describe his infancy, noting that he was a frail child who cried when anyone but she held him. Not until he was 100 days old did she follow the usual aristocratic custom of entrusting him to a wet nurse. And, she tells us, “M y feelings for him have not weakened to this day.” Although for years she had allowed him to do as he pleased, she had expected him to join his brother in praying for her salvation upon her deathbed. His decision to leave when her ad­ vanced years meant that she could not possibly remain long in this world was thus a particularly great blow to her. Perhaps it is not remarkable that even an eighty-four-year-old mother still vividly recalls her son’s infancy, and by this point in the Haha no shu we have grown accustomed to her habit of applying honorifics to her son. The true surprise comes when she compares her feelings to those of King Suddhodana and Queen Maya, parents of Sakyamuni, the historic Buddha. According to tradition, his father had tried to isolate Sakyamuni from knowledge of human suffering, but, as a young man, he happened to witness the pains of childbirth, old age, disease, and death (Jojin’s mother interjects that she herself suffers from two of these: age and illness). As a result of these revelations, Sakyamuni determined to become a monk and seek a means of salvation from the unhappy human condition. This greatly distressed his father, who had planned to pass the royal throne on to him. But, as Jojin’s mother explained, a father’s feelings do not match those of a mother, and Sakyamuni’s mother had died only days after she gave birth to him. She was thereby

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spared the tragedy of being abandoned by her son. Jojin’s mother con­ cludes that her suffering must be worse than that of King Suddhodana, who was merely a father, and laments that, unlike Queen Maya, she had lived to see her son desert her. Explaining that her long life is a “sin” (for want of a better word to translate tsumi), she reverts to poetry: Waga mi dani Kono yo ni nakuba Morokoshi no Wakare naritomo Nagekamashi ya wa.

If only I W ere no longer in this world, Then even if you left me To go to far Cathay, W h y would I need to grieve?

(76) This is the first in a sequence of seven tightly integrated poems in which Jojin’s mother bemoans her long life and loss of her son, while also praying for the Buddha’s salvation. Then she concludes Book One: I asked one of the monks at Ninnaji [where she was then stay­ ing], “Which Buddha is enshrined in this hall?” “Sakyamuni Buddha,” he replied: Nishi ni masu Hotoke no mina wa Kotonaredo Au hakarinaki Kata wa kawarazu.

Although the name O f the Buddha in the west Is different, The impossibility o f reunion Remains unchanged.

(76) She would prefer the Buddha of the west, Amitabha, not only be­ cause of the salvation he promised, but also because west is the direction Jojin will be traveling. Alas, the hall in the monastery where she is staying is dedicated to an inappropriate Buddha. That no longer matters to her, however, for she has given up hope of ever seeing again her beloved son, regardless of which Buddha’s name she invokes. Curiously, Book Two of Haha no shu begins precisely as Book One did with the date of the author’s move from Jojin’s monastery to that of his brother Rishi. Again, it appears to be an addition by a later hand. And, curiously, it is still accurate, for Book Two begins with a flashback to the incident that opened Book One: “Although I have already re­ corded everything concerning the time of my move from Iwakura to Ninnaji, I still do not feel satisfied” (86). Jojin’s mother then repeats her dismay over the move, notes that in the fourth month Rishi was summoned to say prayers at the palace, and explains that after she followed him there, she fell ill in the sixth

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month. Finally, two months later, she began to feel better. Presumably, at that point she resumed her writing after an interval of several months, beginning with a recapitulation of earlier events. Having explained the situation, she offers a remarkable passage of poetic prose describing the period when she had been sick. This is one instance in which she lav­ ished as much care on her prose as on her poetry: Time passed and I was not really myself. Even when the breeze cooled in the eighth month, I felt ever more sad as I recalled the days of a summer spent lying in my bedding. The intense heat silenced the summer insects; the setting sun stirred the laments of the autumn cicadas. The morning glories flour­ ished briefly at dawn; the evening glories bloomed only at night. Secretly I wondered why I cannot live even a moment without lamenting this sad world, I, whose life is even more transient than the dew on the wayside grasses awaiting the sunlight. Just then, the reeds seemed to rustle sympathetically. When I looked in the direction of the sound, however, I saw only their leaves gaily fluttering, tossed about in the wind with­ out a care, and I felt as lonely as the spider that had spun its frail web on them. Alas, I saw no trace of a sympathetic per­ son—even someone who had not suffered as I had—to share my sad appreciation of the scene. The lower leaves of the bush clover too had changed color. The glistening dew, like my life, when will it be extinguished? I felt depressed, for my worries have never been few. In the grass were various insects that I could not identify, each crying in its own way. How sad! Sagano [“Habit Plain,” the location of Rishi’s monastery] too, I thought, must be filled with their cries: Tare o to mo Wakazu nakuran Matsumushi no Waga mi no saga no Ne ni zo kayouru.

W ithout distinguishing For whom they cry, The waiting pine crickets Mimic the weeping That has become my habit.

When night fell, I heard the voice of a cricket crying by my pillow where I lay, and thought: Kusamakura Namida no tsuyu no Kakaru o ya Minekikitsura Naku kirigirisu.

On the traveler’s grass pillow The dew o f tears falls: Like the cricket, I sadly cry.15

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As the pillow became soaked, I said to m yself: Yomosugara Namida no tama no Kakareba ya Kusamakura to wa Hito no iuran.

Is it because Ail night long Tear drops fall on it That people call it A grass pillow? (90-91)

The author’s skill at correlating her own feelings to her natural surroundings, a common technique in Japanese literature, should be ap­ parent even in this translation. Lost, however, are the various poetic devices that she has incorporated into her prose, for it contains perhaps four pivot words (kakekotoba), a pillow word (makurakotoba) and some word associations (engo). These are common techniques of poetry that were rarely used in prose.14 Moreover, her images come directly from Kokinshu. One measure of how close her writing comes to poetry is the similarity of a section of her prose to a poem by Minamoto no Michinari (d. 1019) preserved in Goshuishu (completed in 1086). The passage in question has been translated as “Just then, the reeds seemed to rustle sympathetically. When I looked in the direction of the sound,. . . ” (Ogi no ha no soyo to kikinashitsuru ni oto suru o miyaritareba . . .). The poem, with identical or related vocabulary underlined, is: Sent to a woman who said “W ait until autumn”: Itsushika to Machishi kai naku Akikaze ni Soyo to bakari mo " Qgi no oto senu.

W hen will it come? T o no avail I waited. Now in the autumn wind, Even the reeds Do not rusde sympathetically.15

Conceivably, Jojin’s mother was consciously alluding to this poem, as she too lamented that her beloved had abandoned her and the sound of the wind in the reeds offered no solace. Alternatively, since she had simply chosen here to work within the confines of accepted poetic vocab­ ulary, some overlap with true poetry was inevitable. She was using all the devices of classical poetry except for the syllable counts. Another remarkable feature of this passage is her use of parallelism (“The intense heat silenced the summer insects; the setting sun stirred the laments of the autumn cicadas. The morning glories flourished briefly at dawn; the evening glories bloomed only at night.”). Parallelism is a technique that is found in Japan’s primitive poetry and, under Chi­ nese influence, was used with great skill in some of the choka of M an'yoshu. The literary prose that appeared in the Heian period, however,

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made little use of it, and it was also avoided in the tanka that had become the dominant poetic form. By the eleventh century, parallelism was used rarely except when writing in Chinese. Not until the thirteenth century did it again become common in Japanese writing, when it was used to elegant effect in the sinified prose of masterpieces such as Heike monogatari and Hojoki. In a very small way, Jojin’s mother seems to be anticipat­ ing the style of those works, perhaps under the influence of equally sinified Buddhist writings or rdei, couplets of Chinese poetry chanted in Japanese, a popular form of entertainment in the eleventh century. After briefly recapitulating the events of Book One and bringing her manuscript up to date with a section of poetic prose, Jojin’s mother becomes somewhat more of a diarist than she had been. Events are recorded chronologically, interrupted only by an occasional flashback or brief passage that may have gotten out of order. The language, as before, is a mixture of prose and poetry, although prose dominates. Poems are less frequent, and, perhaps as significantly, few appear in elaborately developed sequences. Whereas Book One includes long sections in which the prose serves only to introduce poems, as was common in poetry collections, Book Two is structured like a collection of “poem-tales” (uta monogatari) such as Tales o f Ise or Tales o f Yamato, in which the stories told in prose become more conspicuous than the poems they introduce. Given the subject matter and poetry’s ubiquitous presence in classical Japanese literature, the result is indeed something like a diary. One interesting feature of the poetry in Book Two is that, for a section in the middle of it, Buddhist poems predominate, including the book’s only long sequence of poems. Some of the Buddhist poetry from Book One has already been discussed, but a few general comments on the subject may be useful before taking a closer look at the sequence of Bud­ dhist poems.16 Already in the eighth century, poems incorporating explicidy Buddhist vocabulary were being written in Japan, and a few appear in Man'yoshu. By the time of Kokinshii, a Buddhist-inspired stress on the imper­ manence of life had come to pervade poetry to the extent that ephemerality, we are told, “can be called the dominant theme of the anthology.”17 The presence of this theme alone, however, does not make a good criterion for labeling a work “Buddhist literature,” for if we accepted this definition, virtually all classical poetry—and most prose as well—would qualify. Certain Buddhist concepts had become ingrained in Japanese consciousness and were as unavoidable in literature as Judeo-Christian ideas are in Western literature. The poetry under consideration here is either specifically classi­ fied as “Buddhist” in the anthologies or includes distinctly Buddhist terminology. By this definition, Kokinshii contains no Buddhist verse. Explicitly Buddhist poetry, however, had not disappeared from Japan. An imperially sponsored anthology of poems written in Chinese,

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compiled circa 818. included a section “The Buddhist School” (Bonmon), and true Buddhist poetry eventually resurfaced in Japanese. Poems were written specifically on the Lotus Sutra (Hokekyo) as early as 955, and Kokin rokujo, a private anthology compiled in the late tenth century, had a section devoted to “Buddhist Matters” (Butsuji). Finally, in 1086, Goshuishu became the first imperial anthology with a special category for Buddhist poems, shakkyoka, literally, “poems on the teaching of Sakyamuni,” although that was merely one of three subheadings in a chapter of “miscellaneous poems.” Just over a century later, Senzaishu included a separate chapter devoted to Buddhist poems, as did all subsequent imperial anthologies. When Jojin’s mother was compiling Haha no shu, Buddhist poetry was flourishing and well on its way to obtaining official recognition as a category in the imperial anthologies. It would always remain, however, a distinctly minor category, rarely accounting for more than 5 percent of the poems in an imperial anthology. In contrast, approximately 30 percent of the poems in Haha no shu are distinctly Buddhist, as identified by use of such terms as “Buddha” (hotoke), “lotus” (hachisu), or “Para­ dise” (gokuraku). A freer definition would increase that percentage. Com­ position of Buddhist poetry was typical of the age in which she lived, and the amount she wrote reflects her piety as surely as had her decision many decad/es earlier to have her young sons become monks. Unfortu­ nately, the merits of religious literature are apt to be lost on readers who do not share its author’s faith or, worse, who miss the allusions essential to understanding the work. The following passage, which in­ cludes the longest sequence of poems from Book Two, illustrates both the practice of Buddhist poetry and the problems in reading it. The translation is relatively literal. References to Buddhist doctrine that may be unfamiliar are explained in the discussion that follows. When I heard that the vernal equinox would come on the twenty-fourth day of the second month, I resolved to say my prayers just as the setting sun colored the horizon to the west. The day was very cloudy, however, and so, despite my impa­ tient wait, I finally had to conclude that the sky was heartless: Waga tame wa Ogamu irihi mo Kumogakure Nagaki yami koso Omoiyararure.

For me, even the setting sun, To which I would pray, Is hidden by clouds And calls to mind Only eternal darkness.

I felt that the whole world had grown gloomy and thought I might recite a sutra as a prayer to the Buddha, but since that

JO JIN AZARI NO HAHA NO SH U

too proved painful, I abandoned the effort. Then I became frightened, thinking to myself that this might be a sin. To comfort myself somewhat:

Chirinikeru Hana no ori minu Sono uki ni Itodo kozue no Haruka naru kana.

Book One The blossoms have scattered And I missed seeing their moment. Sadness wells up: Alas, my son is as far away As those tree tops.

Chiri harau Ie no aruji mo Waga goto ya Madoitaru ko ha Yukashikariken.

Book Two The master o f the house From which the son cleaned the dust Is just like me: He longed for the child W ho had strayed.

Hitotsu ame no Shita ni nuredomo Ikanareba Uruwanu kusa no Mi to nariniken

Book Three Although we all dwell Beneath the same rainy sky, W h y have I become The only grass That does not get watered?

Ei samete Nochi ni awazu wa Ikade ka wa Koromo no ura no Tama o shirubeki.

Book Four After wakening from the stupor, Had they not met How could he Have discovered the jewel Flidden in his garment?

Kimi ni koso Futatsu no tama wa Makaseshika. Itsutsu no sawari Todometeki tote.

Book Five It was to you That I entrusted M y two jewels, In order to escape The Five Hindrances.

Oroka naru Kokoro todomu to Kikishikado Ko wa haruka ni zo Iku kusuri naru.

Book Six The ailing foolish hearts W ere to be left behind, I had heard, But the living medicine, my child, Has gone far away.

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Yuku hito wa Ureshiki fune to Omou tomo Tomareru kata no Urameshiki kana.

Book Seven He who goes M ay think it to be A boat o f joy, But the one left on the shore Finds it only hateful.

Ake kure wa Amaneki kado o Tanomitsutsu Idenishi hito no Iru o koso mate.

Book Eight Day and night In the Universal Gate, I trust, waiting For the person gone away To enter through it.

Sutra o f Innumerable Meanings / Hakari naku XJmoki o watasu Fune no shi wa Mata kono kishi o Tanomite zo matsu.

Like the master o f a ship That can carry The heaviest o f loads, I trust in this shore And wait till my child comes back.

Samantabhadra Sutra Hi ni soete Sora o mo itodo Tanomu kana Namida no tsuyu no Mi o mo kiyase to.

As the days pass, M ore and more I ask The heavens That my body be extinguished Like the dew o f my tears.

Buddha o f Infinite Life Sutra Suguretaru Hachisu no ue o Negau kana Au hakari naki Kimi o tanomite.

I pray for rebirth On the splendid lotus O f Paradise, Trusting in you, W hom I can never meet.

Shorter Amitabha Sutra Asakarazu Omoisometaru Iroiro no Hachisu no ue o Ikaga mizaran.

They are not shallow, M y thoughts o f rebirth On the lotuses Dyed many colors. How can I fail to see them?

I passed the days, trusting in these thoughts. (132-38) This sequence of religious poetry is initiated by a frustrated attempt at celebrating a Buddhist holiday. In 806, the court declared that sutras

JO JIN AZARI NO HAHA NO SH U

25

should be read on the vernal and autumnal equinoxes, and by the midHeian period, this had become an established event on the annual calen­ dar of rituals. It was known as higan, or, literally, “the other shore,” referring to the attainment of salvation from the suffering of this human world. It was celebrated at sunset on the equinoxes because meditation on the setting sun was a practice advocated in the Buddha o f Infinite Life Sutra (Murydjukyd), and the equinoxes were when the sun set directly in the west, the location of Buddha Amitabha’s Paradise.18 Because the sky was cloudy, Jojin’s mother missed her chance to say her prayers at the right time and responds by blaming the sky for failing to cooperate with her religious aspirations. The “eternal darkness” of her poem is a famil­ iar Buddhist metaphor for the unenlightened mind. Thus, when the setting sun ought to be inspiring thoughts of salvation, a clouded sky stirs only fear over her inadequate spiritual development. Her prayers unsaid, she then resolves to try reciting a sutra instead but finds herself unequal to the task. These devotional practices should have offered her solace, but her inability to complete them only deepens her spiritual anxieties. Finally, she assuages her sense of guilt with a sequence of poems meant to symbolize a reading of the sutras. Although she does not explicitly state her source, the first eight are based on the eight books of the Lotus Sutra, a work so well known to her intended audience as to need no identification. These are followed by poems on two sutras that had come to be linked with it, the Sutra o f Innumerable M eanings (M uryogikyo), which was regarded as an introduction to the Lotus Sutra, and the Samantabhadra Sutra (Fugenkankyo), regarded as a conclusion. She concludes with poems on the Buddha o f Infinite Life Sutra (M utyojukyo)19 and the Amitabha Sutra, which she refers to by an alter­ nate name, the Shorter Amitabha Sutra (Sho Amidakyo). These are two of the three basic texts of Pure Land Buddhism, the first of them having provided the inspiration for the festival the author is attempting to cele­ brate. As noted, poems based on the Lotus Sutra were nothing new, but this set of them is perhaps unique. Whereas other poems on the sutra were linked only by their subject matter, these are also held together by a common theme, the now familiar lament for a departed son. Moreover, they form an integrated sequence that follows the basic rules of associa­ tion—each poem incorporates vocabulary from the one before it—and progression—from sorrow over her loneliness to hope of salvation. The poet thus adapts a conventional form of religious poetry to express her own very personal concerns. The sequence begins by alluding to a passage from the introductory chapter to the Lotus Sutra in which we are told that, after the Buddha had preached the sutra, he entered into a meditative state and wondrous flowers rained down from the sky and filled the assembled multitude

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with joy.20 According to her poem, our author’s sadness at not having been able to witness that marvel was deepened by the knowledge that her son is as far away as the tree from which the blossoms presumably fell. In Buddhist thought, however, attachment even to a child interferes with a parent’s spiritual development. This is the poem of someone not yet enlightened. Next, attention turns to a parable from Book Two of the sutra. A young man flees his father’s home. During the next fifty years, the father tries to find him and, meanwhile, becomes fantastically rich. Finally, the son reappears, a beggar who no longer recognizes his father. Realizing that his son is intimidated by his wealth, the father hires him to clean the house of filth, and only gradually reveals his true identity.21 This is to explain why the Buddha first taught lesser truths—those of Theravada—and only later, when his followers had been adequately prepared, the greater truths of Mahayana. Jojin’s mother equates herself with the father longing for his son, which may be appropriate on a literal level, but seems at least immodest, if not sacrilegious, when one considers that in the parable the father represents the Buddha. The poem incorporates two words from the one before: chiri, which in the first poem is the verb “to scatter” and here becomes the noun “dust”; and ko, or “child,” which in the first poem is embedded in the word for “tree tops,” kozue. All the poems in the sequence are linked by adopting vocabulary from the previous one in this manner. From Book Three, the author alludes to “The Parable of the Herbs,” which compares the Buddha’s teachings to a great cloud that rains equally and identically on all trees, plants, and herbs, each of which, nonetheless, develops in its own way.22 The message is similar to that of the previous story: all beings follow the Buddha’s law according to their own various natures. Momentarily, Jojin’s mother has put aside mention of her son and simply notes that she has not benefited from die nourishing teachings of the Buddha. She also hints at the idea that China and Japan are all part of a single universe (Hitotsu ante no shita), as she did in the poem that was later selected for inclusion in Patriotic Poems by a Hundred Poets. She cannot put her son out of her mind—or her poetry—for long, however, and her next poem hints that her salvation depends on his return. It is based on one of her favorite parables to which she alludes frequently. A man, visiting a friend, gets drunk and falls asleep. The friend ties a priceless jewel within the man’s garment and leaves. After­ ward, the man suffers a life of poverty until once again he chances to meet his friend, who tells him of the hidden jewel. The jewel is our potential enlightenment, latent within us, until a teacher, the Buddha, reveals it to us.23 By implication, Jojin alone can enlighten his mother.

JO JIN AZARI NO HAHA NO SH U

27

Unfortunately, even with Jojin’s help, his mother might have found salvation difficult to obtain because, according to Buddhist teachings, women suffered from the Five Hindrances: they could not become Brahma kings, Indras, Mara kings, Cakravarti kings, or Buddhas. The Lotus Sutra, however, told how one woman did attain enlightenment. A daughter of the dragon king offered a precious pearl to the Buddha. In exchange he transformed her into a man, and then she attained perfect enlightenment.24 To modern sensibilities, this may be a rather unsatisfac­ tory statement of spiritual “equal opportunity” for women, but it seems to have satisfied Heian ladies, for they referred to it often.25 In her own poem, Jojin’s mother claims to have outdone the dragon king’s daughter by having offered the Buddha “two jewels,” in other words, her two sons who had become monks. The religious pursuits of her sons should have ensured her salvation, even according to teachings that discrimi­ nated against women. If Jojin’s vocation was meant to contribute to his mother’s enlight­ enment, his absence interfered with it, at least in her mind. Her next poem alludes to the parable of a good physician whose sons, while he is away, sample his poisonous medicines. He returns to find that some, in their delirium, refuse the antidote, and so, after once again departing, he sends a message that he has died. This shocks his sons into taking the medicine that cures them. The moral of the story is that the very rarity of the Buddha’s presence should cause people to strive all the harder to cultivate virtue in his absence, which should shock them into faith.26 Although the poem itself may be open to other interpretations, our author seems to have twisted the story around to mean the opposite of the original: the departure of her spiritual doctor, her son, has ren­ dered her cure more difficult. The second line of this poem presents textual problems and has been slightly modified. In both surviving manu­ scripts it reads kokoro to tomo to, which means “along with my heart” and renders the poems somewhat awkward to construe. Previously a few scholars have proposed the reading adopted here because in the orthography of classical Japanese the syllables mu and mo were easily confused.27 They neglect to point out that this change also establishes the necessary verbal link with the previous poem (that poem’s todometeki is a conjugated form of the verb todomu, “to leave behind”). Without emendation, this poem would become the only one in the sequence that does not incorporate at least one word from the poem before it. The seventh poem clears up any ambiguities that the sixth might have suggested. In Book Seven, the Lotus Sutra offers a series of meta­ phors to describe the text’s power. It is like, among other things, a clear pool to the thirsty, clothing to the naked, and a ferry at a crossing.28 For the pilgrim Jojin, a boat is indeed a blessing, but for his mother,

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left behind, it is a curse. The previous poem did not comment explicitly on his absence, and its allusion suggested it was a blessing in disguise. This poem confirms what we suspected: her son’s departure only makes the author miserable. The final poem based on the Lotus Sutra alludes not to material in the sutra but to the title of a chapter, “The Universal Gate of the Bodhisattva Avalokitesvara (Kannon).29 The word “Universal Gate” is usually pronounced in its Sino-Japanese reading fum on, but here it is “translated” into pure Japanese as amaneki kado. The term is a metaphor of universal salvation offered by the merciful bodhisattva. Here, it be­ comes the gate through which Jojin has left and through which his mother hopes he will return. Having lamented his departure, the author now turns to her religious beliefs, praying not for salvation but for her son’s return. Although the author next moves on to a different sutra, the message of the next poem is much the same as that of the previous one. Putting her faith in Buddhism, she awaits Jojin’s return. The passage she alludes to here is one extolling the merits of the sutra. W e are told that, just as an ailing ferryman recuperating on the shore can still transport a good load if he has a sturdy boat, so the sutra can save those suffering in this world, the shore of ignorance and disease.30 Here, the parable seems appropriate, for the author is indeed suffering the infirmities of advanced years. Again, however, she twists it slightly, and, instead of the sutra, she relies on “this shore,” the human world of suffering. She is not yet ready to leave it until she sees her son again. The second poem on a sutra related to the Lotus Sutra refers, some­ what loosely, to a passage stating that, if one recites the Mahayana sutras, a voice from the sky will respond with praise.31 The poem suggests that time has passed and the author has begun to despair of ever seeing her son again. Now she has begun to accept the teachings of the Buddha. The poems she has been composing are meant to be equivalent to read­ ing the sutras, and so she is waiting to hear the promised voice from the sky. Instead of clinging to “this shore,” she has come to ask for release from her human existence. Having at last turned to thoughts of her own salvation, the final two poems are based appropriately on sutras from the Pure Land tradi­ tion that promised the faithful rebirth in Amitabha’s Western Paradise.32 They are simpler in expression than those that came before and do not require so detailed a knowledge of Buddhist lore to be appreciated. The first of them again takes a word from the title of the sutra, m uryo (infi­ nite) and incorporates it into the poem in its Japanese reading, hakari naki, where it takes on a somewhat different meaning (“cannot be antici­ pated,” i.e., “impossible”). In this poem, she is resigned to the impossibility

JO JIN AZAR1 NO HAHA NO SH U

29

of meeting her son again, but she still relies on him to pray for her salvation. Finally, according to the Shorter Amitabha Sutra, the lotus pond in Paradise is filled with flowers of many hues.33 Jojin’s mother fully expects to see them, for her thoughts of salvation have matured and are now as deep as the water in the pond. She has progressed spiritually from the sadness that welled up in her first poem to confi­ dence in her ability to attain rebirth in the Pure Land, despite Jojin’s absence. This sequence is as much a religious as a literary exercise. After this sequence, the deep faith expressed in these sutra poems persists in Haha no shu, but intermittent news of Jojin revives his moth­ er’s distress. Earlier, he had returned to the capital to see his mother but had stayed only overnight, promising to visit once more before sailing to China. Subsequently, she hears that he has headed for Kyushu and real­ izes that, contrary to what he had told her, he has no intention of returning again before his pilgrimage. Then, in the sixth month, word comes that he had set sail for China three months earlier. His letter telling her of his departure arrives shortly afterward. Once again, she finds herself thinking only of Jojin and feeling miserable. She wants letters from him, and letters do arrive, but they fail to satisfy her. The first is from a disciple who had gone to Kyushu to see him off and had received news of his safe arrival in China, presumably from a Chinese merchant who had recently arrived in Japan. After the new year comes, another disciple announces that he intends to go and meet Jojin in China. The author entrusts him with a letter. From Jojin’s own diary, we know that one of his disciples did journey to China with news from home, but a letter from his mother is not mentioned. Eventually a de­ tailed letter from Jojin does arrive, but it is not addressed to his mother, to her dismay. Attempts to maintain contact with Jojin become a central concern of his mother, and Buddhist poetry briefly fades from the text. Again, she becomes more interested in the solace her son can offer than that of religion. Given the primitive transportation systems of the period, a modern reader is apt to be impressed by the fact that his mother was able to learn of his safe arrival and send a letter to him in China. She, however, was not at all satisfied with this limited communication. In the end, however, it is Buddhism that comforts her. The last dated events she describes took place in the fourth month of 1073. Presumably she died shortly thereafter, perhaps in the fifth month. She concludes with a passage in which the prose is circular and repetitious, but in which Buddhist poetry returns after a considerable interval. These poems, however, are declarations of faith by a dying woman. She ex­ presses herself in uncharacteristically simple language, repeating the word “Paradise” (gokuraku) in the first four of her final six poems. Here,

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at the end of Haha no sbu, we have a passage of integrated prose and poetry that for once does not require commentary: Often I have felt ill, and possibly I am suffering a recurrence these days as my face and body have swollen, causing me to suffer more than usual. “Perhaps I am about to die,” I won­ dered, feeling distraught and not myself. In my confusion, still confident that I would be reborn in Paradise, I took comfort in the parable of the beautiful lotus that grows out of the mire: Hakari naki Kuni o sugitaru Gokuraku mo Kokoro no uchi wa Taenu to zo kiku.

Separated from us By countless lands, Paradise: I hear it can be found Ever in the heart.

Utatane no Hodo mo wasurezu Gokuraku o Yume ni mo min to Omou kokoro mo.

Even should I doze, I will not forget Paradise: I wish to see it Even in my dreams.

I worried that letters from China still did not come to me: Obotsukana Fumi miteshigana Gokuraku ni Fururan hana no Ato to omoite.

W orried, just to see a letter W ould be to step into Paradise, And see the spot W here the flowers rained down.

I remembered how he told me that we must surely meet in Paradise: Gokuraku no Hachisu no ue o Matsu hodo ni Tsuyu no waga mi zo Okidokoro naki.

Rebirth on the lotus O f Paradise: W hile I await it, I have no place to rest M y dewlike body.

I pass the days with such thoughts. Every morning, when the sun drives off the clouds, I pray that the sins I have accumu­ lated daily will be completely extinguished. In the evening, looking at the glow of the moon, I ask it to guide me to the Buddha’s holy Vulture Peak: Washi no yama Nodoka ni terasu

T o Vulture Peak: The gentle fight

JO JIN AZAR1 NO HAHA NO SH U Tsuki koso wa Makoto no michi no Shirube to wa kike.

O f the moon, So I hear, Marks the true path.

Asahi matsu Tsuyu no tsumi naku Kiehateba Yube no tsuki wa Sasowazarameya.

If the morning sun Extinguishes completely The dew o f my sins, How could the evening moon Fail to guide me?

31

I place my trust in this. (229-30)

C O N C L U SIO N

Jojin azari no haha no shii would have to be ranked as one of the lesser gems of Heian literature. Its range is narrow, and it is repetitious. Whereas much of its prose appears to have been written hastily, technical virtuosity alone is the most conspicuous characteristic in many of the poems. Still, the work does merit our attention. Some admirers extol its expressions of maternal love—although Western readers, by now long accustomed to Freudian views, may find this love more neurotic than touching. As this essay has attempted to demonstrate, it is also helpful to those interested in certain problems in classical Japanese literature. It offers a fresh example of how the principles used in compiling antholo­ gies of poetry came to be adopted in what appears to be a work of literary nonfiction, and it thus helps us understand the nature of classical Japanese literary genres. It shows how the language of romantic love poetry could be used to express maternal love, not by changing the poetry, but merely by placing it in a different context. It also reminds us that Buddhist verse had come to find a significant place in Japan’s poetic tradition. The literal accuracy of the work is also an interesting question. Even Jojin’s generally laconic and presumably truthful diary displays a few literary flourishes that may cause readers to question his reliability in places. The conventions of the classical Japanese poetic anthology led his mother to produce a work that is a more subtle blend of fact and artistry. She indeed offers valuable background information to historians interested in her son’s great pilgrimage since without it we would know little about events leading up to the time he boarded ship in Kyushu, the first event recorded in his diary. Still, we must read her work criti­ cally. The day is long past when scholars could treat literary works by court ladies as the best source of historical information regarding aristo­ cratic life in the Heian period.34 Instead, their writings, including the

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work of Jojin’s mother, should be appreciated for what they are, carefully structured works of literature. Whether anthology or diary, Jojin’s mother does offer us a distinctive glimpse at otherwise unfamiliar aspects of Heian life and literature. Even if her account is not reliable in an absolute sense, it includes much that will reward the interested reader. NOTES 1. For a general introduction to Jojin’s diary, see my article “San T endai G odai sa n ki as a Source for the Study of Sung History,” B u lletin o f S u n g Yuan S tu d ies 19 (1987): 1-16. Currently I am working on a complete translation of that diary, a project that has been supported by National Endowment for the Humanities, Fulbright, and Social Science Research Council grants. The present paper is part of that project. 2. For a good introduction to Heian kanbun and its peculiarities, see Judith Rabinovitch, ShOmonki: T he S tory o f M asak ado’s R ebellion (Monumenta Nipponica, 1986), 53— 62. 3. Japanese confusion of these genres has been often noted. See, for example, Earl Miner, J a p a n ese P oetic D iaries (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1969), 1— 20; and Phillip Tudor Harries, P oetic M em o irs o f L ady D aibu (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1980), 28-47. The latter treats a work rather like the one discussed here. 4. Both of the manuscripts have been reproduced. The Reizei text, now in the possession of Osaka Aoyama Tanki Daigaku, appeared as supplementary volume 1, Shiokawa Toshikazu and Ii Haruki, eds., to the series J iiy o kotenseki sokan (Kadokawa Shoten, 1982). The copy in the Imperial Household Library was reproduced as volume 123 of B enseisha bunko , Okazaki Kazuo, ed. (Benseisha, 1979). Of various modem editions, the best is Miyazaki Sohei, J o jin a ja ri h a ha no shit zenshak uchu (Kodansha, 1979). The work has been translated into English, with meticulous annotation and an introduc­ tion detailing the circumstances of composition (Robert Mintzer, “J o jin a z a ri no h a ha shu: Maternal Love in the Eleventh Century, An Enduring Testament,” Ph.D. dissertation, Harvard University, 1978). Although the translations that follow are my own, I owe a great debt to Mintzer, who offers a thorough review of Japanese scholarship and many original interpretations, some of which I have adopted. For discussion of Japanese editions prior to Miyazaki, see Mintzer, “Maternal Love,” 27-30, 414-25. The tide has come to be read in various ways; I have adopted the one found in NKBD 3:351, but I have respected the preferences of scholars who suggest alternate readings in their tides. For a sympathetic introduction to the work in English, see Donald Keene, T ra velers o f a H u n d red A ges (New York: Henry Holt and Company, 1989), 62-67; or in French, Bernard Frank, “L ’Experience d’un malheur absolu: son refits et son depassement. L ’Histoire de la mere de Jojin,” A cadem ie d es in scrip tion s e t b elles-lettres com p tes ren d u s d e sea n ces (1989): 472-88. Quotations trans­ lated from H aha no shit will be identified parenthetically in the text with the page numbers from the Miyazaki edition. 5. For the diary view, see Miyazaki, Z enshakuchu, 247—48; and Mintzer, “Maternal Love,” 30-35; for the collection view, NKBD 3:351-52; for the compromise view, Shiokawa and Ii, JuyO kotenseki sokan , 18. 6. Helen Craig McCullough, B rocade by N igh t: “Kokin W akasbu ” a n d th e C ourt S tyle in J a p a n e se C lassical P o etry (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1985), 497-509; and Janet A. Walker, “Poetic Ideal and Fictional Reality in the Iz u m i Shikibu Nikki,” H a rva rd J o u r n a l o f A siatic S tu d ies 37.1 (1977): 135— 82. 7. For the poem itself, see Kifune Shigeaki, G osen wakashii zenshak u (Kasama Shoin, 1988), 734-35; and Mildred Tahara, T a le s o fY a m a to .A T en th -C en tu ry P o em -T a le (Honolulu:

JO JIN AZARI NO HAHA NO SH U

33

University Press of Hawaii, 1980), 26, 214; for its use in G enji, see Haruo Shirane, T he B rid ge o f D ream s: A P oetics o f “T h e T ale o f G en ji ” (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1987), 184-86, 216. 8. Daiunji, founded in 971, was an important Tendai monastery in Iwakura, just northeast of Kyoto. It is also the setting for the last episode of Ihara Saikaku’s Koshoku ich id a i onna (The Life of an Amorous Woman, 1686). More recently, its head priest created scandal by having its buildings leveled and dispersing its treasures in 1985. Ninnaji, founded in 886 to the west of Kyoto, continues to flourish. The name of Jojin’s brother is unknown. His mother refers to him only as Rishi, the archaic orthography for risshi, literally, “precepts master,” a high rank in the official Buddhist heirarchy. 9. The definitive study on this subject remains Jin’ichi Konishi, “Association and Progres­ sion: Principles of Integration in Anthologies and Sequences of Japanese Court Po­ etry, A.D. 900-1350,” trans. and adapted by Robert H. Brower and Earl Miner, H a rva rd J o u r n a l o f A siatic S tu d ies 21 (1958): 67-127. 10. This literary curiosity was compiled by a group of distinguished scholars and poets, among them Sasaki Nobutsuna, the man responsible for rediscovering H aha no shu. Sponsored by the newspapers that evolved into the present M a in ich i sh in b u n , it was first published in 1942 (Nishiuchi Tadashi, K u n ita m a : Aikoku hyak unin isshu no kaisetsu [Kinseisha, 1985], 218). The following year, its translation into Chinese as Y ingh uaguo g eh u a (Song Talks from the Land of Cherry Blossoms) became the occasion for a special exhibition at a Japanese-run library in Peking, complete with materials con­ cerning each of the poets represented (Okamura Keiji, “Pekin Idndai kagaku toshokan no ‘Nihon,’ ” N ihon kenkyu 7 [1992]: 115-16). More remarkably still, it was translated into English by the indefatigable Heihachiro Honda as O ne H u n d red P a trio tic P oem s (Hokuseido Press, 1944), where the poem by Jojin’s mother appears on p. 27: You start for Cathay,/Which lies on the globe same,/Howe’er far away./Ne’er fail, my son, to esteem/Your land, nor of it to dream! 11. The word orita tsu in this poem has been variously interpreted. Miyazaki explains that it means “descend and go into the river of tears,” but in his translation he has the author speak of being “enveloped in tears of sadness” (k anashim i n o na m id a n i tozasare te iru koto da) (Z enshak uchu , 47— 49). Shimazu Kusako overlooks o ri and takes tatsu (literally “to depart”) to refer to Jojin’s departure for China (J o jin a z a ri no h a ha no sh u San T end a i G odai san ki no kenkyu [DaizO Shuppansha, 1959], 117). Mintzer (“Maternal Love,” 152, 262) follows yet another Japanese scholar who sees orita tsu as a pun meaning both “to descend to a low place,” that is, for the author to drown herself, and “to devote oneself wholeheartedly,” that is, for her son to insist on going to China. I follow Mintzer in taking the word to be a pun, but also believe that in this context Shimazu is right in calling attention to the sense of “to depart.” Ambiguities such as this are rife in H aha no sh u , although I have chosen not to burden the reader with a discussion of each of them. For those who are interested, Mintzer offers a full analysis of the verbal complexities of each poem. 12. Mintzer, “Maternal Love,” 260. 13. No attempt has been made to guess the meaning of the unintelligible fourth line of this poem, which is omitted in the translation. 14. A similar passage of poetic prose from T he T ale o f G enji is discussed in Shirane, T he B rid ge o f D rea m s, 20. 15. Fujimoto Kazue, G oshui ivakashu (Kodansha, 1983), 4:77. 16. The discussion that follows is based on Robert E. Morrell, “The Buddhist Poetry in the G oshuishu," M o n u m en t N ipponica 28.1 (Spring 1973): 87-100 (also see Morrell’s contribution to this volume); Edward Kamens, T he B uddhist P o etr y o f th e G rea t K am o P riestess: D aisaiin S en sh i a n d H osshin IVakashu (Ann Arbor: Center for Japanese Stud­ ies, University of Michigan, 1990); Yamada Shozen, “Poetry and Meaning: Medieval

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Poets and the L otus S u tr a " in T he L otus S u tra in J a p a n ese C ultu re, George J. Tanabe, Jr., and W illa Jane Tanabe, eds. (Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1989), 95-117; Ishihara Kiyoshi, Shakkyoka no kmkyU: H achidaishu o ch ush in tosh ite (Kyoto: Dohosha, 1980); and Ishida Mizumaro, N ihon koten bungak u to BukkyO (Chikuma Shobo, 1988), 85-140. 17. McCullough, B rocade by N ight, 9. 18. Yamanaka Yutaka, H eiancho no n en jii gyOji (Hanawa Shobo, 1972), 187-90. 19. The manuscript actually repeats the tide M uryogik yo, but, for reasons summarized in Mintzer, “Maternal Love,” 337-38, this is surely an error. 20. For an English version, see Bunno Kato, Yoshiro Tamura, and Kojiro Miyasaka, trans., revisions by W. E. Soothill, Wilhelm Schiffer, and Pier P. Del Campana, T he T h ree­ fo ld L otus S u tra (New York: Weatherhill, 1975), 33. 21. Ibid., 110-16. 22. Ibid., 126-29. 23. Ibid., 177-78. 24. Ibid., 211-14. 25. See, for example, Kamens, T he B uddhist P oetry, 71—73, 79—81, 112—13. 26. T h e T h reefold L otus S u tra , 252-53. 27. Mintzer, “Maternal Love,” 332-33. 28. T he T h reefold L otus S u tra , 308-9. 29. Ibid., 319-27. 30. Ibid., 20-21. 31. Ibid., 355. 32. Both of these sutras appear in Max Friedrich Muller, trans., T h e S a cred Books o f th e East, vol. 49, B ud d h ist M ahayana Texts, part II (Oxford: The Clarendon Press, 1894). There, they are tided, respectively, T h e L a rg er S uk havati-vyU ha, and T h e S m a ller S u k h a va ti-vyu h a .

33. Ibid., 94. 34. For Jojin’s diary, see my own article, “The Case of the Plagiaristic Journal: A Curious Passage from Jojin’s Diary,” in Aileen Gatten and Anthony Hood Chambers, eds., N ew L eaves: S tu d ies a n d T ranslations o f J a p a n ese L itera tu re in H onor o f E dw ard S eid en stick er (Ann Arbor: Center for Japanese Studies, University of Michigan, 1993),

63-74. Ii Haruki treats the mother’s work as a source for the son’s travels in “Jojin azari no toso: ‘J ojin azari no haha no shu’ oboegaki,” S h irin 12 (1992):32-52. The idea that literary works are the preferred sources for the study of Heian history was presented, for example, in Ivan Morris, T h e W orld o f th e S h in in g P rin ce: C ourt L ife in A ncient J a p a n (New York: Penguin Books, 1986), 14.

“Seeking What the Masters Sought”: Masters, Disciples, and Poetic Enlightenment in Medieval Japan S

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Matsuo Basho (1644-94) is often seen as the first great poetic figure of Japan’s Edo period (1600-1868). But research reveals that many of his statements draw directly on the past, particularly the medieval tradition (1200-1500) of which he considered his own work an extension. Such is the case with his famous advice to young poets: “Do not seek to follow in the footsteps of the men of old; seek what they sought.”1 For, as original as it may seem, counsel of this sort—which urges the artist to find the secrets of creation for himself and not through imitation— began not with Basho, but with patterns of thought and behavior insti­ gated long before among poets of Japan’s medieval age and, before them, among Buddhist priests. One need not search for long in the poetry of medieval Japan to find evidence of Buddhist ideas and ideals. Not only the overtly religious poetry of the age but also much of its descriptive poetry is dominated by what one can only call a Buddhist mindset. Even in a poem by the priest Noin (b. 988), written some years before the medieval age is generally said to have begun, we confront images that seem to have been chosen less for their own descriptive power than for their ability to express the Buddhist doctrine of impermanence. “Written when he was in a mountain village” Yamazato no Haru no yugure Kite mireba Iriai no kane ni Hana zo chirikeru.

To a mountain village At nightfall on a spring day I came, and saw this— Blossoms scattering on echoes From the vespers bell.2

Bellsound and blossoms: two perfect, if (or because) contrasting, incarna­ tions of Buddha’s law, the resonance of the one calling believers to prayer and the fragile beauty of the other reminding them of the futility

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of even such devout actions in a world where transience is the rule for all things. But such examples remain somehow vague and abstract: not every poem about the scattering of cherry blossoms need be taken as Buddhist allegory. The fact is that Buddhism provided models for medieval poetry and poetic institutions in more concrete and specific ways as well. In recent years, studies in both Japanese and English have documented the impact of the doctrines of the Tendai sect on the great Fujiwara no Shunzei (1114-1204), for instance, showing the ways in which he applied certain meditation practices to his own poetry and criticism, while other studies have documented the influence of similar Buddhist ideas on poets from the monk Saigyo (1118-90), Shunzei’s contemporary, to Kyogoku Tamekane (1254—1332) and Bishop Shinkei (1406-75). W hat these ef­ forts have shown is that for such men the practice of poetry was a W ay of religious devotion and not simply an art or a profession. Nor does this mean that they confused the truths of art with the truths of the sutras; rather, they resisted the notion that there could be a fundamental distinction between the two. For them, poetry was not merely a way of stating religious truth; it was religious truth.3 Not surprisingly, most studies of Buddhist influence on medieval poetry have focused on precisely this aspect of the phenomenon: the interplay of aesthetics and philosophy. Thus we have studies of Saigyo’s nature poetry as a critique of egoism, articles exploring the Zen ideal of “entering into the object” as it occurs in Tamekane’s imagery, and so on. Yet it is clear from the historical record that medieval poets bor­ rowed much more from Buddhism than a set of philosophical tenets. In addition, they borrowed a style of critical discourse, as evidenced in the numerous poetic treatises and critiques of the era that adopt the Buddhist-inspired “dialogue” (;mondo) approach to exposition; an attitude toward poetic composition that owed much to the notion of religious “inspiration” or “enlightenment”; and, in many cases, even a monkish regimen involving various spartan rigors of study, devotion, and often seclusion from the secular world. In this sense, then, one may argue that many poets of the medieval age borrowed not only Buddhist doctrines but a Buddhist lifestyle and worldview. One of the most striking evi­ dences of this is in the widespread adoption among those poets of the Buddhist mode of doctrinal transmission: the master-disciple relationship. That direct oral rehearsal of the law from teacher to student was the preferred method of instruction among many Buddhist sects and establishments from the very beginning of the religion in the sixth cen­ tury B.c. is apparent in the earliest records of the faith. The Lotus Sutra itself, chief scripture of the Mahayana tradition, shows Sakyamuni, the

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historical Buddha, surrounded by disciples ready to hear his word; and many of these disciples became masters in their turn—an understandable development in a world in which for years they were the only source of information on the World-Honored One’s revelations. Even after the advent of the first sutras, however, it was this form of transmission rather than any other that continued as the primary mode of instruction for those serious about their religion. Exactly why this was so may never be clear: partially it was no doubt due to strife between warring factions, each of which wanted to guard its own secrets of doctrine and practice; another explanation is that the central doctrines of Buddhism demanded not passive acceptance but active intellectual and spiritual analysis lead­ ing to a final confrontation with “truth” that was less intellectual than intuitive—the sort of confrontation that could be best achieved through dialogue between teacher and student. For whatever reason, as the reli­ gion spread from India to Central Asia and later to China and Korea, it was carried by wandering monks who gathered around themselves those eager to receive direct transmission of their doctrines and secrets. In time, the master-disciple relationship was conventionalized. The vari­ ous sects developed recognized procedures for the instruction of novices, but for virtually all of them direct training by a master was a major rite of passage. By the time the “new” religion of Buddhism reached Japan in the sixth century a .d . the tradition of direct instruction from master to disci­ ple was already a thousand years old: it was, in other words, an institu­ tion as much a part of the religion as its doctrines or authority structures. It was also an institution that the Japanese seem to have had little diffi­ culty in accepting. Chronicles of the next few centuries record frequent trips to Japan by Chinese clerics, and even more numerous were the Japanese seekers who traveled to the mainland. For understandable rea­ sons, historical records tend to stress the economic, political, and artistic motives behind early excursions to China. Prominent on the passenger rolls of all these trips, however, were the names of men going to China not to trade or learn statecraft but to receive direct instruction from renowned Chinese Buddhist masters. It was not enough to read the sutras, or to listen to the law recited in audience halls; no one who had not studied at the feet of an authority could hope to find enlightenment, or for that matter to succeed in the competitive world of the monasteries. Only those who had learned from the authentic masters of the faith went on to become the leaders of the various Buddhist sects in early Japan. Exactly when poets began to adopt this system of intensive, personal instruction is not easy to determine. It is a well-known fact, for instance, that from early in court history there were families that specialized in one of the arts or in branches of Chinese scholarship (kangaku).

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However, theirs was less a religious than a scholastic tradition. Adoption of the Buddhist model seems to have occurred slowly and with the scholastic model as an additional influence. Therefore, while we know that throughout the years of the Nara and early Heian periods (from 710 to around 1000) the ability to compose poetry in the native language was considered a necessary accomplishment of the high-born, and, al­ though we know that as early as the ninth century there were poets who withdrew from secular life in order to devote themselves to their art as a kind of rehgious Way, the history of those years affords no man the designation of poetic master. Our first record of a more formalized master-disciple relationship patterned as much on the Buddhist as on the scholarly model does not come until the early eleventh century, with the case of Noin—author of the poem quoted above—who studied under one Fujiwara Nagato (fl. 973-1003). Little is known of the precise nature of Noin’s work under his Fujiwara master. That he began his career as a student at the Imperial University, then took up his studies under Nagato, and later took the tonsure to become an itinerant monk and nature poet—this is all that records of his age tell us. If his experience was anything like those of his immediate descendants, however, one can imagine that he pursued his art in much the same way as the novice priest pursued his religious studies: through private conversations with his teacher, who no doubt passed on his knowledge of the poetic tradition as well as his opinions on die best methods of practice (keiko) and suggestions about style. De­ spite the religious overtones of the word, poetic “transmission” in the eleventh century was still probably little more than the practical matter of instructing students in the basic techniques of composition. In subsequent generations, as the warfare and turmoil that began Japan’s medieval age incited people to a more profound interest in Bud­ dhism, the trend toward elevating poetry into a kind of religious pursuit gained pace. As mentioned above, Fujiwara no Shunzei was the most famous of those in the early years of the medieval age who adopted the W ay of Poetry as a religious vocation, studying under a master—Fuji­ wara no Mototoshi, 1056-1142—and in every way adopting the pose of a poetic believer and not just a scholar.4 In his later years, after he had taken the tonsure as a lay monk, he was himself teacher to a whole generation of younger poets, for whom he became judge, arbiter of taste, and ultimate authority in matters of poetic truth. Within several centu­ ries he was in fact elevated in the minds of his literary descendants to the rank of a poetic sage. A description of him in Shinkei’s Sasamegoto (Whisperings, 1463) shows the extent of his apotheosis: Once Lord Teika upbraided Tameie about the latter’s po­ etry. “The W ay of Poetry,” he said, “cannot be pursued as

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you pursue it—all decked out in your guard robes, surrounded by bright lamps, with sake and fish scattered around. It is for this reason that your poems are so trivial. The way my late father wrote—now that is how truly superb poems come to be. I remember how late into the night he would sit facing a dim oil lamp, a faded robe thrown over his shoulders and an old court cap pulled down to his ears. In that posture, leaning on a charcoal brazier pulled up beside him, he would recite poems in low tones in the depths of night when everyone else was in bed asleep. Yes, there he would sit, bent over, with tears streaming down his cheeks.” Ah, what a fine image of a man deep in his thoughts!5 So serious a business had poetry become. Unlike professional clerics, Shunzei came to the priesthood only after a long life of bureaucratic service at court—which is to say that he was not an ordained cleric trained in doctrine and discipline. Yet his status as a lay priest devoted only to his art was probably also one of the factors that led to his celebrity. His pose in Sasamegoto is a meditative one, less the pose of a simple versifier than of a priestly recluse in earnest pursuit of deep truths. And, significantly, the description is recorded as part of an anec­ dote relating another master’s censure of his own pupil—in this case his son—whose methods of study revealed a less serious demeanor. The lesson is obvious: even Shunzei’s image was designed to instruct. After the passing of Shunzei and his generation, the pursuit of po­ etry was greatly complicated by the kind of factional strife that had so characterized the development of Buddhism itself. Within a century after his death, Shunzei’s own family, the Mikohidari house, was divided into three separate lines, each with its secret documents and each claiming to represent the true transmission of poetic truth. In these circumstances, the master-disciple approach to instruction took on an even greater im­ portance. Now one’s reputation depended largely on a scholastic pedi­ gree that could only be attained through study with one of the masters of the recognized houses or their offshoots. Literary history took on the form of a genealogical chart. As the medieval age progressed, the parallels with Buddhist practices became more pronounced. Young poets of these years did not take up study with a teacher but “passed through the master’s gate” as they would pass through the gate of a temple, and when they had finished their course of study—which involved not only practical instruction in composition but also introduction to secret doctrines and formulas— they were issued documents verifying their authority in the manner of young novices granted certificates of ordination. In the words of the Zen monk Muju Ichien (1226-1312), the study of poetry itself had become “a

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mode” (hoben) of entering the path toward enlightenment.6 In the end, many aspiring poets, particularly those of lower social status who could claim no right to the secrets of the poetic houses by birth, went so far as to actually take Buddhist orders as lay monks, signaling a complete identification of the W ay of Poetry with the W ay of the Buddha. The practical effects of the master-disciple pattern of instruction on medieval poetry and poetic history were not always salutary. For one thing, the very notion of a poetic “law” that could be passed down from generation to generation in the form of secret teachings encouraged an approach to the art that was at best conservative and at worst reactionary. In addition, the existence of numerous masters produced more factional­ ism, leading to what some regarded as a vulgarization of what had at the beginning been a religious art. By the mid-1400s, poetic instruction had in many cases become an almost mechanical affair in which a master simply passed on his secrets—still usually in oral form, though now more often committed to writing by students—for a fee or special favor. To some, this seemed the final irony: those who should have become sages instead became professionals with dark robes and shaved heads. Little wonder that some of the more properly religious clerics of the day were often openly contemptuous of those who made their living through kyogen kigo, “wild words and fancy speech.”7 Even in the last days of the court poetic tradition, however, there were those for whom the relationship between master and disciple re­ mained more religious than secular. Shinkei, poet of both the ancient uta and linked verse as well as a high-ranking Buddhist cleric, says in one of his treatises that he studied under his poetic master Shotetsu (1381-1459) for a full thirty years, an indication of his deep commitment both to his teacher and to his art.8 And while admitting the degenerate state of the poetic world of his time, he was still firm in his belief that study under a master is the only way to perfection in the art. In these latter days, many people of talent have been born into the world, but how can even a man of fine intellect escape a bad reputation if he receives degenerate teachings from an inferior mentor? No matter what the Way, it is by sitting at the foot of an enlightened master day and night, receiving all of his wisdom, that one arrives at excellence.9 One gains nothing by sitting at the feet of fools, Shinkei says, but that means only that one must be careful in choosing one’s teacher and not that one can travel the W ay of Poetry alone. As if to emphasize the point, in another treatise he makes a similar statement—but this time in response to the question of whether one should actively seek out the

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wisdom of the masters of one’s own time: “W hat a stupid question! In this W ay one should choose a master and learn from him. . . . ‘A good friend is a great cause and condition.’ ”10 The last quotation is taken from the Lotus Sutra, the fuller text of which makes it clear that a “good friend” can make possible “the vision of a Buddha and the opening up of the thought” to supreme enlightenment." For Shinkei, as for most of his contemporaries, poetry was still a religious pursuit involving one of the most basic of religious institutions. Such examples provide evidence that, even for many living at the end of the medieval age, the practice of poetry was unthinkable outside of the master-disciple relationship. In later years the W ay of Poetry, along with most other medieval arts, from the tea ceremony to flower arrange­ ment, would continue to develop into professionalism. But in retrospect, this fact only makes the religious approach to poetic instruction of earlier poets such as Shunzei and Shinkei more distinctly medieval in definition. Thus the master-disciple relationship, a means of instruction proba­ bly inspired by Buddhist practice and partially sustained by the continu­ ing example of Buddhist institutions, was the primary mode of indoctrination and training for most prominent Japanese poets during a period of at least four hundred years—from the end of the Heian period until the beginning of the Era of W arring States. And it is this fact that makes the following statement from Eiga taigai (Essentials of Poetic Composition, ca. 1222), a treatise written by the poet, scholar, and critic Fujiwara no Teika (1162-1241), come as a surprise: There are no teachers in Japanese poetry. We take old poems as our masters. If one seeks inspiration from the old styles and learns one’s vocabulary from the great poets of the past, how can one fail to compose good poetry?12 Were Teika some eccentric, some obscure figure working on the fringes of the poetic establishment, or even some Zen monk employing the rhetoric of paradox, these words would be easy to discount. But Teika was none of these; on the contrary, he was one of those early medieval poets whom later generations apotheosized. The son and heir of Shunzei, he was the true ruler of the poetic world of his time—one of the compilers of Shinkokinshu (New Collection of Ancient and Mod­ ern Times, 1206) and sole compiler of another imperial anthology, the Shinchokusenshu (New Imperial Collection, 1234); one of the seminal critics of the entire tradition; a poetry contest judge and textual scholar; and the father of all the branches of the Mikohidari house. It would not be an overstatement to say that he ranked even higher in the hierarchic scheme of medieval consciousness than his father.

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How then does one explain Teika’s words? One way is to argue that in Teika’s day the master-disciple relationship was not yet well established as a method of instruction. And, to be sure, in the early thirteenth century that form of direct training was not yet the almost unquestioned institution it was to become in the late medieval period. In the case of so central a poetic figure as Teika, however, it is hard to argue that he was ignorant of the pattern developing all -around him— doubly so when one remembers that he had studied under his own father and acted as a teacher himself not only to his own sons but also to such luminaries as the third Kamakura shogun, Minamoto no Sanetomo (1192-1219), and to several other high-ranking courtiers. And then there is the evidence of his own critical writings, at least one of which speaks at length about the proper attitudes of a master toward his disciples.13 It would seem more prudent, then, to take Teika’s words as having a significance that is less historical than polemical. For some reason he appears to have wanted to direct the attention of his readers—most of them poets themselves—away from their teachers and back to the poetic heritage itself. His is a case in which, at least rhetorically, a master has chosen to turn his disciples away. One explanation for this unexpected stance can be found in another poetic treatise, this one by one of Teika’s contemporaries, Emperor Juntoku (1197-1242): “Poetry springs forth from the heart; it is not something one can learn from anyone else. Thus, a father may be greatly skilled and his son not inherit the gift. A master may have style that is not passed on to his disciple.”14 Here Juntoku gives what may be characterized as a practical critique of the whole notion of “instruction” in the arts that has profound impli­ cations for the practice of poetic transmission. The gist of what he says is that what is most vital to the composition of good poetry simply cannot be transmitted in any simple way. Art is not a kind of “knowl­ edge” that can be produced by mere work or imitation. A master may hand down esoteric information to his student and catechize him in the niceties of various styles and traditions; he may even provide valuable criticism of his work. But such transmissions make the pupil a disciple and not necessarily a poet, for ultimately poetry is not something that one can learn from a master. Poetry, to return to Juntoku’s words—the basic conception of which he not coincidentally borrowed directly from Shunzei—must “spring forth from the heart” (kokoro yori izu).ls It would be a mistake, however, to assume that the source for this implied critique of the master-disciple mode of transmission for both Teika and Juntoku was Shunzei and Shunzei only. Rather, as one might expect among a group of poets who pursued their art as a religious vocation, the prototype of the critique for all three men—Shunzei,

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Teika, and Juntoku—is to be found nowhere but within the very tradi­ tions of medieval Japanese Buddhism itself. In an ironic way, it appears that both the master-disciple relationship and its critique may derive from the same model. As mentioned above, it was the eclectic philosophy of the Tendai sect that had the greatest impact on poets of the early medieval period and on Shunzei and Teika in particular. Imported from China in the early ninth century, Tendai was one of the preferred sects of the court aristocracy, appealing to the highest classes primarily by virtue of its exclusiveness as a religious institution. Indeed, it can be argued that despite its expansive doctrines, which allowed for the Buddhahood of all existences, Tendai—in Japan, at least—was itself profoundly aristocratic in its authority structure, emphasizing above all the importance of cor­ rect doctrinal transmission from the age of the historical Buddha to the present through a long line of masters and disciples.16 By the twelfth century, in fact, Tendai was known as a conservative, authoritarian sect. True to their elitist tendencies, the Japanese Tendai patriarchs had even developed a set of secret oral transmissions as a way of emphasizing the special status of their doctrines. Thus it was that Tendai became a sect in which the direct teaching of students by ordained masters was an important and virtually unquestioned institution.17 However, for Shunzei and other poets of his and his son’s genera­ tion, who were again not professional clerics but aristocrats and artists, it was less the institution of Tendai than its teachings that were an attraction—particularly the doctrine of nonduality, which allowed them to justify their art as a religious activity. Simply put, the doctrine of nonduality, expounded in various scriptures and commentaries accessible to poets as well as priests, claimed that any distinctions between the sacred and the secular were ultimately illusory, and, therefore, in the words of W illiam LaFleur, the composition of poetry “must be a Bud­ dhist activity .. . because the dialectic . . . demands rejection of the holy and profane.”18 Not surprisingly, it was to ideas like this one that Shun­ zei and Teika attached themselves. To those who were still anxious to dismiss poetry as “wild words and fancy speech” it offered a perfect rebuttal: for such distinctions were deemed false in Tendai thought. Poetry was as legitimate a means to enlightenment in the world as priestly devotions. But how could poetry lead to enlightenment in practical terms? Here too Tendai had an answer, this time not in a doctrine but in the devotional practice known as shikan (Chinese zhiguari) or “concentration and insight,” a form of meditation that had as its goal the unmediated union of the mind with the Universal Buddha Nature through encoun­ ters with everyday things. It was here that Tendai, the most authoritarian

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of sects, placed limitations on the viability of the master-disciple rela­ tionship. For shikan—the ultimate means of enlightenment for Tendai devotees—was by definition a personal, intuitive activity that could not be taught in intellectual terms, an experience for which a teacher could perhaps prepare his student but which was beyond the power of “trans­ mission.” In other words, shikan was another of those experiences that could only “spring forth from the heart.” Thus, one may argue that even in Tendai there was a rational basis for questioning the master-disciple relationship as the final means of enlightenment. The Chinese founder of the sect, Zhi-yi (538-97), had even gone so far as to turn his own disciples away upon his deathbed, insisting in his last words that they look for direction now to their vows (pratimoksa) and to private contemplation (samadhi): You ask where I shall be reborn. M y teachers and friends, accompanying Avalokitesvara, shall all come to welcome me. You ask to whom you may look up. Have you not heard? The Pratimoksa is your teacher, the four kinds of samadhi which I have constantly preached to you are your clear guide.19 In this way Zhi-yi anticipated Shunzei and Teika, implicitly re­ jecting the dualistic model in transmission that he rejected more explic­ itly in doctrine. (That Teika recognized this fact is apparent from a statement in his M aigetsusho [Monthly Notes, ca. 1219], in which he says: “Truly, the Middle W ay of Poetry can be known only by oneself alone; you cannot rely on someone else to teach it to you.”20) Within the Tendai establishment of the middle ages, however, his critique of the master-disciple mode of instruction remained largely unarticulated. In order to find more explicit criticism one must turn to the writings of another sect, one greatly influenced by Tendai, that was just devel­ oping in Teika’s day—namely Zen, the most famous of medieval sects, especially in terms of its influence on arts and letters.21 The central place of the master-disciple relationship in Zen is well attested by medieval records in both China and Japan. As a tradition “outside the scriptures,” Zen was virtually obligated to rely on direct transmission of its doctrines and methods from teacher to student. Like­ wise, the unconventional behavior of Zen masters toward those under their tutelage is well known. Records of the sect abound in tales of monks who seem routinely to employ the most unusual of methods, from striking their students with sticks to confounding them with insolu­ ble riddles. An anecdote from the W umenguan (The Gateless Gate, 1228; Japanese Mumonkan), a famous Zen work of China’s Song period, will illustrate the point:

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Whatever he was asked (concerning Zen) Gutei simply stuck up one finger. At one time he had an acolyte, whom a visitor asked, “What is the essential point of your master’s teaching?” The boy just stuck up one finger. Hearing of this, Gutei cut off his finger with a knife. As the boy ran out of the room screaming with pain, Gutei called to him. When he turned round his head, Gutei stuck up one finger. The boy suddenly became enlightened. WTien Gutei was about to die, he said to the assembled monks, “I received one-finger-Zen from Tenryu. I used it all my life, but did not exhaust it.” When he had finished saying this, he entered into his eternal rest.22 Such stories, most of them contained in collections of koan (a special genre of anecdotes and maxims used by masters to instruct their stu­ dents), have done much to create the popular image of the Zen master as a figure of willful eccentricity. In point of fact, however, it appears that the anecdotes that form the basis of most koan were largely apocry­ phal; although employing historical characters like the ninth-century monk Gutei (Chinese Juzhi) for dramatic effect, they were designed not as hagiography but as meditation exercises. Their purpose was thus not properly historical or even intellectual, but heuristic: just as the masters depicted within the koan were intent on inspiring students, so were the koan themselves intended as a means to urge the student toward his own authentic enlightenment. “For,” as one scholar observes, “before true liberation can occur, all idols must be overturned, or stood upside down.”23 When looked at in this way, many of the stories reveal an important commentary on the nature of the master-disciple relationship. The anecdote about Juzhi and his acolyte, for instance, becomes in this view less a bizarre account of monkish violence than a sermon on the dangers of mimicry—even in the fairly innocent form of parody. As one commentator on the text says, what the story is warning against is “the danger of indiscriminate imitation, of any kind of imitation.”24 In a sect for which the direct instruction of students by masters was so much a part of day-to-day life, it can be imagined that imitation was a constant issue—and not simply because it could lead to jealousy and envy within the order of monks.25 The problem with imitation for Zen monks was that like any attachment it was an impediment to an “enlight­ enment” that meant nothing if it was not a personal and intuitive experi­ ence. Like Emperor Juntoku, Zen monks believed that their “truths,” if in fact they may be called that, could not be transmitted from teacher to student by intellectual means; what they hoped to do was instead to create an environment—made up of physical and mental discipline,

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study, and devotion—in which that student could arrive at his own un­ derstanding in a spontaneous way. Indeed, the word “master” in Zen seems not to mean “teacher” at all, but rather something like “leader” or “guide.” It may be this fact more than any other that accounts for the iconoclastic behavior of Zen masters in real life and legend—the kind of behavior that puts the master beyond simulation and encourages the disciple toward his own authentic awakening. It need hardly be said, however, that in the everyday process of instruction such an ideal could easily be forgotten by master or disciple or both. Juzhi and the other Chinese iconoclasts of the koan collections were long dead by the time Zen reached Japan. In a medieval Japanese monastery a master could become proud and haughty, even demanding imitation of those whom he now thought of as his followers; and a young disciple—impressionable and anxious to please—could begin to substitute various forms of obsequiousness for sincere devotion. In such cases, however, the meditation exercises themselves could be depended upon to reemphasize the dangers of seeing the master, or anyone else, as a substitute for the attainment of enlightenment itself. Ummon asked a monk, “W here have you come from?” “From Nangaku,” he replied. “Usually,” said Ummon, “I don’t entangle people with words, and bamboozle them with phrases; come a little closer!” The monk went nearer, and Ummon shouted, “Be off with you!”26 Mugo of Funshu asked Baso, “W hat is the heart seal of the secret transmission of the meaning of Daruma’s coming from the W est?”27 Baso said, “Your honour is in too much of a hurry. Go away for a while, and come back again.” Mugo was about to go out when Baso called to him, “Your honour!” Mugo turned round. Baso said to him, “W hat is it?” Mugo was enlightened, and made him obeisance. Baso said, “W hat’s this fathead making bows for?”28 These examples are some of the more obvious ones in which the masters attempt to disavow their own part in their students’ awakenings. Other exercises go on to reject the most sacred figures of the entire Buddhist tradition: A monk asked Kokusei, “W hat is the Great Meaning of Buddhism?” He answered, “Shaka was an ox-headed lictor of Hell; the Patriarchs were horse-faced hags.”2'2 A monk asked Ummon, “W hat is it that surpasses the Buddhas, surpasses the Patriarchs?” Ummon replied, “Buns.”30

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A monk asked Ummon, “W hat is the Buddha?” Ummon replied, “A dried shit-stick.”31 Such statements can be taken as examples of Zen insistence on the importance of “immediacy and concreteness,” of “saying what is on one’s mind” in the most literal sense; and certainly they are meant to serve the psychological function of “shocking the student out of his intellectual inheritance,” as one scholar puts it.32 But they must also have been designed to remind the disciple engaged in meditation that even the greatest master was no different from the lowest-ranking acolyte in the ultimate sense. A final statement from the great Linji (Japanese Rinzai; d. 867) makes the point in a more unequivocal way: Seekers of the Way, if you say that the Buddha is the ultimate, why did he die lying down sidewise in the forest in Kusinagara after having lived for eighty years? Where is he now? . . . Those who truly seek after the Law will have no use for the Buddha. They will have no use for the bodhisattvas or arhats.. . . Kill anything that you happen on. Kill the Buddha if you happen to meet him. Kill a patriarch or an arhat if you happen to meet him. Kill your parents or relatives if you happen to meet them. Only then can you be free.33 Here the warning is clear: in time, anyone—whether master or patriarch, mother or father, or even the Buddha himself—can become an impedi­ ment to personal enlightenment if approached solely as an object of imitation. Better to kill the Buddha than to copy him.34 The final “Zen Warning” of Wumen states the matter metaphorically when it says that “to look for Buddha, to look for Truth outside oneself’ is to find oneself confined in the center of two mountain ranges of iron.3s One may well ask why Zen masters did not simply abandon the master-disciple mode of transmission—a step that a full-scale repudiation of dualism might seem to demand—and seek out a new way to lead aspirants toward enlightenment. One reason of course had to do with the weight of tradition and the fervent belief among the masters that their truths—which is not to say the mode of “realizing” those truths— were universal and could be transmitted. To deny the masters as objects of imitation was one thing, but to deny the enlightenment of the masters would have been to put into question the validity of the Buddhist tradi­ tion itself. Ultimately the question of why the master-disciple relation­ ship has remained the primary institution of Zen to this day can also be answered in a way that does not require total reliance on historical

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analysis. Simply put, it is probably true that Zen clerics chose not to abandon the master-disciple pattern because there was no other mode of transmission that did not involve the dangers of imitation in precisely the same way. Instruction is mediation by definition, after all; what good would be achieved by looking for a new model that would in the end demand the same critical demystification anyway? Zen masters were con­ vinced of nothing so much as the folly of attempting to escape the world’s patterns while still in the world. The dangers of imitation could most fully be realized from within the structure of imitation itself, in stories such as Juzhi’s, in which the acolyte achieves his enlightenment looking at a bloody stump that reduces his “own” finger from presence to absence.56 So the Zen masters chose rather to debunk themselves and their heritage, making the demystification of the master-disciple relationship one of that relationship’s primary purposes—turning their iconoclastic behavior against all forms of bondage, including that implied by “the master, the patriarchs, and the apostolic succession as well.”37 And in doing so they followed their Tendai ancestors in articulating a pattern that was important for poets of the medieval age as well. For while it would be a mistake to assume that Shunzei, Teika, and subsequent medi­ eval poets were inspired to place limitations on the viability of the master-disciple relationship by the example of Tendai or later Zen clerics alone, it remains a fact that they shared a Buddhist worldview with their clerical acquaintances. And at the very center of that worldview was the idea that individual enlightenment was the product of personal insight within the context of a larger tradition. One cannot forget that it was among Zen monks that the practice of shikan achieved its highest form of articulation, in the form of zazen (“sitting in meditation”), an exten­ sion of the Tendai ideal that was undertaken under the direction of a master but had as its goal personal “awakening.”38 Less eccentric and more conservative, at least as a group, the poets of the day did not leave us anecdotes of the sort that fill Zen anthologies. In statements like the following from Shunzei, however, the attempt to stress the continuity of truth in time without mention of the intervening influence of human transmission is clear. The M ohezhiguan first of all elucidates the way Sakyamuni transmitted the Buddhist Law, teaching men that the W ay of the Law was handed down from generation to generation. The World-Honored One, the One of Great Awakening, even Sa­ kyamuni himself, proclaimed the Law to Kasyapa; then Kasyapa passed it on to Ananda. And in this way it was passed down through twenty-three people, until Zhi-yi. Hearing about this

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transmission, we cannot fail to be filled with awe. In the same way, we should be impressed when we understand that Japanese poetry too has been transmitted from ancient times in the form of what we call the imperial anthologies—beginning with M an’yoshu and then continuing on in the same fashion with the Kokinshu, the Gosensbii, the Shuishu, and so on.39 Doubtless Shunzei learned much from Zhi-yi’s M ohezhiguan (Japa­ nese Makashikari), including the doctrine of “concentration and insight” mentioned above. But in this passage he is less concerned with a specific doctrine than he is with the idea of making a comparison between the transmission of Buddhist law and the transmission of poetry. Moreover, it is not by chance that when he speaks about poetry he departs from his Buddhist model by transferring his focus from masters to the poetic anthologies. He could as easily have extended his statement to include the poetic genealogy of the recent past, naming his own teacher and himself in the process. His choice to concentrate rather on the continuity of the poetic anthologies—what Teika calls “old poems”—is one more indication of the medieval attempt to turn disciples away from teachers and toward an authentic encounter with the poems themselves. When Teika says there are no masters in Japanese poetry, then, he may be making a point that his father had already made in a different way. A master himself, Teika does not mean that all young poets should forsake their teachers in the literal sense; nor does he mean to argue that there are no universal truths in poetry. W hat he may mean, on the other hand, is that disciples should not look to teachers for what cannot be taught, and that teachers should be aware of the limitations of their role. The wells of authentic poetic expression are to be found within, and masters can function only as facilitators or guides. M aigetsusho makes his position clear: In the many sermons of the Buddha, it is said that one must teach one’s students according to their inborn abilities. This is an example we should not depart from.. . . In the world today there are many poets competing with each other, think­ ing themselves experts, who seem unable to understand this truth. But only one who is ignorant, only one with no knowl­ edge of the W ay of Poetry, would say to his students, “Learn my way, and no other.”40 It is only one step from such criticisms to Teika’s statement in Eiga taigai: that for inspiration poets should look primarily to the poems of the past—and even here in a creative way. True to his statement that old poems are the best teachers, his critical works are often little more

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than lists of exemplary poems from the great imperial collections of the past. His comments on how those poems must be used shows the consistency of his approach: in treatise after treatise he insists that the chief task of the poet is to look to the past for inspiration but then to make it new.41 There is a place for creative borrowing in Japanese poetry, but not for empty mimicry. Imitation, whether of masters or of old poems, is death. Not all later poets maintained Teika’s attitudes. One of the branches of his family, the Nijo, in fact seems to have done much to encourage just the kind of imitation that Teika might have condemned. But in every subsequent generation there were some masters who chose to turn their disciples away. During the course of the thirteenth, fourteenth, and fifteenth centuries, Teika’s specific cautions were repeated in a num­ ber of critical treatises written by masters who seem to have understood their role in the way of the Zen masters—not as a model to be adhered to, but as an exemplar to be used in a creative way.42 Some quoted Master Teika himself; others quoted Emperor Juntoku; still others dealt with the problem of imitation in a way inspired by Shunzei, by transfering their disciples’ allegiance away from themselves and onto tradi­ tion. All, of course, studied under masters themselves; like their counterparts in the monasteries, their “critiques” of the master-disciple mode of transmission came from within that model itself. A final and most instructive example can be found in the words of one of the last medieval poets of the classical tradition: Shotetsu, who was mentioned above as the master of Shinkei. Like Noin four centuries earlier, Shotetsu was a poet of the W ay—by profession a Zen priest— who was moved by the power of the Buddha’s voice. Yugure no Kokoro no iro o Some zo oku Tsukihatsuru kane no Koe no nioi ni.

The hue o f nightfall Has infused its very heart Deep into my own— W afted my way on echoes From the fading temple bell.43

In this way Shotetsu too uses poetry as a vehicle for the statement of Buddhist law, echoing Noin’s line in the process. Unlike most of the great uta poets of the late medieval age, he actually studied Zen texts in depth, taking the tonsure in his mid-thirties and remaining a Zen priest all of his life. Perhaps for this reason, he was even more direct in rejecting his own teachers than Teika had been—something perhaps forced upon him by historical circumstance. By the fifteenth century the poetic world was so thoroughly divided against itself that a poet-priest could no longer rely on it alone for transmission of the truths he sought. The great poetic houses, all descended from Teika but perhaps lacking his clarity of mind, spent less and less of their time in creative work and

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more and more of it in argument and strife—a situation that left Sho­ tetsu himself a victim, spending one rather long period of his life in a kind of self-enforced seclusion after offending an important patron.44 For this reason one is not surprised to find comments like the following attributed to him by Shinkei after his death: “It may be true that I am the heir of Tamehide and Ryoshun, but in my poetry I seek only for the deep secrets of Teika and Jichin. For those degenerate houses of our own day—the Nijo and the Reizei—I have no allegiance.”45 Although these words have little of the audacity of the Zen style, they must have struck the “masters” of the time as a rather curt dismissal of their claims to authority. And the similarities with Zen strategy are clear, as are those with the comments of Shunzei and Teika: the poet is disavowing his own genealogy in favor of affiliation with more distant ancestors—a circumvention that allows him to retain the structure of the master-disciple relationship while subverting its more dangerous ef­ fects. His own writings reveal little real animosity toward his own teach­ ers, Reizei Tamemasa (d. 1417) and Imagawa Ryoshun (1325-1420), for whom he seems to have both affection and respect.46 On the other hand, they do show a desire to substitute for them the old masters—Teika in particular. (“I will be a member of the Teika sect to the end of my days,” he is quoted as saying in Toyashu kikigaki, a treatise-memoir by To no Tsuneyori [1402-84]).47 And why? Partly out of respect for the founder of all the medieval schools, who was by all accounts a great poet worthy of veneration and partly, one must surmise, because dead poets know their place. In this sense, Shotetsu’s stance is not unlike the stance of Teika himself, whose famous declaration, “There are no teachers in Japanese poetry,” he quotes faithfully in one of his own critical treatises.48 In both cases disciples are turned from the present to the past, from the living master to old poems—for how else can old poets be known if not through their poems? Neither man goes so far as to dispute the role of models in attaining poetic enlightenment; nor does either go so far as to reject the Buddha and the patriarchs.49 Perhaps the tradition in which they participated could not abide so radical an argument. Masters were necessary to the medieval mind; their role in guiding young poets was beyond question. But both Teika and Shotetsu wanted to place some distance between themselves and those whom they chose to emulate. In so conservative a world, it can be imagined, any distance could become a space in which to pursue the practice of poetry for oneself. This of course leaves the final question of how these attitudes af­ fected die actual composition of poetry. In Teika’s case, the critical tradition speaks with a clear voice, proclaiming his early work in particular

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to be some of the most distinctive of any period. A scholar who knew the old traditions but chose to read them anew, he succeeded remarkably in what Harold Bloom defines as the project of the “strong poet,” that is, to gain immortality for his work by a willful “misreading” of his poetic fathers—in other words, to go beyond mere imitation of the past.50 For his trouble, Teika heard his early poems maligned (praised?) as daruma uta (Zen “nonsense” poems) by more conservative types, but his legacy endured. But what of Shotetsu? He, too, was a restless spirit, who rejected his own immediate forebears even more explicitly than had Teika. A crucial historical difference between his work and Teika’s, however, is that Shotetsu’s failed among the waka poets of his own generation, which marginalized him as an eccentric unsuitable for imitation. One conserva­ tive poet of his time even went so far as to characterize one of Shotetsu’s poems as quite literally dangerous: Nushi shiranu Irie no ydbe Hito nakute Mi no to sao to zo Fune ni nokoreru.

Owner unknown: At evening, by an inlet, W ith no one around— Just a raincloak and a pole Left behind in a boat.

Truly a poem I cannot admire. . . . This is what is meant by “the voice of a violent age.”51 The offense in this case—which the writer condemns via a reference to a condemnation of unorthodox verse recorded in the preface to the foun­ tainhead of the Sino-Japanese tradition, the Chinese Shijing (Book of Odes)—may not even register with the modem reader. But to literati accus­ tomed to more decorous scenes, the stark, inelegant imagery of Shotetsu’s poem must have seemed subversive of courtly values, indeed a “violent voice” that could not be tolerated in polite society. A few similar examples from his personal anthology—all depicting uncourtly scenes of everyday life—provide evidence that he offended with more than one poem. “Spring Paddies” Susamaji ya Ara suku ushi no Tsuku iki mo Kasumu asa no Haru no oyamada.

A fearsome sight— The way the breath o f an ox Breaking new ground Adds to the morning haze Over spring paddies.52

“Evening Shower on the Road” Noki sebaki Hito wa kasanaru

So narrow the eaves That people must crowd together

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Yadachi ni Nagusamu mo nururu Michi no be no io. “Cormorants on a River” Kagaribi o U no iru ishi ni Takisutete Akuru yokawa ni Kaeru funabito.

53

Like the passing clouds— Getting drenched despite the shelter O f a hut by the roadside.”

From his firepot He tosses ashes on the rocks W here his cormorants sit— A boatman making for home As dawn lights the night river.54

“Traveling Past a Market Town” Kaze samumi Tabi naru hito mo Michiburi ni Nomisutete yuku Ichi no ajisake. “W oodcutter” Mizu kiyoki Atari no tani no Kagegusa ni Shiba tate okite Fuseru yamagatsu.

So cold is the wind That a passing traveler Stops along the road T o gulp some before going on— Sweet sake from a market town.”

By a clear stream In a valley, in the grasses Growing in the shadows— A mountain peasant lying asleep Beside his bale o f firewood.ss

“A Man Walking Through the Snow” Kuru hito no Coming toward me Mukau fubuki ni Against a hard, driving wind, Mono iwade The man says nothing— Yuki fumu oto no But I hear him tread the snow Sayuru michinobe. Going down the frozen road.57

One may argue that even such scenes retain vestiges of the court tradi­ tion in choice of topics and vocabulary, but the sensibility they reveal seems somehow more related to the world of Matsuo Basho than to the salons of late Muromachi. Nor does Shotetsu’s originality stop there, for in all periods of his work one finds not only the realism of Basho but also the incipient surrealism of Teika. “W in ter M oon” Saetsukusu Shimo ya kori o Tsuki no uchi ni Atsumete yomo ni Kudasu kage kana.

In unto itself The moon gathers the freezing cold O f frost and ice T o shower down on all quarters In the light o f its rays.58

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“Autumn Reeds” Aki no hi wa Iro yori yowaki Sasagani no Kumo no hatate ni Ogi no uwakaze.

The autumn sunlight Shines weaker than the thread A spider might weave In wind from dark cloud banners Fluttering over the reeds.55

“Mid-spring” Hanazakari Kasumi no mio mo Fukaki yo no Haru no monaka ni Niou tsukikage.

Blossoms at their height— And deep as the dark o f night Is the misty channel W here the light o f the moon glows At the very midpoint o f spring.60

Moonlight showering down frost and ice? The sun as weak as a spider’s web suspended in the wind? Cherry blossoms illuminated by the moon glowing in a misty channel deep as the dark of night? Again the images are subversive of contemporary standards, although in this case more for their rhetorical flair than for any breach in decorum, and they earned Shotetsu the ire of his opponents in the salons of his own day, albeit giving his poems a distinctive quality that reminds one of no one so much as Teika himself, as in the latter’s dreamy evocation of autumn on the Uji River. Samushiro ya Matsu yo no aki no Kaze fukete Tsuki o katashiku Uji no hashihime.

On her mat o f straw, She waits as the autumn wind Deepens the night, Spreading moonlight for her robe— The Maiden o f Uji River.61

Here too readers are invited into a world of the imagination that was beyond the ken of most of Teika’s heirs by blood, who excluded Shotetsu from their salons and attempted to exclude him from the canon. How successful they were in doing so is evident from the way that even scholars, let alone poets, ignored him until the twentieth century.63 Yet, ironically, it is probably for this very reason that Shotetsu’s poems today seem so fresh—and his relationship with the works of Teika so remarkable. A final poem makes the point clear. It is one of Shotetsu’s most famous, which he himself described as an attempt to evoke Teika’s ideal of yu gen, or “mystery and depth.” Snow on the Mountain at Dusk’ Watarikane Kumo mo yube o Nao tadoru

Still hanging back, The clouds too seem hesitant To cross at evening

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Ato naki yuki no M ine no kakehashi.

55

Over the untrodden snow O f the plank bridge on the peak.63

Here Shotetsu may even have had in mind Teika’s famous description of a plank bridge, from the travel book of Sbinkokinshu. Tabibito no Sode fukikaesu Akikaze ni Ytibe sabishiki Yama no kakehashi.

W ith the autumn wind Turning back the flowing sleeves O f a traveler, How lonely in evening light Is the bridge above the gorge.64

So the disciple responds to an absent master. If Shotetsu’s poem can be said to allude to Teika’s at all, however, it should be emphasized that it does so creatively: changing the scene from autumn to winter, transforming the traveler into a cloud, concealing the colors of the wind­ blown sleeves under an unblemished blanket of snow, and, perhaps most significantly, “freezing” his scene in such a way as to allow the reader no sense of movement except what is inscribed as potential. Rather than simple honkadori, which can be defined as building one’s poem around a line or two taken from a famous work of the past, Shotetsu engages in a process less of borrowing or imitation than remaking. In doing so he presents us with an example of a poet who truly strives not to follow in the footsteps of the traveler of old, but to seek—by an untrodden bridge over the ravine of time—what they sought. NOTES 1. Quoted in William Theodore de Bary, Donald Keene, and Tsunoda Ryusaku, eds., S ou rces o f J a p a n ese T radition (New York: Columbia University Press, 1958), 1:450. 2. SK K S 116. 3. For analyses of the influence of Tendai thought on Shunzei, see Konishi Jin ’ichi, M ich i: C husei no rin en (Kodansha, 1975), 45-62, and “Shunzei no yugenfu to shikan,” B u n ga k u 20.2 (February 1952): 108-16; 257-58; and William R. LaFleur, T h e K a rm a o f W ords (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1983), 80-106. Saigyo’s religious tendencies are treated in W illiam R. LaFleur, “Saigyo and the Buddhist Value of Nature,” H istory o f R eligion s 13.2 (November 1973): 93—128 and 13.3 (February 1974): 227—48; and Takagi Kiyoko, “Saigyo—A Search for Religion,” J a p a n ese J o u r n a l o f R eligiou s S tu d ies 4:1 (1977): 41-74. Brower and Miner also offer a summary of the influence of Zen meditation exercises on Tamekane. For two articles that touch on the topic of master-disciple relationships, see Mezaki Tokue, “Aesthete-Recluses During the Transition from Ancient to Medieval Japan,” and Konishi Jin’ichi, “Michi and Medieval Writing,” in Earl Miner, ed., P rin cip les o f C lassical J a p a n ese L itera tu re (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1985). 4. The late medieval poet Shotetsu (1381—1459) recounts how Shunzei was told by the god of Sumiyoshi Shrine while in retreat there that the W ay of Poetry and the W ay of the Buddha were not two Ways, but one. See SM , in N K B T 65:184. 5. N K B T 66:147. The description can be traced to earlier sources, the first probably being the anonymous late-Kamakura work K irihiok e, or “The Paulownia Brazier,” the title

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of which derives from the description of Shunzei it contains. Text available in N K G T 4. 6. Shasekishu, in N K B T 85:248. 7. Some of the most severe critics were Zen priests, whose belief that their tradition was one “outside the scriptures” made them suspicious of those (among their own ranks particularly) who dedicated their lives to poetry. For a case study of a self-deprecating Zennist, see David Pollack, T h e F ra ctu re o f M ea n in g: J a p a n ’s S yn th esis o f C hina fr o m th e E ighth th ro u g h th e E igh teen th C en tu ries (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1986), 134-87. 8. H itorigoto , in N S T 23:468. 9. O i no k u rigoto, in N S T 23:417. 10. S a sa m egoto, in N KBZ 51:130. 11. Leon Hurvitz, trans., S crip tu re o f th e L otus Blossom o f th e F ine D ha rm a (New York: Columbia University Press, 1976), 329. 12. E iga ta iga i, in N K B T 65:115. 13. See M a igetsu sh o, in N K B T 65:135. Some scholars dispute the authenticity of this work, although recent consensus is that Teika was indeed its author. 14. Yakumo m ish o , in N K G T supplementary vol. 3:427. The source of Juntoku’s statement may be the following statement from Mencius: “Mencius said, ‘A carpenter or a carriage-maker can pass on to another his craft, but he cannot make him skillful.’ ” M en ciu s , trans. D. C. Lau (Baltimore: Penguin, 1970), 195. 15. In the preface to his K in d a i shuka (Superior Poems of Our Time, ca. 1209), Teika quotes his father as saying, “Poetry is not an art which can be learned by looking afield and hearing far; it is something that proceeds from the heart and is understood in the self.” Fujiwara no Teika, S u p erio r P oem s o f O u r T im e: A T h irteen th -C en tu ry P o etic T rea tise a n d S equence, translated by Robert H. Brower and Earl Miner (Stan­ ford: Stanford University Press, 1967), 43. N K B T 65:101. 16. Alicia Matsunaga and Daigan Matsunaga, F ou ndation s o f J a p a n ese B uddh ism (Los Angeles: Buddhist Books International, 1974—1976), 1:150, 161-67; 2:289-90. 17. Ibid., 1:163-67; 2:289. See also Tamura Yoshiro, “Japanese Culture and The Tendai Concept of Original Enlightenment,” J a p a n ese J o u r n a l o f R eligiou s S tu d ies 14.2-3 (1987): 203-10. 18. LaFleur, T he K a rm a o f W ords, 91. For a good summary of the doctrine of nonduality, see Kenneth Ch’en, B uddhism in C hina, A H istorica l S u r v ey (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1964), 303-13. 19. Quoted in Leon Hurvitz, C h ih -i: A n In trod u ction to th e L ife a n d Id ea s o f a C hinese B uddhist M onk, vol. 12 of M ela n ges C hinois e t B ouddh iq ues (Brussels: Institut Beige Des Hautes Etudes Chinoises, 1980), 172. 20. N K B T 65:131. 21. For the influence of Zen on Japanese art, see D. T. Suzuki, Z en a n d J a p a n ese C ultu re (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1959), and Thomas Hoover, Z en C ultu re (New York, Vintage Books, 1978). 22. R. H. Blyth, trans., M um onk an , vol. 4 of Z en a n d Z en Classics (Hokuseido Press, 1966), 57. 23. M. Conrad Hyers, Z en a n d th e C om ic S p irit (London: Rider and Company, 1973), 103. 24. Blyth, M um onk an , 62. 25. Here a statement by Rene Girard is apposite: “To imitate the desires of someone else is to turn this someone else into a rival as well as a model” (To D ouble B usiness B ound [Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1978], 140). In contrast to Girard, however, the Zen monk is wary not only of setting up others as models, but also of the rivalry that is inevitable if one perceives a separate self within oneself. 26. Frederick Franck, ed. and comp., Z en a n d Z en Classics: S election s f r o m R. H. B lyth (New York: Vintage Books, 1978), 250.

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27. The word Daruma here refers to Bodhidharma, the Indian monk who brought Zen doctrine from India to China in the sixth century A.D. Mugo’s question, as Baso points out, is a rather grandiose one asking the ultimate significance (“heart seal”) of Bodhidharma’s advent. 28. Franck, Z en a n d Z en Classics, 257. 29. Ibid., 94. 30. Ibid., 244. 31. Ibid. 32. Henry Rosemont, Jr., “The Meaning Is the Use: Koan and Mondo as Linguistic Tools of the Zen Masters,” P hilosophy East a n d W est 20 (1970): 119. 33. From L in -ch i H u i-chao C h ’a n -sh ih y u -lu , quoted in Wing-tsit Chan, ed. and comp., A S ou rce Book in C hinese P hilosophy (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1963), 447. 34. For a related discussion, see Abe Masao, Z en a n d W estern T h o u gh t (Honolulu: Univer­ sity of Hawaii Press, 1985), 144-46. 35. Blyth, M um onk a n, 314. 35. One could of course argue that the acolyte has transcended the imitative mode, but still the role of the master in the process is vital since it was his action that resulted in the awakening. In either case, the story draws attention to the limits of simple imitation as a way of following the Way. 37. Hyers, Z en a n d th e C om ic S p irit, 111. 38. On the historical relationship between Tendai meditative practices and z azen, see Carl Bielefeldt, D ogen 's M a n u a ls o f Z en M ed ita tion (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1988), 61-64, 71—77, and LaFleur, T he K a rm a o f W ords, 82—83. 39. K orai fiiteish o, in N KBZ 50:274—75. 40. N K B T 65:135. 41. Compare his comments on the proper techniques of allusion in E iga ta iga i, in N K B T 65:114-15; K ind a i shuka, in N K B T 65:102-3; and M a igetsu sh o, in N K B T 65:132-33. 42. See for example the late-thirteenth-century work E tsum okusho (N K G T 4:146), Imagawa Ryoshun’s S h isetsu jik en sh u (N K G T 5:213), the early-fifteenth-century R eizei-k e w aka h ih i k uden (N K G T 5:274), Shotetsu’s S M (N K B T 65:193), and T ofu r e n g a h iji (NKBZ 51:174) by Soboku (d. 1545). 43. Sokonshu 8839, in S K T 8. 44. For details, see Robert H. Brower and Steven D. Carter, C on versa tion s -with S h otetsu (Ann Arbor: Center for Japanese Studies, The University of Michigan, 1991). 45. O i no k u rigoto, in N S T 23:417. 46. S M quotes Ryoshun often, and relates anecdotes involving Tamemasa that show him in a positive light. 47. N K G T 5:336. 48. SM . One should note, too, that Shotetsu’s accurate quotation of this passage distances him somewhat from his teachers in the Reizei line, who substitute “thoughts” for Teika’s “old poems.” See Ryoshun’s Rakusho roken, in N K G T 5:207, and R eizei-k e w aka h ih i kuden, in N K G T 5:274. That Shotetsu chose not to “edit” Teika’s words may indicate his commitment to Teika’s approach to the problem of imitation. 49. One could perhaps argue that Shotetsu did reject the Buddhas and patriarchs as a monk who chose to follow the W ay of Poetry instead of a more conventional kind of devotion, but by his time such a choice was nothing new. 50. For a discussion of Teika’s relationship with his father Shunzei, see Roselee Bundy, “Poetic Apprenticeship, Fujiwara Teika’s Shogak u hyak ushu," M on u m en ta N ipponica 45:2 (Summer 1990): 157-88. 51. The comment comes from To no Tsuneyori. See N K G T 5:340-41. 52. Sokonshu 971, in S K T 8. 53. Ibid., 2625. 54. Ibid., 2787.

58 55. 56. 57. 58. 59. 60. 61. 62.

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Ibid., 9880. Ibid., 9373. Ibid., 5999. Ibid., 5346. Ibid., 4618. From round 24, spring, the Saki no sessho-k e utaaw ase, in S K I 5. SK K S 420. Inada Toshinori discusses Shotetsu’s reputation among late Muromachi and Edo poets in the opening of his S hotetsu no kenkyii: C husei kajin no kenkyii (Kasama Shoin, 1978). One ironic twist in the story of Shotetsu’s reception in his own time is that he acted as teacher to a number of younger poets—Shinkei among them—whose subsequent reputation has depended on their work in linked verse, or re n g a , a genre for which Shotetsu himself seems to have had litde use. Thus, while his contribution to the historical development of the u ta form is negligible, his contribution to the develop­ ment of uta aesthetics in linked verse is considerable indeed. 63. Sokonsbu 5885, in S K T 8. 64. SK K S 953.

“Peonies” by Mishima Yukio T

r an slat e d by

A

nth ony

H. C

h a m b e r s,

IN MEMORY OF ROBERT H . BR O W ER

“Peonies” (Botan, 1955) may come as a surprise to readers who are familiar with the later writings of Mishima Yukio (1925-70) and with his reputation for right-wing political leanings. Though the story is typi­ cal of Mishima in some ways—the crisp, precise language; the tone of ironic detachment—it is unexpected in others. Japan was just beginning to recover from World W ar II when “Peo­ nies” was written. Reminders of the disaster were everywhere; memories were vivid. The Allied Occupation had ended only a few years before. Mishima had earned enthusiastic notices for Kamen no kokuhaku (Confes­ sions of a Mask, 1949), with its memorable descriptions of wartime Tokyo, but his career was still young, his political and paramilitary activ­ ities still in the future. The implied antiwar, antimilitary message of “Peonies” and its acknowledgment of the realities of war (even today, some members of the Japanese right deny that the “Rape of Nanking” occurred) come from a youthful Mishima who had not yet assumed the role and persona for which he is most clearly remembered today. The translation is based on the text of “Botan” in Mishima Yukio zenshu, 36 vols. (Shinchosha, 1973-76), 9:627-33. The story was first published in Bungei in 1955. PEONIES

An unexpected friend came to invite me to an unexpected place. He suggested that we go to see a peony garden. I did not know my friend Kusada’s occupation or where he lived; he was rumored to be involved in some political movement or other, but I was not sure. He was small, had sharp eyes and a fine sense of humor, and he knew everything. W e left the house at about two o’clock in the afternoon and, after twice changing trains, boarded a suburban train that I had never ridden before. It was a sunny holiday at the beginning of May.

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In front of a small suburban station waited a large bus that would connect passengers to a port city in Kanagawa Prefecture. The bus took a new concrete road, far more splendid than the streets in the city. “It was built for military use. Just completed,” my knowledgeable friend explained tersely. At a pond by the side of the road, a row of picnicking children scooped for tadpoles without a glance at our bus. Their shirts had come untucked from the backs of their little trousers. At one of the stops we alighted from the bus. A large sign pointed the way to the peony garden. The road meandered between the fields, and, the hour being late, we frequently had to step aside for groups of people on their way home. Eggplant seedbeds. Onion heads. On the other side of the road was a marsh, where tadpoles, clearly visible as they caught the sunlight, dove through the algae, and last year’s frogs, invisible, were croaking here and there. One corner was sectioned off as a place to wash summer radishes. Two farmers in rubber boots that came up to their thighs were energetically washing radishes and stacking them in alternation on a plank to one side. “This freshly washed whiteness is strangely erotic, isn’t it,” I said. “Yes,” Kusada replied indifferently as he rushed along the road. He was walking so fast that I lost sight of him in the crowd several times. The road ascended to a dense grove in which stood a gate. The words “Katsura Hill Peony Garden” came into view. Paying our en­ trance fees, we passed through the gate. The field of vision opened abruptly—sunny beds of peonies lay before us, with a multitude of visi­ tors passing among them in clusters. Paths separated the flower beds, each of which was bounded with anemone, azalea, or iris. Each peony bush was provided with a label, on which was written an imposing name in Chinese characters. UNICORN AND PHOENIX GOLDEN PAVILION OFFICIAL OF JAPAN BLOSSOM MINISTER INEBRIATED FACE MISTY BARRIER ETERNAL PLEASURE COURT MUSIC BROCADE GLOW MOON WORLD Unicorn and Phoenix had a big, reddish-purple, velvet blossom. The pale peach of Eternal Pleasure graduated to a deep scarlet in the center. Most luxurious of all was the large, white Moon World. A visitor

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knelt before it, aiming a camera, and behind him an artist brandished a sketching pencil. The peonies were nevertheless past their prime: the crimson petals of the outworn blossoms crinkled as if exposed to flame, their yellow stamens and pistils shriveled. The dry leaves alone retained a sculptur­ esque elegance in their sharply defined veins. Some plants were only leaves, their flowers having fallen. On some low plants, fresh pale-green sprouts sagged under the weight of huge white blooms, while others were braced with splints and stood a foot tall. “I wish mine looked like that.” The loud voices of two elderly women, probably spinsters, reverberated in my ears. “One would need to have this much space, I suppose.” “Yes, I must pull out some of mine.” Kusada tapped my shoulder. I looked in the direction he pointed. A shabbily dressed old man strolled past us. He wore a patched, striped shirt, narrow-cuffed military trousers, a faded red cap, and the rubber-soled, cloth footwear favored by workmen and gardeners. The man was solidly built, white stubble glinted on his cheek, and his eyes emitted a glow from their deep sockets. He paid no attention to the sightseers around him. He stopped before each peony, one by one, sometimes squatting, and devoured each with his gaze. The flower at which he was gazing just then was a crimson peony called New Year’s Sunrise. The blossom was frilly open and one step short of revealing the first signs of decline. Shadows were wrapped com­ plexly among the petals, shadows that quarreled together as they shifted in the breeze. “Who is he?” I whispered in Kusada’s ear, so gravely was Kusada staring after the old man. “The owner of this peony garden. His name is Kawamata. He bought the place only two years ago,” my friend replied in a low, tense voice. Then he looked up at a tent that had been pitched on a low hill at one edge of the garden. “Hey,” he said abruptly, in a cheery voice. “There’s a beer stand up there. I’ve seen enough peonies. Let’s have a drink.” Angered by his selfishness, I told him to go ahead and start drinking, because I had not yet seen half of the peonies. Once my restless guide had left me alone and gone to have his beer, I was free to see the remaining peonies at my leisure. A peony named Snowy Moon Flower guarded golden pistils and stamens within white crepe petals. Each peony had its own character. When I looked out over the garden, the sightseers standing and squat­ ting here and there obstructed my view; but, nevertheless, the peonies,

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casting heavy shadows one by one on the black soil, were unlike plants in full bloom at an ordinary flower garden. Each one, encircled by its own allotment of soil, seemed isolated from the rest. The overall impres­ sion was one of melancholy. The wide-open blooms, far too large for the squat shrubs they adorned, had an eery vividness about them, as if they had just blossomed from the rain-dampened soil. I followed a turn in the path. The flower beds continued, circling the hill of the beer stand and extending to the foot of the mountains beyond, peonies everywhere. Feeling thirsty, I relented and started up the stone steps of the hill. A gaudy beach parasol stood outside the tent. Under it, Kusada, a beer bottle and glass on the table before him, raised his hand and called to me. W e emptied two bottles in no time. Kusada wiped the foam from his mouth with his hairy forearm and spoke. “Do you know how many peonies there are here?” “There must be a great many.” I gazed down at the peony garden, half of which had been ravished by the evening sun. Many family groups remained. A camera lens catch­ ing the setting sun glowed on someone’s chest. “There are five hundred and eighty.” “You’re very well informed.” Accustomed to Kusada’s extensive knowledge, I responded without surprise. Just then, the old man we had seen before tottered across the center of the peony garden. Stopping before a peony, he stood with his hands folded behind him and stared at the flower’s face. “Five hundred and eighty plants, or five hundred and eighty per­ sons,” Kusada said suddenly. Startled, I lifted my face and looked at Kusada. M y knowledgeable friend continued. “That old man Kawamata used to be the famous Colonel Kawamata. I’m sure you know of him. He’s the man who was considered the ringleader of the Rape of Nanking. “He went into hiding and evaded the war-crimes trials. When it was safe to do so, he reappeared and bought this peony garden. “According to the war-crimes charges, he’s responsible for the mas­ sacre of tens of thousands. But the number the Colonel killed with his own hands, gladly and meticulously, was only five hundred and eighty. “Moreover, they were all women. The Colonel took a personal interest only in killing women. “After becoming the owner of this place, Kawamata strictly limited the number of peony plants to five hundred and eighty. It’s because he reared the flowers with his own hands that the peony garden has turned

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out this well. But what do you make of such a peculiar diversion? I’ve been thinking about it, and now I believe I’ve reached the right conclusion. “He wanted to commemorate, in a secret way, his own evil. He has probably succeeded in achieving the evildoer’s most compelling need: to exhibit his own indelible evil without endangering himself.”

“Mystery and Depth” in Japanese Court Poetry E

d w in

A. C

r an st o n

Anyone who searches for pleasure in poetry will find it where he can, whether along the banks of the Thames, among the boulders of Cold Mountain, or by the shores of Gitche Gurnee. And a spontaneous, unreflective pleasure is not to be despised. The values of sound and rhythm, for instance, are instinctively felt. Take a familiar passage of English poetry: “Over the cobbles he clattered and clashed in the dark innyard.”1 This is a textbook example of alliteration and onomatopoeia, as high school literature teachers used to point out without thereby increas­ ing the impact of the line. The words have their effect, and that effect, although analyzable, is immediately experienced. It is in the nature of language that its sounds can provide a nonrational pleasure, displeasure, or excitement distinct from the meaning of the words. The case is clearer in two examples from Japanese poetry—clearer because the effect is not obviously onomatopoeic and therefore not tied to semantic, rationally perceived values. The first example is the evocation of early spring in the opening verses of M inase sangin hyakuin, a linked-verse series of the fifteenth century. Yuki nagara Yamamoto kasumu Yube kana (Sogi) Yuku mizu toku Ume niou sato. (Shohaku)

Still snow Over mountain mist At evening Moving water far away A plum-scented village.

The soft gliding of the y alliteration and the a-, u-, and o- vowel harmo­ nies seem appropriate to the misted and glistening landscape described, but the effect is really ineffable, present but beyond the reach of analysis. The polysyllabic rhythms, harmonies, and k alliteration in the valedictory poem of the ninth-century poet Ariwara no Narihira (825-80) are the

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elements that make it at once impossible to forget and a pleasure to remember, but they are even less subject to rational explanation. Tsui ni yuku Michi to wa kanete Kikishikado Kino kyo to wa Omowazarishi o.

It is a road That we go on at the end— Oh, I had heard that, But I never realized, Yesterday, today. (K K S

16:861)2

Much of the pleasure of poetry is bound up with this intimate feeling of the poet for the ebb and flow of his language and the aural effects of which it is capable. Poetry is only partly music, however; the score is nothing without the program notes, which are incorporated in the form of the cognitive content. Words have meanings as well as sounds, and meanings are things about which it is possible to learn more than one’s perceptive or unperceptive ear told one at the beginning. To revert to Alfred Noyes’ poem, in the line “The moon was a ghostly galleon tossed upon cloudy seas,”3 die word “galleon” means a kind of ship. This information is necessary in order to understand the moon-ship/ sky-ocean metaphor. The foreign reader approaching English literature armed with a dictionary and a knowledge of the technique of metaphor itself could easily ascertain this much. But words as well as nations have histories, and it would require a modicum of historical knowledge to be aware of the associations raised by the word “galleon”—associations of adventure, gold, and piracy on the Spanish Main. A nimbus of such associa­ tions surrounds the image of the highwayman, a land-bound pirate, riding across the moor. It is this aura of overtones that enriches the image, the line, and the poem. Japanese poetry is often enriched in much the same way. The following poem, written in the fourteenth century by Prince Tsuneakira (1303-51), also deals with the moon on a windy night. On the surface it is simply a tonally dark, descriptive lyric, subjectivized only by the adjective sabishi, “lonely.” Kaze harau Uzura no toko wa Yosamu nite Tsukikage sabishi Fukakusa no sato.

On the windswept moor The nesting places of the quail Are cold at night, And the moonlight lonely on the fields, In the deep grass o f Fukakusa village. (S S Z S 4:352)

Actually the poem is rich in overtones because of allusion to three earlier ivaka dating all the way back to the ninth century. The chain of reference begins with a pair of verses recorded in both Kokinshu and the Tales o f

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Ise as having been exchanged between a lover and his mistress. The lover and author of the first poem is identified in Kokinshu as Ariwara no Narihira. Toshi o hete Sumikoshi sato o Idete inaba Itodo Fukakusa No to ya narinan.

If I should depart, Leaving the village where we have lived All through these years, W ould the Deep Grass deepen further Until it turned into a tangled moor? (K K S 18:971)

Fukakusa, “Deep Grass,” is the name of the village where the mistress lives, and like most Japanese place-names is a latent image. Here the imagistic potential of the word is exploited in a metaphor for lonely fidelity, as the lover asks if no other feet will ever beat a path to the woman’s door. She is recorded to have replied: No to naraba Uzura to nakite Toshi wa hen Kari ni dani ya wa Kimi wa kozaran.

If it becomes a moor, Then as a quail I too shall call Across the years; For can it be that you will not return To falcon briefly on these fields? (K K S 18:972)

These two poems establish the images of the quail and the Village of Deep Grass, images that are given added poignancy in an allusive varia­ tion written by Fujiwara no Shunzei (1114—1204) in the twelfth century. Yu sareba Nobe no akikaze Mi ni shimite Uzura naku nari Fukakusa no sato.

W hen evening comes, The autumn wind from off the moors Pierces to the heart, And cries of quail are borne upon the air From the deep grass of Fukakusa village. (.S Z S 4:259)

Here Shunzei in an outwardly descriptive poem has treated the scene as it might have been years after the woman has indeed been abandoned by her lover. The cries of the quail from the deep grass are both real and the ghostly cries of the forsaken woman. The poem has about it the atmosphere of a Noh play in which the ghost of a vanished beauty might reappear. The scene is effectively set at evening, and Shunzei has added the element of the chill, piercing autumn wind to create a tonally perfect poem. All these matters are thoroughly analyzed in Brower and Miner, Japanese Court Poetry,4 and there would be no excuse for repeating that analysis here were it not to point out that the series does not end

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with Shunzei. Prince Tsuneakira has returned to the same scene and the same story in his allusive variation on Shunzei, Narihira, and the un­ named woman. His poem has Narihira’s Fukakusa and the woman’s quail, both also in Shunzei. Shunzei’s wind is retained, but it is now night instead of evening. The piercing chill of the earlier poem has turned to coldness, and a new element has been added, that of the lonely moonlight shining down on the quail’s nest, a metaphor for the woman’s cottage. Tim e has gone on, and in this poem the happy days of love seem even more remote. Although both Shunzei’s and Tsuneakira’s poems are successful as simple descriptive lyrics, their emotional depth and meaning, and hence the pleasure to be derived from them, are increased immeasurably by a knowledge of the literary content of their images. The use of allusion and of words with an aura of overtones was one way in which waka poets created literary effects of complexity and depth—effects that came to be highly prized during the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. The poet Kensho (ca. 1130-1210) wrote in defense of one of his own poems, “The teaching has been passed down to me that although waka may be called skillful when they are written in a cutand-dried manner, their quality is impaired and they lack elevation. In poetry a gentle sheen and flowerlike loveliness should be the end result, for which pleasing figurative content and a quality of mysterious sugges­ tiveness should be the foundation.”5 The word rendered “quality of mysterious suggestiveness” is yugen, and yu gen is a term so basic to large areas of Japanese esthetics that whole volumes have been written on its meaning and use. Shunzei used it of a poem he admired by his contem­ porary Saigyo (1118-90). Tsu no kuni no Naniwa no haru wa Yume nare ya Ashi no kareba ni Kaze wataru nari.

W ere they but a dream, Those fine spring days at Naniwa In the land of Tsu? Over withered leaves o f reeds The wind goes rusding down the shore.

(SKKS 6:625) The fact that the poet sees one thing and thinks of another is made evident here by the opening question. Naniwa was famous for the beauty of its reeds in spring, and this poem too is an allusive variation on an earlier, happier, celebration of the scene.6 But yu gen was not used to refer only to poems of allusive depth gained through reference to earlier verses in the poetic tradition. Shunzei also applied the term in his critique of a nature poem by the abbot Jien (1155-1225).

“M Y S T E R Y AND D E P T H ” IN JA PA N ESE C O U R T P O E T R Y

Fuyugare no Kozue ni ataru Yamakaze no Mata fuku tabi wa Yuki no amagiru.7

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Each time the topmost Branches of the winter trees, Leafless in the cold, W hip with a touch o f mountain wind, Snow unfurls to mist the sky.

The effect of this poem is one of sharp observation felicitously re­ corded. One is equally impressed with the vividness of the scene and the skillfully arranged word pattern in which it is expressed, which may have been part of what Shunzei had in mind when he wrote of it, “Both the kokoro and the kotoba [the ‘heart’ and the ‘words,’ the ‘content’ and the ‘diction’] are in the yu gen style.”8 But the poem does not seem to carry the weight of extra meanings found in the series on the quail or Saigyo’s poem on the withered reeds of Naniwa. If yu gen is not definable solely in terms of allusive overtones, then the question naturally occurs of what it does mean, and it may be of some interest to pursue this question briefly. The earliest uses of the word yu gen have been found in Chinese Buddhist writings, of which the first, according to Nose Asaji,9 is the Baocanglun of Seng Zhao (ca. 374—414) of the Later Qin. In these writ­ ings the term is used to refer to the profundity of Buddhist doctrine, to a truth ineffable and beyond the reach of ordinary rational processes. The second element of the word, gen or xuan, has a well-established use in Taoist writings, a use that seems to provide the ultimate source of the Buddhist term. Xuan originally meant dark in color, or the color of the sky, and by extension deep, hidden, strange, mysterious. The Taoist locus classicus is in these words about the Named and the Nameless from the Daodejing: Tong wei zhi xuan Xuan zhi you xuan Zhong miao zhi men.

That they are the same is the mystery. Mystery o f all mysteries! The door o f all subtleties!10

Seng Zhao is known to have been a student of Taoism before his conver­ sion to Buddhism, and it is reasonable to suppose that he was familiar with the Taoist use of the word xuan. He is the first writer known to have joined to it the word you —which itself has the meanings of that which lurks hidden, distant, faint, indistinct—to form the compound youxuan, ox yugen. In China through the Tang dynasty youxuan continued to be employed in largely Buddhist contexts, in usages that reflect its ultimate origins in Taoist thought. As a Buddhist term, y u g en came into Japan at least as early as Dengyo Daishi (767-822) at the beginning of the ninth century and

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continued to be used in Buddhist contexts similar to those found in comparable works in China. But in addition to its use as a description of the mysterious profundity of Buddhism, the word gradually began to be used in more general and derived senses. Outside the Buddhist con­ text yu gen sometimes referred to that which had an aura of mystery, or simply what was obscure and hard to understand. One of the earliest non-Buddhist uses, as well as the earliest use of the word in connection with Japanese poetry," occurs in the Chinese preface to Kokinshu (905). The Japanese reading for the passage in question goes: Aruiwa koto shin ’i ni azukari, aruiwa kyo yu gen ni iru, “Sometimes the matter [of poetry] came to concern the miraculous, sometimes its spell partook of the mys­ terious.”12 The same expression, kyo nyu yu gen , or kyo yu gen ni iru, was used repeatedly by Fujiwara no Munetada (1062-1141) in his diary Chuyuki to describe the magical effect of music.13 There are on the other hand several twelfth-century examples of the use of yu gen merely to refer to the obscurity of the past, so that it is apparent that the word was widely used in non-Buddhist contexts. Meanwhile, yu gen developed still other meanings. Late twelfth- and early thirteenth-century sources show it used to refer to things quiet, sequestered, or remote from the mundane. For instance, the following passage occurs in the fourth chapter of Gukansho, a history of Japan written by Jien in 1219: “Now, at the end of the age a great change occurred. From the end of the reign of the cloistered Go-Sanjo the idea that all should be as the nobles wished, that the regent should govern and the monarch remain within the secluded \yugen] precincts of the palace, ceased to satisfy men’s minds.”14 Kojidan, a work of the early thirteenth century, describes a mountain retreat in these terms: “A stream of clear water trickled in the valley, and at a pleasant spot stood a grass-thatched hermitage. The wind was loud in the pines, and the moss deep by the stones under the eaves. It was a place of deep solitude [yugen].”15 Still other sources use the word in the sense of “refined” or “elegant.” Here the word seems to have taken on the qualities of Japa­ nese courtly beauty. In his diary Meigetsuki, Fujiwara no Teika (1162-1241) refers to the wearing of a certain garment as yu gen ,'6 and Azuma kagami, a history of the Kamakura bakufu, uses the same word in describing the courtly sport of kickball (kemari)}1 In both cases “ele­ gant” seems the appropriate translation. In Shikansho, his work on the art of music, the priestly imperial prince Shukaku (1150-1202) prescribes a method of flute playing. “The effect of the playing should be that of an elegant [yugen] man standing in the midst of blossoming autumn plants, his hand on the sword at his hip.”18 Kojidan has a similar passage in which the word is applied to a description of warriors amid lightly falling snow.19 It seems likely that it is the elegant, picturesque quality

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of these scenes to which yu gen refers. But in the juxtaposition of the frightening and the beautiful there may be a hint of mystery too, as when Zeami (1363-1444) the Noh playwright speaks of “the yu gen of a devil.”20 For our purposes the interesting thing about the word yu gen is that it became a key term in Japanese literary esthetics. One well-loiown use as such was by Zeami in his writings on the art of Noh. What Zeami may have meant by the term, though a subject of the most engrossing interest, is beyond the scope of this article. A study of Japanese critical writings makes it clear enough that yu gen was current as a literary con­ cept long before Zeami’s time. Textual evidence indicates that yu gen became firmly established as a criterion for discussion of Japanese poetry in the late twelfth and early thirteenth centuries, the same period in which we have seen it used to refer to music, quiet valleys, kickball, and warriors in the snow. This is the period known in Japanese literary history as the Age of the Shinkokinshu, after the eighth of the imperial waka anthologies, compiled during the first decade of the thirteenth century. The esthetic of this period was crucial for the later history, not only of waka, but of linked verse and Noh drama as well. Although the term yu gen appears sporadically in discussions of waka poetry before the middle of the twelfth century,21 it is chiefly to the writings of three major Shinkokin poets and critics, Fujiwara no Shunzei, his son Teika, and Kamo no Chomei (1153-1216), that we must look for our most important sources. Of the three, Chomei wrote at greatest length about yugen. The voice supplying the “answers” in his treatise Mumyosho, supposedly representative of the opinions of Chomei’s master the priest Shun’e (fl. ca. 1160-80), describes yu gen in a series of analogies intended to convey the effect of something that is essentially indefinable. The relevant passage has been admirably translated by Brower and Miner in Japanese Court Poetry, and I shall take the liberty of quoting here from that translation. [Ajccording to the views of those who have developed the skill necessary to penetrate its mysteries, the qualities deemed essen­ tial to the [yugen] style are overtones that do not appear in the words alone and an atmosphere that is not visible in the configuration of the poem. . . . On an autumn evening, for ex­ ample, there is no color in die sky nor any sound, yet although we cannot give any definite reason for it, we are somehow moved to tears. . . . How can such things be easily learned or expressed precisely in words? . . . Again, when one gazes upon the autumn hills half-concealed by a curtain of mist, what one sees is veiled yet profoundly beautiful; such a shadowy scene,

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which permits free exercise of the imagination in picturing how lovely the whole panoply of scarlet leaves must be, is far better than to see them spread with dazzling clarity before our eyes. What is difficult about expressing one’s personal feelings in so many words—in saying that the moon is bright or in praising the cherry blossoms simply by declaring that they are beauti­ ful? . . . It is only when many meanings are compressed into a single word, when the depths of feeling are exhausted yet not expressed, when an unseen world hovers in the atmosphere of the poem, when the mean and common are used to express the elegant, when a poetic conception of rare beauty is devel­ oped to the fullest extent in a style of surface simplicity—only then, when the conception is exalted to the highest degree and “the words are too few,” will the poem . . . have the power of moving Heaven and Earth.22 This passage is very rich in its suggestiveness, but no poems are quoted as concrete examples of the yiigen style. Perhaps the author of these remarks had in mind poems of the sort we have already examined, whose overtones are those of allusive depth. Another possibility is sug­ gested by the phrase “the words are too few,” a reference to Ki no Tsurayuki’s criticism of Ariwara no Narihira in the Japanese Preface to Kokinshu, “He has too much heart and too few words.”23 Tsurayuki thought Narihira’s content outran his form, and one of Narihira’s verses he found particularly unbalanced was: Tsuki ya aranu Haru ya mukashi no Haru naranu Wa ga mi hitotsu wa Moto no mi ni shite.

Is there no moon? And is this springtime not the spring Of times gone by? Myself alone remaining Still the self I was before... . (KKS 15:747)

An elliptical probing of the nature of time, love, appearance, and reality, this too is a poem with overtones, not of allusive depth, but of philo­ sophical implications. But much of the burden of the Mumyosho remarks has to do with matters of restraint, with the ideal of understatement, with something close to the esthetic of sabi. The passage on the too obvious beauty of cherry blossoms and autumn leaves reminds one of similar statements of aristocratic attitudes by Yoshida Kenko in Tsurezuregusa over a century later,24 and of such a poem as this by Chomei’s contemporary Teika: Miwataseba Hana mo momiji mo

When I gazed about There were neither cherry blossoms

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Nakarikeri Ura no tomaya no Aki no yugure.

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N or scarlet leaves: Over rush-thatched huts along the shore, Dusk at the end o f an autumn day. {S K K S 4:363)

A later work by Chomei, Eigyokushu, contains another treatment of yiigen, and does include two poems cited as examples of the style, one of them the poem by Narihira just quoted. The other is also by Narihira. Nenuru yo no Yume o hakanami Madoromeba Iya hakana ni mo Narimasaru kana.

W hen we lay in sleep Too evanescent was our dream: And so I doze again— For nought; it vanishes, More evanescent than before.

The comment Chomei makes emphasizes the ineffability of the style: “Content and diction are ill defined; it is as if one were gazing at a shimmering of the blue sky. Something is there, yet not; not, yet some­ how there, so faint are the nuances of this style. It is hard to master for those who have not entered the realm.”25 Chomei leaves us finally with the feeling that we are dealing less with actual poetry than with a mirage. Fujiwara no Shunzei had less to say in a connected fashion on the subject of yugen, at least insofar as may be judged from his surviving writings, but his ideas and tastes are regarded as having been very influ­ ential on Chomei and other poets and critics of the period. His longest statement about yu gen is a comment he appended to his judgment of a solitaire poetry competition submitted to him by the abbot Jien in about 1198. The phraseology is strikingly similar to that in the Mumyosho. I shall quote again from the felicitous translation of Brower and Miner: It is not necessary that a poem always express some novel con­ ception or treat an idea exhaustively, b u t . . . it should somehow .. . produce an effect both of charm and of mystery and depth \yugen}. If it is a good poem, it will possess a kind of atmo­ sphere that is distinct from its words and their configuration and yet accompanies them. The atmosphere hovers over the poem, as it were, like the haze that trails over the cherry blos­ soms in spring, like the cry of the deer heard against the au­ tumn moon, like the fragrance of spring in the flowering plum by the garden fence, like the autumn drizzle that drifts down upon the crimson foliage on some mountain peak.26 Shunzei then proceeds to refer to Narihira’s poem about the altered spring moon, just as Chomei later did in Eigyokushu. Despite the obvious preference stated here for poems whose effect is an unaccountable one,

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not to be found in the words themselves, Shunzei does not make a special plea for understatement or for Chomei’s unsubstantial shim­ mering of the air. The images used to express the effect of yu gen are the staples of the courdy tradition.27 Shunzei’s other comments on yu gen are also in the context of poetry competitions. Of the thousands of poems he judged during his long life, in only a handful of cases did he use the word yu gen in his recorded decisions. Fujiwara no Yoshitsune (1169-1206) wrote the following poem on the topic of “Lingering Heat” for The Poetry Contest in Six Hundred Rounds held in 1193: Uchiyosuru Nami yori aki no Tatsutagawa Sate mo wasurenu Yanagikage kana.

By the Tatsuta River Autumn rises from the waves That wash the shore, But not yet have men forgotten The comfort o f the willow shade.

Of this verse, to which he awarded a tie, Shunzei remarked: The phrase Nami yori aki no (“autumn from the waves”) pre­ sents a very pleasant image, but yanagikage (“willow shade”) is another matter. Even in ancient times poems were composed about scarlet leaves floating down Tatsuta River, and so now the image has somewhat the yu gen quality, but although in the middle past the expression “willow shade” has appeared in po­ etry, it probably should be considered a little too close to the vulgar.28 From this it emerges that Shunzei associated the idea of yu gen with phraseology sanctioned by antiquity—here he probably refers to the au­ thority of Kokinshu—and contrasts it with the vulgar. W e have seen that in nonliterary contexts also yu gen was used in the sense of “far from the dust of the world.” That yu gen was not an absolute criterion of excellence for Shunzei is indicated by the fact that the poem with yu gen was not always the one that he awarded the victory. In a Contest o f Selected Poems for which he served as judge in 1201 he declared himself attracted to the yu gen quality of the following poem by Minamoto no Michichika (1149-1202): Shiratsuyu mo Aware fukaki wa Kusa no hara Oborozukiyo mo Aki kumanaku ni.

W hite drops o f dew Are most deeply touching when they he On the grassy plain, For even on nights o f misted moon There is no shelter on those autumn fields.

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He nevertheless decided in favor of the competing poem, which he praised for its “loveliness.”29 In some cases it is the “overall impression” or sugata of a poem that Shunzei mentions in connection with yugen. In the Sumiyoshi Shrine Poetry Contest of 1170 Shunzei commented on a poem by Fujiwara no Sanesada (1139-91) on the topic “Traveler’s Lodgings in the Chilly Rain.” Uchishigure Monosabishikaru Ashinoya no Koya no nezame ni Miyako koishi mo.

A chill rain falls Through the vague loneliness o f night, W here in this hut o f reeds, This tiny hut, I lie awake, Lost in yearning for the Capital.

“The overall effect of Monosabishikaru (‘the vague loneliness’), followed by Miyako koishi mo (‘yearning for the Capital’) places this poem well within the realm of yu gen .'m In this comment Shunzei has singled out the two lines of overt emotional expression containing the adjectives sabishi and koishi as the elements contributing to the total effect of yugen. This certainly seems in contravention of Chomei’s ideal of not stating the emotion but letting it drift in silence. A final example shows Shunzei praising a poem by Ex-Emperor Go-Toba at the Poetry Contest in One Thousand Five Hundred Rounds held in 1201. Kaze fukeba Hana no shirakumo Yaya kiete Yona yona haruru Miyoshino no tsuki.

W ith every puff o f wind A wisp o f the white blossom-clouds Melts into the air, And night by night from clearer skies Shines the moon o f Yoshino.

“I wish for the path of poetry,” Shunzei wrote, “the yu gen quality and difficult-to-attain style of Yona yona haruru / Miyoshino no tsuki (‘And night by night from clearer skies / Shines the moon of Yoshino’).”31 Leaving aside the possibility that Shunzei was merely paying a diplomatic compliment to the former emperor, he seems to be praising as yu gen phrases notable for their loveliness of sound and imagery rather than for either overt emotional content or allusive depth. It is also worth noting that the poem is based on a conceit, albeit a beautiful one. The clouds whose gradual disappearance makes the moon look brighter every night are not real clouds but cloudlike masses of cherry blossoms. The poem has a magical effect amounting almost to a mystery. One prime symbol of beauty waxes while the other wanes. The whole scene is flooded with a moonlit glamor that grows ever brighter and is thus quite

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unlike the somber hues of many other poems credited with the quality of yugen. Shunzei’s son Teika combined his father’s poetic gifts with a more purely theoretical concern for literature. He was the dominant poet and critic of his day and perhaps the most dominant figure in the entire history of Japanese letters. No other man ever held the tradition of court poetry so firmly in his own hands, and even his imperial patron, the ex­ emperor Go-Toba, stood in awe of him. To later generations of poets Teika was the supreme authority. In addition to editing, alone or with others, two imperial anthologies, leaving a large collection of his own verse, keeping a long and important diary, experimenting in the compo­ sition of classical monogatari,n and being active in the preservation of earlier literature, Teika left several critical documents on the art of po­ etry. Some of these are essays, others anthologies of exemplary poems, and still others combinations of the two. Since Teika’s authority was crucial in later times, his genuine critical writings were augmented by a number of ingenious forgeries. As might be expected, controversy has long raged over the question of authenticity. In one of his generally accepted critical writings, Maigetsusho,^ an extended essay on the art of poetry, Teika sets forth a tenfold stylistic categorization of poetry. Of these categories the first four are termed “basic” and are to be learned first. Of these four the first mentioned is the yu gen style. The other three are koto shikarubeki yo, uruwasbiki yo, and ushintei, respectively rendered by Brower in his complete translation of M aigetsusho as “the style of appropriate statement,” “the style of ele­ gant beauty,” and “the style of deep feeling.”34 The four basic styles are termed “natural and gentle,” and the statement is made a little later on that “waka should be composed in a gentle and touching way.” Still later Teika implies again the gentleness of yu gen by mentioning it in contrast to the last of the ten styles, the onihishigitei, or “style of demonquelling force.”35 Unfortunately Teika provides no illustrative examples to go with his ten styles in Maigetsusho. In another work, the first version of Kindai shuka (Superior Poems of Our Time), Teika does quote two poems of the late Heian poet Minamoto no Shunrai (ca. 1057-1129), remarking of them, “These are yu gen in quality, presenting scenes faint in their lineaments and lonely.”36 The poems are these two: Uzura naku Mano no irie no Hamakaze ni Obana namiyoru Aki no yugure.

W hen the shorewind blows Along the banks o f Mano Inlet, W here the quail softly cry, Waves of plumegrass bend across the fields In the last light o f an autumn day.

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Furusato wa Chiru momijiba ni Uzumorete Noki no shinobu ni Akikaze zo fuku.

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M y former home Lies buried in a scarlet cloak O f scattering leaves, While winds of autumn ruffle through the fern Along the edges o f the broken eaves.

There are also a few poetry contest decisions in which Teika men­ tions the quality of yu gen , mostly in connection with poems tonally rather similar to these. But all together they do not provide much to go on.37 There is one other source, however, which can profitably be looked at in connection with Teika’s conception of yugen. This is a document entitled Teika jittei (The Ten Styles of Teika).38 It consists of generous selections of poems grouped to illustrate each of the ten styles, but it is devoid of comment on them. As in Teika’s list of styles in Maigetsusho, the yu gen style has pride of place, and of number too, being with fiftyeight poems the most copiously represented category. Obviously a careful analysis of the content of Teika jittei should be very important to any study of yugen, or of the other nine styles. At the very least, presenting the poems will allow them to impose their own impression of what yUgen was to one literary consciousness, and this article concludes with a complete translation of the yu gen section.39 Un­ fortunately, however, Teika jittei is among the documents whose authen­ ticity is controversial, and so the identity of the consciousness must remain uncertain. Japanese authorities favoring attribution to Teika in­ clude Ishida Yoshisada, Hisamatsu Sen’ichi, Kyusojin Hitaku, Fukuda Hideichi, and Yasuda Ayao. Higuchi Yoshimaro is more sceptical, but on balance affirmative. Taniyama Shigeru also expressed scepticism in a 1943 publication, but he appears to accept Teika jittei as genuine in his article on yu gen in NKBD. Kubota Jun appears to be neutral. Among those opposed are Sasaki Tadasato, Fujihira Haruo, and Imai Akira.40 Brower and Miner described arguments for the authenticity of Teika jittei as “convincing” in 1967, but Brower was more noncommittal in a later reference.41 One major though vaguely worded point of support is that Teika seems to refer to this work in his passage on the ten styles in M aigetsusho ,42 (Sasaki joins Konishi in rejecting the authenticity of M aigetsusho as well, however—see note 40.) Reliance on this passage would date Teika jittei no later than 1219. In any case Teika jittei contains no poems known to have been composed later than the first decade of the thirteenth century. Most of the poems are also in Shinkokinshit, and there seems a good chance that Teika jittei reflects the views of a contem­ porary, even if not of Teika himself. Of the fifty-eight yu gen poems in Teika jittei, twenty-six or almost half are products of the late twelfth and early thirteenth centuries, the

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Age of the Shinkokinshu. The next best represented periods are the ninth and tenth centuries, with sixteen poems. There are fewest poems from the eleventh and early twelfth centuries. These facts are in accord with T eika’s known tastes. Thirty-two poets and four imperial anthol­ ogies (Kokinshu, Gosenshu, Shuishu, and Shinkokinshu) are represented. There are three anonymous poems. A topical analysis shows twentythree love poems, ten miscellaneous, six each on spring, autumn, and winter, three on summer, two on parting, and one each on travel and sorrow. The preponderance of love poems is notable. Yugen is the only category so thoroughly dominated by love poetry. Most of the other categories have very few love poems, and m iru yd, the “style of visual description,” none at all. Omoshiroki yd, the “style of clever treatment,” has ten out of thirty-one; komayaka naru yd, the “style of exquisite detail,” six out of twenty-nine; and hitofushi aru yd, the “style of novel treatment,” seven out of twenty-six. This last style is the only one other than y u gen in which love poems are more numerous than any other kind. It is not difficult to find poems in the yu gen section of Teika jittei that will serve to illustrate most of the yu gen qualities so far mentioned. Several poems have an aura of overtones that comes from allusion to earlier poems. The following, by Fujiwara no Ietaka (1158-1237), is an example: Mushi no ne mo Nagaki yo akazu Furusato ni Nao omoisou Matsukaze zo fuku.

Here where insect cries Shrill on the long night endlessly About my former home, Now the wind among the pines Blows deeper thoughts into my heart. (S K K S 5:473)

This is an allusive variation on two poems in Genji monogatari. The first, from the “Kiritsubo” chapter, is an expression of grief over the death of the consort Kiritsubo, composed by the emperor’s messenger to Kiritsubo’s mother: Suzumushi no Koe no kagiri o Tsukushite mo Nagaki yo akazu Furu namida kana

Though the bell cricket Pours out in grief the utmost Limits o f its voice, Through the long night unassuaged M y falling tears can find no end. (GM 3)

The other poem is from the “Matsukaze” chapter and is composed by the mother of the Akashi lady when she returns to the scenes of her childhood after many years.

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Mi o kaete Hitori kaereru Yamazato ni Kikishi ni nitaru Matsukaze zo fuku.

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Altered and alone, I have returned to this, M y mountain home, W here still the wind among the pines Blows as it did in days gone by. CG M 288)

Ietaka has taken the insect cries from one poem and the wind in the pines from the other and combined them into an evocation of sorrowful recollection that is more powerful than either. The person in Ietaka’s poem has also returned to his former home, but the pine wind arouses memories that, because of the reference to the “Kiritsubo” poem, may be taken to involve grief for a dead loved one. But all is implied, nothing stated, as to the actual content of the thoughts brought by the wind. The poem truly seems to have an atmosphere that hovers over it, “over­ tones that do not appear in the words alone.” There are also a few poems with a nimbus of philosophical implica­ tions. The most famous of these is Ono no Komachi’s verse regretting the ravages of time. Hana no iro wa Utsurinikeri na Itazura ni W a ga mi yo ni furu Nagame seshi ma ni.

The color o f flowers Has faded and vanished away, While in vanity M y life has fallen through the years O f gazing into endless rain. (K K S 2:113)

No translation could do more than suggest the complexity of this poem. Hana refers to cherry blossoms, whose beauty soon fades and falls in the rain. It is also a metaphor for the poet herself. Iro is the color of the blossoms, but also the beauty of the woman. Furu is “to live”— “vainly,” as we are told by itazura ni. It is also the “to fall” of the nagame, or blossom-destroying long rains. But nagam e also means “gaze,” suggesting the listless hopelessness of the woman watching the long rains of time destroy her youthful loveliness. 7ro, moreover, has Buddhist implications of “appearance,” that which is illusory and not real. Thus the deceptive appearances of this world of the senses are also revealed in their true insubstantiality. Chomei’s prescription of restraint, understatement, emotion only hinted, also finds exemplars in Teika jittei. The following poem is attrib­ uted to the seventh-century emperor Tenji in the Gosenshu: Aki no ta no Kario no io no Toma o arami

In the autumn fields This flimsy shelter for the harvest watch Is thatched so roughly

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W a ga koromode wa Tsuyu ni nuretsutsu.

That all through the lonely night M y sleeves are wet with dew. (G S S 6:302)

The poem is about loneliness, of course, and the image of dew can be taken both literally and as a metaphor for tears. But the metaphorical interpretation is kept quite tacit by the logical structure of the poem relating the dripping dewdrops to the sparseness of the thatch. The translation contains an adjective, “lonely,” that is not represented, but only implied, in the original. Hence the emotional content of the poem is understated, only hinted. An attempt to find an embodiment of Chomei’s ideal of an ineffably vague, miragelike quality is probably doomed to wander without end in the mists of subjectivity, but a verse by Shunzei’s Daughter (ca. 1171-1254) does have a kind of tenuous bewilderment as its theme. Yume ka to yo Mishi omokage mo Chigirishi mo Wasurezu nagara Utsutsu naraneba.

W ere they but a dream— The shadowy features that I saw, The words he swore? W hile these remain still unforgotten, Because they now have no reality.. . . (S K K S 15:1391)

Loneliness and tonal darkness, mentioned as yu gen qualities by Teika in Kindai shuka, are much in evidence among the yu gen poems in Teika jittei. The poems already quoted are illustrative of these qualities, as is this poem by Teika himself, written “when, in the autumn of the year his mother passed away, he went back to her old home on a day of violent wind.” Tamayura no Tsuyu mo namida mo Todomarazu Nakibito kouru Yado no akikaze.

Faint as the whisper O f the swaying beads, these drops O f dew and tears yet fall: Here where I yearn for one who is no more This house is shaken by the autumn wind. (S K K S 8:788)

W hat one does not find among the yu gen poems of Teika jittei are evocations of magical, flowerlike beauty of the sort Shunzei found praiseworthy in Go-Toba’s poem on the blossoms and moon of Yoshino. The compiler of Teika jittei evidently thought of yu gen more in terms of muted shades of tonal darkness. He also apparendy thought of it in terms of subjectivity. There are no nature poems divorced from fairly obvious involvement with human emotions or the human condition. The sort of sharply realized natural scene of almost mysterious beauty, but

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without allusive or other overtones, represented by Jien’s poem on the snow stirred into mist by the wind, is lacking. One may feel that Teika’s requirement that “a poet’s own impressions be set aside in order to draw near to the very essence of a subject” in order to reach the “profound mystery” of yu gen , as alleged by Konishi Jin ’ichi, does not match the content of the yu gen section of Teika jittei in this regard.43 The closest approach to objective nature among these yu gen poems is this evocation of autumn by Saigyo: Kirigirisu Yozamu ni aki no Naru mama ni Yowaru ka koe no Tozakariyuku.

W hen the crickets chirr In the coldness o f the night As autumn deepens, They seem to weaken, for their voices Fade ever farther on the air. (S K K S 5:472)

This is actually a poem in the mode Brower and Miner called descriptive symbolism. The poem means more than its words say. The weakening voices of the crickets are a metaphor for the death of all things that reach their autumn, including man. As Brower and Miner perceptively remarked of this poem, “although the idea that man, too, must die is not suggested, the tone, the image, and Buddhist thought make tht feelin g that this is so convincingly evident by means of a symbolic description.”44 A more typical use of description in the poems under consideration involves it overtly as a comparison with a human concern, as in the jo, or metaphorical “preface,” in the following poem by Fujiwara no Hideyoshi (1184—1240): Moshio yaku Ama no isoya no Yukeburi Tatsu na mo kurushi Omoitaenade.

From huts on the shore W here sea folk burn the briny wrack, Smoke rises in the dusk, As rumor rises to my hurt From these still smoldering fires o f love. (S K K S 12:1116)

Or the natural scene may be used for its effect on the human heart, as in this anonymous love poem in the Shinkokinshii: Ama no to o Oshiakegata no Tsuki mireba Uki hito shimo zo Koishikarikeru.

W hen the light o f dawn Pushes wide the portals o f the sky, The pale moon brings Such tender longing to my heart, Even he, my hateful love, is loved once more. (S K K S 14:1260)

There is even a poem by Lady Ise (ca. 877-940) whose only imagery is embedded in place-names.

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Wasurenamu Yo ni mo Koshiji no Kaeruyama Itsuhata hito ni Awamu to suramu.

W hen shall I come again Past Itsuhata in Koshi And Homecoming Mountain, Back to this world to meet once more One who will have long forgotten me? (.S K K S 9:858)

In Japanese Court Poetry Brower and Miner sum up their discussion of yilgen in these words: [T]he core of yugen remained the ideal of an artistic effect both mysterious and ineffable, of a subde, complex tone achieved by emphasizing the unspoken connotations of words and the im­ plications of a poetic situation. . . . The principal vehicle for yugen . . . was descriptive poetry (wit, elaborate conceits, and fancy rhet­ oric would distract attention from the effect of the overtones); its typical imagery was calm, quiet, and muted . . . and its characteris­ tic tone was one of sadness or wistful melancholy.45 The yu gen poems in Teika jittei illustrate this definition only in part. Complex tones, muted imagery, and melancholy are easily found. On the other hand, wit and a rhetoric that calls attention to itself are by no means lacking. In fact, the yu gen section begins with a poem whose third and fourth lines consist almost entirely of kakekotoba, a literary pun that is one of the chief varieties of Japanese rhetorical wit. The poem was written by Prince Motoyoshi (890-943) after the revelation of a secret affair he had been carrying on with the emperor’s consort. Wabinureba Ima hata onaji Na ni wa naru Mi o tsukushite mo Awamu to zo omou.

As in this sad plight The end is one— our names will be Flaunted in the roads O f Naniwa, markers in the tide— Whatever may betide, I’ll meet you still. (G S S 13:960; S I S 12:766)

Naniwa naru miotsukushi means “the channel marker at Naniwa,” while the same syllables can also be read to mean “will become [the same] name [i.e., reputation]; though I exhaust myself.” This wordplay is so prominent that it really becomes the main point of the poem. Komachi’s complex poem on fading beauty is also rich in wordplay as well as reli­ gious overtones. Of the “four basic styles,” in fact, the yu gen section in Teika jittei has the highest percentage of poems (36 percent) with kakekotoba. Although they thus vary in their degree of rhetorical sobriety, the yugen poems in Teika jittei are, as already observed, marked by subjectivity

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and a dominant tonal melancholy. But perhaps the most obvious way in which these poems are unified is by theme. In y u g en and yu gen alone there is one theme throughout. It takes various forms but can perhaps best be summed up in the word “attachment.” There is at­ tachment of men and women for each other, of animals for their mates, of man for natural beauty; a fear of isolation and a longing for human presence; a clinging to this world. Needless to say, such cling­ ing is unenlightened from the Buddhist viewpoint, and in a sense these are the poems of unenlightenment, of the human condition. The prevalence of love poetry again comes to mind. The first poem, Prince Motoyoshi’s declaration of his intention to meet his love de­ spite all difficulties, announces the theme. More frequently the woman is found waiting in vain for her lover, as in this poem by the priest Sosei (fl. 859-923): Ima komu to Iishi bakari ni Nagatsuki no Ariake no tsuki o Machiidetsuru kana.

Brief was your message: “I shall come anon,” you said; And for those few words I’ve waited through this long October46 night The late rising o f the waning moon. (KKS 14:691)

Once the lover does come, the woman tries to delay his departure. Fujiwara no Koreshige (953-89) treats the moment when the lover thinks he sees dawn starting to creep across the sky. Shibashi mate Mada yo wa fukashi Nagatsuki no Ariake no tsuki wa Hito madou nari.

W ait just a little! The night has far to go; It is the light O f long October’s waning moon That leads you so astray. (SKKS 13:1182)

A poem by Princess Shokushi (d. ca. 1201) treats “Concealed Love”: Wasurete wa Uchinagekaruru Yube kana W are nomi shirite Suguru tsukihi o.

How soon I forget And spend an evening o f sighs For truant love, W hen truly it is only I who know The sad secret o f these passing days. (SKKS 11:1035)

Shunzei’s Daughter deals with regret for the end of life and love: Shitamoe ni Omoikienamu

These embers o f desire, Now still smoldering within,

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Keburi dani Ato naki kumo no Hate zo kanashiki.

Must soon grow cold, And the end is sad when smoke from such a fire Vanishes into the trackless clouds.

(SKKS 12 :10 8 1) A n im als also are tre a te d as lo n g in g fo r th e ir m ates, as in th is p oem a ttrib u te d to K a k in o m o to n o H ito m a ro in th e S hink ok inshu:

Saoshika no Tsumadou yama no Okabe naru Wasada wa karaji Shimo wa oku to mo.

On the hills below The mountain where the stag cries out In longing for his mate I shall not cut the early rice Though frost should setde on the fields.

(SKKS 5:459) H u m a n iso la tio n and lo n e lin e ss are e vo k ed in a p o e m b y S o n e n o Y o sh ita d a (late te n th c en tu ry):

Yamazato ni Kiri no magaki no Hedatezu wa Ochikatabito no Sode mo mitemashi.

If the fence o f mist That closes in this mountain village Did not stand between, I might glimpse at least the sleeve O f some traveler far off on the road.

(SKKS 5:495) N a tu re to o serve s as th e o b je c t o f m a n ’s atta c h m e n t. S a ig y o ex­ presses th e re g r e t occasio ned b y th e fa llin g o f th e c h e r ry b lossom s:

Nagamu tote Hana ni mo itaku Narenureba Chiru wakare koso Kanashikarikere.

It was the gazing-— I’ve grown painfully attached T o cherry blossoms; Now I realize how sad It is to let go and part.

(SKKS 2:126) A n o th e r m o n k , th e ab b o t J ie n , casts th e p ro b le m o f a tta c h m e n t to n a tu ra l b e a u ty in its m o st o v e r tly B u d d h ist term s.

Shiba no to ni Niowamu hana wa Sa mo araba are Nagametekeri na Urameshi no mi ya.

By my brushwood gate Let the cherry tree now bloom Or not, as it will— I gazed upon it not long since, Oh wretched creature that I am!

(SKKS 16 :147 0 ) In a d d itio n to b e in g v ie w e d as an im p e d im e n t to salva tio n , n a tu ra l b e a u ty m a y be associated w ith th e b itte rn e ss o f u n h a p p y lo v e , as in this p o e m b y M ib u n o T a d a m in e (e a rly te n th c en tu ry):

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Ariake no Tsurenaku mieshi Wakare yori Akatsuki bakari Uki mono wa nashi.

85

Since my last sight O f your cold face beneath The waning moon There has been nothing Hateful as the dawn. (K K S

13:625)

A poem by Jakuren (d. 1202) presents a similar situation but with an opposite conclusion. The speaker of the poem is a woman kept wait­ ing too long. Uramiwabi Mataji ima wa no Mi naredo mo Omoinarenishi Yugure no sora.

Grown weary with wrath, I’ll wait no more, now is the end, My stand is firm— And yet, this sweet, familiar light That hovers in the evening sky! (S K K S 14:1302)

The past constitutes still another of the many attachments compris­ ing the thematic material of the yu gen poems. One of Shunzei’s most famous verses is here. Mukashi omou Kusa no iori no Yoru no ame ni Namida na soe so Yamahototogisu.

Thinking o f the past, In this grass-thatched hut I ponder Through a night o f rain: Do not add still further tears to these, O mountain cuckoo, with your call. (S K K S 3:201)

Another treatment of the theme of recollection was written by the monk Gyohen (1181-1264) after he had spent a night in conversation with Fujiwara no Teika. Ayashiku zo Kaesa wa tsuki no Kumorinishi Mukashigatari ni Yo ya fukenikemu.

How strange it was! The moon along my homeward way Was veiled in clouds; Can I have talked so deep into the night O f things that happened long ago? (S K K S 16:1550)

The two had been reminiscing about Saigyo, whose disciple Gyohen had been as a child, and we are to understand that the moon was really clouded by Gyohen’s tears.47 It may be appropriate to conclude these comments on poems from Teika jittei with an allusive variation on Narihira’s passionately confused questioning of the changed moon and spring, itself described by both Shunzei and Chomei as having the quality of yugen. The variation was

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written by a court lady known as Nijoin Sanuki (ca. 1141-1217) for the Poetry Contest in One Thousand Five H undred Rounds. Mi no usa ni Tsuki ya aranu to Nagamureba Mukashi nagara no Kage zo morikuru.

W hen in misery I gaze into the night and murmur, “Is there no moon?” Its light, unchanged from what we knew, Comes filtering through my broken eaves. ( S K K S 16:1542)

Here Narihira’s question receives an answer. The beauty associated with happier times does continue unchanged, or changed only in the added poignancy of its evocation of the past. Once a learned scholar told me that “we Japanese” prefer to forget the past with its pain. I cannot dispute his knowledge of his own culture, and yet to me the matter seems more complex. Wasuregusa, “the grass of forgetfulness,” is touted as the sovereign remedy for m i no usa, “the misery of the self.” But that medicine does not always cure.48 Usa is more than melancholy or even misery; it is the endemic sickness of the human condi­ tion, the dark night of the soul into which attachment drags us down. And yet, and yet. Mukashi nagara no/Kage zo morikuru. That light filtering in comes from the past we seek to forget. The moon of our salvation is also the moon of seduction. It is pleasure amid pain, overly­ ing and glorifying pain, and in that paradox lurk the charm and the power of yugen, the darkling mystery. Or so at least the perhaps anony­ mous compiler of Teika jittei seems to say. As far as I am aware, this is a unique view of yugen, that clouded mirror full of sad reflections. But it need not be so strange to researchers of lost time, partakers of the cup wherein the flower of attachment unfolds in all its ancient beauty. An In tegra l Translation o f the Yugen Section o f Teika J itte i 1.

G S S 13:960, “Love,” Prince Motoyoshi; also S I S 12:766. After the discovery o f his affair with the Kyogoku Lady o f the Bedchamber.

Wabinureba Ima hata onaji Na ni wa naru Mi o tsukushite mo Awamu to zo omou.

As in this sad plight The end is one— our names will be Flaunted in the roads O f Naniwa, markers in the tide— Whatever may betide, I’ll meet you still.

2. SKKS 14:1329, “Love,” Princess Shokushi. From a hundred-poem sequence. Ikite yomo Asu made hito wa

I cannot believe That I shall live or he be cruel

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Tsurakaraji Kono yugure o Towaba toe kashi.

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Until tomorrow: Let him come, if come he will, W hile the sky is still at dusk.

3. SKKS 6:649, “W inter,” Fujiwara no Hideyoshi. Where Narumi Strand was painted on a sliding screen at Saisho Shitennoin. Kaze fukeba Yoso ni naru mi no Kataomoi Omowanu nami ni Naku chidori kana.

W hen the sea wind blows Along the sounding strand o f Narumi, Scattered plovers drift Far on unfamiliar waves, Crying each in longing for its mate.

4. GSS 9:515, “Love,” Lady Ise. Written when she, having gone off somewhere without letting anyone know, received a letter from a man of her acquaintance saying that he had been going to great trouble for several days trying to find her, and had been afraid she must be dead. Omoigawa Taezu nagaruru Mizu no awa no Utakata hito ni Awade kieme ya.

Am I but froth, A fragile bubble on the flood O f the ever-flowing River o f our love, that I Should vanish ere we meet again?

5. SKKS 1:58, “Spring,” Jakuren. On the occasion of a hundred-poem competition at the home of the Regent Prime Minister. Ima wa tote Tanomu no kari mo Uchiwabinu Oborozukiyo no Akebono no sora.

Now the time is near, The wild geese fill the rice fields W ith their cries o f grief; Beyond the haze-enshrouded moon Dawn breaks across the sky.

Honka: IM 15, episode 10. Miyoshino no Tanomu no kari mo Hitaburu ni Kimi ga kata ni zo Yoru to naku naru.

In fair Yoshino The wild geese in the rice fields, How they flock to you, They too, in earnest pleading Raising their anxious cries.

6. KKS 13:625, “Love,” Mibu no Tadamine. Topic unknown. Ariake no Tsurenaku mieshi Wakare yori Akatsuki bakari Uki mono wa nashi.

Since my last sight O f your cold face beneath The waning moon There has been nothing Hateful as the dawn.

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7. SKKS 8:788, “Sorrow,” Fujiwara no Teika. When, in the autumn of the year his mother passed away, he went back to her old home on a day of violent wind. Tamayura no Tsuyu mo namida mo Todomarazu Nakibito kouru Yado no akikaze.

Faint as the whisper O f the swaying beads, these drops O f dew and tears yet fall: Here where I yearn for one who is no more This house is shaken by the autumn wind.

8. KKS 4:221, “Autumn,” Anonymous. Topic unknown. Nakiwataru Kari no namida ya Ochitsuramu Mono omou yado no Hagi no ue no tsuyu.49

Can these be tears Fallen from the wild geese crying As they cross the sky, These dewdrops on the clover brush Around this brooding house?

9. SKKS 5:473, “Autumn,” Fujiwara no Ietaka. From a fifty-poem se­ quence submitted to Priestly Imperial Prince Shukaku. Mushi no ne mo Nagaki no akazu50 Furusato ni Nao omoisou Matsukaze zo fuku.

Here where insect cries Shrill on the long night endlessly About my former home Now the wind among the pines Blows deeper thoughts into my heart.

Honka (1): GM 3, from “Kiritsubo.” Suzumushi no Koe no kagiri o Tsukushite mo Nagaki yo akazu Furu namida kana.

Though the bell cricket Pours out in grief the utmost Limits o f its voice, Through the long night unassuaged These falling tears can find no end.

Honka (2): GM 288, from “Matsukaze.” Mi o kaete Hitori kaereru Yamazato ni Kikishi ni nitaru Matsukaze zo fuku.

Altered and alone, I have returned to this, M y mountain home, W here still the wind among the pines Blows as it did in days gone by.

10. SKKS 3:201, “Summer,” Fujiwara no Shunzei. A poem on the cuckoo, from a hundred-poem sequence composed at the command of the Lay Priest Former Regent at the time he was Minister of the Right. Mukashi omou Kusa no iori no

Thinking o f the past, In this grass-thatched hut I ponder

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Yoru no ame ni Namida na soe so Yamahototogisu.

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Through a night o f rain: Do not add still further tears to these, O mountain cuckoo, with your call.

Honshi: Lu shan y u y e cao an zhong. At Mount Lu on a rainy night in a grass cottage, a line from “Lodging Alone on a Rainy Night in a Thatched Cottage on Mount Lu,” by Bo Juyi (772-846);51 Wakan roeishu 555. Honka: KKS 3:145, “Summer,” Anonymous. Topic unknown. Natsuyama ni Naku hototogisu Kokoro araba Mono omou ware ni Koe na kikase so.

Hototogisu Calling in the summer hills, If you have a heart, Do not make me hear your voice, Whose thoughts are sad enough.

11. SKKS 18:1764, “Miscellaneous,” Shunzei’s Daughter. At the Poetry Bureau, on the spirit of personal grievances. Oshimu to mo Namida ni tsuki mo Kokoro kara Narenuru sode ni Aki o uramite.S2

Nothing o f regret: For the moon that floats in tears My own heart’s to blame; But my sleeves have known too long This weary autumn that I hate.

12. GSS 6:302, “Autumn,” Emperor Tenji (626-71). Topic unknown. Aki no ta no Kario no io no Toma o arami W a ga koromode wa Tsuyu ni nuretsutsu.

In the autumn fields This flimsy shelter for the harvest watch Is thatched so roughly That all through the lonely night M y sleeves are wet with dew.

13. SKKS 5:459, “Autumn,” Kakinomoto no Hitomaro (fl. 689-700). Topic unknown. Saoshika no Tsumadou yama no Okabe naru Wasada wa karaji Shimo wa oku to mo.

On the hills below The mountain where the stag cries out In longing for its mate I shall not cut the early rice Though frost should settle on the fields.

14. SKKS 5:495, “Autumn,” Sone no Yoshitada. Topic unknown. Yamazato ni Kiri no magaki no Hedatezu wa

If the fence o f mist That closes in this mountain village Did not stand between,

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Ochikatabito no Sode mo mitemashi.55

I might glimpse at least the sleeves O f some traveler far o ff on the road.

Honka: GSIS 4:324, “Autumn,” Mother of Tsunenobu (early elev­ enth century). On mist in a mountain village. Akenuru ka Kawase no kiri no Taedae ni Ochikatabito no Sode no miyuru wa.

Has the dawn begun? W here the river mist now thins In scattered patches I catch glimpses o f a traveler’s sleeves Far o ff on the road beside the ford.

15. SKKS 5:472, “Autumn,” Saigyo. Topic unknown. Kirigirisu Yozamu ni aki no Naru mama ni Yowaru ka koe no Tozakariyuku.

W hen the crickets chirr In the coldness o f the night As autumn deepens, They seem to weaken, for their voices Fade ever farther on the air.

16. SIS 6:306, “Parting,” Minamoto no Shigeyuki (d. ca. 1000).54 Topic unknown. Wasuru na yo Wakareji ni ouru Kuzu no ha no Akikaze fukaba Ima kaerikomu.

Do not forget me: W hen the autumn wind blows back Leaves o f arrowroot Along the road o f parting I shall come to you again.

Honka: KKS 8:365, “Parting,” Ariwara no Yukihira (818-93). Topic unknown. T achiwakare Inaba no yama no Mine ni ouru Matsu to shi kikaba Ima kaerikomu.

Now I rise and go, Leaving for the mountains o f Inaba, But on those pine-grown peaks Should I hear you peak and pine I shall come to you again.

17. SKKS 9:858, “Parting,” Lady Ise. Topic unknown. Wasurenamu Yo ni mo Koshiji no Kaeruyama Itsu hata hito ni Awamu to suramu.

W hen shall I come again, Past Itsuhata in Koshi And Homecoming Mountain, Back to this world to meet once more One who will have long forgotten me?

18. KKS 18:962, “Miscellaneous,” Ariwara no Yukihira. Sent to someone in die palace at the time when the author, having incurred disfavor

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during the reign of Tamura [Emperor Montoku], was living in re­ tirement at a place called Suma in the province of Tsu. Wakuraba ni Tou hito araba Suma no ura ni Moshio taretsutsu Wabu to kotae yo.

If by some chance Any should inquire o f me, Tell them I languish By the shores o f Suma, spilling Brine drops on the rough sea wrack.

19. SKKS 10:900, “Travel,” Kakinomoto no Hitomaro. Topic unknown. Sasa no ha wa Miyama mo soyo to Midarumeri W are wa imo omou Wakarekinureba.55

The whole mountainside Seems to tremble with the sighing O f the bamboo grass; I am longing for my love, Now that I have come away.

Compare MYS 2:113, Hitomaro. Sasa no ha wa Miyama mo saya ni Midaru to mo W are wa imo omou Wakarekinureba.

Though whole mountainsides May rusde with the thrashing O f the bamboo grass, I stand longing for my love, Now that I have come away.

20. SKKS 16:1542, “Miscellaneous,” Nijoin Sanuki. For the Poetry Com­ petition in One Thousand Five Hundred Rounds. Mi no usa ni56 Tsuki ya aranu to Nagamureba Mukashi nagara no Kage zo morikuru.

W hen in misery I gaze into the night and murmur, “Is there no moon?” Its light, unchanged from what we knew, Comes filtering through my broken eaves.

Honka: KKS 15:747, “Love,” Ariwara no Narihira (825-80). None too seriously, he had begun an affair with a lady who lived in the western pavilion of the Gojo Consort’s palace. Then, a little after the tenth of the first month, she dropped out of sight. He heard where she was, but couldn’t get word to her. And so, in the spring of the following year, on a lovely moonlit night when the plum blossoms were at their best, he went back to the western pavilion, yearning for the year that was gone. He lay on the deserted board floor until the moon was low in the sky, and composed: Tsuki ya aranu Haru ya mukashi no Haru naranu W a ga mi hitotsu wa Moto no mi ni shite.

Is there no moon? And is the springtime not the spring O f times gone by? Myself alone remaining Still the self I was before. . . .

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21. SKKS 16:1550, “Miscellaneous,” Gyohen (1181-1264). One bright moonlit night I went to visit my lord Teika. He asked when I first conceived a deep ambition to enter the W ay of Poetry, and I told him how when I was young I had accompanied Saigyo and listened to his conversation over a long period. After relating many things he had told me, I returned home and the next morn­ ing sent this poem57: Ayashiku zo Kaesa wa tsuki no Kumorinishi Mukashigatari ni Yo ya fukenikemu.58

How strange it was! The moon along my homeward way W as veiled in clouds; Can I have talked so deep into the night O f things that happened long ago?

22. SKKS 18:1707, “Miscellaneous,” Kakinomoto no Hitomaro. Topic unknown. Ashigamo no Sawagu irie no Mizu no e no Yo ni sumigataki W a ga mi narikeri.

W here the mallards flock W ith squabbling cries among the reeds, The inlet waters Never clear for me this world Is but a muddy dwelling place.

23. SKKS 18:1809, “Miscellaneous,” Fujiwara no Shunzei. On the spirit of dawn. Akatsuki to Tsuge no makura o Sobadatete Kiku mo kanashiki Kane no oto kana.

Borne from afar This signal o f the dawn reaches M y boxwood pillow, W here I sadly lift my head And listen to the booming o f the bell.

Honshi: Yi-ai-si zhong y i zhen ting. “I lift my head from my pillow and listen to the bell of Yi-ai Temple,” a line from the fourth of five poems that Bo Juyi “chanced to inscribe on the eastern wall when, having newly divined [a site for] a mountain dwelling below Incense Burner Peak, the thatched cottage was completed”59; Wakan roeishu 554. 24. SKKS 11:993, “Love,” Kakinomoto no Hitomaro. Topic unknown. Isonokami Furu no wasada no Ho ni idezu Kokoro no uchi ni Koi ya wataramu.

As the early rice At Furu in Isonokami Shows yet no grain, Shall I too keep hidden The longing in my heart?

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Compare MYS 9:1772, Nukike no Obito (early eighth century). Isonokami Furu no wasada no Ho ni idezu Kokoro no uchi ni Kouru kono koro.

As the early rice At Furu in Isonokami Shows yet no grain, Deep within my hidden heart These days I go on in longing.

25. SKKS 12:1081, “Love,” Shunzei’s Daughter. Presented with a fiftypoem sequence: love related to the clouds. Shitamoe ni Omoikienamu Keburi dani Ato naki kumo no Hate zo kanashiki.

These embers o f desire, Now still smoldering within, Must soon grow cold, And the end is sad when smoke from such a fire Vanishes into the trackless clouds.

26. SKKS 11:1035, “Love,” Princess Shokushi. From a hundred-poem sequence: concealed love. Wasurete wa Uchinagekaruru Yube kana W are nomi shirite Suguru tsukihi o.

How soon I forget And spend an evening o f sighs For truant love, W hen truly it is only I who know The sad secret of these passing days.

27. SKKS 15:1376, “Love,” Princess Yashiro (eighth century). Topic unknown. Misogi suru Nara no ogawa no Kawakaze ni Inori zo wataru Shita ni taeji to.

Over Nara stream, W here the cleansing rites are held, M y prayer is wafted Far upon the river wind, That our secret may not die.

28. SKKS 12:1116, “Love,” Fujiwara no Hideyoshi. On the topic of evening love. Moshio yaku Ama no isoya no Yukeburi Tatsu na mo kurushi Omoitaenade.

From huts on the shore W here sea folk burn the briny wrack Smoke rises in the dusk, As rumor rises to my hurt From these still smoldering fires of love.

29. SKKS 13:1182, “Love,” Fujiwara no Koreshige. Topic unknown. Shibashi mate Mada yo wa fukashi Nagatsuki no

W ait just a little! The night has far to go: It is the light

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Ariake no tsuki wa Hito madou nari.

O f long October’s waning moon That leads you so astray.

30. SKKS 12:1139, “Love,” Fujiwara no Hideyoshi. On the topic of nocturnal love, when men presented poems on this topic at Uji. Sode no ue ni Tare yue tsuki wa Yadoru zo to Yoso ni nashite mo Hito no toe kashi.

“Upon those sleeves Because of whom, oh tell me, Does the moon now lodge?” Though she cast the blame aside, At least let her ask me this.

31. KKS 14:691, “Love,” Sosei. Topic unknown. Ima komu to Iishi bakari ni Nagatsuki no Ariake no tsuki o Machiidetsuru kana.™

Brief was your message: “I shall come anon,” you said, And for those few words I’ve waited through this long October night The late rising o f the waning moon.

32. SKKS 13:1203, “Love,” Fujiwara no Hideyoshi. Topic unknown. Ima komu to Tanomeshi koto o Wasurezu wa Kono yugure no Tsuki ya matsuramu.

“I shall come anon”— If she has not forgotten But still trusts those words, W ill she be waiting eagerly The rising o f this evening’s moon?

Honka: KKS 14:691 (number 31 above). 33. SKKS 15:1390, “Love,” Shunzei’s Daughter. At the poetry competi­ tion held at the Poetry Bureau, on the spirit of estranged love. Yume ka to yo Mishi omokage mo Chigirishi mo Wasurezu nagara Utsutsu naraneba.

W ere they but a dream, The shadowy features that I saw, The words he swore? W hile these remain still unforgotten, Because they now have no reality... .

34. SKKS 14:1260, “Love,” Anonymous. Topic unknown. Ama no to o Oshiakegata no Tsuki mireba Uki hito shimo zo Koishikarikeru.

W hen the light o f dawn Pushes wide the portals o f the sky, The pale moon brings Such tender longing to my heart, Even he, my hateful love, is loved once more.

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35. SKKS 14:1295, “Love,” Fujiwara no Norikane (d. 1165). When poems from love letters were ordered to be submitted in the reign of the cloistered Nijo. Wasureyuku Hito yue sora o Nagamureba Taedae ni koso Kumo no miekere.61

W hen because o f him W ho journeys in forgetfulness I gazed upon the sky, The very clouds o f heaven floated Lone and scattered on the empty air.

36. SKKS 14:1302, “Love,” Jakuren. At the poetry competition held in the third month of Kennin 1 (1201), on the spirit of estranged love. Uramiwabi Mataji ima wa no M i naredo mo Omoinarenishi Yugure no sora.

Grown weary with wrath, I’ll wait no more, now is the end, M y stand is firm; And yet, this sweet, familiar light That hovers in the evening sky!

37. SKKS 14:1316, “Love,” Fujiwara no Ietaka. At the Poetry Bureau poetry competition, on the topic of love in the deep mountains. Sate mo nao Towarenu aki no Yuhayama Kumo fuku kaze mo Mine ni miyuramu.

Yet even now In autumn the mountain fringe Receives no visitor, Though the wind that blows the clouds Must be plain upon the peak.

38. SKKS 14:1317, “Love,” Fujiwara no Hideyoshi. At the Poetry Bu­ reau poetry competition, on the topic of love in the deep mountains. Omoiiru Fukaki kokoro no Tayori made Mishi wa sore to mo Naki yamaji kana.

This longing goes deep To such inmost reaches that The long mountain trail I regarded as my clue Is no pathway to my heart.

39. SKKS 15:1337, “Love,” Fujiwara no Ietaka. For the fifteen-poem contest at Minase. Omoiiru Mi wa fukakusa no Aki no tsuyu Tanomeshi sue ya Kogarashi no kaze.

One whose longing goes Deep grass o f Fukakusa, Autumn dew— The end o f his promises: Wind over withered fields.

F o r th e honka and re la te d p oem s, see pages 6 6 - 6 8 .

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40. SKKS 14:1334, “Love,” Shunzei’s Daughter; For the fifteen-poem contest of love poems held at Minase. Furinikeri62 Shigure wa sode ni Aki kakete Iishi bakari o Matsu to seshi ma ni.

It began to rain— W intry showers on my sleeve— W hile I was waiting, Hoping for the things you said; But autumn was only a word.

Honka: IM 171, episode 96. Aki kakete Iishi nagara mo Aranaku ni Konoha furishiku E ni koso arikere.

I know I told you T o pin your hopes on autumn— It didn’t come true; It looks as if our karma W as only a leaf-strewn stream.

41. SKKS 14:1312, “Love,” Jakuren. At the Bureau of Poetry poetry competition, on the spirit of estranged love. Sato wa arenu Munashiki toko no Atari made Mi wa narawashi no Akikaze zo fuku.

The old house is bleak, And the autumn wind blows in— Into a desolate bed, To the place where one still lies W h o has learned her lesson well.

Honka: SIS 14:901, “Love,” Anonymous. Topic unknown. Tamakura no Sukima no kaze mo Samukariki Mi wa narawashi no Mono ni zo arikeru.

The wind gets in, Cold in the empty place where once Your arm was my pillow; But it’s all in getting used to it, And I am well inured by now.

42. SKKS 14:1326, “Love,” Shunzei’s Daughter. On the spirit of forgot­ ten love. Tsuyu harau Nezame wa aki no Mukashi nite Mihatenu yume ni Nokoru omokage.

Brushing away dew As I wake is an old tale O f weary autumns; But this shadow o f a face From a dream not seen to the en d. . . .

Honka (1): GSS 11:770, “Love,” Anonymous. Visiting someone, the author was not admitted, but spent the night lying on the veranda. On leaving for home in the morning, he sent in the following: Yumeji ni mo Yado kasu hito no

If on the dream-path One could find a kindly soul

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Aramaseba Nezame ni tsuyu wa Harawazaramashi.

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To lend one lodging, One need not on awaking Go brushing away the dew.

Honka (2): GSS 11:771, “Love,” Anonymous. Reply. Namidagawa Nagasu nezame mo Aru mono o Harau bakari no Tsuyu wa nani naru.

The kind o f waking That pours out a river o f tears Is what I know well— W hat is this matter o f dewdrops Barely worth brushing away?

Honka (3): KKS 12:609, “Love,” Mibu no Tadamine. Topic unknown. Inochi ni mo Masarite oshiku Aru mono wa Mihatenu yume no Samuru narikeri.

Even life’s passing W ill not bring me such regret As one other thing: The wakening that takes me From my yet unfinished dream.

43. SKKS 16:1449, “Miscellaneous,” Sugawara no Michizane (845-903). On a willow. Michinobe no Kuchiki no yanagi Haru kureba Aware mukashi to Shinobare zo suru.

A rotted willow By the road: now that spring is here, Alas, how by longing I too am drawn to recapture Seasons that once were green.

44. SKKS 16:1470, “Miscellaneous,” Jien. Topic unknown. Shiba no to ni Niowamu hana wa Sa mo araba are Nagametekeri na Urameshi no mi ya.

By my brushwood gate Let the cherry tree now bloom, Or not, as it will— I gazed upon it not long since, Oh wretched creature that I am!

45. KKS 2:113, “Spring,” Ono no Komachi. Topic unknown. Hana no iro wa Utsurinikeri na Itazura ni W a ga mi yo ni furu Nagame seshi ma ni.

The color of flowers Has faded and vanished away, While in vanity M y life has fallen through the years O f gazing into endless rain.

46. SKKS 2:116, “Spring,” Noin. Composed when he went to a moun­ tain village.

in

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Yamazato no Haru no ytlgure Kite mireba Iriai no kane ni Hana zo chirikero.

A mountain village At the twilight hour in spring: Now that I am here, I see how at the sunset bell The air fills with falling bloom.

47. SKKS 2:117, “Spring,” Egyo (fl. 960-90). Topic unknown. Sakura chiru Haru no yamabe wa Ukarikeri Yo o nogare ni to Koshi kai mo naku.

W hat melancholy— See the cherry scattering On the hills o f spring: It was surely to no avail That I fled from the world to this.

48. SKKS 17:1619, “Miscellaneous,” Saigyo. Topic unknown. Yoshinoyama Yagate ideji to Omou mi o Hana chirinaba to Hito ya matsuramu.

Yoshino Mountains— I shall never leave you now, So run my thoughts; “Once the blossoms have scattered . . . ” Yes, people must wait for me still.

49. SKKS 6:559, “W inter,” Jien. At the Kasuga Shrine poetry contest, on the topic of fallen leaves. Konoha chiru Yado ni katashiku Sode no iro o Ari to mo shirade Yuku arashi kana.

Leaves are scattering; In the house I sleep alone— The passing storm Does not know there is color Here too, strewn over my sleeve.

50. SKKS 2:126, “Spring,” Saigyo. Topic unknown. Nagamu tote Hana ni mo itaku Narenureba Chiru wakare koso Kanashikarikere.

It was the gazing— I’ve grown painfully attached T o cherry blossoms; Now I realize how sad It is to let go and part.

51. GSS 3:146, “Spring,” Ki no Tsurayuki. Written on the last day of the third month at the end of a letter in which he explained why he had not paid a visit for a long time. Mata mo komu Toki zo to omoedo Tanomarenu W a ga mi ni shi areba Oshiki haru kana.

It will come again, Seasons always do, I know, But this self o f mine Cannot be relied upon, And so I regret spring’s passing.63

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52. SKKS 6:552, “W inter,” Fujiwara no Takamitsu (fl. late tenth cen­ tury). In the Tenryaku reign, offering on command poems beginning “Kaminazuki.” Kaminazuki Kaze ni momiji no Chiru toki wa Sokohaka to naku Mono zo kanashiki.

W hen the red leaves fly, Scattering before the wind In the Godless Month,64 There is left a pervading sadness Too vague to say where it lies.

53. SKKS 6:578, “W inter,” Kiyohara no Motosuke (908-90). Topic unknown. Fuyu o asami Madaki shigure to Omoishi ni Taezarikeri na Oi no namida wa.

W inter is shallow, Still— too soon for the cold rains, Or so I thought, But it seems they could not wait— Nor the tears o f an old man.

54. SKKS 6:658, “W inter,” Sensai Shonin (d. 1127). Sent to [Fujiwara no] Mototoshi on a snowy morning. Tsune yori mo Shinoya no noki zo Uzumoruru Kesa wa miyako ni Hatsuyuki ya furu.

The eaves o f this hut Thatched with dwarf bamboo are buried Deeper than their wont— Today perhaps in the Capital You’ve had your first fall o f snow.

Compare Gosotsushu 121, Oe no Masafusa (1041-1111). Tsu no kuni no Ashi no ha shinogi Furu yuki ni Koya no shinoya mo Uzumorenikeri.

In the falling snow Weighing down the leaves o f reeds In the land o f Tsu, This small hut, this bamboo hut Has at last been buried too.

55. SKKS 6:661, “W inter,” Murasaki Shikibu (late tenth to early elev­ enth century). On a day of first snow when something was occupying my thoughts. Fureba kaku Usa nomi masaru Yo o shirade Aretaru niwa ni Tsumoru shirayuki.

That in the fall o f time Only heartache deepens here It does not know, This first snow that steadily Covers my desolate garden.

Honka: KKS 18:951, “Miscellaneous,” Anonymous. Topic unknown.

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Yo ni fureba Usa koso masare Miyoshino no Iwa no kakemichi Fuminarashitemu.

To go on in the world— The heartache can only get worse; In fair Yoshino I shall make the timbers groan On the road across the cliffs.

56. SKKS 16:1486, “Miscellaneous,” Princess Shokushi. Recollecting her days of vestal service. Hototogisu Sono kamiyama no Tabimakura Honokataraishi Sora zo wasurenu.

Cuckoo, long ago You sang once on Holy Hill W here I lodged that night: T o my pillow your faint cry Came from a sky unforgotten

57. GSS 4:170, “Summer,” Mibu no Tadamine. Topic unknown. Yume yori mo Hakanaki mono wa Natsu no yo no Akatsukigata no Wakare narikeri.

If there is something Yet more dreamlike than a dream, It must be this: The moment when two lovers part In the dawn o f a summer’s night.

58. GSS 4:209, “Summer,” Anonymous. When the Katsura Princess [Fushi, daughter of Emperor Uda] told her maidservant to catch fireflies, the girl wrapped them in the sleeve of her trailing robe. Tsutsumedo mo Kakurenu mono wa Natsumushi no Mi yori amareru Omoi narikeri.

W rap it as I may, It can never be concealed, The yearning fire From the summer insect flowing, Too great for her body to hold.65

NOTES 1. Alfred Noyes, “The Highwayman,” Collected Poems (New York: Frederick A. Stokes Company, 1913), 1:192. 2. Citation numbers for poems are based on SKT. 3. Noyes, “The Highwayman.” 4. JC P , 298, 299. 5. Kensho chinjo, in Kawamata Keiichi, ed., Shinko gunsho ruiju (Naigai Shoseki Kabushiki Kaisha, 1939 [hereafter referred to as SGR]), 10:430. 6. Saigyo’s allusive variation is on a poem by Noin (b. 988), in GSS 1:43: “Whoso has a heart, / To him would I show it— / In the land of Tsu / Along the ways of Naniwa / The fair scenery of spring."(Kokoro aramu / Hito ni miseba ya / Tsu no kuni no / Naniiva watari no / Ham no keshiki o.) Shunzei’s comment applies to both poems in Round 29 of Saigyo’s solitaire poetry contest Mimosusogavia utaaioase, in Nihon koten zensho (Tokyo, Osaka: Asahi

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Shinbunsha, 1969) [no vol. number]), 376. Tsu no kuni no is the poem of the right in Round 29. The poem of the left is: “In gathering dusk / I have but to hear the name, / River of Heaven, / And the old waves come breaking / Over my drenching sleeves.” (Kakikurashi / A m a no kawara to / Kiku kara n i / M ukashi no n a m i no / Sode n i kakareru.) This in turn looks back to a honka by Ariwara no Narihira (K K S 9:418 [IM ,

episode 82]): “Once he went hunting on the estate of Prince Koretaka. The party dismounted beside the river known as Ama no Kawa, and while they were drinking wine the prince said, ‘Present the wine cup with a poem on the spirit of having gone hunting and reached the edge of the Ama no Kawa.’ And so the author recited: ‘Hunting until dusk, / From the Weaving Maid I’ll borrow / Lodging for the night, / For I have finally arrived / At the verge of the River of Heaven.’ ” (K arik urashi / T anabatatsum e n i / Yado k aram u / A m a no k aw ara n i / W are w a kinikeri.) 7. K enkyii m a tsu n en g o r o J ic h in Osho jik a a w a se, in Hagitani Boku and Taniyama Shigeru, eds., Utaa-waseshu, in N K B T 74:466. 8. Ibid. 9. Nose Asaji, Y ftgenron, in N ose A saji chosak ushu (Shibunkaku Shuppan, 1981), 2:208. This article is heavily indebted to Nose. See also Jin’ichi Konishi, A H istory o f J a p a n ese L itera tu re, vol. 3, T h e H igh M id d le A ges, translated by Aileen Gatten and Mark Harbison, edited by Earl Miner (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1991), 185-93 and passim. 10. As translated in Wm. Theodore de Bary, et ah, eds., S ou rces o f C hin ese T radition (New York: Columbia University Press, 1960), 53. 11. The word y u g e n was used in Japan in connection with Chinese poetry in a kanbun composition manual known as Sakum on d a ita i (Essentials of Composition) dating from the early tenth century but augmented by various hands, notably those of Fujiwara no Munetada (see below). In this w o r k y iig e n is used to describe the indirect treatment of a topic: “The Style of Implications and Subtleties \yojo y u g e n no tai ]. On the topic ‘Flowers are cold; orchids and chrysanthemums glow in the grass thickets,’ a poem by Kan Sanbon [Sugawara no Fumitoki, 899-981] says: ‘After the storm has spread purple across the gardens of orchid and melilotus, / The moon shines in the frost in the grottoes of Penglai.’ (Lan h u i y u a n lan tu i z i h ou / P en gla i d o n g y u e zhao sh u a n g z h on g.) These [lines] are truly in the y u g e n style. The author has gotten through to the essence of these elegant scenes.” SGR 6:497. 12. Saeki Umetomo, ed., Kokinwakashu, in N K B T 8:336, 337. 13. C huyuki 1, in Zoho sh iryo ta isei (Kyoto: Rinsen Shoten, 1965 [hereafter referred to as ZST\), 9:173, 351; C huyuki 3, in Z S T 9:158. 14. Okami Masao and Akamatsu Toshihide, eds., Gukansho, in N K B T 86:188. See also Delmer M. Brown and Ichiro Ishida, T he F u tu re a n d th e P ast: A T ranslation a n d S tu d y o f th e Gukansho, a n I n te rp re tiv e H istory o f J a p a n W ritten in 1219 (Berkeley, Los Angeles, London: University of California Press, 1979), 72. 15. Kuroita Katsumi, ed., K ojidan, in Kokushi taikei (Yoshikawa Kobunkan, 1932 [hereafter referred to as KT\), 18:58. 16. Kokusho Kankokai, ed., M eigetsu k i (Kokusho Kankokai, 1911), 2:23. 17. Entry for Kennin 1 (1201) .9.22. AT 32:591. 18. Shikansho is a lost work. The passage is quoted in R yojin hish o kuden, m ak i 12, 3 work spuriously associated with the fragmentary R yojin hisho kudenshu, by Emperor GoShirakawa (1127-92), an originally ten-volume work on the art of im ayo. See Masamune Atsuo, ed., K ayoshu 1, in N ihon koten z en sh u (Nihon Koten Zenshti Kankokai, 1935), 50, 227. Nose (Y u genron, 239), apparendy erroneously, cites R yojin hisho k uden­ shu, m ak i 13. 19. K ojidan, 90.

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20. KakyO, in Hisamatsu Sen’ichi and Nishio Minoru, eds., K aronshu nogak uronshu, in N K B T 65:425. 21. The first known use of the term y u g e n in uta a w a se judgements was by Fujiwara no Mototoshi (1056-1142) in the N ara K a rin ’in u ta a w a se of ca. 1124. The poem of the left in Round 2 on the topic “Felicitations” is: “The reign of our lord— / From the Heavenly Rock Cave / The Sun emerged, / But there is no way of knowing / How many its circles since then.” (K im i g a y o w a / A?na no rw ato o / Izurti h i no / lk u m e g u r i ch o / K azu m o sh ira rez u .)

Mototoshi comments: “The diction is distant from the commonplace; it has entered [the realm of] y u g e n ." Quoted in NKBD 6:110. 22. J C P , 269. 23. KKS, 100. 24. “Are we to look at cherry 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." Donald Keene, trans., Essays in Idleness: T h e T su rez u regu sa o f Yoshida Kenko (New York: Columbia University Press, 1967), 115. 25. E igyokushu, in N K G T 3:323. 26. J C P , 266. 27. Konishi’s comment is of interest here: “The yugen defined by Chomei and Teika belongs to a different dimension from ‘yugen’ as invoked by Shunzei and his prede­ cessors. In his last years, Shunzei was not at all attracted by the yugen style. We must therefore conclude that Teika, not Shunzei, established yugen as a waka style.” Konishi, A H istory o f J a p a n ese L itera tu re, 3:193. 28. K enk yu y o n e n roppyakuhan utaaw ase, in N K B T 74:436. 29. SGR 9:115. 30. Hagitani Boku, ed., H eia n -ch o u ta a w a se ta isei (Hagitani Boku, 1963), 7:2198. 31. K ennin g a n n e n sen gohyak u han utaaw ase, in N K B T 74:486. 32. Teika the storyteller can be savored in Wayne P. Lammers, trans., T he T ale o fM a tsu r a : F u jiw a ra T eika’s E x perim ent in F iction (Ann Arbor: Center for Japanese Studies, The University of Michigan, 1992). 33. Konishi rejects M a igetsu sh o from the canon of Teika’s works: “I do not join the major­ ity of scholars in endorsing the traditional attribution. The M a igetsu sh o postdates Teika’s time: it could not have been written before the late thirteenth century.” Konishi, A H istory o f J a p a n ese L itera tu re, 3:201. 34. Robert H. Brower, “Fujiwara Teika’s M a igetsu sh o,” M on u m en ta N ipponica 40.4 (1985): 410-11. Brower’s translations of the style names have been adopted throughout this article. 35. M aigetsu sh o, in N K B T 65:127, 135. 36. K in d a i shiika (kensobon), in N K G T 3:328. 37. The following poem by Koben ShOnin (better known as Myoe Shonin, 1173-1232) came to Teika’s attention when he was compiling the ninth imperial w ak a anthology, Shinchok usenshu, in 1233: “In autumn in the course of meditation the poet gazed at the moon all night. Feeling ‘the light that shines on every village’ concentrated in himself: ‘Moonlight does not choose / One particular mountain / Over all others; / How then can it shine most purely / On the peak where I cleanse my heart?’ ” (Tsukikage w a / Iz u re no y a m a to / W akazu to m o / S um asu m in e n i y a / S u m im a sa ru ra m u .) SC SS 16:1081.

Teika decided to include the poem, remarking that its effect was very much in the y u g e n style. See Imagawa Fumio, ed., K undok u m eigetsu k i (Kawade Shobo, 1979), 6:65. See also Konishi, A H istory o f J a p a n ese L itera tu re, 3:265. 38. Teika j i t t e i is included in N K G T 4:362-79.

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39. S K T numbers, headnotes from relevant chokusenshii, and bonka are included with the translation. It will be observed that the poems are grouped by thematic and imagistic association. 40. Ishida Yoshisada, F ujiw a ra Teika no kenkyu (Bungado Shoten, 1957), 367-490; “Teika,” in Ito Yoshio, et al., eds., Waka bungak u d a ijiten (Meiji Shoin, 1962), 723; Yoen: Teika no hi (Hanawa Shobo, 1979), 274. Hisamatsu Sen’ichi, “Teika jittei,” Waka bungak u da ijiten , 725. Kyusojin Hitaku, “Kaidai,” in N K G T 4:58. Fukuda Hideichi, C hiisei w ak ashi no kenkyu (Kadokawa Shoten, 1972), 545. Yasuda Ayao, F ujiw ara Teika kenkyu (Shibundo, 1967), 67. Taniyama Shigeru, Y ugen no kenkyu (Kyoto: Kyoiku Tosho Kabushiki Kaisha, 1943), 168, 170-72; “Yugen,” in N KBD 6:110. Higuchi Yoshimaro, Teika h achidaisho to kenkyu (Toyohashi: Mikan Kokubun Shiryo Kankokai, 1957), 2:118—30. Kubota Jun, “Jittei,” in NKBD 3:215—16. Sasaki Tadasato, C hiisei karon to sono sh iihen (Offrsha, 1984), 68-79. Fujihira Haruo, Shinkokin to sono z en go (Kasama Shoin, 1983), 237-39. Imai Akira, “ Teika j i t t e i no ichi,” Waka bungak u kenkyu 55 (November 1987): 32— 41; reprinted in Gakujutsu Bunken Kankokai, ed., K okubungaku n en jib etsu ronbunshu, ch iisei l (Hobun Shuppan, 1987). Sasaki, like Koni­ shi, believes M a igetsu sh o also to be a forgery. He regards Teika ji t t e i as the source of later forgeries among documents spuriously attributed to Teika, and he ascribes to Teika a more “literal” (gen gitek i) understanding of y u g e n than can be derived from that work. Fujihira too notes the dominant emotional tone of the y ttg e n poems in Teika j i t t e i as arguing against compilation by Teika. Imai suggests Go-Toba as the compiler. 41. Brower and Miner, trans., F u jiw a ra T eika’s S u p erio r P oem s o f O u r T im e (Stanford: Stan­ ford University Press, 1967), 145; Brower, “Fujiwara Teika’s M a igetsu sh o,” 406, n. 18. 42. M oto no sugata to mosu wa, kangaemOshisoraishi jittei no naka no . . . nite sOrobeshi (“What I call the four basic styles are . . . of the ten styles I have previously made the subject of my considerations”). M aigetsu sh o, in N K B T 65:127. 43. Konishi, A H istory o f J a p a n ese L itera tu re, 3:163. 44. JC P , 306. 45. Ibid., 265, 266. 46. “Long October” renders nagatsuk i, the ninth month of the old calendar, corresponding more or less to our October in its placement in the solar year. Although it was not regularly longer than other months (in the lunar calendar, months were either twenty-nine or thirty days long, but which were which varied from year to year), it was the last month of autumn, whose nights were conventionally “long.” 47. Gyohen’s dates demand that we assume he was Saigyo’s disciple as a child, since he would have been only nine when Saigyo died. 48. “In my undersash / Grasses of forgetfulness / I tucked away— / Oh, that scurvy scurvy-grass, / I see it was so much talk.” ( W asu regu sa / W a g a shitabim o n i / Tsuketa red o / Shiko no shik ogusa / K oto n i sh i a rik eri.) M Y S 4:730. Otomo no Yakamochi (718-85). 49. Following the KokinshU version, which has h a g i rather than the o g i of Teika jitte i. 50. Shinkokinshii has akanu instead of akazu. 51. Saku Setsu, ed., K a nsh i taikan (Ho Shuppan, 1974), 2:2012. 52. Reading na m id a n i and u ra m ite, as in Shinkokinshii, rather than the n a m id a m o and u ch im ite of Teika jit t e i. 53. Reading sod e m o, as in Shinkokinshii, rather than the sode w a of Teika jitte i. 54. This poem, ascribed to Shigeyuki in Teika jit t e i, is listed as anonymous in Shuishii. 55. Reading soyo to and m id a ru m eri, as in Teika jit t e i, rather than the soyo n i and m id a ru n a r i of Shinkokinshii. 56. Reading usa, as in Shinkokinshii, rather than the uk i of Teika jitte i. 57. See n. 47.

104 58. 59. 60. 61. 62. 63. 64.

C R A N STO N

Reading fu k en ik em u , as in Shinkokinshu, rather than the fu k m u r a n of Teika jitte i. Saku, K a nsh i taikan, 2:1992. Reading m a ch iid etsu ru , as in K okinshu, rather than the m a ch iiz u ru of Teika jitte i. Reading m iek ere , as in Shinkokinshu , rather than the m ien u re of Teika jit t e i. Reading fu r in ik er i, as in Shinkokinshu , rather than the fiir in ik er u of Teika jitte i. The G osenshu compilers note that Tsurayuki died that same year. K am inazuki, “the Godless Month,” refers to the tenth month, when all native deities assembled at Izumo, leaving the country at large “godless.” 65. According to Y amato m o n o ga ta ri , episode 40, the girl was in love with Prince Atsuyoshi, Princess Fushi’s brother.

“Traditional Approaches to Learning” in Japan: M ich i and the Practice of Calligraphy in Japan’s Middle Ages G ary D e C oker

Contemporary Western interpreters of Japanese culture often refer to “traditional approaches to learning” that still exist in Japan, many point­ ing to the significance of these approaches in modern Japan. Karel van Wolferen even speculates that there are political consequences to what he terms “traditional Japanese learning methods.”1 Traditional ap­ proaches to learning undoubtedly have continued to exist even through the structural changes of the Meiji and Occupation periods. Neverthe­ less, in order for this phrase to add to our understanding of Japanese education, it requires more precise definition. This is a complicated endeavor because the phrase pertains both to Japan’s long history of formal and informal education and to the “traditional arts” and religious practices that continue to attract many devotees to this day. Traditional approaches to learning, defined to their broadest extent, encompass a wide range of pursuits that have evolved over the centuries. A first step in defining the term, therefore, requires focusing on the transmission of one skill or form of knowledge in one time period. For this purpose, I have chosen to present a detailed analysis of the practice of wayo (Japanese-style) calligraphy in the Heian court during the late twelfth through mid-fourteenth centuries. Japanese-style calligraphers in this period strove to preserve the traditions of the late Heian period that evolved in an atmosphere of minimal Chinese influence. Central to the conserving nature in the two centuries following the Heian period was the concept of m ichi (artistic vocation).2 During this time, the artist began to see his art as a vehicle for spiritual progress. Artistic practice came to equal Buddhist practice, and the goal of one’s artistic endeavor became nothing less than spiritual enlightenment. It is in this context that the ideal of michi, which has continued into contemporary Japan, began to influence the Japanese. The centuries that lie between that time and the present make it impossible to portray a direct link between the concept of michi and

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“traditional approaches to learning” in contemporary Japan. Neverthe­ less, in the minds of many Japanese and Western scholars, the influence of m ichi extends to the present.3 An analysis of the approach to learning in that period, therefore, offers a starting point in understanding the elements of traditional educational thought that remain in modern Japan. The art of calligraphy is one of many pursuits that exhibit the influence of the development of the concept of michi in the High Middle Ages. Konishi has very systematically shown the effect of m ichi on the style of classical Japanese poetry. The focus of this essay, however, is not calligraphic style, but rather the way michi influenced calligraphers’ discussions of the study of their art. The source of information on the study of calligraphy is two treatises: Saiyosho, based on the teachings of Fujiwara no Norinaga (1109-80) as imparted to Fujiwara no Koretsune (d. 1227), and Jubokusho, written in 1352 by Prince Son’en (1298-1356) for Emperor Go-Kogon (r. 1352-71) of the Northern Court.4 These treatises give insight into the practitioners’ conception of the educational process in the art of calligraphy.5 In addition, the writing of these trea­ tises falls at the beginning and in the middle of the period in which the concept of michi dominated, thereby illustrating the development of the concept during the 170 years between the writing of these two treatises. M IC H I.

A DEFINITION

Three major difficulties exist in defining the concept of the artistic W ay. First is the scope of the use of the Chinese character for the word michi. M ichi (Chinese dao; Sino-Japanese do and to) has various meanings that extend from the concrete and specific to the abstract and mystical. Most of the uses of the word arise out of its fundamental meaning of path, road, way, route, or course. M ichi can mean career or profession when used to define the route or course that a person chooses to follow during life. When used to describe a person, the word takes on an ethical meaning and refers to a person of character, justice, principle, or conviction. It moves further into the domain of ethics when used in a normative sense to define the proper way or course of action. In a religious context it has been used to mean teaching, doctrine, or truth. When the Chinese character for the word michi is combined with an­ other character, it is pronounced do or to—for example, hutsudo, the W ay of Buddha, or Buddhism; shinto, the W ay of the Gods, or the Shinto religion; dokyo, Taoism; dogaku, morals, Confucian philosophy, or Taoism. The second difficulty in discussing the concept of the artistic W ay lies in the number of arts that have been practiced as Ways. The modern words for many of the Japanese arts end with the Chinese character for michi in its Sino-Japanese pronunciation do—for example, chado or sado,

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the W ay of Tea, or the tea ceremony; kado, the W ay of Poetry; budo, the W ay of the Military, or martial arts; shodo, the W ay of Writing, or calligraphy. By including other arts that do not end with the character for michi but fall under the rubric geido (the W ay of Art or artistic Ways), the number exceeds one hundred, many of which still are being practiced today.6 Although similarities exist among these arts, their his­ torical evolution differs greatly. Nishiyama divides them broadly into three groups: those that arose out of the aristocratic culture of the Heian period, those that arose out of the military culture of the thirteenth through sixteenth centuries, and those that arose out of the plebeian culture of the Edo period.7 The third difficulty results from the changes that have taken place within the concept of michi as it evolved through the centuries. Nishiyama’s three categories of arts arose out of three distinctly different cul­ tures, the aristocratic, military, and plebeian, each of which dominated a certain historical period. Saiyosho and Jubokusho represent the aristo­ cratic art of calligraphy during a time when the military came to domi­ nate the political affairs of the country. THE USE OF THE W O RD

M IC H I

IN

S A IY O S H O

AND

JU B O K U S H O

In the book Do no sbiso (The Ideology of the W ay)8 Terada Toru examines the specific meaning of do or m ichi as it is used in numerous treatises on religion and art. He discusses works from various arts in different historical periods including Son’en on calligraphy, Zeami (ca. 1363-1444) on Noh drama, Shotetsu (1381-1459) on poetry, Sen no Rikyu (1520?—90) on the tea ceremony, and Miyamoto Musashi (d. 1645) on swordsmanship. The following analysis follows Terada’s exam­ ple by explaining the uses of the term “the W ay” in Saiyosho and Jubokusho. In Jubokusho Son’en uses the character for michi (sometimes in the Sino-Japanese pronunciation do) twenty-two times. He also uses “correct path” (seiro) three times and “false paths” (jakei) one time. In eight of the uses of michi, Son’en is referring specifically to the art of calligraphy: kono michi (this Way) used four times, sono michi (the Way) used two times, and juboku no michi and nohitsu no m ichi used once each and translated as “the W ay of Calligraphy.” In all of these instances Son’en uses m ichi within a discussion of historical aspects of the art of calligra­ phy, most often with reference to acknowledged masters in the art such as Kukai and the “Three Masters” (sanseki) or while discussing the ex­ isting tradition of the art.9 For Son’en, the focus of calligraphy is the past masters who exem­ plify the ideal practitioner of the art. “These Three Masters—Michikazc, Sukemasa, and Yukinari—have been admired as exemplars of this W ay

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throughout succeeding generations to the present day and we use the styles of each as models” (225).10 “If you base your study on the heart of the classic calligraphers and study the W ay thoroughly, you will natu­ rally master its mysteries” (213). In contrast to the person who respects the traditions of the art, Son’en presents those who study letters with the intention of improving the quality of their correspondence. These people represent those that take a narrow view of the art-and see their practice as leading to immediate practical benefits. “This situation results from their complete ignorance of the Way. First, how are they to appre­ hend this W ay and how are they to determine their own talents? Are they to randomly determine the rules and set the limits?” (221). Son’en uses the word shodo (various Ways, any Way, or these Ways) to refer to the arts in general. “The rule for practice in the various Ways is that unless you put in hard work and effort over some time, you will find it difficult to achieve anything” (220). “Ultimately, the study of any W ay is a labor of the heart” (213). In addition to their similar mode of practice, Son’en also likens the other arts to calligraphy in their relationship to Buddhism. “For the reality of this W ay had its origin in Buddhist enlightenment and from there entered the secular arts. In wind and stringed instruments, songs and lyrics, Chinese and Japanese poetry—in all of these Ways there is right and wrong, and you should be discriminating” (216). In the above example Son’en uses the words kono michi (this Way) in a broad sense beyond the meaning of “calligraphy.” This entire pas­ sage is an attempt by Son’en to link the artistic Ways including calligra­ phy to the pursuit of Buddhism. He makes this connection more explicitly in section fourteen when again using m ichi to refer to the arts. “In all things, the Ways requiring practice are ever without limit. When you study Buddhism, you explore the witness of Buddha and our virtuous predecessors; you try to attain to the knowledge and insight of Buddha, but it still remains unattainable. It is surely the same in the secular arts” (221). In other uses of the word michi, Son’en also alludes to the existence of a larger W ay. This expansive use of the W ay is most apparent in the sentence, “The Greater W ay is distant and difficult to follow, and false paths are near and easy to tread” (217). Here Son’en uses the word daido, which has a normative meaning as “the proper course of action.” In the context of the arts, this points to the existence of a lengthy and carefully followed approach to study. Norinaga uses the character for michi three times in Saiyosho. In section 36 kono m ichi (this Way) refers specifically to calligraphy. In section 39 shodo (all the Ways) refers to other artistic Ways. In section 43 juboku no michi (the W ay of Calligraphy) again refers only to calligraphy.

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In all three of these examples the word “W ay” has a narrow meaning without the moral, ethical, or religious overtones that exist in Jubokusho. This difference in the use of m ichi illustrates the change in the concep­ tion of the arts in the period between the writing of Saiyosho and Jubokusho. THE FIVE COMPONENTS OF

M IC H I

The way Son’en and Norinaga employ the word michi gives insight into their notion of the concept. Another means of exploring the concept is to present a broad definition of michi and use it to analyze the two treatises. As a means of doing so, I will draw upon Konishi’s discussion of the formation of the concept in terms of five components that coa­ lesced in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries: specialization, univer­ sality, transmission, conformist ethic, and authority." Each of these subsequently will serve as a basis for examining the treatises. Specialization and U niversality An early example of the specialized nature of m ichi can be seen within the university (daigaku) of the late Nara and early Heian periods. Certain families dominated specific areas of study at the university; for example, the Nakahara and Sakanoue families specialized in law, and the Miyoshi and Kotsuki families specialized in mathematics. The character for michi in the Sino-Japanese form of do was used to designate the areas of study at the university, for example, myobodo for law and sando for mathematics.12 The tendency toward specialization even took place within individual fields of study as Sansom points out in a discussion of the early Heian period. Perhaps the most interesting feature of Confucian studies in Japan at this time was the specialization of Japanese scholars. Certain families devoted themselves especially to certain works and became hereditary authorities in their own branches. Such were Mifune on the Three Books of Rites, and Yamaguchi on the Spring and Autumn Chronicles." Mid-Heian period writers used the phrase “a person of the W ay” {michi no hito or michi no mono) to describe someone who received train­ ing and became a specialist in an art or skill. The phrase indicates that a person had entered the ranks of the professional and achieved the highest levels of expertise as a specialist. In The Tale o f Genji a variety of pursuits, including music, scholarship, the Chinese classics and wood­ craft, are referred to as Ways, but the most highly respected areas of

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study in the Heian period were Chinese and Japanese poetry, music, and calligraphy. In the thirteenth century the Zen master Dogen (1200—53) uses an apparently current notion that supports the intense pursuit of a single area of study to urge Buddhist monks to specialize in their study of Buddhism. A man who is born into a certain family and engages in its profession (michi) should know that he must be diligent above all in his family’s work. If he learns a profession in addi­ tion to his own, one that he knows is not within his scope, he is acting totally in error. Rather than a man—monk or layman—pursue several areas of study without mastering a one, he should perfect a single pursuit, becoming so expert in it that he can give public performances. How much more does this apply to nonsecular matters: Buddhism has been studied since time began, but never thoroughly.14 Yoshida Kenko (ca. 1283-1350) in his Tsurezuregusa suggests the same singleness of purpose for those who pursue the secular arts. W e must carefully compare in our minds all the different things in life we might hope to make our principal work, and decide which is of the greatest value; this decided, we should renounce our other interests and devote ourselves to that one thing only.15 If you are determined to carry out one particular thing, you must not be upset that other things fall through. Nor should you be embarrassed by other people’s laughter. A great enterprise is unlikely to be achieved except at the sacrifice of everything else.16 Zeami gives similar advice to the serious student of Noh drama. In the introduction to Fushikaden he states: “He who wishes to excel in the michi of no must, above all, not practice other michi.”17 Although Heian society in the early Kamakura period recognized the necessity of intense devotion to an art or skill in order to attain the level of a professional or specialist, the members of that society did not view all pursuits as equal. The aristocrats considered certain arts as their sole possession; they were superior and so were the arts. Fujiwara no Teika [1162-1241], the leading poet of the day, is said to have protested strongly when a certain monk presented

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a commentary on the poems of the N ihongi to [Emperor] GoToba [1180-1239], on the ground that a man of low degree ought not to be allowed to express opinions concerning one of the classics of Japanese literature.18 Later in the Kamakura period, however, the various arts and skills came to be viewed on more equal terms: the level that the practitioner reached became more important than the genre in which he practiced. Regardless of the art or skill, the wisdom of the master at the highest levels was viewed as universal. Kenko illustrates this in a story of a tree trimmer who silently watches a man climb a tree. Upon seeing that the man has descended from the top and is within a few feet of the ground, the tree trimmer finally speaks and advises the man of the need for caution. When asked why he waited so long to give his advice, the expert tree trimmer explains: “That’s the point,” said the expert. “As long as the man was up at a dizzy height and the branches were threatening to break, he himself was so afraid I said nothing. Mistakes are always made when people get to the easy places.” Kenko adds: “This man belonged to the lowest class, but his words were in perfect accord with the precepts of the sages.”19 The tree trimmer’s pursuit of his specialization and the skill he acquired led him to a univer­ sal truth. The decline of the aristocratic class and the rise of the military class in the Kamakura period is one explanation for the shift from the elitism of the aristocrats of the Heian and early Kamakura periods to the accep­ tance of the universality of various pursuits. Zen Buddhism, with its teaching that enlightenment can be reached through the pursuit of the activities of daily life, is also an important aspect of this change. Zen incorporated some of the practices of Tendai and replaced Tendai ritual with activities common to all people such as tending a garden, preparing food, and partaking of meals—each carried out within a strictly pre­ scribed ritual. Indeed the ritual of practice, that is, the approach to practice, became more important than the area of pursuit. The importance of approach is evident in the Tendai practice of shikan (concentration and insight) that was incorporated into the art of poetry by Fujiwara no Shunzei (1114-1204) and his son Fujiwara no Teika during the late Heian and early Kamakura periods. Shikan, which Konishi states “is equivalent to the content of Zen,”20 is defined by Brower and Miner as follows: The religious exercise had as its purpose the achieving of a mystical insight into the nature of the Buddha by means of

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contemplating a painting or piece of sculpture. The individual would concentrate upon the icon with such intensity that his inner mind would become filled with a universal vision of the Buddha transcending the finite characteristics of the image be­ fore him.21 Shunzei describes the possibility of approaching poetry through the practice of shikan. “Shunzei’s poetical treatise, the Korai Futeisho, reflects his deep interest in the practice of shikan, and offers strong evidence that the kind of experience of poetic contemplation which he and Teika emphasized owed a good deal to the Tendai teachings.”22 Shunzei states that poetry like Buddhism has a long history through the ages, and, although Buddhism may appear superior to poetry, they possess an affinity. I have cited, on the one hand, the golden teachings of the Buddhist Law, deep in significance. On the other hand I speak of what may appear to be no more than a sporting with false­ hoods and frivolities (fugen kigo, a Buddhist pejorative term for all secular literature). Yet poetry may also reveal the deeper import of things and in so doing may be made to travel on the Path of Buddha.23 Shunzei’s son, Teika, pursued the study of shikan to an even greater degree than his father. When he was near the age of seventy, Teika copied the entire ten volumes of M ohezhiguan, the Chinese text by Zhiyi (538-97) that outlines the process of shikan.u In his treatise on poetry, M aigetsusho, Teika discusses the composition of poetry in terms very similar to shikan-. “Only when a person has completely cleared his mind and thoroughly immersed himself in the unique realm of this style is it possible to compose in it, and even then success is rare.”25 Specialization, U niversality, an d C alligraphy Neither Jubokusho nor Saiyosho contain strong exhortations on the need of the calligrapher to specialize. Son’en, realizing that calligraphy will be one of many arts pursued by the young emperor, states in sec­ tion 11: Every day you should apply yourself for some time, about two to four hours. Of course you should not neglect your official meetings and other studies, for, needless to say, you cannot make writing practice your first priority. Still, there should be a proper time reserved for it. (219)

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This contrasts sharply with Zeami’s advice that the student of Noh drama should not study other Ways. Zeami was writing for the student studying to become a professional. For Son’en’s student, calligraphy is only one of the accomplishments deemed appropriate for a member of the imperial family. Saiyosho, with its audience of professional calligra­ phers, is a more likely location for a statement on the need for devotion to a single art; however, it also does not contain an imperative statement. Jubokusho and Saiyosho do agree, however, on the need for calligra­ phers to pursue the study of the art earnestly. Son’en continues in sec­ tion 11: The rule for practice in the various Ways is that unless you put in hard work and effort over some time, you will find it difficult to achieve anything. At the beginning, for a year or two, or at least for two or three hundred days, apply yourself with some urgency. Then, after that, it will be in order to practice at a more gradual pace. (220) Norinaga states: “A professional calligrapher should constantly be writ­ ing something, otherwise his brushwork will suffer” (267). The two treatises differ considerably in their references to the uni­ versality of the various Ways. Jubokusho refers to the study of the arts as similar to the pursuit of Buddhism.26 Saiyosho takes a more parochial view of calligraphy and its relation to the arts. In section 39, Koretsune records a vague example stating: “In the case of wind and stringed instru­ ments and the like, poor tone should be corrected. It is a mistake to disregard it and do nothing about it, even though it is poor. It is the same in all the Ways” (275). Norinaga seems to mean that in all of the arts the practitioner must pay attention to even the smallest matters and strive for perfection. In section 36 of Saiyosho, Norinaga contradicts the idea of universality: “Of all accomplishments, calligraphy is supreme. It is valuable for determining the good and the bad in yourself and others, and so talented calligraphers are important. As a result, this W ay is treated with special respect in China” (274). The universality of the arts suggests convergence of the highest levels of each art. Son’en, however, rejects this notion of a final level of expertise: “In all things, the Ways requiring practice are ever without limit” (221). In describing the highest level of the art, Son’en uses meta­ phor to portray the energy that the master transmits to his calligraphy, drawing heavily on images from nature to describe the quality of supe­ rior brushwork. In broader terms, the energy of a floating cloud, a water­ fall, or a spring, the curving shape of a dragon or a serpent,

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and the bent form of an old pine—these in their own right are your models. The brushwork of the classics is simply this. In his Yobitsu no Zu, Hsi-chih describes the narrowing down-stroke as a withered wisteria ten thousand years old. (215)27 Expert calligraphers achieve this level of quality through devoted practice that results in complete freedom: “Superior work that has at­ tained a level of expertise is free in every respect” (216). After years of practice, the master reaches this freedom, which guides the art at its highest level. In this freedom exists the universality of the arts. Son’en describes this as “the style of unlimited freedom,” which is achieved through the following of one’s heart (216). He uses the Analects to illus­ trate his point. “Confucius said that by the age of seventy he could follow the desires of his heart and not transgress what was right” (214). But this freedom is not the careless exploring of a novice. Rather it is the result of years of devotion to the fundamentals of the art. Freedom arises from the constraint of careful practice at earlier stages. The temptation to feign the freedom of the master often seemed to overcome the novice. Son’en warns his student not to rush his study by attempting something beyond his level. The difficulty lies in the begin­ ner’s inability to see beyond the form of the master’s art: “Those who practice incorrectly try to imitate the form of the characters. The form looks similar, but they cannot reproduce the vigor of the brush and so their characters seem to be without life” (213). Early in Jubokusbo Son’en introduces the novice to the details of study, beginning with the correct grip and later the required posture during practice. The proper physical position promotes an appropriate level of concentration, something stressed often throughout the text: In the beginning of your studies you should practice by taking the correct posture, concentrating while you move the brush quietly. After you have achieved proficiency, your writing will not depart from the rules of calligraphy even though you let the brush follow its own bent. (214) Following a carefully prescribed method of study is the only path to the freedom of the highest reaches of the art, a universal freedom found in the study of all the arts and in the practice of Buddhism. Transmission At the end of Fushikaden, Zeami adds a quotation that seems to have had wide circulation during his lifetime: “A house becomes a house upon possessing a transmission; a person becomes a person upon possessing

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knowledge.”28 This adage offers a reminder of die dual nature of the transmission of the Japanese arts, that is, the organization and the indi­ vidual. Both of these must be considered in order to understand the meaning of transmission, Konishi’s third component of the concept of michi. Transmission extends beyond the teacher and student to include the members of a house or school and their ancestors who form the lineage of the art. Each family that formed around a body of knowledge strove to distinguish itself from other families with the same specialty. They did so by developing esoteric teachings and carefully transmitting them to worthy members of the family. Some scholars claim secret teaching in the arts existed as early as the Nara period, but the evidence is lacking.29 There are legends from the early Heian period, however, that illustrate the secretive nature of the arts. One well-known legend revolves around the teaching of the biwa, a type of lute. Semimaru (fl. ca. 920), a blind musician and poet, having received instruction in two secret biwa compo­ sitions, “The Flowering Spring” (Ryusen) and “The Woodpecker” (7bkuboku), retired to his hermitage without ever performing the pieces. The grandson of Emperor Daigo (885-930), Minamoto no Hiromasa (918-80), determined to learn the secret biwa compositions, went to Semimaru’s residence every evening for three years without once gaining admittance. Finally Semimaru rewarded Hiromasa’s persistence by ac­ cepting him as a student.30 In a story from part six of Kojidan, a series of legends compiled in the early Kamakura Period, a reluctant teacher agrees to teach his stu­ dent a secret piece of music for the sho, an organlike reed instrument. On a rainy evening the two men leave separately for a secluded location where the lesson is to take place. The teacher, disguised in a straw raincoat and hat in order not to be followed by someone who may try to listen to the lesson, arrives last and insists on lighting a torch to search the area for unwanted visitors. He discovers a man lurking in the shadows and learns that he is a practitioner of the same musical instru­ ment. To the student’s chagrin the teacher is upset by the intruder and refuses to carry out his promise to teach the secret composition.31 The origin of secret teachings in the arts often is traced to practice in Tendai Buddhism where the esoteric teachings of the religion are transmitted orally from teacher to student. This “oral transmission” (kuden), which took place when the student had reached a certain level in his studies, is an initiation rite with an accompanying purpose of certifying the student’s previous acquisition of knowledge.32 The secret transmission of knowledge from teacher to student also exists in Zen Buddhism, an example of the intertwining of Tendai, Zen, and the arts.33

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And just as Tendai and Zen stress the importance of correct transmis­ sion, so too did the arts become concerned with proper lineage. As the aristocrats lost their power to the military class in the late twelfth century, they began to rely on their knowledge of the arts to insure their livelihood. Pecuniary matters heightened their concern with the possession of the secret teachings. Schools of the arts flourished, each stressing their hereditary connections and purporting to possess the secret teachings of the masters. These teachings gradually became an important credential, one as important as the possessor’s ability in the art itself. Transmission and C alligraphy Calligraphy, too, developed schools, each of which took pride in its heritage and the secret teachings that it transmitted. In an era when calligraphy as practiced by the aristocrats varied little, schools of the art distinguished themselves from each other through claims of faithful transmission of the art and of possession of secret teachings.34 Son’en stresses the importance of these teachings at the beginning of section 6. “People who proceed thoughtlessly, not knowing this W ay nor receiving the oral transmissions, usually deviate from the correct path and always evince bad habits” (215). For this reason, Son’en cautions his student to practice under the guidance of a teacher. The highly structured world of the arts with its clearly marked schools vying for the patronage of the court and military rulers allowed no room for self study. Only a teacher could validate a student’s progress and transmit the “secrets” of the art, thereby recognizing the recipient’s efforts. Ability, without credentials conferred by a recognized master, would almost invariably go unnoticed. In addition to receiving the secret teachings from his teacher, the student must study the classic masters of the art: “The way to acquire this brushwork is to examine carefully and understand the classics of calligraphy” (213). Son’en reveres the classics and his praise is unquali­ fied—“The brushwork of the classic masters is filled with life and dis­ plays no weakness” (215)—and his respect for the lineage of Japanese calligraphy is especially apparent in sections 18 and 19. In section 18, he lists important calligraphers beginning with Asano Nakai (fl. ca. 794), whose calligraphic form “is no different from the present form” (224-25). During his discussion of the Japanese classic masters, Son’en admits that variations have taken place in the angle of the brush and in the brush-form; however, he ends the section by reiterating his claim of the uniformity of Japanese calligraphy: “Thus, the Japanese style has not changed” (225).

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In section 19, Son’en details the influence of various styles on the basic form of calligraphy that existed in more recent times from the era of the “Three Masters.” He ends this section by stating: In order that you understand how these things have come about over time, I will mention the following. Lord Yukinari’s descendants all copied his works without changing the writing forms in the least. Although the external appearance of these forms may seem to have changed over the ages, in essence they are all the same and were not mixed with other styles. From the time of Lord Yukinari to Yukitada of today, the form has remained quite the same. It would seem to have been faithfully transmitted. (226) Norinaga agrees with Son’en on the importance of studying with a teacher: “When you are inexperienced, it is difficult to comprehend the intention of the model, and so you should study with a teacher” (274). Although Saiyosho contains references to classic Japanese calligraphers, it does not exhibit the same reverence for the past as does Jubokusho. Section 30 even includes a critique of the calligraphy of each of the “Three Mas­ ters.” This critique and his negative statements about two calligraphers of the Japanese-style tradition, Tadamichi and Tomotaka, illustrate a major difference between the two treatises, that is, Norinaga does not attempt to portray Japanese-style calligraphy as a unified tradition as does Son’en. Saiyosho, however, is not without statements showing a respect for the past. It occasionally defers to an earlier treatise, Yakaku teikinsho, which details various conventions of the Sesonji school, the knowledge of which helped the school to preserve its dominant position.35 The connection to the traditions of the predecessors of the school, however, receives less emphasis in Saiyosho than Jubokusho. C onform ist Ethic Families of artists in Japan’s Middle Ages established their place in society by conforming to traditions rather than by stressing innova­ tion. Conformist ethic, Konishi’s fourth component of the concept of michi, revolves around the kata or “forms” of each art, the basic patterns that are practiced repeatedly by students of an art. These forms are visible in Tendai and Zen Buddhism as well as in the arts. Tendai, as practiced during the Heian period, was replete with rituals that were repeated by the followers as a means of receiving Buddhist tradition and its teaching. Zen later replaced the elaborate rituals of Tendai with the ritual of daily life activities that codified the prac­ titioner’s every action. These restrictive rituals of Zen were thought

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to lead to an ultimate state of true freedom that exists at a level free from all obstacles. Kata in the arts indeed were restrictive, but also were viewed as the surest, most expedient way to achieve mastery of an art. Scholars of the Japanese arts often caution the reader not to apply twentieth-century standards to the world of the arts in Japan’s Middle Ages. Today people assume that, when we are given free rein to exercise creativity, our specialized knowledge or skills will improve. This is not wrong. Yet it also does not represent the only truth. Progress and improvement of a different sort are effected through the denial of one’s immediate creativity.36 LaFleur reminds us of the anthropologist’s view of ritual as a mode of cognition and uses this perspective to discuss Tendai and Shingon Buddhism. [Ritual] is a way of learning, reiterating, and retaining some­ thing new and important. That ritual is done with the body rather than with the mind alone is not only fully harmonious with Buddhism’s traditional discomfort with mind/body di­ chotomies but is also harmonious with what is increasingly recognized to be a salient feature of Japanese intellectual tradition.37 The repeated practice of the basic forms of an art insured the trans­ mission of the art without alteration. The idea that an art should remain the same through the centuries resulted from the belief that the artists of the present never could surpass those who preceded them and that models of beauty lie waiting to be recaptured from the past. For the individual student of an art, concentration on standard forms meant a denial of the self and a foregoing of any creative attempts. Imitation was the goal. And this conscious imitation extended to the most minute detail. Kenko in a passage on the method of practice stresses the impor­ tance of the basic principles: The performers who now rank as the most skilled in the whole country were at the beginning considered incompetent, and, indeed, had shocking faults. However, by faithfully main­ taining the principles of their art and holding them in honor, rather than indulging in their own fancies, they have become the paragons of the age and teachers for all. This surely holds true for every art.38

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C onform ist Ethic and C alligraphy Although the word kata most often refers to a pattern of movement in an art such as dance or the tea ceremony, a broader definition of the word also includes forms such as the model work copied by the student of calligraphy. According to Son’en this model must be duplicated with precision: “First, practice one or two poems over and over many times for many days. When the image of the model emerges clearly in your mind and you are able to write an almost identical copy from memory, then proceed gradually further into your studies” (212). Later Son’en adds: “In the end, everyone who studies a model should be in accord with it and there should be no difference between his writing and the model” (213). In Saiyosho, although Norinaga stresses the understanding of the intention of the model, he does not give as much emphasis to the precise duplication of it. “To study the copybook, first understand the brushwork of the model. If you let the brush flow without under­ standing the intention of the model, you will be able to write only when looking at the model and not on your own” (273). Although both treatises stress the use of a model, they differ in their choice of models. Norinaga approves of a broader range of calligra­ phy for use as models, including both Chinese and Japanese works. Son’en is critical of contemporary work influenced by Chinese styles. He limits the range of models for study but encourages the viewing of many: “It is important to have a wide range of models. Decide on one model for your practice, but peruse many others to further your studies” (220). The two treatises also differ regarding the tenacity of practice. Norinaga’s advice to the student to put aside characters that are especially difficult and return to them at a later date is in sharp contrast to Son’en’s recommendation to continue practicing the same model even when fac­ ing difficulty. Norinaga states: You will become tired of your practice if you incessantly try to copy a character that you do not write well and concentrate only on that particular one. If you practice something two or three times without success, put it aside for a while and study something else, then go back to it later. If you do this a few times, you will naturally be able to duplicate it. (276) Son’en describes periods of poor quality and states: While you are still a beginner and are practicing calligraphy, your brush may suddenly stagnate and your characters will not resemble the model. Unexpected things inevitably occur. At

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such times you will become inattentive and entertain idle thoughts. Pay no heed, and just continue to practice as usual. Then, in four, five, or perhaps ten days, you will again improve and will surpass what you previously considered your best. This will happen again and again. Do not give up while you are a beginner. Over time your efforts will lead step by step to a mature form. (219) A uthority Authority, the fifth aspect of Konishi’s definition of michi, appeared fully during the Kamakura period when the content of the arts at the deepest level began to be recognized as universal. As a result, authority came to be tied less to the art itself than to its transmission through the generations and to the specialization of the practitioners. Michi, more than the art, commanded respect. The authority of the art was upheld by the rigorous training required of a student who in some cases came to revere his ancestors almost as gods. Shotetsu’s (1381-1459) adoration of Fujiwara no Teika resulted in this statement: “Those who, though they practice the way of poetry, look down on Teika will not enjoy the blessings of providence, but will suffer punishment.”59 A uthority an d C alligraphy Norinaga and Son’en often attempt to garner authority by referring to respected masters and their writings. Both treatises include numerous references to the classic works of past masters and to the need for thor­ ough study of these works. Three sections of Saiyosho mention Yakaku teikinsho and three sections mention the “text” from which Saiyosho was taken. For example, “this is explained extensively in Yakaku Teikinsho. This treatise contains what was handed down to us by our predecessors, and we should have faith in it” (271). There are also references to Chinese works such as T aipingyulan and Nanshi. Son’en, too, mentions the works of Kukai, W ang Xizhi, and Emperor Taizong. Another aspect of authority is the definitiveness with which each treatise distinguishes the correct from the incorrect. Both contain clear distinctions such as Son’en’s contrast of beautiful and attractive charac­ ters with those that are weak and pitiful (216) and of an undiscriminating person with one who knows the W ay (216). Norinaga writes of charac­ ters that are fresh in contrast to those that are unsightly (269). Implicit in these discussions of what is correct is the caution to the beginning student against proceeding too quickly or becoming too confident before developing the requisite skill. Saiyosho warns the student against displaying his work early in his career and gaining a bad reputation.

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“A calligrapher should recognize his level” (270), states Norinaga. In the same vein Son’en, criticizing those who think highly of themselves and write finished copies too early in their career, asks rhetorically: “First, how are they to apprehend this W ay and how are they to deter­ mine their own talents? Are they to randomly determine the rules and set the limits?” (221). Son’en’s description of the writing of letters in section 14 suggests that the student should not begin with a specific desire to develop one skill quickly, but rather should put aside short-term goals and pursue all facets of the art without a desire for recognition. In section 7 he cautions novices not to let the temptations of fame lead to cherishing the outland­ ish at the expense of real practice. Both Norinaga and Son’en clearly define superior calligraphy and the proper method for pursuing it. Over­ all, however, Son’en seems more dogmatic in his approach, which more clearly outlines the process of study. SUMMARY

Konishi, describing the five components that make up the concept of michi, shows the development of each component from its earliest inception to the High Middle Ages. As described above, some originate early in Japan’s history, and others come fully into play in the years following the Heian period. The establishment of m ichi in the High Middle Ages resulted from the emergence of universality. For this rea­ son, the greatest difference between Saiyosho and Jubokusho should lie in this component. In analyzing Saiyosho and Jubokusho, therefore, one would expect that universality would be more evident in Jubokusho than Saiyosho. This is indeed the case. The development of universality in the concept of michi in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries is most apparent in Son’en’s linkage of the arts and Buddhism. He clearly conceives calligraphy, indeed all of the arts, as a W ay that parallels the study of Buddhism. When dis­ cussing the W ay of the arts he states that “the reality of this W ay had its origin in Buddhist enlightenment and from there entered the secular arts” (216). Nothing in Saiyosho displays such a universal view. Son’en’s more frequent and varied use of the word m ichi symbolizes the differ­ ences in the treatises. The moralistic tone of Jubokusho, the emphasis on the unbroken lineage of the art, and the total devotion to the Japanese style distinguish Jubokusho from its predecessor, Saiyosho. In many ways Jubokusho epitomizes the concept of michi. Son’en wrote it during the period that michi coalesced, and he did so from a perspective arising out of a declining Heian aristocracy that strove to conserve indigenous traditions and reject contemporary Chinese influence.

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Son’en’s treatise on his approach to the art, therefore, is one of the earliest records of the influence of the fully developed concept of michi on the transmission of a skill. The conservative tone of Son’en’s treatise represents the ethos of m ichi in Japan’s Middle Ages. This conservatism, however, is not neces­ sarily a reflection of the way Son’en actually practiced the art of calligra­ phy. In fact, despite Son’en’s professed allegiance to Japanese calligraphic traditions and his rejection of the contemporary Chinese form, Son’en is noted for incorporating contemporary Chinese elements into his cal­ ligraphy. By doing so, he succeeded in bringing new life to the courtly tradition of Japanese calligraphy. At the same time, however, Jubokusho provides support for the Japanese traditions from which he and his Shorenin school received their legitimacy. NOTES 1. Karel van Wolferen, The Enigma o f Japanese Power (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, Inc., 1989), 378-80. 2. “M ichi—vocation, cultivation of a way of life that would lead to Buddhist enlighten­ ment—was the central ideal aspired to by writers of the High Middle Ages” (Jin’ichi Konishi, A History o f Japanese Literature, vol. 1, The Archaic and Ancient Ages [Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1984], 62-63). Konishi defines the High Mid­ dle Ages as the Kamakura and Muromachi periods. 3. Konishi describes m ichi as an underlying cultural ethos that allowed the Japanese to quickly absorb Western culture during the Meiji period: “In Japan, by contrast, the skills of various specialties were perfected by the idea of michi, vocation. Because a person who could excel in the given vocation was so highly respected, it was possible to rise by excellence to the very top in the succession of the specialty of a given family (ie). Because Japan did not have the Chinese civil service system, and because it maintained outstanding men of talent in a variety of fields, it was able so quickly to take and digest modern Western culture at the end of the nineteenth century” (ibid., 75). One of the leading American scholars of Japanese education, Thomas Rohlen, uses m ichi to explain the Japanese willingness to pursue a single goal relentlessly: “In Japan, to cultivate a particular ‘way’ means essentially to spend a very long time practicing an ‘art,’ thus deepening one’s intuitive grasp of its inherent nature.” Con­ temporary Japanese, according to Rohlen, recognize any career, study, or societal role as a W ay that leads to an external truth. “The power to perceive deeply, to know, comes from long, devoted training, patience, and concentration focused on some ‘way’ ” (Thomas P. Rohlen, “The Promise of Adulthood in Japanese Spiritual­ ism,” Daedalus 105 [Spring 1976]: 133-34). 4. For a description of these two treatises and their translations, see Gary DeCoker, “Se­ cret Teachings in Medieval Calligraphy: Jubokusho and Saiyosho,” M onumenta Nipponica 43.2 (Summer 1988): 197-228; and 43.3 (Autumn 1988): 261—78. 5. Calligraphy, along with poetry and music, comprised the three pursuits of an educated person in this era. 6. Nishiyama Matsunosuke, Gei no sekai: sono hiden denju (Kodansha, 1980), 27-30. 7. Nishiyama Matsunosuke, Geido to dento, vol. 6 of The Collected Works o f Nishiyama Matsu­ nosuke (Yoshikawa Kobunkan, 1984), 145—

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8. Terada Torn, Do no shiso, Shintai no Shiso Series (Sobunsha, 1979). 9. The “Three Masters”—Ono no Michika/.e (894-966), Fujiwara no Sukemasa (944-98) and Fujiwara no Yukinari (972-1027)—receive credit for raising Japanese-style callig­ raphy to a high level during the late Heian period. Kokai (774-835) was a Japanese monk and calligrapher. 10. Page numbers refer to the translations in DeCoker, “Secret Teachings.” Section num­ bers refer to the twenty sections of Jubokusho and the forty-eight sections of Saiyosho. 11. I have drawn on the following works of Konishi: “Chusei to gendai: danzetsu no keijijogaku,” Kokubungaku kaishaku to kyozai no kenkyU 18.11 (September 1973): 34 40: Michi: chusei no rinen (Kodansha, 1975); “Michi no keisei to kairitsuteki sekai,” Kokugakuin zasshi 57 (1956): 15-24; A History o f Japanese Literature, vol. 3, The High Middle Ages (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1991), 139-65; and “M ichi and Medieval W riting,” in Earl Miner, ed., Principles o f Classical Japanese Literature (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1985), 181-208. 12. Takahashi Toshinori, Nihon kyoiku bunkashi (Kodansha Gakujutsu Bunko, 1978), 2 : 11- 12 .

13. G. B. Sansom, Japan: A Short Cultural History (Charles E. Tutde Co., Inc., 1973), 234. 14. Konishi, “M ichi and Medieval W riting,” 194. 15. Donald Keene, trans., Essays in Idleness: The Tsurezuregusa ofK enko (New York: Colum­ bia University Press, 1967), 160. 16. Ibid., 161. 17. Konishi, “M ichi and Medieval Writing,” 195. Zeami, however, adds that poetry should be studied because of its importance in Noh drama. 18. Helen Craig McCullough, trans., The Taiheiki: A Chronicle o f M edieval Japan (Tokyo: Charles E. Tuttle Co., Inc., 1979), xxvi, note. 19. Keene, Essays in Idleness, 92-93. 20. Jin’ichi Konishi, Image and Ambiguity: The Impact o f Zen Buddhism on Japanese Literature (Tokyo University of Education, 1973), 9. 21. JCP, 257. 22. Ibid., 257. 23. Clifton W. Royston, “The Poetics and Poetry Criticism of Fujiwara Shunzei (1114—1204)” (Ph.D. dissertation, University of Michigan, 1974), 338. The informa­ tion in the parentheses is a footnote in the original translation. 24. Konishi, Image and Ambiguity, 34. For information on the Mohezhiguan, see Wm. Theodore de Bary, Wing-tsit Chan, and Burton Watson, eds., Sources o f Chinese Tradition (New York: Columbia University Press, 1964), 1: 322-28. 25. Robert H. Brower, “Fujiwara Teika’s Maigetsusho,” M onumenta Nipponica 40.4 (Winter 1985): 412. 26. See above p. 107. 27. Son’en probably is referring to Battle Array o f the Brush ascribed to both Wang Xizhi (ca. 307-65) and his teacher Lady Wei. 28. Ijichi Tetsuo, Omote Akira, and Kuriyama Riichi, eds., Rengaronshu, Nogakuronshu, Haironshu, in NKBZ 51:297. 29. Sasaki Hachiro, Geido (Fuzanbo, 1956), 219-20. 30. Hayashiya Tatsusaburo, Chusei bunka no kicho (Tokyo Daigaku Shuppankai, 1955), 344; Susan Matisoff, The Legend o f Semimaru: Blind Musician o f Japan, vol. 14 of Studies in Oriental Culture (New York: Columbia University Press, 1978). 31. Takahashi, Nihon kyoiku bunkashi, 2:16. 32. Robert H. Brower, “ ‘Ex-Emperor Go-Toba’s Secret Teachings’: Go-Toba no In Gokuden,” Harvard Jou rn al o f Asiatic Studies 32.1 (1972): 22-23. 33. H. Paul Varley, “Ashikaga Yoshimitsu and the World of Kitayama: Social Change and Shogunal Patronage in Early Muromachi Japan,” in John Whitney Hall and Toyoda

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34. 35. 36. 37. 38. 39.

DECOKER

Takeshi, eds., Japan in the M uromachi Age (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1977), 193n. See DeCoker, “Secret Teachings,” 198-201, for a discussion of schools and secret teachings. See Gary DeCoker and Alex Kerr, "Yakaku Teikinsho: Secret Teachings of the Sesonji School of Calligraphy,” M onumenta Nipponica 49.3 (Autumn 1994): 315-29. Konishi, “M ichi and Medieval W riting,” 183. William R. LaFleur, The Karma o f Words: Buddhism and the Literary Arts o f M edieval Japan (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1983), 16-17. Keene, Essays in Idleness, 135. Donald Keene, Some Japanese Portraits (Kodansha, 1978), 47.

Kitahara Hakushu’s “Katsushika Compositions in Tranquillity”: Lyrical Structure and the Religious Experience C

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Kitahara Hakushu (1885-1942) is best known for his ffee-verse symbolist poetry written in the first two decades of the twentieth century, but he is also famous for having composed prolifically and skillfully in various Japanese poetic forms, from the choka to folk songs and children’s verse. From his middle years, the tanka especially drew his attention, where his compositions derived from a poetic he eventually termed shin yugen, a fair though still mystifying translation of which would be “new mystery and depth.” When Hakushu spoke of “new yu gen" in his later years, invariably he illustrated its origins in his work with compositions from “Katsushika kangin shu” or “Katsushika Compositions in Tranquillity,”1 a discrete group of 285 poems within his tanka collection Suzume no tamago (Sparrow Eggs). As a collection, these poems were published in August of 1921, when Hakushu was thirty-six and reaching the height of his powers as a poet. Traditionally critics and commentators have used random poems from Sparrow Eggs as mirror-image illustrations of the life of its poet, but in doing so they have ignored the relatively independent aesthetic identity of “Katsushika Compositions,” an existence that should be al­ lowed its own life apart from the biographical facts of Kitahara Haku­ shu’s life. At the same time, however, neither the factual record nor the poet’s statements elsewhere about his life and work during this period should be ignored. They remain as important guides to Hakushu’s inten­ tions, and his comments about his experiences between the time that he actually lived them and the publication of the finished collection provide helpful information concerning the evolution of his own view of his work. From beginning to end, Hakushu never meant Sparrow Eggs to be anything other than the record of a continuing spiritual quest. The interest in religious truth had awakened within him when he was at work on the poems contained in his second tanka collection, K irara shu (Mica, Mother of Cloud, 1915); however, what began as a continuation

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eventually took on an independent shape as Hakushu endlessly worked over old poems, wrote new ones under renewed inspiration, and then combined and recombined the new with the old. Almost eight years went into the production of a work that focuses on less than half those months and years; that in time clear contours for the experience would emerge in the poet’s mind seems, therefore, only natural. It would also stand to reason that the artist might try to give it expres­ sion in prose, which he did, in two autobiographical novellas, a num­ ber of essays, and a long and rambling collection of loosely connected prose reflections entitled Suzum e no seikatsu (Sparrow Life, 1920), all of which were published prior to Sparrow Eggs. Presumably, Hakushu’s readers already knew a great deal about the experiences dealt with in the poetry, and one might also believe that they were familiar with most of the poems, as more than 80 percent of them had been published previously in various journals. Nowhere in any of the earlier work, however, is there the overall unity of Hakushu’s collected tanka covering the same period. W hat Hakushu did in the first half of 1921 with these tanka that he had not done before was to coordinate the relations between the individual poems and to form them into an integrated whole; his efforts resulted in this coherent picture of a quest for religious enlightenment. Sparrow Eggs was special in every way for Hakushu and unusual for its time. It is a large collection, 415 pages in its first edition, comprising 687 tanka, 12 choka or “long poems,” and 2 kouta or “short songs.” Seventeen illustrations, all by Hakushu himself, accompany the text, as does a long introduction under the title “Daijo” (Great Preface), in which Hakushu first recounts his struggles to complete the work and bring it to some sort of finished form and then goes on to provide an extended critical discussion of the tanka} The struggles were long and rigorous. The oldest poems in the collection date from as early as 1914, some of them no more than revi­ sions of compositions from Mica, M other o f Cloud. He wrote steadily until the beginning of 1917, when his production of tanka waned and then stopped altogether. He did not write any more tanka until the early months of 1921, the year that the collection was finally published. Dur­ ing this time he was not altogether silent, however; he wrote much children’s verse, a number of autobiographical novellas (including those mentioned above), essays on various topics, and Sparrow Life. Publication of the tanka collection was delayed partly because Hakushu could not get either the individual poems or the collection as a whole into the kind of shape that would satisfy him. Twice during the period from 1917 to 1920 he had what he initially believed a finished manuscript,

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only to reject it later. It was lucky for him that his publisher was his younger brother Tetsuo, though not perhaps for Tetsuo, because in the meantime Tetsuo’s first publishing company, Oranda Shobo, foundered while waiting for its star author’s long overdue work. As he makes clear in the “Great Preface” to Sparrow Eggs, Hakushu felt largely responsible for the economic woes of his brother’s company; yet still he delayed, wrote, and rewrote.3 In the eight years that Hakushu was focused upon this collection, his own financial situation as well went from bad to worse, as he insisted on living or dying by his writing, and until 1919 and 1920, with the publication of first his children’s verse and then Sparrow Life, he eked out only the barest living. In September of 1914 he and his first wife, Toshiko, were divorced. This was the same woman for whom Hakushu had risked name and career by going to jail for adultery, the result of a failed attempt to rescue her from a very unhappy first marriage. Following his release and her divorce, Hakushu had married Toshiko and forsaken a relatively successful career in Tokyo to seek a “new life” first in the Misaki area on the Izu Peninsula and then in the desolate Ogasawara Islands far to the south. He had given up everything that had brought hint both eco­ nomic and psychological ease, only to have her (as he tells it) reject his devotion to his art and to the quasi-religious “way,” or michi, at which it had begun to aim.4 In Hakushu’s retrospective view, Toshiko lusted after glamour, wealth, and the life of high style, which strained not only their own relationship but that with his parents as well. Eventually he felt he had to choose between this dissatisfied and dissatisfactory, though still passionately loved, wife and his beloved father and mother. In the end he rejected Toshiko. The struggle continued, however, for he was economically responsi­ ble for his aging parents, who only a few years before had been rich but now were indigent, and after M ay 1916 for his second wife, Ayako, as well. Struggle was almost all he knew during these years: he had no money for food; he had a father who bitterly complained of his son’s inability to support any of thems; and he had a consumptive wife to care for. And a new wife did not end his domestic strife, for in the early summer of 1920 he divorced again, only to marry once more in the spring of the following year. In August 1921, with the publication of Sparrow Eggs, Hakushu thought his struggle at an end. He had married for a third and final time in April 1921 to Sato Kikuko, with whom he had his first taste of long-lasting marital peace. No longer did his situation seem hopeless: he was now relatively stable financially, and in March of the same year he had again begun publishing tanka in a number of different journals.

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He spent the spring months working feverishly both on new poems and at editing and revising the many poems he had never put together as a finished collection. The pain of the years of his late twenties and early thirties seemed to have borne fruit. “Sparrow Eggs is complete, finally complete.” The mere thought of this draws from me a sigh, one of relief.. . . Simply to complete this work I have endured every kind of hardship. The depths of poverty, to the brink of death from starvation, these so many times I bore and continued to bear through to the end—all just for these poems. Therefore, flawed they may be, but with each and every poem my neck was on the line. It was always with the resolve to die if I must that I composed.6 The Katsushika episode in Hakushu’s life began in May 1916, when he and his second wife, Ayako, left Tokyo just after their marriage for the Katsushika area of present-day Chiba Prefecture. Though beset with pov­ erty, here Hakushu immersed himself in what he termed a “state of spiritual tranquillity” (kanjaku-zanmai).1 His fife there ended rather quickly, however, a mere thirteen months later; yet Hakushu wrote about little else for the next six years and remained nostalgic about the experience to the end of his life. Hakushu’s experiences in Chiba and their importance to his life are subjects for which Hakushu’s many disciples and admirers have provided much valuable information over the years, but the further question of what Hakushu created from the raw material of his experience has gone unasked. As Hakushu’s “Great Preface” shows, he struggled with more than just poverty; the artistic toil of recreating, and making acceptable lyrical sense of, his Katsushika months, was the most arduous of his labors. The integrated collection that resulted became a turning point in the body of Hakushu’s work, and the period in his life that serves as its central focus was a seed time for everything he would write in the future.8 Sparrow Eggs contains three major sequences. Hakushu originally intended each of the sequences as a separate collection. Only very late into the composition and revision process did he decide to produce one large three-part work,9 and even with the finished collection he desired that his readers read its three sections as separate works.10 The oldest poems in terms of composition, poems that focus on Hakushu’s troubled married fife with his first wife Toshiko and his eventual rejection of her, are found in “Rinne sansho” (The Wheel of Karma: Three Chapters)," which forms the second sequence in the finished Sparrow Eggs. The poems covering his experiences after his break with Toshiko and prior to his move to Katsushika make up the third and final sequence and have the same title as the collection as a whole, “Sparrow Eggs.” That

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Hakushu retained this title for the whole as well was because the phrase “sparrow eggs” had such an important connection to the entire work.12 The poems that deal specifically with his Katsushika experiences are gathered in the first and largest of these, the “Katsushika Compositions,” which were his most recent in terms of composition and the biographical experiences on which they were based. In other words, the chronological continuity represented by these poem sequences is reordered so that it goes End-Beginning-Middle. That Hakushu placed the Katsushika sequence first must mean that he wanted it read first, and a careful consideration of its 285 poems reveals the probable reason. One finds there, in hundreds of intercon­ nected though still discrete poems, a full seasonal round and part of another as experienced by a man on a religious quest. He has sought out an ancient, tranquil farming community that has as well important connections with Japanese cultural tradition, and by listening to and watching that natural setting and by monitoring his own perceptions and feelings, he seeks to affirm that tranquillity as his own, and implicitly to claim continuity with that vital tradition. He suffers from poverty and from starvation brought on by that poverty, but more intense than these is his sabishisa or “loneliness,” a feeling presented as both a burden— for the intense personal suffering that it causes—and as a prize—because somehow it is allied with the beauty' of the natural setting. In the view presented in Hakushu’s sequence, this feeling lies at the heart of both the natural and the human worlds, and a sensitive apprehension of sabi­ shisa therefore can bring with it a sense of communion. This is the affirmative end toward which the Katsushika sequence moves. This man’s quest is already well under way as the Katsushika se­ quence begins. His key crisis, a point at which he must accept without despair the rigors of what might best be termed an existential loneliness, lies ahead of him, but that he has made the decision to move to this place and to stay on there demonstrates an instinctual certainty that he has chosen the proper road. In speaking of his determination not to rush to publish the collection but to wait until he was totally satisfied, Hakushu says that “if the eye of my understanding had not been prop­ erly open, I no doubt would have committed suicide.”13 Determined and yet often close to despair—this is the situation of the poetic speaker as well as how the Katsushika sequence opens. Susukino ni Shiroku kabosoku Tatsu kemuri Aware naredomo Kesu yoshi no nashi.

Above pampas heath A white, thinning trail O f rising smoke— Though piercingly sad There is no putting it out. (155)14

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A detailed analysis of this, the first poem in the collection, will be given below, but it is important to note here the poem’s intensely personal note and its suggestion of the presence of psychological pain, a pain that, because there is no escaping it, the speaker is resolved to endure. The beginning suggests the kind of end that the sequence will seek, a movement toward affirmation of the speaker’s situation without the situ­ ation itself changing. The two chronologically earlier sequences concern the speaker’s life before the resolute determination of the first poem was found, in other words before he became enlightened this far. Only in the final stage of the revision process did Hakushu come to see his experience in these terms, as can be shown by looking closely at one of the more famous of the earlier poems, number 351 in the collection,15 which has as its topic “Separation” and its subtopic “I send my wife away.” The poem appears halfway through the “W heel” sequence and depicts its key event, the final rejection of the first wife by the speaker. Mazushisa ni Tsuma o kaeshite Asagao no Kakine yuiori Take to nawa mote.

In my poverty, I have sent my wife away; And now I weave A morning-glory fence, Clutching stick and twine.

(236) After many tears and much lamentation, the speaker is finally able here, though just barely, to let go of this woman, who it appears is fast becoming the bane of his existence and the greatest hindrance in his quest to find tranquillity and repose. A certain stoic resignation emerges for the first time that helps him to bear up under the emotional strain of the moment, the same resignation that provides the impetus for the beginning of the “Katsushika Compositions.” The terse, stoic quality of the present poem gives it life and has helped make it one of the most lavishly praised tanka of the collection and a favorite among Hakushu’s admirers. The sub-sequence “Separation,” in which this poem is embedded, changed interestingly in the years between its first appearance in a jour­ nal and its final revision for inclusion in Sparrow Eggs. The majority of the poems were first published in the October 1917 issue of Bunsho sekai under the title “Aishohen ketsumatsu,” or “Conclusion to the Laments”; in other words, these poems appeared only after Hakushu was married to Ayako and had already moved from Katsushika back to Tokyo. In the title, “Aishohen” (Laments) refers to the famous final section of Hakushu’s first tanka collection, Kiri no hana (Paulownia

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Flowers, 1913), where the poet dealt in autobiographical fashion with the aftermath of his adulterous relationship with Toshiko. Now, more than four years later, he provides a final chapter for those “Laments,” where he casts off Toshiko in a literal sense as a wife and in a figura­ tive sense as a subject for his poetry. But for Hakushu the artist, the “Conclusion to the Laments” proved not to be the final word on his renunciation of Toshiko. Poem 351, appearing for the first time here in the Sparrow E ggs collection of 1921, would have this distinction.16 Along with other poems from the 1917 “Conclusion to the Laments,” it is grouped under the second major subdivision, “ Betsurisho” (Sep­ aration), of the “W heel” sequence. Betsuri can mean the separation of husband and wife, but more to the point, here it implies a step toward religious renunciation of worldly ties and leads directly into the third and final major subdivision entitled “Hosshinsho” (The Awakening of Faith), where hosshin is unmistakably meant in its reli­ gious sense. Only after this “awakening” does the speaker come upon the “sparrow eggs” that will be a metaphor for the new life he will soon begin, and that provides the title for the third sequence, Suzum e no tam ago, as well as for the collection as a whole. The sparrows encountered there, however, are city birds, smudged literally and metaphorically with the soot of city life. A further “distancing” is still necessary before this speaker can advance further along his cho­ sen religious and aesthetic path, which the move to rural Katsushika gives him. There is no doubt from the very beginning of the “Katsushika Compositions” that Hakushu’s view of that period of time is a retrospec­ tive one. The primary organizing principle for the opening sub­ sequence, a group of six poems under the heading “Katsushika Prefatory Poems,” is just such retrospection. 1. “Pampas Heath” Susukino ni Shiroku kabosoku Tatsu kemuri Aware naredomo Kesu yoshi mo nashi.

Above pampas heath A white, thinning trail O f rising smoke— Though piercingly sad There is no putting it out.

2. “M illet” Asaborake Itten harete Kibi no ha ni Suzume hatataku Sono koe kikoyu.

Morning brightens; The reach o f sky comes clear. Among millet leaves A beating o f sparrow wings The sound that rises above.

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3. “Lotus Flower” Rakueki to Jinba tsuzukeru to Matsuribi no Zaisho no miete Byakuren no hana.

Strand-entwined strand O f man and beast stringing past On festival day, The back-country comes into sight— W hite lotus flower.

4. “W hite Horse” Honobono to Hakuba hikarete Nigorikawa Nigoreru mizu ni Kuchi tsuke ni kinu.

Softly, softly, A white horse drawn along; Mud-clouded river, To the muddied water It comes to touch its lips.

5. “A Sparrow Chick Happily Playing” Leaping up, T obiagari In mid-air pausing, Chu ni tamerau A sparrow chick, Suzume no ko Wings beating, stares Hatatakitemiori At the quivering branch. Sono yururu eda o. 6. [Same] Tobiagari ChQ ni hatataku Suzume no ko Koe tatetekaeru Sono yururu eda ni.

Leaping up, In mid-air beating wings, A sparrow chick W ith a cry returns To the quivering branch. (155-56)

Though not readily apparent in translation, there is here as in most tanka an important seasonal referent. W hat at first appears a series of unrelated poems presents an ordered but unusual seasonal movement. The first, because of the appearance of the pampas grass, occurs in autumn, which is also the suggestion of the millet of the second. The third poem focuses on the white lotus, however, a flower traditionally associated with late summer; then, after a seasonless, or miscellaneous, poem, the fifth and sixth poems introduce the sparrow chick, which is associated with late spring or early summer—the time, in other words, that Hakushu moved to Katsushika following his marriage in May 1916. This speaker, then, has run the film backward, so to speak, to the begin­ ning of his Katsushika stay, which is where the second sub-sequence of the collection begins. The “Prefatory Poems” do more than simply return the sequence to its chronological beginning, however. Even if it must be reversed, why does it begin where it does rather than from Hakushu’s real-life

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situation and circumstances in the spring of 1921 when he did the final revising and editing? The other than random ordering suggests that the first poem depicts an important starting point for something, even if not the first moment of the sequence’s temporal progression. Its final two lines are very personal and subjective, an emotional reaction to the ex­ pansive view laid out before his eyes. In no way is it an extraordinary scene; in fact, its very commonness renders it easily synonymous with ordinary human life. The smoke comes from a cooking fire within a home, perhaps even his own,17 and day-in and day-out, despite the feel­ ing and the knowledge that life is ultimately an insubstantial and insig­ nificant thing, somehow, like the fire, it manages with surprising tenacity to remain unsnuffed and long-burning. There is perhaps a resonance as well with Emperor Jomei’s poem at the beginning of Man'yoshu (no. 2) “when he climbed Kagu Hill to view the land” and sees that “On the plain of land, / smoke from the hearths rises, rises.”18 In the M an'yoshu, of course, that scene signifies that all is well in the realm because the people have food to cook, but here in the realm of the modern individ­ ual, there is food for the time being, yes, but this sad, transient existence with which modern man is faced is more than a matter of merely staving off hunger. It is a hard, sad life, but as there is no escape, one must simply endure as best one can. The autumn section marks the transition toward the speaker’s crisis, which will come in the winter poems when the speaker experiences his most trying moments of physical and psycho­ logical need. The opening poem points in that direction even as it starts a retrogression in time back to the beginning of his Katsushika stay. The poem begins descriptively, placing the characteristic human dailyfife activity within an expansive natural setting; it then introduces into that scene the personal voice of the speaker of the “Katsushika Compositions,” a man who is troubled and sad, yet resolved to continue on in his present condition. The setting and the implied end point for the smoke, that is, the sky, are points of connection with the second poem, which introduces the other “hero” of the narrative, the sparrow, not yet as a fully embodied presence, but only as a flurried beating of wings. The sparrow makes its presence known with a sound: beneath the broad canopy of the clear blue sky it rapidly beats its wings, perhaps in a rush to leave its overnight shelter on the ground in order to return to its natural element. The third poem reverts to the world of common human endeavor, but in what seems a picture that possesses the air of a dreamlike symbol, as if Hakushu had attempted to produce a verbal mandala. Indeed, when describing the same scene in a prose essay within SpatTow Life, he calls it “a microcosm of the peaceful life,”19 similar therefore to the microcosmic pictorial manifestations that mandalas so often present. Just as mandalas often display an infinite circling movement around an unmoving center,

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so too does this picture of the endless, connected movement of human life come to resolution on the still image of a lotus, which is, of course, the Buddhist symbol for human enlightenment that grows from the “mud” of karmic attachment. As indirect support of this reading, mention might also be made of a journal founded at Hakushu’s urging during his Katsushika period by his disciples. It carried the title Mandala. Having entered the realm of the symbol in the fourth poem, the series then becomes wholly dreamlike symbol in the fifth, with its white horse led by an unseen and seemingly disembodied hand to the “muddy river.” The river calls to mind the muddy pond of the lotus, a Buddhist symbol for the world of conceptual illusion into which it is the human fate to be born. But the white horse, by extension allied with the white lotus of both the previous poem and the Buddhist symbolic cosmos, paradoxically draws nourishment from just these clouded waters. Just when the sub-sequence seems to have focused wholly on the world of the symbol, the fifth poem introduces a concrete and very real sparrow, but one that could be said to be either moving, because it is in flight, or still, in that it is stationary. Moments when both movement and stillness seem paradoxically to combine in the same phenomena are found throughout “Katsushika Compositions.” As he makes plain in Sparrow Life, do (movement) and sei (stillness) were, for Hakushu, concepts to be found at the heart of all phenomena,20 and when present in a combined form as here, the implication is that an irreducible truth has been revealed. The final poem, though not nearly as popular with anthologizers as the fifth, brings closure to the scene by returning the sparrow to the branch from which it was apparently startled. The return is marked by a cry, which in the course of the sequence comes to seem the sparrow’s equivalent to a poet’s poem. It is a return in another paradoxical sense as well, to the beginning. Hakushu’s discovery of the religious sig­ nificance of the sparrow, what he elsewhere called “the little monk,”21 was for him the beginning of his combined religious-aesthetic quest. The beginning, however, is also the end, in that the sparrow itself is the fundamental reality to be found at both the beginning and the end of his search. Though very real and a suitable object for the descriptive realism popular in his day, for him it appeared at the same time as a symbol for the life-force that underlies the phenomenal world.22 In the worldview of the “Katsushika Compositions,” the sparrow not only embodies the truth that Hakushu’s poetic speaker seeks but also guides man to the truth, as a monk should. In the collection’s third sub-sequence, “To the Field, to the Mountain,” the complexity of the sparrow’s existence emerges, though not in any poem considered independendy of its context. Rather, this aspect reveals itself only when the poems are read sequentially, with the poem-to-poem relations given consideration.

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“To the Field, to the M ou n tain” 13. “One” Onozukara Kokoro yasumaru Sube moga to Sabishiki tsuma to No ni ideteminu.

If her heart Could just find its ease. O for some way! So, with this desolate wife I venture out into the fields.

14. Niodori no Katsushika ono no Yugasumi Momo iro fukashi Haru mo inuran.

Katsushika o f the grebes, Over this Katsushika’s fields An evening haze Peach-hued and deep— Ah, spring will soon depart.

15. “T w o” Kono tsuma wa Sabishikeredomo Asajiu no Tsuyukeki asa wa Suso kakagekeri.

Though this wife May be desolate at heart, In a reed-covered field Oil this dew-drenched morning She rolls back her hem.

Kusa no ha ni Areshi bakari no Tsuyu no awa Hotaru wa imada Hikarienaku ni.

Froth o f dew Only just begotten On leaves o f grass. Yet the fireflies are still Unable to bring forth their light.

16.

17. “Three” Yama yuku to Tsuma o itawari Sasagani no Ibuseki ito mo W are wa haraitsu.

Walking on the mountain Her pain I feel as my own; From her path I brush All the suffocating threads O f the crablike spiders’ webs.

Tamasaka ni Kitarinagameshi Yama no ike Haya utsukushu Mikusa oinikeri.

Quite by chance W e come upon the scene O f a mountain pond— So beautiful already The water reeds have grown!

18.

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19. Karogaro to Suzume tobitsuki Sae no yuri Yuri mo yamaneba Shita nozokioru.

Lightly, lightly, A sparrow springs to a branch And sets it quivering. Before that quivering can stop, Already it is peering below.

Kobashiku Sabishiki natsu ya Sekaseka to Haya yamazato wa Mugi koki no oto.

Redolently fresh, A deliciously lonely summer! All busde and haste Already in this mountain village The sound o f the threshing o f wheat. (157-58)

20.

Besides creating a pleasant rhythm, the heading of the sub-sequence, with its parallel placement of two different kinds of terrain, suggests that the actions and experiences occur over an extended period of time, rather than in consecutive instants like successive frames of a moving film. Indeed, the temporal movement implied in the seasonal references sug­ gests that the individual scenes take place over a number of days, as spring passes into summer and the time of the rains approaches. The division of the sequence into a first, second, and third group, however, perhaps relates to the rhythmically shifting focus of the speaker’s gaze. In number 13, the speaker concentrates on his wife and her feelings, and by implication on his own as well. In poem 14, he looks outward onto the world of external nature, but in number 15 the focus returns to his view of his wife’s feelings. With the alternation outside to nature in the next poem (no. 16), the pattern of modulation between their inner and outer worlds is set, and the focus in number 17 on the compassionate act of the speaker for his wife reinforces an expectation of the pattern’s continuation, which indeed happens when number 18 returns his gaze to external nature. In poem 19 the key to the pattern emerges as a break in the oscillation; the focus remains externally oriented on na­ ture and finds now the sparrow. It is as if the bond of compassion established between the speaker and his wife in number 17 has given them the impetus and strength to remain outwardly focused on the natural world. This first appearance of the sparrow within the forward-moving temporal progression of “Katsushika Compositions”23 suggests the role the bird will assume in the man’s life and the kind of relationship possi­ ble between man and nature. The sparrow effects a transition to the resolution of the sub-sequence, in which the inner and outer worlds as

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perceived by this speaker are suddenly revealed each to contain the other. The sparrow is a catalyst only: it alights on the branch and, in the fifth and concluding unit of the poem, quickly turns its attention to another scene, which redirects the gazes of the speaker and reader alike away from the bird and towards the object of its attention, by implication the scene in poem 20. There the speaker finds a “deliciously lonely” specta­ cle, obviously an externally focused moment; but at its heart is the emo­ tion with which the sub-sequence began, the loneliness, now redefined as positive—this too in some way thanks to the sparrow. The emotional content gives overall structure to the sub-sequence. A feeling of compassion comes over the speaker in the first of its three groups when he realizes that his mate suffers from the unpleasant feeling of loneliness. In the second, the emotion remains the same, but the speaker sees that the woman has the emotional depth to bear up under her burden and attend to the natural beauty of their surroundings. The third group begins with the speaker undertaking a compassionate act for his wife, but at the point where the reader has come to expect another internally oriented poem, the sparrow, in what corresponds to its own act of compassion, directs the couple toward the emotional resolution of their most pressing problem, the sabishisa (“loneliness,” but better understood here as an existential aloneness). They do not rid themselves of the emotion; rather, with the bird’s instinctual ministrations, they discover that sabishisa can be savored for its link to nature’s beauty, which, as the use of traditional seasonal words suggests, resonates with the classical literary past. Sabishisa itself can be found at the heart of man and nature alike, and the sparrow, a companion sentient consciousness, functions as an instinctual guide, a kind of compass pointer to the speak­ er’s and to nature’s emotional north. The essential structural component of this sub-sequence, and indeed of the “Katsushika Compositions” as a whole, is a pairing, and often as above a balancing, of what at first seems opposed sets of elements. As noted above, sabishisa here possesses a dual nature; it is both a psycholog­ ical burden and conversely the beauty to be apprehended at the heart of nature and its seasonal round. It is, in other words, the link that pulls the inner subjective and the outer objective worlds into balance. Compassion triggers this realization, but compassion resides as well in both the subjective and objective worlds, the human and natural realms. The movement from number 17 to number 18 is from a compassionate act of one person for another to a scene where a truth of nature is revealed. The scene, though ordinary, is one of beauty (Haya utsukushu / Mikusa oinikeri), but beauty of a dual nature: it is ephemeral in that time’s movement in the form of the seasons has brought it on, and it

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too will pass the way all seasons do; it is also eternal in that with another seasonal round that beauty will come again. The hay a of line 4 (and again in the same position of the same line in no. 20) implies an expectation on the speaker’s part that this beauty would indeed come but that he had not thought it would arrive so soon. The movement between poems 17 and 18 parallels that between poems 19 and 20, but with the “human” and “natural” terms interchanged. Now a representative of nature per­ forms the compassionate act (the sparrow in poem 19), and the seasonal change is discovered in a human-centered scene, the wheat harvest in a mountain village. The structure of this sub-sequence resulted from the spurt of new creative activity that accompanied Hakushu’s return of interest in Spar­ row Eggs in the first half of 1921. Only two poems within the series date from an earlier time, numbers 16 and 19, and in the sequences within which they originally appeared in journals, both poems are purely descriptive in mode, carrying no structural weight.24 Within the finished collection, how­ ever, the significance of especially poem 19 has undergone a transformation simply by its being linked to other poems within a series. The elements paired are various and might appear within the bounds of a single poem, as happens in poem 76, a summer poem in the “High Noon” sub-sequence. Onten ni Ikazuchigumo no Sokobikari Cho hitotsu maeri Konata no ta ni wa.

In the distant sky, Thunder-filled clouds W ith a light within— A single butterfly comes dancing Over the nearby fields.

(170) The pairing here is first between far and near, line 1 (onten, “the distant sky,”) set against the last line (konata no ta, “the nearby fields”), and second between light and dark, in that the lightning is found at the heart (literally “light at the bottom”) of the dark rain clouds. Once the reader is attuned to this tendency toward duality within the “Katsushika Compositions,” other more tenuously balanced groupings suggest themselves. For example, in the above poem the lightning flash (a visual image) is discovered at the heart of what is at least partly an aural image (the thunder-filled clouds), and the foreground and back­ ground framing created by the poem’s first and last lines might be taken to suggest that the dancing butterfly and the flash of lightning are somehow similarly, though inexplicably and mysteriously, linked as allied existences. Such pairing is the apparent rationale behind the two-poem sub­ sequence entitled “Ox.”

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87. Nanno hana Niou kusabu zo Tsuno sashiire Utsutsunaku ushi no Kioikageru wa.

Some flower loosing scent Amid this clump o f grass? An ox, horn thrust in, Lost to the world outside In a frenzy of sniffing.

Shiro no ushi Nesoberu soba no Ebizuru no Ruri irodama no Suzunari no fusa.

A white ox Lying sprawled out beside Scrub grapevines W ith their emerald-hued gems In clustered bell bunches.

88 .

(172)

In the present sub-sequence, the first poem, depicting the ox’s frenzied search for the source of the enticing scent, is a do poem, whereas the second, showing the reclining ox after it has found that source, balances it with a sei emphasis. Further, the ox responds to an olfactory sensation, but the stasis that results from its instinctive action is the visually ori­ ented image of the white of the ox matched with the emerald green of the grapes. As with “To the Field, to the Mountain” above, Hakushu’s structuring of this sub-sequence came about in the first half of 1921. Though a version of poem 87 was published as early as July 1917, there is no companion poem nor is the ox of the original version in a frenzy to find the source of the scent—rather, its otonashisa (“meekness, gentle­ ness”) stands out to the earlier speaker.25 Hakushu was concerned not only to point to these pairs but also to focus his poems often on the instant at which these elements either merge with one another (as do movement and stillness in the station­ ary flight of the sparrow in no. 5) or change to become their oppo­ sites—for example, light becoming dark, stillness becoming movement, silence being filled with sound, and so on. One example of a poem focused on such a change is number 209 from among the winter poems. 209. Suzume ga ni wa Korogehabataku Utsutsunaki Ochin to shite wa Mata tobiagaru.

Sparrows, two, Tumble over, wings Shirring wildly. They seem about to fall to the ground W hen again they fly back up.

(202)

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As did the ox of poem 87, the sparrows act unthinkingly, frenziedly, and without a thought for anything else, all of which is conveyed, as in the earlier poem, by the word Utsutsunaki. Similarly as well, Hakushu only added this modifier to the poem in the finished Spairow Eggs, though an earlier version of number 209 appeared in a journal in 1916. '’ In Hakushu’s own explication of this poem, the tumbling of the sparrows off the limb is an instant at which sei passes over into -do}1 In Sparrow Eggs, however, Hakushu not only captures that instant within a single poem but also establishes a more expanded context for it. In the “Katsu­ shika Compositions” the poem ends the sub-sequence “Frost and Spar­ row” and is preceded by three additional poems. 206. Kuraki sora no Shita ni akarite Hitokiwa shiroku Shimo tsukeshi eda wa Sarusuberi no eda.

A dark sky, Beneath, radiating light, W hiter than all, Branches over-covered with frost, Branches o f the crepe myrde.

Eda ni ite Ichiwa wa nozoku Niwa no shimo Suzume tsukuzuku Nakifufumitsutsu.

From a limb One bird looks down On the garden frost, A sparrow, deeply and long, Coos throaty chortles all the while.

Mukimuki ni Suzume nakizuru Eda no shimo Mada hi wa sasane Chirikiraitsutsu.

In every quarter Sparrows singing as they appear, Frost that covers the branches Though yet ungrazed by the sun Falls fogging the air.

207.

208.

( 202)

The first of the four poems (no. 206) focuses on frost alone and the last (no. 209) on only sparrows. The movement in the four is again from stillness (of both the frost-covered landscape in no. 206 and the cooing sparrow in no. 207) to movement (the falling of the frost in no. 208 and the tumbling fall and frenzied flight of the sparrows in no. 209). An air of mystery envelops this sub-sequence, the result of the eerily beautiful scene of the opening poem. Light is matched with dark, but unusually, as if it were the negative of a photograph on which the speaker looked. Beneath a dark sky (implicitly that of early morning) the ground seems to shine, especially one spot, the result of a thick layer

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of frost that shows especially brightly on the smooth limbs of a crepe myrtle tree. In what seems the order in which the speaker perceives the scene, the focus moves from the black sky to the “shining” below and then to the more detailed identification of the source of the shining, the frost on the limbs. At this point the topic marker via creates a pause in the flow, as if an initial reaction of surprise has subsided and been re­ placed by a calmer frame of mind, and the speaker then identifies the tree, which leads him to repeat the word “branch.” In the middle poems (nos. 207 and 208), sparrows and frost share the focus. The number of birds that the speaker notices grows as the sub-sequence progresses, as if more birds have appeared with the passage of some time in the gradually brightening, though still dark, morning landscape. The wholly visual scene of the opening poem accrues an aural element in the second, and that sound grows in the third as the number of birds increases. Swelling sound and the appearance of the sparrows is accompanied as well by movement in the natural scene, as the frost falls thickly from the branches, though there is as yet no sunlight to cause it to melt. Such a thick layer of frost is strange and unusual, and its clouding the air as it falls from the branches on which it has settled is doubly so. Perhaps the sparrows themselves shake the frost from the branches, or perhaps there is some other unspecified cause. The special­ ness of the scene is matched by the unusualness of the verb collocations in the final lines of the middle two poems. Nakifufumi seems to be of Hakushu’s own coinage and indicates a sound made by the bird in its throat without its mouth fully open, therefore, not a full cry and more like a chortled coo. In poem 208 the compound verb chirikirau means something like “falls and fogs” or “falls and mists” and again is probably of Hakushu’s own coinage. The placement of number 209 at the end of “Frost and Sparrow” gives the poem implications that it could not have if it stood alone and suggests a relationship of more than just pure coincidence between the spatial and temporal setting and the actions of the birds. As the com­ pound topic implies, the sub-sequence is about both frost and sparrows; there is a relationship between them. Certainly the sparrow of number 207 is stimulated by the frost, and its cooing is its response. The coos grow to cries and the frost falls in poem 208, and as a further develop­ ment of the progression described in the first three poems, the sparrows of poem 209 are galvanized into action. Stillness becomes motion, until in the final two lines of number 209 a kind of stasis in motion is achieved. Through the first three lines it seems as if a single action is unfolding before the reader’s eyes; in the final two lines, however, in both the Japanese original and the English translation, a repeated action could be described just as easily as a single incident. Is it the strange

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beauty of the scene that inspires this behavior? That interpretation re­ mains as one of the possible implications of the sub-sequence. I have called the “Katsushika Compositions” a sequence, which suggests that there are relations established between sub-sequence and sub-sequence and some kind of linear development over its 285 poems. As mentioned earlier, there is the obvious seasonal progression from one spring to the next and into the following summer. The speaker is always the impoverished contemplative who, together with his wife, lives a re­ clusive life in the rural community of Katsushika. Who he is or what he is beyond that cannot be told from the evidence of the sequence itself, but it is clear that he seeks spiritual peace and that he believes that it is obtainable only by a willing endurance of poverty, hunger, and the elements, especially the cold of winter. A more subtle sense of linear progression is created within the sequence through extended develop­ ment of the kinds of pairings discussed so far and by the periodic repeti­ tion of certain images and motifs. Reading through “Katsushika Compositions,” one becomes aware of a pulsing, wavelike rhythm in the sequence, a more extended version of the oscillation of the focus apparent in “To the Field, to the Moun­ tain.” The progression from “Move to San’ya” through “Scenes of Farmhouses,” “Fireflies: Four Chapters,” and “Coolness,” to “High Noon” illustrates one such oscillation.28 W ith “Move to San’ya” the speaker has settled into a new home, and the sub-sequence of poems under that topic has him begin that new life by sounding what will become base notes of sorts for his experience in rural Chiba. 49. “The Garden” Itsushika ni Natsu no aware to Narinikeri Hoshigusagoya no Momoiro no tsuki.

At some point—but when?— Summer’s sad beauty Has arrived. Hut o f dried thatch Under peach-hued moon. (165)

This descriptive poem notes the arrival of summer, but as the subtopic of the next poem (no. 50) indirecdy indicates, the “hut of dried thatch” is the speaker’s new home. Succeeding poems will move closer to that dwelling. The context for his new life is established here, however, and it is clear that the sadness of nature’s beauty will not deter the speaker from staying on. The next two poems (nos. 50 and 51) are paired under the subtopic “Grass Hut of the Purple Smoke” (the name Hakushu gave to his

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Katsushika dwelling), and they close the focus down to the wellspring at the side of the house. 50. “Grass Hut o f the Purple Smoke” Fukiibe no By the wellspring Ayame no soba no Beside the purple iris Takedana ni On the bamboo shelf Senmenki shiroshi A washbasin so white. Tsuma ka fusetaru. Did my wife turn it so? 51. Fukiibe no Ayame no moto no Koboremizu Suzume nomiori Afururu mizu o.

By the wellspring Beneath the purple iris The water-spill— A sparrow there is drinking O f the water welling over. (166)

Probably the contrast in color between the purple of the iris and the white of the washbasin in the first of these poems has drawn the speaker’s eye and consciousness to the everyday scene of the well, but his questioning himself as to whether his wife might be responsible for the arrangement suggests that the cognition accompanying his awareness is somewhat deeper than ordinary, and he has his wife to thank for this deepening. In poem 51 a sparrow in the same setting drinks from the water welling up at the foot of the same flower. The poem ends in a grammati­ cal inversion, which here suggests an exclamatory element. There in the same spot where his wife has instinctually created a lovely color contrast in an ordinary, everyday scene the sparrow finds a welling up of water, the liquid of life, a welling up that perhaps the speaker has missed until now, and would have missed entirely had it not been for the instinctual action of the sparrow. The rewards of his always watchful contemplation are such as these, ordinary scenes rendered meaningful, though not in any discursive way. Repeatedly as the sequence moves through the sea­ sons, the actions of these two vital presences in his life, his wife and the sparrows, provide him with tiny stimulations, often in consecutive poems, that help him find the peace and affirmation he seeks. In the present sub-sequence, these tiny discoveries lead sequentially to a scene of children cutting grass (no. 52) and then to three poems (nos. 53-55) grouped under the subtopic “W hile Eating Rice.” The first of this group, poem 53, is about a figure from the cultural past, the poet-priest Ryokan (referred to as Koshi no hijiri, or “the saint of Koshi”), and

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whether his daily life resembled that of the speaker (“Did he sustain himself with food?”). Perhaps an associative link is at work here: Hakushu himself in Senshin zowa (Remarks toward a Cleansing of the Heart, 1921) retells the legendary story of Ryokan becoming so engrossed in a game of hide-and-seek with village children that when the children go home and leave their playmate still in hiding, Ryokan, unaware that he has been left behind, remains in his hiding spot all that night.29 Certainly the thought alone suggests for the speaker that Ryokan, and especially his childlike innocence, is a model to emulate in his own life. In the sequence a number of other role models are introduced as well. In number 55 the speaker’s own past and present supply the focus, as again the sparrows inspire in him a deep feeling: intensely remem­ bered love and a nostalgic yearning for his parents. Katsushika no Fukurasuzume no Koe kikeba Tsukuzuku koishi Chichi haha no ie.

I hear the calls O f the chubby sparrow chicks O f Katsushika And deeply do I long For the house of my father and mother. ( 166)

This emotional call to the past is a return to the fold, to the wellspring of his own life. The speaker has found a proper beginning for his medita­ tion on life, and later he will meditate as well on its end. In the mean­ time, all of the notes struck here will be sounded again. “Move to San’ya” focuses on scenes in and close by the speaker’s dwelling, and overall the sub-sequence maintains a subjective cast. It is followed by “Scenes of Farmhouses” (nos. 56-62), a sub-sequence of beautiful nightscapes in the fields surrounding his home. The focus has turned, therefore, more outward and farther afield than in the previous sub-sequence. Stimulated by the beauty of the scene, the speaker, now childlike himself, wants to call out all the neighborhood children to play among the luminous moonlit flowers (no. 59). Though there are subjec­ tive elements in some of the poems of this sub-sequence, overall they aim at a descriptive, objective style. The outwardly focused concentration on images found in the fields somewhat away from his own dwelling continues in the next sub-sequence, seven poems under the heading “Fireflies: Four Chapters” (poems 63-69) that focus on their subject at morning, evening, and noon, and then during a rainstorm. Here, however, Hakushu adds an element of mystery, and he sounds a heav­ ier note when he uses what can be taken as a death-related image. The noontime group of poems takes place in the dark quiet of a thick bamboo grove.

“K A TSU SH IK A C O M P O S IT IO N S IN T R A N Q U IL L IT Y ”

Mosochiku ni Moso karuku Kabusaru sato Konmori to miete Mae no hasu no ta.

Bamboo of The bamboo grove lightly Overhangs the village, Looking dimly indistinct, The lotus pond in front.

Kasuka naru Hane tatetetobu Hiru no hotaru Konmori to sasa wa Ue o shidaretari.

Wings whirring Faintly as it flies, A firefly at noon— Dimly shadowed with bamboo grass Hanging down from above.

Hiru nagara Kasukani hikaru Hotaru hitotsu Moso no yabu o Idetekietari.

Though daylight, A single firefly, Faintly shining, From a bamboo grove Emerges to vanish from sight.

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68 .

(168-69) The first poem (no. 66) presents a still-life that is the larger overall setting within which, in succeeding poems, the fireflies will appear. Framing a central image of the basic human communal unit, a village, is an overhang of bamboo in the background and a lotus pond in front. The poem ends in a substantive (Mae no hasu no ta), and the reader receives no clear statement of the ruling emotion of the poem; it simply describes the physical situation of the village. The modifier of the fourth line (konmori to, translated as “dimly indistinct”) does bring to the de­ scription a sense of dark, thick growth, however, and adds a sense of mystery to this quiet country setting. A problem arises, though, in decid­ ing to which element the line attaches grammatically: the village lighdy capped by the bamboo grove or, as an inverted predicate, the lotus pond. The line is likely a zeugma that functions as the complement for both simultaneously. Hakushu uses zeugmas often enough elsewhere in the collection to make this assumption reasonable. But a further ambiguity exists in the opposed connotations of the positive-sounding karuku (“lightly”) and the somewhat negatively charged konmori to. The situa­ tion of the village as it appears here embraces conflicting possibilities, and the ensuing poems of the sub-sequence then develop the nature of these possibilities. The focus narrows in poem 67 to the barely visible and fragilelooking firefly, which brings some movement to the scene. Tonally, the

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poems share the sense of dark mystery that the repeated modifier, konm ori to, and the similar framing of the central images bring. Now the referent of the adverbial phrase is clear; it describes the low-growing, overhanging bamboo grass, which here creates a darkness that frames the barely visible light of the firefly. Poem 67 is a microcosmic version of the previous poem, showing at another level how phenomenal life is framed by a mysterious, unknown darkness, and it creates a transition to the third poem of the group (no. 68) by introducing the firefly in what is essentially a static scene. Poem 68 at one level completes the transition from static to kinetic states begun in the previous poem, as the firefly moves from the dark of the grove into the light beyond. The firefly’s light merges with the light beyond the grove, the light of the daytime sky. It is instructive to note that another reading for the charac­ ter for “sky” isora) is ku, which is the Buddhist term for the void that both surrounds and permeates all phenomenal life. Symbolically, the firefly finds union with the void, but that very natural movement also symbolically images death to phenomenal life. The firefly’s individual life is ephemeral, and the sequential relations and parallel images of the poems in this group suggest that the ontological situation of the village of poem 66, and of all human life, is the same. After symbolically situating all phenomenal life in a balance with death and the light of that life in a balance with the surrounding, myste­ rious dark, the sequence remains oriented toward objective description in the next sub-sequence, five poems under the topic “Coolness.” The final two of these poems, which are grouped under the subtopic “During the Rains,” take place inside what is probably the speaker’s home and introduce a concrete image of death. 73.

Sugadatami Kesa sayasayashi Kaze ni fukare Tobi tobi karoki Aogaeru hitotsu.

The sedge mat This morning is cool, clean. Blown on by the wind Its jump, jump, so light, A single blue-green frog.

Hashibuto no Amaai no karasu Shimijimi asobi Kawazu hikisakeba Aoki shiru nagaru.

The fat beaked Crow in a break in the rain Completely lost in play Rips a river-frog to pieces And the blue-green juices flow.

74.

(170)

In the first of these poems the poet establishes a cool, crisp atmo­ sphere for these two scenes of animals absorbed in play. The frog and

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the crow do only what comes natural to them, which in the crow’s case is to kill the frog. The violence of the act evokes no response of censure or complaint from the speaker, which is not to say that he is necessarily indifferent to the scene. Metrically both poems are highly irregular, the extra syllables probably being the poet’s way of underscoring the animals’ total absorption in what they are doing and the speaker’s total absorption in his observation of those actions. He has set himself the task of submit­ ting to the natural order, and his understanding, which is gained from the quiet contemplation of all around him, must encompass this aspect of the natural world as well. A further extension of that meditation, however, is an acceptance of the fact that his own personal situation differs not at all from that of nature’s other animals, and the sub-se­ quence that follows brings out this aspect. The sub-sequence “High Noon” (nos. 75-86) follows “Coolness” and, midway through its twelve poems, returns the focus to scenes in the speaker’s home and to his own personal situation. Curiously ominous images surface in the first four poems. There is the long, drawn-out cry of a cicada that frightens a passing mother and child (no. 75), then the flash of lightening at the heart of a rain-cloud that startles a butterfly (no. 76), then the glare off the surface of a pond into which a frog, singing only an instant before, has suddenly leaped (no. 77), and finally the rumble of thunder in the distance that makes the speaker “utterly lonely” (hitasabishi in no. 78). The speaker’s own actions are the subject of the next two poems. 79. “W hile Simmering Sizing” Nikawa nite Gindei tokasu Hi no mahiru Nanika shika hisomu Kuraki kehai wa mo.

Sizing simmering For melting silver-leaf At the day’s midday— Something—W hat is it?— lurking, An air o f darkness over all. (171)

The speaker discovers a paradox: at the heart of the brightest part the day, he finds an inner core of darkness, which inverts the image the lightning at the heart of the thundercloud in poem 76. He, too, a sentient being is subject to the natural order that he has observed previous poems, and the fates of the firefly and the frog are his own well, which is the symbolic import of the next poem of the group. 80.

Yaregaki ni Hi no teri mabushi Omowanu ni

The sun shining O ff the broken-down hedge is blinding. A sudden slap

of of as in as

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Hottsuri to hitotsu Ame no tsubu ochinu.

As a drop, just one, O f rain falls to the ground. (171)

The resolution evident in the first poem of the collection notes the speaker’s determination to remain where and as he is. He is drawn to nature’s beauty, but he is also painfully subject to the loneliness of being and the other conditions of existence, including the necessity of death. After two poems on a dragonfly, the first in bright sunlight and the second in the dark of the shade of miscanthus stalks (nos. 81-82), “High Noon” ends with a group of four poems under the subtopic “Hide and Seek,” which describe the headlong, energetic play of some children presumably in a field of high grass close by the speaker’s home at the same time of day (nos. 83-84), the call of a reed warbler somewhere among the reeds (no. 85), and lastly a scene of the speaker himself, like the legendary Ryokan, taking part in the children’s game. The speaker has progressed far enough along the road of his quest now that his desire to become like the “Saint of Koshi” and to call out the children to play does not stop at only a thought, as in “Scenes of Farmhouses”; now he wholeheartedly loses himself in childlike play, even despite intuitions concerning his own ephemerality. The echoing and deepening of these notes first sounded in “Move to San’ya” suggests that the more inno­ cently childlike the speaker becomes, the closer he is to the goal of enlightenment and affirmation of life that he has set for himself. The attainment of childlike innocence is in some sense a return, and man and sparrow alike share this desire. For the speaker, it is expressed periodically as a wistful yearning for his native home and absent parents, as in poem 55 above; for the sparrow it takes the form of an instinct to return to the sky, “that nest that endlessly shines,” as Hakushu calls it in Sparrow Life,30 In a poem set on the two hundred and twentieth day by the lunar calendar (usually the first or second day of the ninth month), a time associated with autumn typhoons, the sparrows reappear in the sky. 147. Potsupotsu to Suzume detekuru Nokorikaze Nihyaku hatsuka no Yuzora harete.

Here and there Sparrows coming out In the after-breeze— The two hundred twentieth day’s Evening sky is clear. (191)

A storm has passed, the skies just cleared, and the wind is still high, but already the sparrows venture out from the shelter they found on the

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ground and brave the high wind in an instinctual return to their native element. The passage from Sparrow Life quoted above continues: “As man yearns for paradise, so too the sparrow yearns for the blue sky. Therefore, the sparrow also is sad.”M The sky symbolizes paradise for man, the nest for the sparrow, that is, the ultimate end for man, the beginning of life for the sparrow. It is, in other words, the sign of the beginning and the end of life, and the sadness, both the sparrow’s and man’s, derives from their being likewise placed in the world of being. Because they are constituted as individual beings, they are unable finally to satisfy their yearning. Poem 147, giving concrete expression of the sparrow’s desire, leads to a sub-sequence of five poems (nos. 148-52) on the speaker’s similar love for his parents and yearning for the world of his past. The sub­ sequence is called “Moonlight and Crickets” and comes in the middle of the sequence, at autumn’s most beautiful stage when the speaker’s father comes to visit. The opening poem lays out the scene and estab­ lishes the mood. 148. “Bathing with M y Father, Our First Reunion in a Long W hile”: Oare no After the violence Ato ni shimijimi O f the gale, these crickets Nakiizuru Fully, deeply Korogi no koe no Crying forth their calls— Aware sayakesa. Ah, so crisp and clear. (191)

This tanka works a transition from the external scene in the natural world to indoor scenes that will focus on the speaker’s emotions. In the silence of the evening after the loud destructiveness of the gale, the cries of the crickets take on for the speaker a new depth of feeling, perhaps for their contrast to the earlier storm. But the new depth has another source as well, and one, it should be added, that the poem did not have when it first appeared in the June 1917 issue of Bunsho sekai, where it lacked the present headnote and was not placed together with four poems on Hakushu’s reunion with his father. In the context of the fin­ ished “Katsushika Compositions,” poem 148 shifts the center of atten­ tion from the broad, description-oriented vista of poem 147 to the closer auditory image of the crickets’ crying in the dark, which in turn leads to the emotional declaration of the final line, Aware sayakesa. The emotional element in turn prepares for the subjective and more narrowly concen­ trated poems in which the speaker scrubs his father’s back. It also shifts the reader’s attention smoothly away from the visual image of the spar­ rows in the cleared sky to the speaker’s similarly cleared emotional land­ scape. One might easily imagine that this inner landscape had been

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subjected in the past to “storms” of the father’s anger, indeed the case in Hakushu’s life when he chose to run away to Tokyo to become a poet rather than succeed to the head of the family sake business. The air, literally and emotionally, is clear now for the speaker to reaffirm his love for his parents and move a step closer to a fully realized awakening, and he questions his father about his mother, who is absent from the world of the narrative, though in Hakushu’s life she was close at hand. Chichi no se ni Shabon tsuketsutsu Haha no koto Aga kiiteiru Tsukiyo korogi.

Lathering soap Over Father’s back, I ask question after question All about Mother— Moonlight and crickets. (191)

The “Moonlight and Crickets” section also marks the end of an­ other stage in the sequence. It comes at the heart of the autumn poems (which extend from roughly nos. 110 to 182) and concludes a section of subjectively centered declarations concerning the speaker’s poverty and lack of food.32 Only in the autumn section do such statements enter the bounds of the sequence, but a context for them is established at the end of the summer poems in a long meditation in the form of a choka on St. Francis of Assisi (ca. 1181-1226), another of the speaker’s cultural heroes. Hakushu’s conception of the saint was that of a man who, as the poem tells us, willingly accepted a life of poverty and loneliness in his quest to know God, one who succeeded so well that eventually he was able to minister to the sparrows, for his words were so simple that even they could understand him. St. Francis was Sabishiku mazushiku Mashimasu ga yue Herikudari, Tsune ni kanashiku.

Because Lonely and poor, Humble, And always sad. (175)

The speaker emulates St. Francis in seeking a similar humility, and he has resigned himself to the necessity of enduring the same sadness, for he believes it the essential nature of the world, an emotional base for all natural phenomena and the unifying link not only between man and sparrow but also among all nature’s beings. Kanashimi (“sadness,” but also at times meaning “love”)33 appears in one grammatical form or an­ other throughout the Katsushika-centered poems, as does the exclama­ tory emotive utterance of aware, to which it is closely related. Sabi, the

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“desolation and beauty of loneliness; solitude, quiet,”34 is the fundamen­ tal condition for coming to know the common emotional essence of natural phenomena. Just as sabi has traditionally been associated with decay and the acquisition of a weathered rusticity, in living beings it relates to the death and decay of the body, or the hardships that convey to a living being a sense of its end; for only when people have in some way seen the cycle of life and death through to its conclusion might they become enlightened. In the “Katsushika Compositions,” the season of winter ends that cycle. Though the speaker’s is the only subjective voice in the “Katsushika Compositions,” he is not the only subject placed within the set of natural conditions described here, which explains perhaps the movement in the “Hide and Seek” group from children to reed warbler to speaker himself. They are all equally subjects within and subject to nature and the condi­ tions that govern all phenomenal life. W hat the speaker desires for him­ self is the innocence and simplicity of a child combined with the heightened awareness of a saint. “Truly, the heart of the saint,” says Hakushu elsewhere, “is a deepened form of the heart of a child.”35 Developing awareness, a contemplative attitude, and an intuitive sense of the essential oneness of all natural phenomena underlie one further unifying technique in the collection, one that involves the use of the same or similar image or motif periodically within the text to create a certain flow from beginning to end. One such flow involves the image of the matsukaze, or “pine wind.” It is first introduced in the summer poems in a sub-sequence entitled “Brief Respite on a Clear Day” (poems 38-44). 42. Kono yama wa Tada soso to Oto su nari Matsu ni matsu no kaze Shii ni shii no kaze.

On this mountain Only a murmuring sigh Do I hear . . . Through pine a pine wind, Through oak an oak wind.

(164) Development is the heart of this poem. In the pause between the third and fourth lines a change occurs. The undifferentiated sound of the wind fills the space around the speaker at the beginning, but as he continues to sit quietly, concentrating on the sough of the breeze, he finds that he can distinguish the sound of the wind striking upon pine trees from that blowing through the oaks. His sensitivity develops as the poem progresses, which deepens his relation to nature and brings him a step closer to the truth to be grasped there.

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The matsukaze is not heard again until autumn is well advanced, and there it becomes the topic of a sub-sequence of three poems (poems 166-68). 166. “Squirrel” Matsu ga eda ni Futoo no risu no Mimi tatete Kikisumasu kaze wa Yama no aki no kaze. 167. “Sunset” Yamamatsu no Oto no towataru Hi no kure wa Yuyake no akaki Sora mo sube zo naki.

On a pine branch A full-tailed squirrel Pricks up its ears— The wind it strains to hear The mountain’s autumn wind.

From mountain pines Sound rushes across At day’s end— There is in the flaming evening’s crimson Sky no break anywhere to be found.

168. Yamamatsu no Sugata sabishiki Hi no kure wa Shoji hayaku shimete Hitori meshi ku.

Mountain pines Showing up desolate Day’s end— Quickly throwing the I eat my rice alone.

shoji

shut (194)

Though in number 166 it is the speaker himself, of course, who performs the implicit reasoning linking the cause (the wind) with the effect (the squirrel pricking up its ears to listen), nevertheless the squirrel’s action here parallels that of the man in number 42, as they react to the same stimulus. The significance of the wind to the squirrel is left unspecified, but probably it functions as a signal of a coming seasonal change, with autumn giving way to the harsh coldness of the winter, and for this the squirrel must prepare. The rest of the sub-sequence turns the focus back to the speaker. The feeling that the wind stimulates in him is not named in number 167, but the negative construction of the final phrase (Sora mo sube zo naki) suggests that the speaker would prefer to see a break somewhere in the crimson of the sunset sky, that about the sky there is something almost oppressive in its solidity, a feeling that the extra sylla­ ble in each of the final two lines is perhaps meant to underscore. The last of the three poems then has him cut off that view from sight and from contemplation. Now the feeling that has arisen in him is specified, again a desolate loneliness, and now it attaches to the visual aspect of the pines at dusk (Sugata sabishiki). For the moment the loneliness that seems to well from the sight is too much for him, but only for a moment.

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W ith the next sub-sequence, “Late Autumn in the Farm Fields” (poems 169-77), he is out again in the fields, and the sight of undaunted spar­ rows braving the strong autumn winds in the sub-sequence’s first three poems (nos. 169-71) leads sequentially to a reaffirmation of the beauty of that same sabishisa, and once again the sparrows have led him to it. 172.

Hanayakani Sabishiki aki ya Chimachida no Honami ga sue o Murasuzume tatsu,

Brilliandy hued Desolation o f autumn! Field after field O f wave-forming grain and beyond A flock o f sparrows surges up. (195)

The matsukaze appears again early in the winter poems as the first of ten poems on the “W inter Showers” (nos. 192-201). 192.

Matsukaze no Shigururu tera no Maedori Toru hito wa aredo Hi no kure no kage.

A pine wind Showers down upon the temple And road in front. Though people there are who pass along, Shadows o f the setting sun. (198)

The speaker’s psychological strength has grown since the fall appearance of the wind in the pines. It still fills him with an unpleasantly lonely feeling, which is the implication of the unfinished statement in line 5 following upon the irregularly metered (nine syllables), proselike conces­ sive construction of line 4, but here he does not turn from it. He has grown more able to withstand the feeling it stimulates in him, to endure even if he cannot yet affirm the feelings that attach to the phenomenon of the pine wind. With the strong Buddhist influence evident in this collection, it seems to me significant as well that at this place where the matsukaze is so very strong there is a temple. By late winter, with his crisis past, the situation has changed and his reaction to the image progressed. 263.

Matsu bakari Oru yama kamo Kaze fukeba Tada soso to Matsukaze no oto.

A mountain covered W ith nothing but pines! W hen the wind blows Only a murmuring sough, The sound o f the wind in the pines. (214)

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The negative emotions are gone now. In fact, the only clue to the speaker’s feelings about what he hears is the exclamatory kcvmo of the second line. He is excited; he seems to look forward to the sound that arises in the final three lines. His anticipation in itself is a sign that he is near to the affirmation of life that he has sought from the beginning, and the line repeated from number 42 (Tada soso to) now reverberates positively, an important change from the earlier poem. In the poem immediately following, the exclamatory tone swells together with the sound of cymbals used in a Buddhist ceremony. 264.

Matsukaze no Sumifuku tokoro Tera arite Nyohachi narasu Sono nyohachi o.

A pine wind Blows clearly here W here stands a temple Sounding with the ring o f cymbals And oh those cymbals, oh! (214)

Again, as in number 192 above, a temple is placed where the wind in the pines is at its strongest and loudest, as if on purpose so as to be perfectly situated to hear this sound. In winter the emotion of loneliness that the speaker both savors and fears reaches its most intense pitch, which brings him to his emo­ tional crisis. The crucial time comes in the longest single sub-sequence of the Katsushika poems, “The Sparrows’ Lodging” (Suzume no yado), comprising twenty-six poems (nos. 228-53) within the winter segment.36 Now the plethora of plants, animals, and insects that filled the spring, summer, and fall sub-sequences has disappeared, leaving little more than the sparrows, the speaker and his wife, the bare branches of winter trees, and the winter wind’s biting cold. The speaker here comes closest to experiencing a union of his inner and outer worlds, a chance imaged in a multiform, all-embracing whiteness that comprehends his entire land­ scape, near and far alike—from far-off Fuji’s snow-covered and barely visi­ ble peak to his dog’s long-empty feeding dish in his own garden. The season that he has long awaited is at hand, and a crucial moment arrives as he contemplates the still scene of a willow set in the bank of a pond. 237.

Furuike no Soba ni sugareshi Kawayanagi Fui ni ugokasu Suzume ga shiroku.

Rooted in the bank At the side o f the ancient pond, A purple willow— Shaken by a sparrow A sudden quiver o f white. ( 209)

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The “quiver of white” is the underside of the willow leaves, which, had it not been for the instinctual action of the sparrow, would have gone unnoticed by the speaker. This cognition comes in a scene that unfolds as a still life, a sei picture that remains as it has been since long before the speaker’s arrival. “Ancient,” modifying “pond,” conveys this aspect, but the perfective inflection (shi) on the verb sugaru (“cling, rely”; “rooted” in the above translation) underscores the feeling as well. Sud­ denly, however, the sparrow injects movement into the scene, movement in the midst of stillness that reveals the white of the willow leaves’ reverse sides. At this moment the speaker awakens to the essential nature of the willow, an essence that comprehends both its past stillness and its present movement, as imaged by the two sides of its leaves. In a 1918 essay, Hakushu said of the scene of this poem, [W]hen it flashed the white underside of its leaves, the purple willow truly manifested its existence to me for the first time. This thoroughly and profoundly still fife, at a chance touch of the Divine [shinki ni fu rete] shone for an instant and then just as quickly returned to its original stillness. The stillness that followed was inexpressible. Only then did I enter into true stillness, true nirvana, and the true realm of Zen meditation. And as I quietly meditated upon that scene, my soul became one with it. It is here that the mysterious realm of union be­ tween subject and object comes into being.37 W hat was inexpressible in 1918 finds expression in 1921 as fifteen poems presenting a picture of the most intense endurance of suffering the speaker experiences in the whole of the sequence. First, the scene recedes to its undifferentiated oneness. 238. Suehiro ni Hi no kageru rashi Hosoriki no Karegi no sora no Kedoki mireba.

The fanned out Sunlight must be failing. Threadlike trees W ith bare branches against a sky That looks withdrawn, distant.

(209) His sabishisa eventually finds its external correlative in the biting cold of the wind. 246.

Mazushiki wa Koraen shikaredo

Poverty at least I’ll bear somehow, some way,

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But this cold Right now o f this wind I can no longer bear. (210)

Again compassion lends him the emotional support he needs. He finds it first in the sparrows. 248. Orifushi Shoji hibikasu Hane no oto Suzume zo to moedo Hotohoto sabishiki.

An instant W hen shoji ratde at The sound of wings— “A sparrow no doubt,” I surmise, But utterly, so utterly lonely. (2 1 1 )

His wife, however, provides him with the decisive gift, a moment of humor to lead him to the other side of his pain. 252. “An Exorcism” Mazushikeba Mame nato makeme to Tasuki kakete Sabishiki tsuma ya Oni wa soto to iu.

“W e ’re so poor, Let’s scatter some beans,” Says my lonely wife As she ties up her sleeves. “All demons to the outside!”

253. Yarawarete Nige yuku oni no Ushirokage Sho Ki ga niramu Furi no okashisa.

A t the vanishing figures O f the demons as they flee, Driven away, Sho Ki the Demon-Queller58 glares— And how funny she looks! ( 211)

The speaker now has found the emotional strength to push on. The pain of hunger, cold, and extreme loneliness pushes the man and his wife to the limits of endurance just before the arrival of spring, but winter passes on, as it always does, though the cold remains for some time into the calendar arrival of the new season. The intense personal pain as well seems to have receded now that the peak of the season is past, and the calm that has replaced it expresses itself in a wholly impersonal, outwardly oriented perspective on the part of the speaker. Poem 263 above is one example of the shift. Another extremely important link in his new outlook comes in the first sub-sequence follow­ ing the passing of winter, entitled “Miscellaneous Poems on Shallow Spring.”

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275. “Spring in the Tilled Field” Haru asami Sedo no mizuta no Midori ha no Nezeri wa uma ni Taberarenikeri.

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Spring yet shallow . . . In a paddy beyond my door Green leaves O f parsley—by a horse Cropped up and swallowed! (216)

The scene is commonplace and one that at first glance would seem not to deserve the exclamatory inflection attached to the verb tabu (eat) of the fifth line, but the exclamatory quality and the state of mind that it signifies are the point. Spring has arrived, but nature’s winter aspect has yet to soften. Little has turned green; therefore, the speaker’s eye natu­ rally focuses on a tiny green plant, the parsley, found at the edge of a field being turned in preparation for the spring planting. At that same instant, however, the parsley on which the speaker’s concentration has settled is eaten by a horse in the midst of pulling a plow about the field. The nature of his surprise is left unspecified, and the flatness of the rendering has the reverse effect of amplifying the emotional waves that wash over readers only after they finish the poem. That the speaker registers no positive or negative reaction to the scene, that his conscious­ ness records but a deep cognition, implies the attainment of a contempla­ tive attitude allowing him a supremely heightened awareness of the outside world of nature uncolored by personal desire. As my remarks on his use of the figures of Ryokan and St. Francis of Assisi might suggest, Hakushu finds meaningful resonances between his Katsushika experiences and the collective cultural past. His periodic use of a number of M an’y o pillow words and much archaic vocabulary is but another aspect of the same point of view. A number of other historical figures are present either by reference or allusion, including the Buddha, the M an’y oshu poet Takahashi Mushimaro (fl. ca. 730-35), the poet-priests Saigyo (1118-90) and Amada Guan (1854-1904), and the kokugaku scholar Kamo no Mabuchi (1697-1769). The most impor­ tant literary ancestor for him, however, is the haikai poet Matsuo Basho (1644—94), who also prized the concept of sabi. Poem 275 alludes rather clearly to a famous poem from Basho’s Nozarashi kiko (The MoorExposed Skeleton Diary, 1685). Michinobe no Mukuge wa uma ni Kuwarekeri.

At the roadside A rose mallow—by the horse Devoured!

Both poems imply a commonality of existence between the horse and the speaker. The humility such a commonality implies and the various

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meaningful “views” that naturally unfold before the speaker now are what is new about his perspective in these final poems. That he perceives the significance of a seemingly ordinary scene—not that he can spell out that significance but simply that his consciousness naturally gravitates toward these meaningful prospects—demonstrates in some sense an en­ lightenment attained. It is as if his awakening had come while he was unaware, and it gains expression through his total lack of selfconsciousness. “Katsushika Compositions” comes to a final resolution in the man­ ner through which it found unification and created linear flow through­ out, by focusing on an image at the end that is a varied form of one presented earlier. As did the “Katsushika Prefatory Poems” (nos. 1-6), the final sub-sequence of five poems under the topic “Rainbow at Dusk” (nos. 281-85)39 represents something of an irregularity within the tempo­ ral progression of the sequence as a whole. Though there is no retro­ grade motion, the sequence suddenly jumps ahead from early spring when the soil is tilled, which was the season of the two preceding sub­ sequences, to a time in early summer, the season of the final sub­ sequence, just after the transplanting of the young rice shoots in the paddies. A rainbow appears unexpectedly off in the distance (poem 281), even as over the paddies close by it is still raining hard (poem 282). The light of day has begun to fail, and yet the rainbow only grows more distinct (no. 283). It is dinnertime in this poor, agricultural community, and all within it sit down to their meager evening meals in sight of the beautiful surprise the sky has presented them (no. 284). The sequence then ends with this poem: 285. Ame fukumu Nora no shinju no Sora chikaku Kenu ka no niji no Mada naname naru.

W ith the sky close To the rain-swelled, new-grown leaves O f the trees on the fields, The faint faded rainbow Still slants down. (218)

The rainbow has faded to the point that the speaker thinks it will disap­ pear any second, but still it hangs in the sky, dispensing its beauty to the wondering eye of this beholder. Though declarative in mode, the poem’s descriptive element is most distinctive if the composition is con­ sidered apart from the sequence as a whole, and yet this is the final poem of a sequence that began in the same setting with a similar image, the thin trail of smoke rising to the sky above a pampas heath in the collection’s opening poem, which was quoted earlier. The first and last poems of “Katsushika Compositions” both focus on images that connect

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sky and earth, and in either case what would normally disappear quickly without a trace exhibits a surprising longevity. What was cause for sad­ ness and resignation in the first poem, however, now becomes the subject of admiring wonder; the sequence that opened with a monochromatic, commonplace scene finds closure in the same scene reset with a rain­ bow’s colorful hues. The solitary speaker of the beginning now finds community among the poor farmers of Katsushika, whom he calls wagadochi (my friends) in number 284. The strong element of personal pain evident in the opening poem has modulated in the final poem to an impersonal, though in no way indifferent, tone. No longer does he wish to work a change on the world that meets his gaze (one implication of the transitive kesu); now he accepts fife in this world as it is (the positive, transitive kesu in number 1 pairs interestingly with kenu in the final poem, a negative intransitive form of the same root word). The move­ ment from a subjective to an objective view of essentially the same land­ scape, from monochromatic to colorful versions of similar images, and from a tone of pain-filled resolution to one that, though outwardly di­ rected and largely descriptive, contains a hint of excited wonder, all speak of an affirmation of life acquired in the course of the sequence. The speaker’s positive perspective expresses itself in the images on which he now focuses, not only that of the rainbow but also the swelling new growth of leaves. Within the eternal circle of the seasonal round, the speaker’s life and experience have sketched in a life-affirming line. At the time of its publication, few if any of Hakushu’s readers seem to have paid much attention to the sequential development within “Ka­ tsushika Compositions.” Some critics, Ogiwara Seisensui (1884—1976) for example, raised doubts concerning the originality of poems like num­ ber 275 because the material and situation of such poems was too special­ ized.40 In print Hakushu rose to his own defense, insisting that his poetry reflected only what he himself had experienced.41 Implicitly, then, he insists on the unity between himself and his poetic speaker. But which speaker is he, the voice of Sparrow Eggs or that of the “Conclusion to the Laments” of 1917? There is no need, it seems to me, for modern readers to choose, and it seems ridiculous to charge Hakushu either with piracy for making allusions to the works of earlier literary figures or perjury for pouring his experiences into the crucible of his imagination and having them come out changed. Especially in the West with our different literary-critical traditions, few would expect the process to turn out differently. But Hakushu’s work does not exist in a vacuum, and his insistence on the autobiographical faithfulness of the poems to his experi­ ence opens him to criticism from a different direction. Seventy years later, few of us would demand that the speaker and the poet be interchangeable

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entities, and yet the undeniable interconnectedness between the two sug­ gests that neither can they be completely divorced. As Hakushu implic­ itly insists we recognize, this is the story of a poet searching for his ultimate poetic content, and yet not once does a poet, poetry, or any­ thing about the conscious side of the creative process enter within the sequence’s boundaries. The speaker provides detailed descriptions of his everyday activities, depicting himself as now a sweeper of gardens, now a mender of fences, occasionally a planter of trees and flowers, and sometimes a repairer of shoji, but always a meditative recluse who walks among fields or along a riverbank, or who simply sits quietly while concentrating intently on his garden or the fields that surround his home. Where, it might be asked, is the poet, and what of his activities as a writer? His poverty, he tells us repeatedly in the “Great Preface,” resulted from his insistence not to publish his poems until they were perfect, and his labors to produce a finished collection testify to a com­ pulsion to spend enormous amounts of time rewriting and revising. Where is the mountain of rejected draffs and revisions for Sparrow Eggs that buried his Katsushika study?42 His persona, however, never sits down to a desk before a writing brush or pen and a blank sheet of paper. This basic paring down of his field of vision leads to another related point as well. The whole of the natural world has special value; therefore, any kind of plant, insect, and animal form can enter the reach of the speaker’s sight (and “Katsushika Compositions” virtually overflows with plain waterside grasses, snails, and other organic forms not normally seen in traditional tanka). The only humans besides the speaker allowed to inhabit this landscape, however, are his wife, his father, a tired post­ man, a few neighborhood children, and an occasional stylized, cardboardfigure farmer, as if all other relations to human society have been cut. Hakushu himself, on the contrary, found it impossible to lead the her­ metic existence that he pictures here; as mentor to a circle of young poets that included Muro Saisei (1889-1962), Hagiwara Sakutaro (1886-1942), and Ote Takuji (1887-1934) among others, he spent much time and effort reading and critiquing his disciples’ work; and his Katsu­ shika home, the Shien Sosha (the Grass Hut of the Purple Smoke used as the subtopic for numbers 50 and 51), was the center of their activities and provided the group with its name. So heavily did his disciples depend on him that eventually he felt it necessary to break off their masterdisciple relationship, both to force upon them an independence they seemed to lack and to give himself over to the growing but still far from finished Sparrow Eggs.*1 Much has been cut away in the conversion of the real life of the poet to the fictional life of the speaker, and it is not unreasonable that some readers might find the limitations imposed too narrowly confining.

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Still, there is much fine poetry here. Hakushu demonstrates a su­ perbly developed, almost cinematic sensitivity to the possibilities of ma­ nipulating the focus within single poems and from poem to poem in sequence, and perhaps this power to manipulate the focus provides what would be Hakushu’s answer to the criticism that he excludes too much of life here. Perhaps he would argue that in order to catch a glimpse of the essence of life, one must learn to close down one’s focus, as one would close down a camera lens, to the locus of the gleam and ignore the rest to the point of not even noting its existence. Certainly, the interesting air of mystery that rises from poems like number 4 of the “Prefatory Poems,” with its white horse being pulled along without even so much as a human hand appearing within the bounds of the poem, derives precisely from Hakushu’s ability to stop down his lens so very tightly. Such control of the field of view often renders commonplace scenes mysterious and seemingly fraught with meaning, a mystery and a meaning that the average eye and sensibility would likely miss. Haku­ shu’s sense of the rhythm of words and lines, of the succession of a series of images, and of the relation that humans establish at an uncon­ scious level to their everyday environments is superb. One example of the poet at his best is poem 104 from the summer segment. Nagarekite Chu ni todomaru Akaakitsu Tokibi no hana no Sakisorou ue o.

Flowing forward, It comes to a stop midair, A red dragonfly Above bluebottle flowers, An entire field abloom. (179)

Seemingly unobtrusive and effortless, this poem is much more care­ fully structured than might be apparent at first reading. A flow of breeze carries the tiny, almost weightless dragonfly from, by implication, out of the depths of the sky and into the foreground. In what is literally the physical center of the poem, the insect abruptly arrests its forward mo­ tion, and the essentially passive movement of being carried on the wind is paradoxically terminated by an active assertion of the insect’s will to stop. Stopping, in other words, converts a moving set into a stationary do, which tightens the focus down to the tiny splash of red in the fore­ ground that is the dragonfly itself. By inverting the grammar and with­ holding the name of that which is carried forward on the wind until the third line, Hakushu manages to delineate an unfolding process involving mind and sense, quite as if the reader were in the speaker’s mind and seeing through his eyes. It is as if the speaker tells the reader the insect’s name at the same instant that he identifies it for himself, an identification made possible only because the dragonfly stopped where and when it

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did. This miniscule, easily blown about, seemingly insignificant and short-lived life form carries inscribed in its name, however, the sugges­ tion of an antiquity equal to the land to which it is allied through an ancient pillow word for Japan (akitsushima). In the next line the lens of the tanka slides down unobtrusively to the azure flowers below and then widens out suddenly in the final line to the boundaries of an entire field, alive with the explosion of color that the flowers’ simultaneous blooming creates. A second grammatical inversion (or it might be considered an extension of the first) makes this zoom lens effect possible. Lines 4 and 5 syntactically come before the first two lines, but by placing these lines in the lower section of the poem, Hakushu has the sky in the upper two lines and the earth in the lower two; wide vistas in the first and fifth lines; a movement approaching the speaker’s position, background to fore, in the first line and a movement of the eye away, fore to back, in the fifth; and more narrowly defined points of focus of the foreground in the second and fourth lines. And though the particle o at the end of the last line is strictly speaking a place marker telling where it is that the dragonfly is “flowing,” by coming at the very end and being the eighth syllable in what is normally a seven-syllable line, it becomes some­ thing of an emphatic, a function for which the particle o may also be used. In other words, this poem begins as a seemingly flat, unemotional description but ends on a note of exclamation; within its five short lines, this tanka contains a balanced combination of do and sei elements, an everyday present of an insignificant insect (and by extension of the indi­ vidual human who observes it) tied to the ancient past of the land as a whole, a field of vision that makes a sort of hourglass shape as it moves from a distant background to the immediate and narrowly focused fore­ ground and then out again. In its movement it joins sky and field (heaven and earth) together, as did the images of the smoke and the rainbow in the sequence’s first and last poems—a perfectly realized aesthetic whole created thanks to the delicate and seemingly frail unifying image of the dragonfly at the poem’s literal and figurative center. The poem’s lan­ guage and rhythm are so natural and fluid, however, that the poem itself, like the dragonfly it takes as its subject, almost escapes notice. I am one reader who considers himself fortunate that it did not.44 NOTES 1. Hereafter cited as “Katsushika Compositions.” 2. The complete text of S p a rrow E ggs, together with the earlier texts of most of the poems and the details of later revisions, can be found in Hakushu’s collected works, Kimata Osamu, Yota Jun’ichi, et ah, eds. H akushu zen sh u, 40 vols. (Iwanami Shoten, 1984-88 [hereafter referred to as HZ\), 7:125—434. 3. Ibid., 133. 4. Hakushu provides this information in his short introduction to “Rinne sansho” (The

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Wheel of Karma: Three Chapters), the second sequence of Sparrow Eggs. See ibid., 221. 5. Ibid., 133. 6. Ibid., 129. 7. Ibid., 130. 8. As an example of the continued importance this period had for Hakusho in his own mind, one might point to the first issue of Tama, the organ of the Tama Tanka-kai. This coterie group was formed in 1935 with Hakushu’s shin yugen poetic as its touchstone ideal, and on the cover of its first issue was a drawing of a nest full of sparrow eggs. 9. Ibid. 10. “Afterword,” ibid., 321. 11. Hereafter referred to as “W heel.” 12. Ibid. 13. “Great Preface,” ibid., 134. 14. The numbers in parentheses give the page number on which the poem is found in H Z 7. 15. The numbering of the poems is my own and for the convenience of citing. Hakushu himself provided only topics and subtopics. 16. Kawaguchi Hiroaki was the first to point out the absence of this poem from the “Aishohen Ketsumatsu” group, and he suggested that its appearance in the finished Sparrow Eggs indicated a change in Hakushu’s conception of the structure of the collection as a whole. Kawaguchi did not, however, go on to suggest what that structure might be, nor did he examine any poems within “Katsushika Composi­ tions.” See “Suzume no tamago no kozo,” Kokubungaku kaishaku to kansho 50 (Decem­ ber 1985): 98-102. 17. See H Z 15:23, where in an open letter to his close friend and future brother-in-law, Yamamoto Kanae, he makes the following comment while describing a walk along a river embankment near his new home in Katsushika: “Ah, nearest to me within this friendly landscape, the dangling willow-limbs, and there, just beginning to send its thin stream of smoke upward, is a thatched house—might that not be my own home, where my wife is stoking the fire for cooking the evening meal?” 18. Ian Levy, trans. The Ten Thousand Leaves (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1981) 1:38. 19. H Z 15:349. 20. See, for example, H Z 15:465, where Hakushu says, following a description of the playful flight of two sparrows: Here was an instance of movement (do) within stillness (set). It was a case of nature’s stillness (seijaku), through the flapping of the sparrows’ wings, beginning for the first time to move, to shine, and to gain greater depth, and nature’s life-force, having been touched by the Divine (shinkt), appeared to me here for the first time. Not only that, the sparrow’s own fife as well shone blindingly for me at that time. It was in the sound of the wines. 21. Ibid., 393. 22. Ibid., 255. 23. A sparrow appeared in the final two poems of “Prefatory Poems,” but that these were prefatory should be kept in mind. The forward temporal push of the sequence does not begin until poem 7 and proceeds from there in linear fashion. 24. Number 16 appeared in the 15 July 1917 issue of Chuo koron (32.8, which was a special issue), and number 19 in October of the same year in Tanka zasshi 1.1. 25. The earlier version of the poem was published as the sixteenth of a group of twentythree poems under the general topic “Katsushika Poems” and the subtopic “White

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Ox” (for which it was the only poem) in the 15 July 1917 special issue of ChuO koron. See HZ 7:370. 26. The journal was Tabako no hana 1.2 (December 1916) and the Japanese text in romanized form was as follows: S uz rn ne ga ni w a / Yoretehabataku / Utukushisa / Ochin to shite wa / Mata tobiagaru. 27. See his remarks in Doshin (The Heart of a Child, 1921), in HZ 16:315ff. 28. HZ 7:165-71. 29. HZ 15:499-500. 30. Ibid., 262. 31. Ibid. 32. See, for example, the three choka with envoys in “Rice, the White Jewel” (nos. 119-24) or the two choka in “Dog and Crow” (nos. 125-26). HZ 7:182-87. 33. See, for example, poem 151 in ibid., 191. 34. Earl Miner, Hiroko Odagiri, and Robert E. Morrell, The Princeton Companion to Classical Japanese Literature (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1985), 295. 35. Remarks toward a Cleansing o f the Heart, in HZ 15:513. 36. HZ 7:208-11. 37. This essay was first published in two parts under the tide “Tanka shisaku” (My Own Tanka Revisions) in Tanka zasshi (January and February 1918). It was later included in the expanded version of The Heart o f a Child (ARS, 1930). The original of the passage translated here is found in HZ 16:318-19. 38. A mythical Chinese being that dispels demons. In Japan he became associated with the Boy’s Festival, and his image was thought to overpower evil and pestilence. See Kodansha Encyclopedia o f Japan (Kodansha, 1983), 7:163. 39. HZ 7:217-18. 40. Ogiwara did this in the course of a series of articles he published in 1922 in S oun, a magazine that he also edited. Cited in Kimata Osamu, Hakushu kenkyu, (Yagumo Shoten, 1943), 148n.5. 41. “Tansho and Haiku: Part Four, to Ogiwara Seisensui,” in HZ 18:255-56. This was the fourth of a series of five articles originally published in Shi to ongaku 1.2 (Octo­ ber 1922). 42. Hakushu describes this scene in the “Great Preface,” HZ 7:130-31. 43. Ibid., 132-33. 44. I wish to thank the Kyoto office of the Japan Foundation for providing me with an opportunity to present an earlier version of this paper. I owe a great debt to Professor Ueda Hiroshi and the Kindai Tanka Kenkyfl-kai of Ritsumeikan University for their unlimited patience and help. I would also like to thank Professor Esperanza RamirezChristensen of the University of Michigan for her invaluable criticisms of this essay.

Noh and Its Antecedents: “Journey to the Western Provinces” JAN ET GOFF

Since the late sixteenth century, the Noh repertoire has formed a closed system. The number of plays has been sharply reduced and the overall language has undergone litde change, although in variant performances part of a play may be deleted. More importantly, almost no new pieces have been added to the repertoire. This stability, or rigidity, contrasts sharply with the dynamism of the Muromachi period (1336-1573) when the canon was produced. In the early days, Noh avidly absorbed elements from other per­ forming arts, while playwrights freely revised earlier plays or combined them with new ones. This process would be almost completely lost to us today were it not for the information provided by Zeami Motokiyo’s treatises. Kusemai, a type of narrative song and dance popular in Zeami’s day, offers an excellent example. Although the form was later absorbed by kowaka-mai, which in turn died out, Kannami’s introduction of a modified form of kusemai into Noh permanently enshrined it in the Japanese performing arts, so to speak. More importantly, Kannami’s bold innovation brought Noh a giant step closer to the attainment of its present form. Kusemai not only gave Noh greater rhythmical variation and interest, but provided material. Zeami’s treatises and Sarugaku dangi, a collection of his observations on Noh set down by his son Motoyoshi in 1430, reveal that plays were often constructed around independent kusemai songs, and that playwrights not infrequently transferred songs from one play to another rather than creating a new song for each play. Kusemai are also believed to have figured in the creation of the dream structure of Noh (m ugen no), which provided a framework for this core material.1 The present essay shows how kusemai served yet another func­ tion: helping to develop the highly figurative language for which Noh is famous. The discussion focuses on the kusemai song “Saikoku kudari” (Journey to the Western Provinces), preserved in Zeami’s treatise

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Go on. The discussion is accompanied by an annotated translation of the song.2 Drawing upon the war between the Taira and Minamoto clans at the end of the twelfth century, “Saikoku kudari” describes the Taira clan’s flight from Kyoto in 1183 with the six-year-old emperor Antoku (1178-85). The journey marked the beginning of a period of wandering that would end in the final defeat of the clan at the battle of Dannoura in 1185. “Saikoku kudari” was written as a companion piece to “Togoku kudari” (Journey to the Eastern Provinces), a song about the journey of a captured Taira warrior named Morihisa to Kamakura to face execution.s “Togoku kudari” was inspired by a song belonging to a popular genre, now defunct, called soga (literally, “fast songs”), whose repertoire of roughly 173 songs was codified around 1300. “Togoku kudari” was sub­ sequently incorporated into the Noh M orihisa, a play by Zeami’s son Motomasa, and was taken up by numerous later genres, such as Kabuki. The ubiquity of the story has made “Togoku kudari” the subject of broad interest, whereas “Saikoku kudari” has long remained in the shad­ ows of its better-known counterpart, despite deserving special consider­ ation in its own right as a precursor of Noh. In particular, the song throws light on the formation of the repertoire stylistically, and shows how supposedly autonomous genres or texts are linked to each other on a formal and substantive level. The identity of the author and his ties with Zeami only add to its significance. T H E PRO VEN A N CE OF “ SAIKOKU KUD ARI”

Sarugaku dangi tells us that “Togoku kudari” was composed after “Rin’a incurred the displeasure of the shogun and went to the eastern provinces.” “Once while he was still known as Fujiwaka,” the treatise remarks, “Zeami sang ‘Togoku kudari’ before the shogun, who de­ manded to know the identity of the writer and had Rin’a recalled.” It adds that “Saikoku kudari” was written as a sequel.4 The shogun was Ashikaga Yoshimitsu, whose discovery of Noh around 1373 and subsequent patronage of Kannami and Zeami pro­ foundly altered the fortunes of Noh. The author, Rin’a (also known as Rinnami or Tamarin), was a renga poet in the service of Yoshimitsu. Contemporary records describe him as a member of the circle led by Gusai, Nijo Yoshimoto’s renga mentor, while a poetry treatise by Imagawa Ryoshun states that Nijo Yoshimoto considered him in the second rank of renga poets.5 Rin’a appears to have been a waka poet as well. His apparent connection with Konrenji, a temple in Kyoto belonging to the Jishu, or Time, sect of Buddhism suggests that he was affiliated with that religious organization, a theory reinforced by his name, which ends with a suffix (-a, or -ami) favored by members of the sect.

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“Saikoku kudari” was set to music by Kannami. According to Sarugaku dangi, Naami, a patron of Kannami and member of the shogun Ashikaga Yoshimitsu’s circle, advised changing the rhythm of the word kakurete in the passage, Ashi no hawake no tsuki no kage,/kakurete sumeru koya no ike (11. 34-35). Since Naami, the author of two kusemai, died in 1381, and since the name Fujiwaka was bestowed on Zeami by Nijo Yoshimoto around 1375, it is possible to date “Saikoku kudari” unusu­ ally closely.6 Although Zeami’s treatises indicate that his father and other sarugaku and dengaku performers from the same generation also wrote Noh plays, it is difficult to grasp a sense of the early repertoire since their work has mostly come down to us only through Zeami. “Saikoku kudari” and “Togoku kudari” thus provide an unusual glimpse of Noh in his father’s day, assuming, of course, that Zeami did not rework the two kusemai. T H E C O N T E N T S OF T H E W O R K

Sarugaku dangi describes kusemai as songs that contain a two-part kuse and begin and end with a shidai. “Saikoku kudari,” which was writ­ ten specifically for Noh, deviates from this pattern, as it links together two kuse and lacks an introductory and concluding shidai. The first part of the song recounts the journey as far as Fukuhara, where Kiyomori, the head of the Taira warrior clan and the most powerful man in the land, forced the emperor and court nobles to move in 1180. Kiyomori seems to have built Fukuhara with the intention of making it the new capital, but his scheme ended in failure, for the court returned to the old capital in Kyoto after only six months, and within a year Kiyomori was dead. Describing the flight of the Taira in highly allusive language, “Saikoku kudari” suggests the betrayal of the wily retired emperor GoShirakawa, who refused to accompany his grandson Antoku and the retreating Taira to Kyushu, and hints at the despotic behavior of Kiyo­ mori. The text also alludes to Kyo no Shima, or Sutra Island, built by Kiyomori off Wada Cape in the Inland Sea in the 1160s to protect the local harbor. The second part of “Saikoku kudari” continues the western progress of the Taira past Suma, the site of Hikaru Genji’s exile in Genji monogatari, in the direction of Kyushu. As I shall demonstrate below, the language of “Saikoku kudari,” like “Togoku kudari,” bears the heavy imprint of soga. The material regarding the war between the Taira and Minamoto clans, however, does not derive from this rival song form, which eschews the subject.7 Instead, “Saikoku kudari” draws upon Heike monogatari, a medieval epic about the war. The allusion in “Saikoku kudari” to the excesses of Kiyo­ mori echoes a major theme in Heike, which ascribes the downfall of the

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Taira to him. The song draws especially upon “Ichimon no miyako ochi” (The Flight of the Heike from the Capital) and “Fukuhara ochi” (The Flight from Fukuhara) in chapter 7 of Heike. For the sake of convenience, the discussion and notes below are keyed to the readily available NKBT edition of Heike, a reproduction of the Kakuichi text belonging to the oral, or katari-bon, tradition of Heike? The enormously complex history of Heike, however, makes it hazardous to ascribe the source to a specific text. In fact, some of the material overlaps with the Enkei-bon, an expanded version of Heike belonging to the tradition of written texts, or yom i-m ono? Specifically, the section titled “The Heike Spend a Night at Fukuhara” contains several placenames, including Muro, Ushimado, and Tomo, and an allusion to a poem about an old man’s fishing pole found in “Saikoku kudari” (11. 77-78) but not in the corresponding section of the Kakuichi text. In the second part of “Saikoku kudari,” the connection with Heike fades and is replaced by allusions to the “Suma” chapter of Genji (about eight of thirty lines altogether). The allusions include yom o no arashi (wind blowing all around), ushiro no yam a (hills behind), keburi (smoke), shiba to iu mono (what is known as brushwood), and seki fukikoyuru (blow­ ing past the barrier). The last phrase echoes a passage in Genji about the Heian courtier Ariwara no Yukihira, who was exiled to Suma10: At Suma, amid the autumn wind that increases troubled thoughts, the waves on the bay, which Middle Counselor Yu­ kihira had spoken of in terms of [the wind] “blowing past the barrier,” sounded very close indeed, night after night, although the sea was not very near. Nothing is more moving than au­ tumn in a place like this. “Blowing past tlte barrier” alludes in turn to a poem by Yukihira in the eleventh imperial anthology (Shokukokinshu-, “Travel,” 10:876): Tabibito wa Tamoto suzushiku Narinikeri Seki fukikoyuru Suma no urakaze.

The edges O f the traveler’s sleeves Have become cool: The breeze from Suma Bay Is blowing past the barrier.

Like “Suma Bay,” all of the above items were recognized as linking words in renga. The song thus deserves special note as an early example of the confluence of the worlds of renga and Noh. These phrases are followed by an allusion (11. 93-96) to a passage in “Suma” about a former Gosechi dancer who stops at Suma Bay with her family on the way back to Kyoto from Tsukushi (Kyushu), where

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her father had been in government service (GM 2:195-97). The first two lines from the following poem she sent to Genji on that occasion are woven into “Saikoku kudari”: Koto no ne ni Hikitomeraruru Tsunade nawa Tayutau kokoro Kimi shirurame ya.

I am drawn By the sound o f the zither: Are you aware that my heart Quivers like the ship’s rope W hen I hear the sound?

Today, the episode is hardly considered one of the more memorable passages in Genji, but an entry in Renga yoriai (Notebook of Conven­ tional Associations in Linked Verse, 1494) suggests that it was well known in medieval renga circles11: Zither: The place name Suma is linked to this word because of a scene in Genji m onogatari in which the Gosechi dancer, passing by Suma on her way back to the capital from Tsukushi, hears Genji playing a zither. In lines 100 and 101, musoji (sixty [years old]) and towazugatari (unsolic­ ited remarks; translated as “disclosure”) apparendy allude to the Akashi lay priest who invited Genji to move his place of exile from Suma to the more hospitable shores of Akashi across the bay. The priest had long harbored an ambition to secure an advantageous marriage for his daughter, and one moonlit night, without needing any prompting, he tells (towazugatari) Genji about her (GM 2:234). Like Radiant Genji long ago, the Taira cross Suma Bay in the direction of Akashi (1. 105).12 The song implies that the place was illsuited to the Heike because the hero of Genji belonged to the enemy clan, the Minamoto. In fact, when the Taira clan returned to that part of the country six months later after having been driven from Kyushu, Suma would figure as the scene of fierce fighting at the battle of Ichinotani. Whereas Heike material is not taken up as a theme in soga, the soga repertoire contains innumerable allusions to Genji, some of which over­ lap with “Saikoku kudari.” For instance, a song called “Moon” (“Tsuki”) alludes extensively to the scene in the “Akashi” chapter in which the Akashi lay priest reveals (towazugatari) to Genji the existence of his daughter13: Tsuki wa Akashi no ura no sumai maki no toguchi no tsuki kage towazugatari no yume mo geni wasurenu fushi to ya narinuran. (Phrases also found in Genji are underlined.)

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The moon is bright; at the home in Akashi Bay in the moonlight by the black-pine doorway the dream expressed in a revelation forms an unforgettable story. Like “Saikoku kudari” (1. 99), the song plays on the meaning “bright” in Akashi. A soga called “Musical Entertainment” (“Seigaku kyo”) contains material from “Suma” also found in “Saikoku kudari”: Hikaru Genji no sasurai ni mitose wa suma no urazutai hitori ukine ni kikiwaburu wa seki fukikoyuru akikaze ni koe uchisouru okitsunami musoji no omoi setsu narishi. . . . During his exile, Radiant Genji spent three years along the Bay of Suma. While sleeping in misery alone, he listened unhappily to the autumn wind blowing past the barrier, to which the waves on the bay added their voice; The sentiments of the sixty year old were touching. . . . Another song, “Boats” (“Fune”), contains the phrase suma no urazutai (crossing the bay of Suma) as well as an allusion to a Chinese poem by Liang Zong-yuan, titled J ia n g xue (Gosetsu shi\ Snow on the River), also found in “Saikoku kudari” (11. 77-78): Tsuki ni sao sashite, utau okina no chogyo no fune. Pointing toward the moon with his pole, an old man sings in a fishing boat. The formation of the soga repertoire around 1300 was closely tied to the warrior class in Kamakura.14 In terms of musical notations and formal characteristics, numerous parallels can been found between Noh and soga, which flourished in the middle ages but died out in the Edo period. Like Noh, the repertoire of 173 songs was heavily influenced by the language and techniques of ivaka, including its 7-5 syllabic verse form. The songs tend to consist of catalogs of things; as the above examples from “Boats” and “The Moon” show, they weave together a host of allusions about a particular subject. As such, they represent a kind of orally transmitted source book on commonplace themes and motifs. Soga were especially popular among the warrior class, but were

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also sung by renga masters and Noh actors, and thus can be considered general knowledge in Noh circles. T H E LITE RA RY ST Y LE OF “ SAIKOKU K UD ARI”

Like soga and Noh, “Saikoku kudari” abounds in rhetorical tech­ niques inherited from waka, including pivot words, famous places, poetic language, allusions, prefaces (jo kotoba), and related words (engo). It also prefigures the development of the michiyuki, or travel song, a basic com­ ponent of Noh, albeit not in such a pronounced manner as “Togoku kudari.” Like Morihisa’s journey to Kamakura to face execution, the westward flight of the Taira is recounted in a lyrical manner through a description of the journey, but “Saikoku kudari” mentions only about twenty place-names, compared to seventy in “Togoku kudari.”15 The infrequency of conventional poetic references to place-names west of Akashi (after the time of Man'yoshu), compared to the home provinces and eastern part of the country, may account in part for the difference. In any event, the further the narrative moves away from the capital in “Saikoku kudari,” the vaguer the description becomes. Also, place-names do not function as pivot words to the extent that they do in “Togoku kudari,” where place-names simultaneously imply spatial progression and, through wordplay, describe Morihisa’s mental state. “Togoku kudari” builds upon the soga song “Kaido kudari,” but the earlier song simply weaves together a series of place-names, whereas “Togoku kudari” adds a narrative framework—the story of Morihisa, which gives the lyrical description a narrative thrust that had previously been missing. In contrast, “Saikoku kudari” dilutes the story of the Taira clan’s flight, never actually mentioning the name of the clan and embroidering the text (especially in the second half of the song) with digressions in the form of allusions and figurative language that spring from elements of the story such as the sea and boats. In other words, the song employs a metaphoric mode of discourse characteristic of poetry, as opposed to a metonymic mode, which, in the words of Terence Hawkes, tends to “be foregrounded in prose.”16 The following description of poetry by Hawkes might have been written about “Saikoku kudari”: By the use of complex inter-relationships, by emphasizing re­ semblances and by promoting through repetition “equiva­ lences” or “parallelisms” of sound, stress, image, rhyme, poetry patterns and “thickens” language, “foregrounding” its formal qualities, and consequently “backgrounding” its capacity for sequential, discursive, and referential meaning. In soga, where figurative structures predominate, the rhetoric takes on a life of its own instead of being subordinated to larger concerns.

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However attenuated the narrative line in “Saikoku kudari” may be, the song is no mere assemblage of unrestrained rhetorical flourishes, for the theme of a journey and the progression of place-names, supported by the images of the moon and boats, which imply westward movement, hold this tendency in check. Moreover, the linking of central images such as the moon, sea, and boats to thematic concerns, a more pro­ nounced phenomenon in “Saikoku kudari” than in “Togoku kudari,” foreshadows Noh and may even have served as a model.17 “ SAIKOKU K UD ARI” AND N O H

A tissue of language found later in Noh plays, “Saikoku kudari” represents an important link in, if not a starting point for, the creation of a common pattern in michiyuki, or travel songs, sung by the waki at the start of a play. For instance, the beginning of the first sashi, in Tadanori (1:242), a second-category warrior play by Zeami, is almost identical to “Saikoku kudari” (11. 3-5)18: seinan no rikyu ni [omomuki]/ miyako o hedatsuru yamazaki ya/seki no [shuku]. The year reign, ju ei, men­ tioned in fine 1 of “Saikoku kudari” occurs later (in the sageuta on 1:246): ju e i no aki no koro (autumn in the Juei era). The sashi also men­ tions Akutagawa and “Ina’s fields of bamboo grass” (ina no ozasa), while the sageuta describes Koya Pond using a play on sum[u] (live, clear) that is echoed in line 34 of “Saikoku kudari” (sum eru koya no ike\ translated as “clear is the hidden pond at Koya”). Ashi no hawake (through the leaves on the reeds) in the ageuta also occurs in “Saikoku kudari” (1. 33): sashi

sa geu ta a g eu ta sashi

sageu ta a g eu ta

Seinan no rikyu ni omomuki miyako o hedatsuru Yamazaki ya sekido no shuku wa na nomi shite tomari mo hatenu tabi no narai uki mi wa itsu mo majiwari no chiri no ukiyo no Akutagawa Ina no ozasa o wakesugite. Tsuki mo yado karu Koya no ike minasoko kiyoku suminashite. Ashi no hawake no kaze no oto. W e head toward the southern palace; past Yamazaki, separated by hills from the capital, the inn at Sekido exists in name alone; travel offers no restful place to stay. Our unhappy lot to mingle endlessly in the dust o f this wretched world, we cross Akutagawa, River o f Mud, and Ina’s fields o f bamboo grass. In Koya Pond, a humble lodging for the moon, the water is clear even at the lowest depths. The rusde o f the wind through the leaves on the reeds.

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The beginning of Sumiyoshi mode, a third-category play inspired by Radiant Genji’s pilgrimage to Sumiyoshi Shrine in the “Miotsukushi” chapter o f sashi

sa geuta sashi

sa geu ta

G e n ji,

contains sim ilar m aterial19:

Miyako no tsuki no omokage hedatsuru Yamazaki ya, Sekido no shuku mo utsurikinu. Harawanu chiri no Akutagawa Ina no sasawara wakesugite. At Yamazaki, the hills hide even more the moon above the capital, and then the inn at Sekido is left behind. W e cross muddy Akuta River, which gathers dirt, and Ina’s fields o f bamboo grass.

Further evidence of the textual open-endedness of Noh can be found in Toei, a fourth-category play, whose initial sashi, sageuta, and almost the entire ageuta (in the Hosho and Kongo schools) are the same as in Tadanori.1" Like “Saikoku kudari,” Tadanori alludes to Po Chii-i’s poem about the owl and fox.21 Moreover, the remark in the following song (an ageuta) that Suma is no place for the Taira clan because of Radiant Genji’s association with it clearly echoes “Saikoku kudari.” It is conceivable that the comment originated in a Heike text, but the similar­ ity between the play and the song does not end there, for Tadanori, like “Saikoku kudari,” also draws extensively on material from G enjiP The play contains the same allusion about “blowing past the barrier” as well as the phrases “wind blowing all around” (yomo no arashi), “hills behind” 0ushiro no yam a), “smoke” (keburi), and “what is known as brushwood” (shiba to iu mono). Assuming that “Saikoku kudari” underwent no change at the hands of later transmitters, including Zeami, it would appear to have provided Tadanori with material. Finally, seven lines at the end of “Saikoku kudari” (11. 122-28) are nearly identical to the last part of the kuse in M iidera, a fourth-category play of uncertain provenance about a woman whose child was abducted, causing her to go mad23: Tsuki ochi tori naite, shimo ten ni michite susamashiku, koson no gyoka mo honoka ni, han’ya no kane no hibiki wa, kaku no fune ni ya kayoran, hoso ame shitadarite, nareshi shioji no kajimakura ukine zo kawaru kono umi wa nami kaze mo shizuka nite.

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As the moon sinks in the west, a bird cries; cold frost lies everywhere. On the river by the village, fishing flares are dim; does the bell ringing late at night reach the travelers’ boat? Rain falls on the window o f the thatch-covered boat. Even when accustomed to a pillow on a boat, sleeping is difficult. But on these waters, the waves and wind are quiet.

As in “Saikoku kudari,” the moon forms an important motif in the play, which ends with the woman finally finding her child during a moon­ viewing party at Miidera. As the above discussion shows, “Saikoku kudari” bears evidence of having assimilated older art forms and contributed, in turn, to the forma­ tion of the Noh repertoire. Separated by several centuries from the cultural matrix in which it was produced, the allusive language taxes the reader’s understanding. The supplementary information needed to recover the meaning of the text requires the mediation of extensive scholarly research and educated guesswork. But the preceding discussion also shows that “Saikoku kudari” was part of a larger “text.” The duplication of Genji ma­ terial in a wide variety of art forms, for instance, suggests that apparently obscure allusions were part of a common body of knowledge that would have been recognized by audiences familiar with other genres. “Saikoku K udari”: J o u rn ey to the W estern P rovinces sashi 1

5

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In autumn o f the second year o f Juei the Taira clan, heading for the western seas, stopped at the southern palace.24 Past Yamazaki, separated by hills from the capital, at the Sekido barrier house, they set down the imperial palanquin and bowed low in the direction o f Yawata.2! Praise be to the great bodhisattva Hachiman, the sixteenth sovereign since the age o f human rule began. Clear are the waters o f Afimosuso River26; how could one who sprang from the same source turn his back upon the clan,

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when divine favor was specially bestowed upon them?27 Like the waves on the western sea we will return; once more we will set foot in the distant capital

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and gaze upon the moon above Miyako, they vowed inside their hearts, but evil and dishonor had piled high, and the gods and Buddhas withheld their protection.28 Abandoned by noble and base, high and low alike, they leave the walls o f the capital behind. W hat will become o f them? They pass Minase River in the distance below the hills29; bearing bow and quiver, they give free rein to their horses crossing Akutagawa, River o f Mud, where a man wept long ago when a demon devoured his beloved.20

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Departing from the familiar capital, whither are they bound? Amid Ina’s fields o f bamboo grass there is no place to spend the night.31 In the moonlight through the leaves on the reeds, clear is the hidden pond at Koya.32 By the river in the fields o f Ikuta their rest is disturbed; like the plaintive cry o f the water bird o f old shot down to no avail, what good is sleeping as they lament the end o f their lives?33 The waters rise from rain in myriad hills; when muddied, a name cannot be cleared, like Cloth-Pulling W aterfall where the cascading waves resound.34 In what direction do the clouds go? Reminiscent o f the double-oared boats, five hundred ships were built, and tribute was constantly conveyed to the port at Muko Bay.3S They arrived in Fukuhara, the former capital, where the houses lay in ruins after three years.36

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An owl hoots amid pine and cassia branches; a fox lives hidden amid orchids and chrysanthemums.37 No trace o f former glory remains; the wind and waves strike the shore where the abandoned buildings stand38; like the child o f fisherfolk without a fixed abode, the travelers have no place to stay.39 Kiyomori’s buildings have completely changed: moonlight streams through the eaves o f the former capital; ornaments o f gold and jewels and throngs o f flowery carriage shafts are recalled as though it were today. W hat longing those days arouse.

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The collected sutras of Sakyamuni Buddha, five thousand volumes and more, were inscribed in stone and sunk to the bottom of the sea,40 creating an island home that allowed thousands o f ships to moor safe from the perils o f the wind and sea. It was a precious reminder. In this wretched world amid the approaching waves, the moonlight vanished, never to return.41

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They could not remain as they were, and so they followed His Majesty onto the waiting boats.42 It is sad to think o f the unhappy pillows, floating on the unfamiliar waves. The dragon and phoenix boats on the palace lake

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come to mind, and the song about the pole o f an old man fishing on a cold river.45 Among the voices that fell on unfamiliar ears, seagulls on the bay and plovers amid the rocks call out to their mates. Wind-filled sails face the oncoming waves,44 as the oarsmen’s voices spur on the moon. As they round Wada Cape45 the pine trees on the distant shore seem part o f the deep-blue sea. At Suma Bay fierce is the wind in all directions. The sound blowing past the barrier mingles with the evening smoke in the hills behind: what is known as brushwood smoulders; poignant is the unfamiliar sight.46

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“I am drawn by the sound o f the zither,” said the Gosechi maiden in a poem, overcome by emotion at Suma; the Tsukushi boat long ago was bound for the capital, but now it goes the other way. 47 Sad is the future waiting beyond the waves. The setting moon is bright at Akashi Bay48; sixty autumns and more had passed when a disclosure was made long ago.49 Longing is aroused by the memory o f those days. How pleasant to move from the boats to carriages

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and linger here a while. But crossing the bays o f Suma and Akashi, the path that Genji followed, is hardly fitting for the Heike clan.so And so they leave this coast once more. The waves are high—at Takasago the early autumn wind blows in the pine on the knoll; where will it convey the ships?51 On the thatch-roofed boats at Muro Harbor moonlight streams through the cracks at night; a courtesan’s song contains a sad phrase about wandering through this wretched world.52 The unfamiliar journey causes misery; at the Straits o f Ushimado beware o f the receding tide.si Rough indeed are the warriors bearing catalpa bows suiting Tomo Bay; the hearths o f the people thrive at Kamado Barrier; the sound o f waves beckons to the path o f dreams.54

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As the moon sinks in the west, a crow cries; cold frost lies everywhere. On the river by the village, fishing flares are dim; does the ringing o f a bell deep in the night reach the travelers’ boats? Rain falls on the window o f a thatch-covered boat; on a pillow during an unfamiliar journey by sea,55 the sleeves, spread alone, must be wilted.56 As waves approach the shore, the moonlight vanished, never to return. NOTES

1. Omote Akira and Amano Fumio, Nogaku no rekishi, vol. 1 of Iwanami koza: nB kyOgen (Iwanami Shoten, 1987), 36. 2. The translation is based on the text in Omote Akira and Kato Shuichi, eds., Zeami, Zenchiku, in NST 24:228-29. 3. For an English translation of “Togoku kudari,” see P.G. O’Neill, Early No Drama (London: Lund Humphries, 1958), 153-60. The song is also discussed in Frank Hoff, “City and Country: Song and the Performing Arts in Sixteenth-Century Japan,” in George Elison and Bardwell Smith, eds., Warlords, Artists, and Commoners (Honolulu: University Press of Hawaii, 1981), 133-62. 4. Omote and Kato, Zeami, Zenchiku, 277. 5. Rakusho roken-, cited in Kido SaizO, Renga shi ronko, (Meiji Shoin, 1971-73), 1:316. For the most comprehensive account of Rin’a in Japanese to date, see Takemoto Mikio, “Rin’a ko—Nanbokucho-ki kusemai sakusha no yokogao,” Geinoshi kenkyu 53 (April 1976): 1-14. Rin’a is described as a member of Gusai’s circle in Sozei’s treatise Kokon rendanshu and elsewhere. His name also appears in Hitorigoto and Tokorodokoro hends. 6. Takemoto, “Rin’a ko,” 8.

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7. Ibid., 9. 8. Heike monogatari, 2 vols. in NKBT 32 and 33. Helen McCullough’s English translation, The Tale o f the Heike (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1988), is based on this edition. The principal sections that “Saikoku kudari” draws upon are “Tsukishima” from chapter 6 (1:410-12; McCullough, Heike, 212-13); “Ichimon no miyako ochi” from chapter 7 (2:109-13; McCullough, Heike, 250-53), and “Fukuhara ochi” from chapter 7 (2:114-17; McCullough, Heike, 253-55). 9. Matsuoka Shinpei, “ ‘Saikoku kudari’ oboegaki,” N ogaku ta im uz u, 332 (November 1979): 7, notes the similarity between “Saikoku kudari” and the section titled “Heike Fuku­ hara ni ichiya yadoru koto” in the Enkei text (Yoshizawa Yoshinori, ed., O ei Shosha E nkei-bon H eike m o n o ga ta ri [Benseisha, 1977], 627-28). 10. GM 2:190, in Abe Akio, Akiyama Ken, and Imai Gen’e, eds., NKBZ 13. For an extended discussion of the connection between the “Suma” chapter of Genji, “Saikoku kudari,” Noh plays set at Suma, and medieval poetics in general, see Janet Goff, Noh Drama and The Tale o f Genji: The Art o f Allusion in Fifteen Classical Noh Plays (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1991). 11. Steven D. Carter, The Road to Komatsubara: A Classical Reading o f the Renga Hyakuin (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1987), 25. The quotation comes from Kido Saizo and Shigematsu Hiromi, Renga yoriai shu to kenkyu, (Toyohashi: Mikan Kokubun Shiryo Kankokai, 1978-79), 1:163. The episode involving the Gosechi dancer is mentioned in Genji okagami, an early Genji digest thought to date from the fourteenth century that contains all of the poems in the tale. The episode is not mentioned in all texts of Genji kokagami, the most widely circulating Genji digest for renga and zoaka poets, dating from the fourteenth century. 12. The phrase urazutai (across the bay, crossing the bay) occurs in the following poem by Genji in the “Akashi” chapter (2:226) and elsewhere: “How much further/My thoughts must travel/Now that I have moved/Across the once unknown bay/To one even further away.” (Haruka ni mo/Omoiyarti kana/Shirazarishi/Ura yori ochi ni/Urazutai shite.) Renga handbooks cite urazutai as a linking word. Heike contains the expression Suma yori akashi no urazutai (crossing the bay from Suma to Akashi; 1:338 and 2:226). 13. Takano Tatsuyuki, ed., N ihon kayo sh ilsei (Shunjusha, 1928), 5:44. “Musical Entertain­ ment” (“Seigaku kyo”), p. 167; “Boats” (“Fune”), p. 95. 14. Karen Brazell, “ ‘Blossoms’: A Medieval Song,” Journal o f Japanese Studies 6:2 (Summer 1980): 243-66. 15. Matsuoka, “ ‘Saikoku kudari’ oboegaki,” 7. 16. Terence Hawkes, Structuralism and Semiotics (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1977), 81. 17. Matsuoka, “ ‘Saikoku kudari’ oboegaki,” 7. 18. Yokomichi Mario and Omote Akira, Yokyoku shu, in NKBT 40:241-48. For a discussion of Tadanori, see Thomas Blenman Hare, 7 eam i’s Style: The Noh Plays o f Zeami Motokiyo (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1986), especially 189-90. M y translation of the pun on “hut” in Koya as “humble lodging” was inspired by Zeami's Style. 19. Sumiyoshi mode is located in Sanari Kentaro, Yokyoku taikan (Meiji Shoin, 1954), 1537—48. Translated in Goff, Noh Drama, 160-65. 20. Nogami ToyoichirO, ed., Kaichu Yokyoku zenshu, (Chuo Koronsha, 1971), 4:544. The waki's opening shidai is the same as the one in Hachinoki, while Sarugaku dangi notes that the rongi in Matsukaze had been moved from Toei. 21. Yokomichi and Omote, Yokyoku shu, 2:247. See Hare, Zeami's Style, 203—4. 22. Heike is also influenced by Genji monogatari. Sasaki Hachiro thinks that as Heike devel­ oped the influence of Genji became more pronounced; he cites yom i-m ono texts as

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an example. See his Heike monogatari no kenkyu (Waseda Daigaku Shuppanbu, 1948), 1:84. 23. The connection with Miidera is noted in Takemoto, “Rin’a ko,” 11, and elsewhere. A play of unknown authorship, M iidera is first mentioned in Zenchiku’s treatise Kabu zuino ki (1456). Ito Masayoshi, Yokyoku shu (Shinchosha, 1988), 3:468. Ito’s commen­ tary on the play (3:263-77) shows the extent to which the text overlaps with “Sai­ koku kudari.” 24. M y translation is based on the text in Omote and Kato, Zeami, Zenchiku, 228-29. “Fukuhara ochi” (Heike 2:114—17) states that the retreat from the capital was com­ pleted on the twenty-fifth day of the seventh month (autumn in the lunar calendar) in Juei 2 (1183). Seinan no rikyu (southern palace) refers to the Toba palace in Fushimi, in the southern part of Kyoto. The retreat of the Taira clan is described in “Ichimon no miyako ochi” (Heike 2:109-13). 25. Yamazaki y a , sekido no in ni tama no mikoshi o kakisuete, yawata no kata o, fushiogam i follows the wording in Heike (2:111) except for Otokoyama instead of Yawata no kata. Iwashimizu Hachiman Shrine, also known as Yawata, is located on Mount Otoko southwest of Kyoto. The sixteenth historical Japanese emperor, Ojin, who is alluded to below, was worshipped as the god of Hachiman Shrine. “Sekido residence” translates Sekido no in, official quarters at the Sekido barrier southwest of Kyoto. Yamazaki is prefaced in “Saikoku kudari” by miyako o hedatsuru, producing miyako o hedatsuru yama (separated by hills from the capital) and “Yamazaki.” 26. Mimosusogawa no soko sumite alludes to a poem in the twenty-first imperial anthology Shinshokukokinsbn (7:797): “In the divine wind/Clear are the waters/Of Mimosuso River,/Which flows eternally/Like our sovereign’s rule.” (Kamikaze ya/Mimosusogawa no/Soko sumite/Nagare hisashiki/Kimi ga miyo kana.) Mimosuso is another name for Suzuka River, which flows through the precinct of Ise Shrine, where Amaterasu, the divine progenitor of the imperial family, is enshrined. Sue o ukekumu onnagare ([the stream] that sprang from the same source) refers to Retired Emperor Go-Shirakawa (1127—92), who refused to accompany the child emperor Antoku and his entourage to the western provinces in 1183 (Heike 2:114). 27. Heike has izure no hi, izure no toki, kanarazu tachikaeru beshi to (some day, sometime, we will return [2:114]). The passage contains a conventional, untranslated association between kumo (clouds) in teito no kumo o fu m i (set foot in the [clouds of the] capital) and kokonoe (literally, “ninefold”) in kokonoe no tsuki o nagamen (gaze upon the moon [of the capital]). Kokonoe stands for the gate of the imperial palace and, by exten­ sion, Kyoto. 28. Akugyaku muto (evil and dishonor) suggests the excesses of Kiyomori, the head of the Taira clan and most powerful person in Japan in the 1160s and 1170s. Heike (1:241) glosses buto instead of muto. 29. Embedded in nani to nariyuku M inasegawa is a play on m i (station, lot) in Minasegawa (Minase River), producing nani to nariyuku m i (what would happen to them). A poetic place-name, Minase River is located in modern Osaka Prefecture. 30. Hitokuchi (devoured) alludes to episode 6 of the Heian classic Ise monogatari, which tells how a man abducted a lovely woman and took her to Akutagawa River, where they spent the night in a rundown dwelling. While he stood guard, quiver in hand, to ward off evil spirits, she suddenly disappeared, swallowed up (literally, “in a mouthful,” hitokuchi) by a demon, reducing the poor man to tears. In “Saikoku kudari,” Akutagawa (River of Mud) serves as a pivot word, producing oni hitokuchi no aku (demon opens its mouth) and Akutagawa (Akuta River). 31. Ina is located in southeastern Hyogo Prefecture. In izuku ni ina no ozasahara, ina suggests “go” (iku), producing “whither they are bound.” In hitoyo kari ne no yado

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■wa nashi, hitoyo (one night) suggests yo (bamboo node), echoing “bamboo grass” above. Kari ne (temporary [place to] sleep) implies “reap” (kart), which is convention­ ally associated with ashi (reeds). 32. In kakurete sumeru koya no ike, sumeru (clear) implies “live.” Koya, a pond near Ina, can also mean “hut.” 33. Kmvanami ni ukine seshi, tori wa inedomo ikanareba, m i o kagiri to wa nagekuran. A reference to the water bird and to the members of the Taira clan, ukine (literally, “sleeping wretchedly”) suggests ukine (crying wretchedly) and “drifting” (uku). The text alludes to poems connected with the maiden Unaiotome in book 9 of M an’yOshU and the narrativization of that story in the tenth-century Yamato monogatari (episode 147), about a maiden who was wooed by two suitors. Her parents decided that whichever man shot a bird floating on Ikuta River would win her hand; when both hit the bird at the same time, she threw herself into the river and drowned. The story formed the basis for an early Noh play Motomezuka (“The Sought-After Grave”). In inedomo ikanareba, inedomo (shot down) can also mean “sleep,” producing “what good did it do sleeping,” and “what good did it do shooting down the bird.” Ikuta was the site of fierce fighting between the Taira and Minamoto clans in 1184. 34. Sarasu kai naki nunobiki no taki alludes to a poem in the eleventh imperial anthology, Shokukokinshu (3:239), composed by Jusammi Yukiyoshi: “Upstream the waters/Are muddied by the rains/Of the fifth month:/At the Cloth-Pulling Waterfall,/Bleaching cloth does no good.” (Samidare ni/Mizu no minakami/Sumiyarade/Sarasu kai naki/ Nunobiki no taki.) Nunobiki (“Clothing-Pulling”) Waterfall is located upstream on Ikuta River. In oto tatete (literally, “create a sound”; translated as “resound”), tatete is linked by association with “cloud” (kumo). Nagaruramu (streaming clouds) suggests the waterfall, as well as the fleeing Taira. 35. The allusion to itsutebune, boats with five pairs of oars, is obscure. A major port in the middle ages, Muko Bay was located east of modern Kobe on the Inland Sea. 36. Kiyomori built new villas and government offices in Fukuhara (present-day Kobe), where he forced the young emperor Antoku and court nobles to move in 1180. After only a few months, however, the court returned to Kyoto. The night spent at Fuku­ hara in 1183 during the journey westward is recounted in “The Flight from Fuku­ hara” in Heike. 37. The couplet “An owl hoots . . . chrysanthemums” comes from a poem by Po Chii-i titled “The Haunted House” (Xiong-zhai shi). 38. Nagori mo nami kaze plays on na[mi] (no) and nami (waves), producing nagori mo nami (no trace) and nami kaze (translated as “wind and waves”). 39. “Child of fisherfolk without a fixed abode” (ama no ko . . . yado mo sadamezu) alludes to a poem in Wakan roeishu (no. 721): “On the strand/Where the cresting waves come in/I pass my life;/The child of fisherfolk,/! have no fixed abode.” (Shiranami no/Yosuru nagisa ni/Yo o sugusu/Ama no ko nareba/Yado mo sadamezu .) The Shinkokinshu version (18:1701) gives yo o tsukusu (I spend my life) in the third line. 40. lkkyo no shima (island home) presumably refers to Kyo no Shima, or Sutra Island, constructed by Kiyomori in the 1160s; see “Tsukushima” in chapter 6 of Heike (1:410-12). 41. Ukinami no yoru no (wretched waves approach) serves as a preface for tsuki (moon) through yoru, a homophone with “night.” 42. Lines 72 and 73, shusho o hajimetatematsuri, mina onfune ni mesarekeri , closely follows Heike (2:116). “His majesty” refers to the six-year-old emperor Antoku. In narauianu nami no ukimakura omoiyaru, uki- serves as a pivot word describing pillows floating (uki-) on the waves, and wretched (uki) pillows. 43. Kangs ni, tsuri no okina no sao no uta comes from the Chinese quatrain by Liang Zongyuan titled J ia n g xue:

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On a thousand mountains flights of birds have ceased, On ten thousand paths, men’s footsteps sink away. A lone boat, an old man in rainhat and raincoat Fishes alone in the snow on the cold river. Stephen Owen, trans., The Great Age o f Chinese Poetry: The High T a n g (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1981), 260. 44. Fuhan nami ni sakanobori, rosei wa tsuki o ugokasu: an apparent Chinese allusion. 45. Wada Cape, located in modern Kobe, is mentioned in Heike (1:415). 46. The setting for chapter 12 of Genji, which recounts the hero’s life in exile, Suma Bay also happened to be the scene of major fighting in 1184. The following allusions to the “Suma” chapter (2:190—99) are embedded in the passage: “wind in all directions” (yomo no arashi)\ “blowing past the barrier” (seki fukikoyuru); “smoke from what is known as brushwood smoulders in the hills behind” (ushiro no yam a no [keburi] shiba to iu mono fusuburu)-, and Yukihira no chunagon no seki fuk i koyuru to iikemu uranami (the waves that Middle Counselor Yukihira had spoken of in terms of blowing past the barrier). 47. The text alludes to a passage in “Suma” about the Gosechi maiden who stopped at Suma Bay with her family on their way back to Kyoto from Kyushu (Tsukushi), where her father had been in government service (GM 2:195-97). Koto no ne ni hikitomeraruru (11. 93-94) comes from a poem she sent to Genji from the boat. 48. Tsuki no Akashigata plays on tsuki no akashi (moonlight) and Akashigata (Akashi Bay). 49. “Sixty [years old]” (musoji) alludes to the Akashi lay priest (GM 2:228), whose daughter Genji meets and marries while in exile. When turbulent weather and strange omens occur, Genji moves from Suma to Akashi at the urging of the lay priest. Towazugatari (a voluntary disclosure or confession) occurs twice in the “Akashi” chapter: once when the Akashi lady’s father first tells Genji about her, and then when Genji con­ fesses to Murasaki about his relationship with the Akashi lady. 50. Suma ya Akashi no urazutai (crossing the bays of Suma and Akashi): see n. 12, above. 51. A poetic place-name, Takasago is located in Hyogo Prefecture. Nami mo takasago plays on taka[shi], producing nami mo taka[shi] (the waves are high) and “Takasago.” Taka­ sago is associated with the famed “pine on the knoll” (tmoe no matsu), that is, the pine of Onoe Shrine. The sequence continues onoe no matsu no hatsu arashi (the early autumn wind in the pine on the knoll), with hatsu (early [autumn]) suggesting ha (leaf, needle), thereby finking the preceding “pine on the knoll” (onoe no matsu). 52. A major port in the Inland Sea during the middle ages, Muro was famous for its courtesans. In Muro no tomari no tomayakata (the rush-thatched roofs of the boats in Muro Harbor), tomari (harbor) and tomaya (rush-thatched roofs) provide alliteration. Fushi (a section of bamboo and a song) echoes yo (world) in ukiyo (wretched world), a homophone with the word for “bamboo node.” 53. In narawanu tabi wa Ushi/mado (the unfamiliar journey causes misery), a play on ushi (wretched) in Ushimado produces tabi wa ushi (the journey is miserable) and Ushimado. 54. Tomo is written with a character denoting an “archer’s protective wrist band,” hence the apparently obscure association. “Hearths” is embedded in Kamado (literally, “Hearth”), a place-name in Kyushu. Seki (barrier) and yum eji (the path of dreams) are conventionally associated with sasou (beckons to) below. 55. Lines 122-28 are almost identical to ones in the Noh play Miidera, discussed at the end of the essay above. “Faint” (honoka) also suggests “flames” (ho). 56. Kajimakura, katashiktt sodeya shioruran echoes “Ochi ashi” in Heike (2:226), which says Suma yori Akashi no urazutai, tomari sadamenu kajimakura, katashiku sode mo shioretsutsu (Crossing the bay from Suma to Akashi: the sleeves, spread alone, must be wilted on a pillow at night during a sea journey without a fixed mooring).

A Separate Piece: Proprietary Claims and Intertextuality in the Rokujo Plays T h o m a s H are

One of the first things one comes upon in discussions of Noh theater, whether in Japanese or Western languages, is acknowledgment of the debt Noh owes to texts of the antecedent literary and intellectual tradi­ tion. It would be difficult to find a Noh among the several thousand extant playscripts that does not quote or somehow otherwise make use of Chinese or Japanese legends, poems, or religious texts. But the atti­ tude toward this “borrowing” has varied radically in the last century. At one time Noh was characterized pejoratively as a mere patchwork of old commonplaces and verses, a derivative and parasitic form that had little cultural value and hardly merited serious intellectual consideration. This attitude no longer holds sway, and most recent discussion of Noh has been less eager to make qualitative assessments—even of individual plays, much less the entire repertory—based on the simple fact that Noh shares its language with other texts. The relation between the texts of Noh and other texts, however, continues to hold great interest. Most often, studies of this relation fall into the category of the “influence of x on Noh,” or “allusions to y in such-and-such a Noh play.” Without wishing to denigrate such ap­ proaches, I think it is, all the same, worth pointing out that they tend to assume a one-way relation between the text in question and the Noh under study. In a strictly diachronic sense, this may well be the case, but questions of purely historical influence may obscure other issues central to the act of reading (or seeing the performance of) a play and thereby mislead us regarding the participatory character of textual rela­ tions, the way in which one text is not just derivative of another, but repre­ sents, in fact, a new reading of the earlier text, a new participation in it. “The text is a tissue of quotations drawn from the innumerable centers of culture,” says Roland Barthes, there is one place where this multiplicity is focused and that place is the reader, not, as was hitherto said, the author. The

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reader is the space on which all the quotations that make up a writing are inscribed. . . . A text’s unity lies not in its origin but in its destination.1 W e may, in talking of Noh, want to replace the word “reader” with “viewer,” or “spectator,” but with that small change, Barthes’s observations are highly relevant and suggest the approach to be taken in this paper. We can find further specificity, and a helpful discussion of the term “intertextuality” in the following passage from an essay by Barbara Johnson about reading Mallarme: Contemporary discussions of intertextuality can be distin­ guished from “source” studies in that the latter speak in terms of a transfer of property (“borrowing”) while the former tend to speak in terms of misreading or infiltration, that is, of viola­ tions of property. Whether such violations occur in the oedipal rivalry between a specific text and its precursor . . . or whether they inhere in the immersion of any text in the history of its language and literature . . . , “intertextuality” designates the multitude of ways a text has of not being self-contained, of being traversed by otherness.. . . The integrity and intentional self-identity of the individual text are put in question in ways that have nothing to do with the concepts of originality and derivativeness, since the very notion of a self-contained literary “property” is shown to be an illusion. When read in its dy­ namic intertextuality, the text becomes differently energized, traversed by forces and desires that are invisible or unreadable to those who see it as an independent, homogeneous message unit, a totalizable collection of signifieds.2 Seen from this perspective, the text seems to weave a web of ques­ tions about the “proper,” and its cognates: W hat can be considered the “proper” understanding of a text? In what sense can language be consid­ ered property? In what sense does one make a text one’s own (in French, propre) in alluding to it or in reading it? How does the appropriation of a text influence the meaning one constructs in it? How does the textual environment, the proximity of other texts, influence meaning? (Note here the Latin prope = “near.”) Indeed, since we are dealing with drama here, how do dramatic props interact with dramatic texts? The plays Aoi no Ue and Nonomiya offer fertile ground for the exploration of some of these questions. They are exemplary works, both in the sense that they are highly regarded by actors, audiences, and critics and in the sense that they are representative or typical of many of the forms and conventions of Noh in a more general sense. Both

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plays are frequently performed today and they have been so since the fifteenth century.3 Both are readily available in well-annotated Japanese texts and translations into Western languages. Among all the plays still performed that treat episodes from Genji monogatari, they alone share Rokujo no miyasudokoro, “Lady Rokujo,” as shite. Kosai Tsutomu has pointed out that, for all these similarities, the two plays sometimes seem to stand as each other’s opposites: It almost seems that [Lady Rokujo] had been depicted as a baddie in Aoi no Ue, so in order to make amends, Nonomiya was constructed to depict her as a goodie. But even when you take into account formal generic differences—the one play is focussed on the dramatic present whereas the other centers on the past—the discrepancy between them remains too great. In Aoi no Ue, the source materials have been turned inside out: the malign spirit that had been placed in the shadows [in Genji monogatari] is pushed to the fore as the center of the play, a shamaness and exorcist are created out of nowhere, not a single word of the original tale is quoted, and the play is given an independent existence quite apart from its source through the author’s ingenuity. Nonomiya, on the contrary, follows the orig­ inal story faithfully down to the smallest details in wording; the author represses any trace of self-assertion, and ultimately the work relies wholly on its source, never quite establishing an independent identity.4 W e need not agree in every detail with Kosai to recognize that there is much good sense in what he says. And in particular, in reference to the intertextuality of these plays, we should note his observation that “not a single word of the original tale is quoted” in Aoi no Ue, whereas Nonomiya “follows the original story faithfully down to the smallest de­ tails in wording.” The degree of reliance on the monumental Genji has been a continuing concern of those who have written about these plays, and it engages us here in a consideration of these texts as reflections, recontextualizations, imitations, or, if you wish, counterfeits of other texts. The general outline of the story treated in Aoi no Ue and Nonomiya will already be familiar to many readers, but we will rehearse it briefly here. A royal prince has been removed from the imperial line and given the commoner surname “Genji” because of political intrigue in the imperial palace. He has been married to the daughter of the senior minister in the civil administration, Lady

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Aoi, but he finds her cold and intimidating, and spends little time with her, preferring instead the company of other ladies of various social circumstances. One of the most compelling of these is Lady Rokujo, the widow of a former crown prince, a woman of extraordinary elegance and sophistication . . . and deadly jealousy. Genji has heard rumors of Lady Rokujo’s beauty and grace and sought her out. She conceives an obsessive and tormented love for him, but Genji is not content to limit his extramarital entanglements to Lady Rokujo, and leaves her in lonely soli­ tude for months at a time while pursuing other women. Genji’s father the emperor has in the meanwhile decided to abdicate in favor of his son, Genji’s elder half-brother, and in accordance with tradition, he has appointed a vestal to the Ise shrine; the girl is Rokujo’s daughter by the late crown prince. Rokujo now contemplates the prospect of a life in the capital neglected by Genji and deprived of her daughter, and seriously considers taking the unprecedented step of accompa­ nying the young girl on the long journey east to Ise. In the hope that she might find some temporary diversion from this sadness, she sets out one day to see a grand ceremo­ nial procession in the northern part of the capital. She does not wish for her party to be recognized and is careful that they travel in unobtrusive carriages. Her few attendants draw up along the parade route and station her carriages in a place where she can watch the proceedings. Genji’s wife, Lady Aoi, now pregnant, has no great desire to attend the festivities herself, but her ladies-in-waiting con­ vince her to make the excursion at the last moment. When her carriage finally arrives, all the good places along the route have been taken. Her drunken footmen catch sight of two modest carriages occupying a good place—Lady Rokujo’s carriages as it happens—and decide to push them out of the way to make room for their own lady. In the process, Rokujo’s carriages are damaged and, worse still, she is recognized by some in Lady Aoi’s party. The humiliation is unbearable. As the months pass and Lady Aoi comes closer to giving birth it is apparent that she has fallen prey to supernatural forces. Exorcisms are performed, but one tenacious and malev­ olent spirit refuses to withdraw. Her condition becomes more and more serious, and she goes into early labor. The presence of the spirit overwhelms Lady Aoi and she seems close to death. As Genji sits with her, she speaks to him with a voice not her

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own, the voice of Lady Rokujo. Genji is aghast, but even as he struggles to regain his composure, Aoi is delivered of a healthy baby boy, and her condition seems to improve. Genji remains close to her side for the first days of her convalescence but eventually leaves to make an appearance at court. W hile he is away, Aoi is seized with another fit and dies. Rumors implicating Lady Rokujo in the death circulate in the capital, and she, always intensely concerned about her reputation, is in despair. She has her own reasons to suspect that her jealousy has played a part in the affair, and is particu­ larly troubled that the smell of burnt poppyseeds hangs about her no matter how many times she changes her clothes— poppyseeds were always burned at exorcisms. These events de­ cide Lady Rokujo. She will indeed accompany her daughter to Ise and turn her back upon the sorrow and humiliation of life in the capital. Before her daughter can take up the position at Ise, however, she must, in accordance with custom, retreat to the precincts of a “Shrine upon the Fields” (nonomiya) in Saga to the west of the city. Rokujo accompanies her there, and it is there that Genji one day makes his way to say his goodbyes before her long absence from the capital. Aoi no Ue and Nonomiya share much of this story, although the former play ends with the episode of the spirit possession, whereas the latter only vaguely acknowledges that incident, concentrating instead upon the scene at the Shrine upon the Fields. Both plays refer to the struggle to find a place to station Lady Aoi’s and Lady Rokujo’s carriages. The relation between the text (as opposed to the general story) of Genji m onogatari and the two plays is, however, very different. Aoi no Ue uses the story but barely any of the words of the text while Nonomiya maintains a close relation to the specific language of the Aobyoshibon recension of Genji m onogatari} Omote Akira and Yokomichi Mario have in some degree shown the extent of this debt by reproducing relevant parts of the “Sakaki” (“Sacred Tree”) chapter of Genji monogatari, un­ derlining the specific phrases that find their way into Nonomiya. I will follow their lead here, adding a translation: tsuraki mono ni omoihatetamainamu mo itoshiku. . . . Nono­ miya ni mode tamau. Nagazuki nanoka bakari nareba . . . harukeki nobe wo wakeiritamau yori ito monoaware nari. Aki no hana mina otoroetsutsu asaiigahara mo karegare naru mushi no ne ni matsukaze sugoku fukiawasete sono koto to mo

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kikiwakarenu hodo ni mono no nedomo taedae kikoetaru ito emu nari. . . . mono hakanage naru koshibagaki wo ogaki nite itayadomo atari atari ito karisome nari. Kurogi no toriidomo wa sasuga ni kogoshu miewatasarete . . . hitakiya kasuka ni hikarite . . . tsukigoro no tsumori wo tsukizukishu kikoetamawamu mo mabayuki hodo ni narinikereba sakaki wo isasaka orite motamaerikeru wo sashiirete kawaranu iro wo shirube nite koso igaki mo koehaberinikere, sa mo kokorouku to kikoetamaeba, kamigaki wa shirushi no sugi mo naki mono wo ika ni magaete oreru sakaki zo to kikoetamaeba . . .6 he did not want the lady [to go off| thinking him com­ pletely heardess . . . He [gathered his resolve and] set off for the shrine. It was on about the seventh of the Ninth Month. It was over a reed plain of melancholy beauty that he made his way to the shrine. The autumn flowers were gone and insects hummed in the wintry tangles. A wind whisding through the pines brought snatches of music to most wonderful effect, though so distant that he could not tell what was being played. . . . A low wattle fence, scarcely more than a suggestion of an enclosure, surrounded a complex of board-roofed build­ ings, as rough and insubstantial as temporary shelters. The shrine gates, of unfinished logs, had a grand and awe­ some dignity for all their simplicity, . . . The fire lodge glowed faintly. . . . Not wishing to apologize for all the weeks of neglect, he pushed a branch of the sacred tree in under the blinds. “W ith heart unchanging as this evergreen, This sacred tree, I enter the sacred gate.” She replied: “You err with your sacred tree and sacred gate. No beckoning cedars stand before my house.”7 The underlined passages do not necessarily appear in close proxim­ ity in the text of Nonomiya. Several of them are to be found in the central narrative passage in the play (the kuse), but others come earlier in the play, in the waki’s first song8 and in the interchange between the shite and wak? and die song that follows it.10 As Yokomichi and Omote put it, “[the quotations] are skillfully woven into the Noh text in such a manner that they do not seem to be a direct quotation from the original.”11

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Nor does this exhaust the text that Nonomiya shares with Genji monogatari. A bit later in the “Sakaki” chapter, we find another passage that again underscores the intertextual nature of Nonomiya-. juroku nichi Katsuragawa nite onharae shitamau . . . kakemaku mo kashikoki omae ni tote yu ni tsukete . . . sakaki ni sashite, furisutete kyo wa yuku to mo Suzukagawa yasose no nami ni sode wa nureji ya . . . mata no hi, seki no anata yori zo onkaeshi aru. Suzukagawa yasose no nami ni nurenurezu Ise made tare ka omoiokosemu.12 On the sixteenth there was a lustration at the Katsura River. . . . he sent only a note tied with a ritual cord. “To her whom it would be blasphemy to address in person,” he wrote on the envelope.. . . [Genji sent out a poem] attached to a sacred branch: “You throw me off; but will they not wet your sleeves, The eighty waves of the river Suzuka?” . .. her answer . . . came the next morning from beyond Osaka Gate. “And who will watch us all the wav to Ise, To see if those eighty waves have done their work?”13 The underlined phrases appear near the end of the kuse where they are joined with yet another quotation from “Sakaki,” this time of a phrase from the first few lines of the chapter.14 A curious thing has happened here, however, something that complicates the intertextual relationship, as we shall see after quoting the passage in question from Nonomiya-. Sono nochi Katsura no onharai shiraiu kakete kawanami no mi wa ukikusa no yorube naki kokoro no mizu ni sasowarete yukue mo Suzukagawa yasose no nami ni nurenurezu Ise made tare ka omowan no koto no haha soiyuku koto mo tameshi naki mono wo oya to ko no Take no miyakoji ni omomukishi kokoro koso urami narikere.15 After that, the Katsura lustration. Sacred branches bound in sacred cords.

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Cast away on the river waves, I am myself a floating weed, no shore to shelter on, my heart drifts off upon the current, “Down the Suzukagawa, all the way to Ise, who could have a thought for me, drenched by river waves or not?” These, the words of a mother in her daughter’s train— no precedent for this— they traced the road to Take palace: my heart was bitterness. Some of the changes that have taken place in the “Sakaki” text as it has been used in Nonomiya are minor. Different orthographic conven­ tions and diachronic phonetic changes can be observed (barae, for exam­ ple, becomes harat), and in some cases, perhaps for metrical reasons, synonymns have been interchanged (yu has appeared as shiraiu). Other changes are more significant. Part of a famous poem has, for instance, been interpolated between the passages shared with “Sakaki”: Fun’ya no Yasuhide ga Mikawa no jo ni narite agatami ni wa eidetataji ya to iiyarerikeru kaerigoto ni yomeru, Wabinureba Mi wo ukikusa no Ne wo taete Sasou mizu araba Inamu to zo omou. Ono no Komachi, KKS 938 In response to an invitation to come along and see his new posting, from Fun’ya no Yasuhide, recently named to thirdranking official position in Mikawa, Borne upon these waves of sorrow, I’m a floating weed myself, If the current took me Cutting free these roots I’d surely drift away. Ito Masayoshi and others have also demonstrated convincingly that in this and many other passages in Nonomiya, not to mention other plays in the Noh repertory, the intertextual relation to Genji m onogatari is neither direct nor exclusive. That is to say, the author of Nonomiya, although obviously familiar with the Genji m onogatari text, was also draw­ ing on medieval transformations of it, participating thereby in a highly articulated system of discourse about Genji m onogatari that Noh shares

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with the art of linked verse, renga. In the case of this particular passage, Ito notes that the words oya to ko no, in leading to take, exemplify a pattern also to be found in the renga handbook, Renga tsukeai no koto. Similarly, Miyako, Take, and Ise are part of a lexical category mentioned in another renga handbook, Renju gappekishu.16 A yet more striking example occurs earlier in the play, during the exchange between the waki and shite, and the chorus’s first song: Waki: Shite: Waki: Chorus:

Mori no shitamichi aki kurete Momiji katsu chiri Asajigahara mo Uragare no Kusaba ni aruru Nonomiya no Kusaba ni aruru Nonomiya no Ato natsukashiki koko ni shi mo Sono nagazuki no nanuka no hi mo Kyo ni megurikinikeri Mono hakanashi ya koshibagaki Ito karisome no onsumai Ima mo hitakiya no kasuka naru Hikari wa waga omoi uchi ni am Iro ya hoka ni mietsuran Ara sabishi miyadokoro Ara sabishi kono miyadokoro.17

Waki: Shite: Waki: Choms:

Autumn deepens on the path beneath the wood, Red leaves scatter here, And there, a plain of bmsh bamboo, Deadened with the biting frost, Sere and faded grasses isolate the Shrine upon the Fields Sere and faded grasses isolate the Shrine upon the Fields Vestiges of a waning season, sad reminders of what’s gone, The seventh day of this Long Month at autumn’s close, W hat—the very day’s come round again, A bmshwood fence, fragility itself, A momentary residence . . . Even now the guardsfire sheds glow dimly The light’s inside M y thoughts, no doubt, made manifest outside: Oh, these halls are lonely. Oh, these halls are lonely.

All the underlined words belong to the category, “the essence of the end of late autumn” in Renju gappekishu ,18 In this, they show how

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classical texts like Genji monogatari played a generative role for other literary and dramatic texts, and how that role was often mediated by still other texts, like the renga handbooks mentioned above. As Ito explains, Noh texts share an expressive base with waka and renga. In the case of the linking techniques of renga, in particular, a body of rules regarding expression was created that, even as it was founded upon a wide field of knowledge and folklore— ranging over the standard language of waka, to classical narra­ tives, Buddhist scriptures, and Chinese poetry—made possible a certain independence from these sources. The reason I have made frequent reference to renga handbooks like Renju gappe­ kishu, and so on, in the headnotes to [the Shinchosha edition of Noh plays] is not because the language of Noh texts was dependent on these but rather in consideration of the common conventions Noh shares with them in terms of invention, asso­ ciation, and expression, and because there are many cases in which Noh plays do not maintain a direct relation to their classical sources. Though based in these sources, they open up upon a new expressive world independently.19 This is a valuable insight into the mechanics underlying Noh texts, and in many cases it provides an explanation of divergences in treatment between the way a given Noh play may handle an earlier source and the understanding contemporary criticism brings to that source. It is important, all the same, to draw a distinction here between the type of intertextuality we see between Nonomiya and Genji monogatari and that which has been demonstrated to us by Ito and others between Nonomiya and works like Renju gappekishu. A competent reading or viewing of Nonomiya requires some conscious association between the play and the story of Lady Rokujo in Genji monogatari-, it is far less significant to make the association between Nonomiya and Renju gappekishu. W hat about Aoi no Ue in this regard? Its “partnership” with renga via the handbooks we have cited in our discussion of Nonomiya is much weaker—Ito points to only one example. Indeed, it seems to share very little of the “expressive base” we have seen in the other play. And as Kosai pointed out above, “not a single word of the original tale is quoted” in Aoi no Ue, whereas Nonomiya “follows the original story faithfully down to the smallest details in wording.” It might be easy to assume, then, that Aoi no Ue is the product of a less literate age—it is after all, about a half century older than Nono­ m iya .20 But that would prove too hasty an assumption since the text of Aoi no Ue, too, is richly allusive, and, indeed, participates in, if anything,

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a broader intertextual web than Nonomiya. The latter play may be more “faithful” to the text of Genji m onogatari, but the intertextual relations of Aoi no Ue include not only a more wide-ranging selection of allusions to waka and waka poetics, but also several quotations of Chinese verse and an array of linkages to Buddhist texts. Various commentators have also suggested allusions to exalted classics like Man'yoshu, Kokinshu, Shinkokinshu, and Wakan roeishu. But most of the waka in prominent places in Aoi no Ue are from less canonical sources such as Rakusho roken, Shoshin kanseidan (1237), Tauezoshi, and the Yamabushi kagura piece enti­ tled “Bangaku no mikoma.” One might also cite nonpoetic sources, especially Buddhist scriptures like Vimalaklrti-nirdesa, Rokudo koshiki, Daisho Fudomyoo konbaku hiho, Shogun ’6 Fudomyoo shijuhasshisha himitsujoju giki, and Daishogonron. Even the Sino-Japanese (mis)transcription of a Sanskrit dharanl finds a place in Aoi no Ue. Most of these allusions seem to me to have rather fleeting significance in the play (that is not the case with its intertextual collaboration with the Lotus Sutra, which we will touch on later). Now, however, we are in a position to consider some of the critical ramifications of the intertextuality we have examined. The considerable effort expended in tracing the textual “pedigree” of Nonomiya and Aoi no ue has been used for a wide variety of purposes. Some people have viewed the diversity of sources in Aoi no ue as the result of a kind of intertextual promiscuity, whereas Nonomiya has been regarded as the faithful consort of its classical source. Faithfulness to Genji pedigree has been linked to remarks about the fulfillment of dra­ matic potential, the artistic quality of the plays, and attribution, some­ times with well-reasoned, historically based observations about patronage and sometimes with no small taint of snobbishness. On the other hand, the discovery of renga's filiality to Noh has resulted in some unusual reevaluations of certain famous Noh plays (and their reputed authors). Some scholars have taken an odd delight in this discovery as if somehow they had debunked a long held superstition, or killed a sacred cow. A play is presumed less interesting or serious, simply because its relation to Genji monogatari is shown to be, at least in part, mediated by other forms of cultural discourse. This charge is related ideologically to the old-fashioned notion mentioned earlier, that Noh texts were derivative and parasitic, a mere patchwork of old common­ places and verses. Such views may have ties to Romantic notions of creativity and nineteenth-century Western philology. In any case, we can see here a new kink in the exercise of proprietary interest in the plays. Now the texts are subordinated to scholarly interest and professed objectivity. In uncovering the putative origins of a given text in yet other texts (especially popular texts), the scholar stakes his own claim upon them in evaluative dominion.

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This approach in its grosser manifestations has been largely discred­ ited, and the intertextual diversity of Noh today is generally appreciated for the renewed sense of the vitality of Muromachi culture that it gives us, but now, claims to diversity are sometimes related to nativistdc and nationalistic claims that are ridiculous in their own new way. One of the oddest examples of this I have found weds the discovery of Nonomiya's intertextual relations with renga handbooks to the ideology of “Japan the Unique” to “prove” how advanced the writers of Noh were in com­ parison with their supposedly intertextually naive Western counterparts: The meta-level sensibility apparent in Noh and renga reveals . .. the appearance of a modern spirit and historical sensibility attempting to interact freely with history. European drama had to wait until the twentieth century to attain the kind of meta­ level sensibility whereby one might travel freely in and out of the bounds of the story itself. The reason it is necessary for us to reread Noh, not as a performing art of the middle ages, but as a contemporary text, is that our own historical sensibility is alive there.21 W e might wish this writer a better reader of, for example, Shake­ speare or Racine or Euripides, but his failings extend even beyond his lack of familiarity with non-Japanese drama to a basic naivete about the prevalence of intertextuality. Fortunately, most work in this area has not been so blind. The question of proprietary interest in Noh has a relevance beyond questions of reading and the relations of one text with other texts be­ cause Noh is drama, and especially because it is drama with a sixhundred-year history of unparalleled continuity and consistency. Conse­ quently, in the case of Noh, it is well worth considering not only the proprietary relations of text to text, but also those of text and author with performance and actor. In this area as well, the Rokujo plays offer certain insights that may have a broader application. Take, for example, the performance history of Aoi no Ue and the tentative attributions that have been made for the play. Zeami’s artistic memoir, Sarugaku dangi, mentions a performance of the play by one of his major rivals, Inuo Doami: In Aoi no Ue, riding out in the carriage, he wore a very long robe lined with willow green, and with Iwamatsu in the part of the attendant, he clung to the carriage shafts, singing from the hashigakari in a full and flowing voice: Mitsu no kuruma ni nori no michi, kwataku no kado wo ya idenuran,

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Yugao no yado no yareguruma yarn kata na. [Riding in three carriages down the road of the True Law, W ill she, in the end, pass through the gateway of the burning house? Abandoned here beside these lodgings covered over in moonflowers, A broken carriage, nothing to be done.] As the cart moved on, he sang the shidai. Ukiyo wa ushi no oguruma no, ukiyo wa ushi no oguruma no, meguru ya. [An ox-drawn carriage in this dreary world, An ox-drawn carriage in this dreary world, Round it goes.] He chanted the syllables ma no of kuruma no at high pitch and brought the song to cadence with stomps of the feet. In the latter half of the play, he took the role of the evil spirit. (The priest was played by Toyo.) During the exorcism, he looked back at [the priest] and adjusted his robe; the effect was abso­ lutely indescribable.22 Like other passages in Sarugaku dangi, this is tantalizingly concrete, while at the same time so brief and so tied to contemporary performance practice as to be bewildering. (What, exactly, was so enthralling about looking back at another actor and adjusting a robe?) It is the oldest extant record of a performance of Aoi no Ue. In relation to our present concern, the passage has been used to suggest a proprietary relation between the play and the actor, Doami. The argument offered suggests that Doami, as first recorded performer of the play, must have had an important role in creating it, and that Zeami couldn’t have written it (as Tokugawa-period playlists assert) because Doami would not have performed a play written by his junior and rival of the Yuzaki troupe— this, in spite of Zeami’s own claim (in Go on) to have written the very lines quoted first in the passage. This involves us in the complicated issues surrounding attribution in medieval Japan, at the heart of which is the notion of property, and our projection of ownership of the play to the historical figure of Zeami, or Doami, or whomever we may find a more plausible character. Some claim to have no interest in such

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problems, but such claims themselves become engaged with the issue of proprietary claims usually as a counter, a denial of proprietary rights to a historical author to the advantage of proprietary interpretive claims by the modern critic. But there is a further complication. The fact that these are dramas, and dramas with a highly conventionalized and commodified perfor­ mance canon, means that they become the property of acting guilds too. How each play is to be done within the performance canon of each particular school is yet another field for the assertion of proprietary rights. A Meiji-period flute-school treatise, Chino no tsumigusa, exercises its claims in the following manner: In Aoi no Ue, before the shite of the first act leaves the stage, where the text speaks of fireflies above the marsh, one is to tip the mask from left to right, but there are those who jerk it back and forth violently. This is calculated pandering to the audience, just the sort of thing [Kabuki] actors do with wideeyed exaggeration. It is not appropriate. M oreover,. . . these fireflies above the marsh are, like the “fireflies that fly in a chaos of tiny lights” in the play Kakitsuhata, purely a matter of the imagination—a person who makes it his profession to pan­ der to the audience cannot understand the true sense of yu gen that such a passage promises.23 This passage, with its disparaging reference to (Kabuki) actors, illus­ trates the social difference perceived at the time between Noh and its younger theatrical cousin. It also becomes a test for the evaluation of an actor’s understanding and mastery of the play. The actor who plays the role too literally shows a lack of understanding coming from the vulgar desire to appeal to his audience. More preferable, in the above writer’s eyes, would be a conscious restraint not only demonstrating the actor’s understanding of the “true sense of yu gen ” in the passage but also clearly differentiating his art from Kabuki, proving the one more “symbolic,” “elegant,” or “abstract,” the other more “direct,” “color­ ful,” or “lively.” By the time this passage was written, Noh had long since been appropriated by the ruling samurai class as the ritual music of the Tokugawa Bakufu. W e find, however, a passage with apparendy similar aims, in the mid-sixteenth-century treatise, Zenpo zodan, this time discussing the performance of Nonomiya: In Nonomiya, where it says, “for whom do I pine, to the cries of the pine crickets . . . i n that place Okura Dayu perks up his ears to listen, something that the renga poet Soseki says would not be done in the vocation of poetry. Since the Shrine

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upon the Fields [where the play is set] is deeply overgrown with autumn grasses, a great many pine crickets must be there, crying away, so wouldn’t one simply listen to them without making any particular effort? In the dance where one brushes away the dew, shouldn’t he brush it away only there in front of himself? If [the text] read, “dew on the brushwood fence,” then it would be a matter of brushing dew off of a fence. What it says is “So fragile to look at, the little brushwood fence. Brushing away the dew, . . . ” so no matter where you brush, there must still be plenty of dew. If the cuckoo lets out a single song to the clouds on high, that’s when you prick up your ears to listen. That is why they say the cuckoo cries forth to ardent expectation. Now, if the crickets I mentioned at Nonomiya were just one or two crying out faindy, then you might prick up your ears to listen.24 This anecdote shows sensitivity in reading the playtext, and its aes­ thetic judgments again reveal the kind of marking out of territory we witnessed in the earlier passage. The aesthetics of Noh are assimilated to those of poetry—note the citation of the renga poet Soseki as the authority for a strategy of performance, and the discussion of the cuckoo (,hototogisu) as treated according to the poetics of waka. The passage clearly reveals the assiduous (and eventually quite successful) efforts of Noh actors to identify themselves with the high culture of Japan, to lay a claim to the elite tradition. The tradition itself becomes a commodity, and the exercise of the profession of Noh actor enables one to cash in on it, to own a piece. The other side of the coin shows a darker face. In these attempts to exercise a proprietary interest on the performance of the play, there is also an attempt to discredit the interest of someone else, Okura Dayu in the second quotation, and those who “pander to the audience” in the first. Critical pluralism is not a hallmark of traditional commentary on Noh, and within the context of the acting schools it is almost unheardof. The ideological dominance of a performative canon may have be­ queathed to the twentieth century a remarkably well-preserved facsimile of seventeenth-century (and in some cases earlier) performance styles, but it has also undeniably limited the development of Noh and effec­ tively killed off all but the most circumspect creative initiative. Let us not, however, deceive ourselves in taking a too critical view of the proprietary strategies of previous readers and actors. W e too are snared by territorial claims upon the play. Our efforts, too, are an at­ tempt to make the plays our own, however disinterested we may feign to be. The textual destination is forever changing, and our engagement

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with the text is an appropriation of it to our own experience. Inasmuch as we engage Aoi no Ue and Nonomiya as readers or attentive viewers, we are also engaging Genji monogatari, the Lotus Sutra, and the other texts in that web from which the two Noh construct their meaning. Very early on in Nonomiya, there is a disarmingly appropriate statement to this effect. The waki has arrived at his physical destination and is taking stock of the site of the Shrine upon the Fields: Ware kono mori ni kite mireba, kurogi no torii, koshibagaki, mukashi ni kawaranu arisam aP Coming to this wood I see a torii of rough-hewn logs, a small brushwood fence—a sight no different fro m the distant past [my emphasis]. Like one of the emperors in a Man'yo “land-viewing” (kunimi) poem, the waki here takes possession of the site by looking at it, and he takes a further step in the self-conscious assertion that what he sees is “no different from the distant past.” Such a reading strews rich ironies across the scene. The immediately preceding passage—the first song in the play—suggests strongly that the waki has never been to the Shrine upon the Fields before, so there is no reason to imagine that he is in any position to judge whether it is different from what it may have been in the distant past. No reason, that is, other than his reliance on the text of the place: kurogi no torii, koshibagaki, “a torii of rough-hewn logs [and] a small brushwood fence,” a text engendered by Genji monogatari and “certified,” as it were, by an entry in the renga handbook Renju gappekishu: Nonomiya to araba . . . aki no kusa, asajigahara . . . koshi­ bagaki . . . kurogi no torii, sakaki . . . hitakiya . . . Nagazuki, Saga no yama.26 If [the reference is to] Nonomiya, [follow with] . . . autumn grasses, a plain of brush bamboo . . . a small brushwood fence . . . a torii of rough-hewn logs, plume grass . . . guardsfire sheds . . . long month [the ninth lunar month], the hills of Saga. Still more significant is the discrepancy between the waki’s assertion and the feelings of the shite, for whom the very problem is that the past has changed irrevocably. The brief time when she had Genji to herself is never to be recaptured, thus the agony that pursues her through this play (and through the narrative of Genji m onogatari proper).

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This finds concrete, albeit fragile, representation in a Shinto shrine gate (;torii) with sections of brushwood fence on each side. This, the only large prop used in the play, is placed at center stage just before the play begins (in full view of the assembled audience). The fence marks off a division between the sacred precinct of the shrine and the secular world outside, but it is the torii that draws attention. If the fence divides, the gate undoes the division; a banal observation, to be sure, but, the play is, after all, about just such a difference, the construction of a subject within the bounds of difference. If “subject” is construed thematically, then the question becomes, W hat are the bounds of Rokujo’s person, and how is her person constituted in the transgression of those bounds? If the subject is, rather, the critic-reader-viewer, then the question is, What are the bounds of the experience of the play: how does it revise Aoi no Ue, Genji monogatari, and the “Parable of the Burning House” from the Lotus Sutra?21 Posit an ontological subject and the question reaches further still: What, indeed, are the bounds of salvation; who is inside and who outside? W e have postponed a discussion of the Parable of the Burning House, but the image of the torii on stage provides a good opportunity to open that discussion because that concrete representation of a gate on stage draws our attention to a remarkable departure from convention in the text of Nonomiya. The final words of the play are kwataku no kado, and they are remarkable on several levels. First of all, it is highly unusual to find a final nominal (taigendome) at the end of a Noh play. In other ways (for reasons I cannot go into here), Nonomiya lines up extraordinarily closely with the orthodox formal structure of a katsuramono like Zeami’s Izutsu.2S But, whereas Izutsu ends with a sentence-final verb termination that echoes the thematic closure achieved in the last act of that play, Nonomiya comes to rest on the gate of the burning house, an image from the Lotus Sutra with textual ante­ cedents earlier in this play and, interestingly, in Aoi no Ue as well. Now, Aoi no Ue ends quite explicitly with the release of the shite from her torments: Dokuju no koe wo kiku toki wa, Dokuju no koe wo kiku toki wa, Akki kokoro o yawarage, Ninniku jihi no sugata nite, Bosat’n mo koko ni raiko su, Jobuttokudat’n no, Mi to nariyuku zo arigataki. Arthur W aley translates the lines as follows,

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When she heard the sound of Scripture The demon’s raging heart was stilled; Shapes of Pity and Sufferance, The Bodhisats descend. Her soul casts off its bonds, She walks in Buddha’s W ay.29 But Nonomiya avoids the kind of closure that would release its shite to another incarnation or to enlightenment and concentrates on the image of the gate of the burning house, finding whatever formal closure it achieves in cyclicality, a return to and reemphasis upon the dilemma the shite has faced all along. (All along, indeed, from Aoi no Ue, for the line is an exact quotation from the shite’s entrance in that earlier play: kwataku no kado o y a idenuran, “W ill she, in the end, pass through the gateway of the burning house?” From this perspective, we must of course reread the ending of Aoi no Ue, and reread as well the “Parable of Burning House” from the Lotus Sutra. Now, the notion of escape from the burning house to the one great vehicle of Mahayana Buddhist enlightenment is overwhelmed by the idea of inescapability. The shite tries unsuccessfully to step through the torii on stage, drawing her foot back inside its bounds, and thus reading the famous parable in the Lotus Sutra in the light of Genji monogatari, where boundaries are always a problem for Rokujo. In Genji, Lady Rokujo is unable to contain Prince Genji within the bounds of her emotional domination. More important still, she is unable to keep herself within the bounds of her own body. The tragedies she unwittingly precipitates in the novel result from an inability to—liter­ ally—contain her jealousy. It becomes incarnate as an ikiryo and takes flight to torment Ladies Yugao, Aoi, Murasaki, and so on. Although there is no mention of the malevolence lurking in Rokujo’s jealousy in Nonomiya, this problem of the transgression of boundaries is evident even from the very entrance of the shite: Kokoro no iro wa onozukara Chigusa no hana ni utsuroite Otororu mi no narai kana. The colors of my heart depart And of themselves suffuse the autumn’s wildflowers. Yes, this is the rule with ruined souls. This time, in keeping with the profoundly elegant and pessimistic nostalgia of the play, it is not a vengeful living demon that departs from Lady Rokujo’s breast to torment her rivals, but rather, the “colors” of

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her heart. The word iro, “color(s)” can be read in many ways; it could be her passion, her beauty, her very substantiality, but, characteristically, she is unable to keep something within the bounds of her being. And even as she is unable to control what escapes from the bounds of her being, so also is she unable to effect the escape of her being from the grounds of the Shrine upon the Fields (and whatever metaphorical read­ ing one overlays upon those grounds). This brings us to two very specific problems of reading that require our own exercise of proprietary rights upon the text of Nonomiya, per­ haps transgressing and thereby invalidating the proprietary claims of author and actor alike, for as we come to the last lines of the play we must make two specific choices. The lines have been quoted repeatedly in the previous discussion, but I will repeat them again here for conve­ nience of reference: Kwataku no kado o ya idenuran, Kwataku no kado. W ill she, in the end, pass through the gateway of the burn­ ing house? The gateway of the burning house. The first choice is how we read the particle ya. Does it mark a question? Does it mark an exclamation? There is no contextual or syn­ tactic inevitability for either alternative. The reader must choose; the text exacts our complicity in the economy of appropriation and proprie­ tary claims we have been talking about all the while. (My English transla­ tion is crippled by its inability to replicate this ambiguity, and I have laid my cards on the table for the first alternative.) The second choice entails the acceptance or rejection of the taigendome or sentence-final nominal at the end of the play. I mentioned this final image of the gate of the burning house above, and, as you will recall, this grammatical nicety distinguishes Nonomiya from the vast ma­ jority of plays in the repertory. W hat if, however, the author of the play did not write it that way. There is a strong likelihood that the taigendome ending of the current playtext is actually a misreading of a “ditto” mark in one of the oldest printed texts of the play, the Kurumayabon text. If that is the case, then the entire line kwataku no kado o y a idenuran was intended by the author to be repeated. To read it thus, however, would, I think, weaken the play decisively, and in a single blow. This is not my opinion alone; the acting traditions of Nonomiya are our accomplices in this transgression of authorial proprietary interest. All five schools of shite acting, with slight variation, choose to end the play on the image of the burning house instead of on die word idenuran, “will she escape.”30

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Both of these matters are rather diminutive details in what is cer­ tainly one of the most celebrated and lyrical plays in the Noh repertory. In a form of such subtle and pervasive conventions as Noh, however, often details such as these separate the trees from the forest. It also seems important to me that these details are not susceptible to arguments of “proof.” The grammatical and textual ambiguities that they entail illustrate how crucial our own process of reading, our own appropriation of the play to personal experience and judgment is, and in that process we gain not only the delight of reading or seeing Nonomiya but a deeper and more authentic reading of Aoi no Ue, Genji monogatari, and the Lotus Sutra as well. NOTES 1. Roland Barthes, Im a ge, M usic , T ext (New York: Hill and Wang, 1977), 146, 148. 2. Barbara Johnson, “Les F leu rs du m a t a rm e: Some Reflections on Intertextuality,” L yric P oetry: B eyon d N ew C riticism (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1985), 264—65. 3. Nose Asaji’s records of late medieval performances from 1429-1602 list A oi no Ue thirtyfive times and N onom iya forty-one times, putting them among the top twenty-odd plays in the records he has consulted. Nose Asaji, N ogaku gen ryu k o (Iwanami Shoten, 1938/1979), 1300-16. 4. KOsai Tsutomu, NoyS shinko (Hinoki Shoten, 1972), 178. 5. Ito Masayoshi, ed., Yokyokushu (Shinchosha, 1988), 3:451. The Aobyoshibon recension is that generally preferred by modem scholarship. Another important tradition is that of the Kawachibon, and there is a third group of texts, called kohon or beppon, outside of these two main streams. 6. Yokomichi Mario and Omote Akira, eds., Yokyokushu (Iwanami, 1963/1972), 2:437-38. They read ito k arisom e n a m eri rather than ito k arisom e n a ri. I have taken the latter alternative, following the text in Ishida Joji and Shimizu Yoshiko, eds., G M (Shin­ chosha, 1977), 2:129. 7. Edward Seidensticker, trans., T he T ale o f G en ji (New York: Knopf, 1980), 185ff. 8. The unspecified h yosh i a w a z u shodan of the first dan. See Yokomichi and Omote, Yokyo­ kushu 2:318. 9. The m on d o of the third dan. Ibid., 319. 10. The shodo, that is, the chorus’s first a geu ta , in the third dan. Ibid., 320. 11. Ibid., 438. 12. Ishida and Shimizu, G M , 135-38 passim. 13. Seidensticker, T h e T ale o f G enji, 189—90. 14. The phrase echoes oya soite k u daritam au r e i m o koto n i nak eredo from the opening passage of “Sakaki.” 15. Yokomichi and Omote, Yokyokushu 2:320. 16. Ito, Yokyokushu 3:71. 17. Yokomichi and Omote, Yokyokushu 2:320. 18. Ito, Yokyokushu 3:70 19. Ito, Yokyokushu 1:364-65. 20. A oi no U e was performed by InuO Doami, who died in 1413. The first recorded performance of N onom iya, on the other hand, does not come until 1465. 21. Tsuchiya KeiichirO, “Noh, the Birth of Meta-level Sensibility,” K okubungaku, kaishaku to kyozai no kenkyu 31.10 (September 1986): 50. 22. Omote Akira and Kato Shuichi, eds., Z eam i, Z enchik u, in N S T 24:263.

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23. Morita Mitsukaze, ed., C hino no tsumigusa-. M orita M isao iko (Perikansha, 1986), 113. The book collects three treatises on the lore and performance of Noh flute (nokan ) by Morita Misao (1846-1922) and was first published in 1937. Much of the information contained therein, however, seems to reflect performance traditions and confidential transmissions of the Morita school extending further back into the Tokugawa era. 24. Omote Akira and Ito Masayoshi, eds., K onparu kodensho sh u sei (Wan’ya Shoten, 1969), 451. 25. Yokomichi and Omote, Yokyokushu 2:318. 26. Quoted in Ito, Yokyokushu 3:67. 27. The “Parable of the Burning House” appears in the third chapter of the L otus S utra, itself entitled “Parable.” A translation can be found in Leon Hurvitz, S crip tu re o f th e L otus B lossom o f th e F in e D ha rm a (New York: Columbia University Press, 1976), 58-83. 28. This issue is discussed in Thomas Hare, Z eam i's S tyle, th e N oh P lays o f Z ea m i M otokiyo (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1986), 157-59 and 181. 29. Arthur Waley, T he N oh P lays o f J a p a n (New York: Grove Press, n.d.), 189. 30. Kanze and Hosho schools end with kataku no kado, “the g a t e of the burning house”; Konparu and Kita schools end with simply kwataku “the burning house”; and the Kongo school, in the most emphatic statement of all, includes the objective case particle (kuiataku no kado o).

Norinaga on the Translation of Waka: His Preface to A Kokinshu T elescope T . J . H a rper

Anyone who has developed an appetite for waka will appreciate how difficult it can be to communicate the satisfactions of these thirty-one syllables to a noninitiate. It is not simply a matter of explaining what the words mean. Even colleagues who read classical Japanese with ease may confess that they find Chinese poetry in translation a deeper draught than waka in the original. Depths there are, we assure them; it is simply a question of how to get at them. How, indeed? The surest way, of course, is to read a vast amount of waka, memorize some of it, at least well enough to recognize it on second encounter, and then read a fair bit of what has been said about waka. Anyone who manages to trudge this far will probably be addicted and will need no further encouragement. But is there no quicker way, at least to get started? The natural response to this reasonable plea is to suggest translation as a first step toward conveying something of the devotee’s delights to the neophyte. Yet no sooner is the suggestion made than the discussion becomes mired in a bog of imponderables having to do with the “special problems” of Japanese and its very special verse forms. To anyone who has experienced this exquisite form of intellectual frustration, it may be of interest to learn that one of the most astute students of the Japanese language, Motoori Norinaga (1730-1801), has dealt with these same difficulties long before any of us. In 1797, at the behest (and expense) of two of his Nagoya disciples,1 Norinaga published a complete translation of the premier anthology of Japanese poetry, Kokin wakashu. This work, to which he gave the technologically advanced title Kokin wakashu tokagami (A Kokinshu Tele­ scope),2 was probably the first exemplum3 of that now thriving genre the gendaigoyaku, “modern language translations” of texts written in classical Japanese. But to the foreign student, for whom problems of translation are perennial, the fascination of Tokagami is likely to lie not so much in the translated texts as in the translator’s preface. Here Norinaga explains

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in great detail why he translates rather than annotates, and how he has dealt with some of the more difficult problems of translation. This trea­ tise4 is translated below. There is no need to reiterate the main points of Norinaga’s discus­ sion. His treatise, though it demands close reading, speaks for itself; and anyone who has translated a Japanese text of any sort will see immedi­ ately that Norinaga’s problems were much the same as our own (and that we have not come very far since this first attempt to define and solve them). It may be well, however, to note a point or two in which his aims and attitudes differ somewhat from ours, and hence lead him to adopt solutions that translators into European languages may not be able to emulate. Norinaga, like most practitioners of the W ay of Poetry, writes not as a “critic,” but as a teacher of poetic composition to those who would follow him in this “W ay.” And to a practitioner of the Way, Kokinshu is not merely the first imperially commissioned anthology of waka-, it is the very foundation of the tradition. In other matters Norinaga was more than willing to depart from tradition. His attacks against the secret transmissions of the poets of the imperial court are well known,5 as is his personal preference for the poetry of SbinkokinshU.6 Nonetheless he remains firmly at one with Shunzei7 and Teika in insisting that the ultimate model and source for one’s own compositions must be Kokinshu. The first task of every aspiring poetaster, then—no less in the mod­ est home of the Matsusaka physician than in the Kyoto mansions of the nobility—must be to master Kokinshu. It is this fundamental need that prompts Norinaga to translate. In Sei Shonagon’s day mastery of Kokinshu might be acquired simply by memorization.8 A few centuries later, in the “middle ages,” memory was often augmented by written commentary that explained the meaning of what had been memorized. By Norinaga’s time, however, the art of reading waka had declined no less than the art of writing it. Nearly a millenium now stood between the student and the poems he must emu­ late. If justice were to be done even to the basic sense of Kokinshu, something more than memorization and an explanation of what the words meant was needed. But why translation? Norinaga’s choice of this new medium has much to do with his view—again traditional, and per­ haps a bit fanciful—of Kokinshu and the nature of poetry in general. “Poetry,” says Norinaga, “is above all a spontaneous expression of feeling” l U l C t 1C. $ \ f t * 1C 9 (ft)]).9 He does not go so far as to endorse Tsurayuki’s proto-ethological classification of poetry with the song of birds and the croak of frogs, but one suspects that he would not take issue with much else in this first description of the nature of waka. It follows, therefore, that mastery

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of Kokinshu demands more than mere cerebral understanding; one must penetrate to the primal feelings that inspire the poems, and one must participate in all the nuances of language with which those feelings were expressed. To this end, Norinaga translates Kokinshu into a language his students could respond to instantaneously and instinctively, without the intervention of discursive thought—eighteenth-century Kansai Japanese. Post-Meiji Westerners were not the first to seek a quicker way to the animating depths of waka through translation. It takes but a glance to see that Norinaga’s translations lie well within the “free” range of the liberal-literal spectrum. They are two, three, four times as long as the originals,10 littered with appendages and glosses, encoded with numbers and symbols. In many cases bits of commentary are tacked on at the end, sometimes denigrating the commentary in Keichu’s (1640-1701) Kokin yozai sho (1692) and Kamo no Mabuchi’s (1697-1769) Kokin wakashu uchigiki (1789), sometimes quoting with approbation an observation offered by his patron Yokoi Chiaki, sometimes noting a lexical or philological point that his transla­ tion illustrates. Yet this apparent profligacy of means is only apparent; within the spacious room for maneuver that he allows himself, each of Norinaga’s devices contributes some element of rigor to his translations. He scrupulously identifies all of his own additions, he leaves no doubt as to which word translates which, he notes every alteration in the posi­ tion of words with numerical specificity, and he leaves visible gaps be­ tween phrases where the reader is meant to pause. In short, he makes not the least concession to the claims of poetry or readability; for the ultimate rigor is that he expects the reader to complete the circle, to abandon the translation and return to the original. How many readers actually did complete the circle we cannot judge, but one cannot but wonder if these early gendaigoyaku did not contribute to the development of a new audience for classical literature—the “com­ mon reader” who reads mainly for pleasure or enlightenment and not as an adjunct to the acquisition of some polite accomplishment, and thus may be content to read the translation alone. Norinaga claims no con­ cern for such an audience, nor would he have written so technical a preface for such an audience. Ozaki Masayoshi, however, plainly states that his translation of the same poems is intended “for boys and girls who could never hope to understand a commentary.”11 And Sasaki Nobutsuna (1872-1963), with reference to his father’s belief in widespread education, notes that Hirotsuna (1828-91) considered translations “such as Kokinshu tokagami and Toshi sen kokujikai'2 to be of enormous benefit to beginning students.”13 The only reference to any specific reading of Norinaga’s translation that I have thus far encountered, however, is Wada Hidematsu’s (1865—1937) confession that he used Tokagami in

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place of the original to study for the Tokyo University entrance exami­ nations in the early 1880s.14 The history of gendaigoyaku and their readers remains a dim but fascinating corner of Edo-period literature that de­ serves a good deal more illumination than it has received to date.15 Translating a treatise on translation presents its own peculiar prob­ lems of translation. Not the least of these was the question whether to translate utsusu—Norinaga’s word for whatever it is one does in transposing words—as “translate.” In the end I have done so. Ninthcentury Japanese and eighteenth-century Japanese seem a bit too far removed from each other to treat the one as a “rendition” or “version” of the other. More to the point, though, is Norinaga’s use of utsusu in the elaborate metaphor that gives the work its title. When one “views” (iutsusu H&T, 9T > LM -S) a distant object through a telescope (tokagam i , tomegane m egane it is as if that object were “transported” (utsusu ) to the place where one stands. In like manner can a translation (utsushi 1? ) “transfer” (utsusu f£ T ) the mean­ ing of an ancient text, thus affording the reader a closer “view” of it. To denote this sort of “transportation” and “transference,” “translate” seems an appropriate verb. Norinaga’s use of the character IP to render this sense of utsusu seems further to underwrite this choice, as does the use of the same word by other writers to denote translation from foreign languages.16 Norinaga’s preface is richly circumstantial and amply illustrated with examples drawn from the body of the work. He assumes, of course, that the complete work is in the hands of the reader and thus does not cite whole poems. Since the text of Tokagami may not be readily available to every reader of this translation of Norinaga’s treatise, complete ver­ sions of most of the poems he cites have been inserted following the sections in which they are cited. These insertions are not essential to a general understanding of Norinaga’s arguments and may be passed over. The reader who takes the time to study them, however, will find them richly rewarding, both as amplifications of the principles they are called upon to illustrate and as demonstrations of Norinaga’s application of these principles in his own work. Occasionally Norinaga neglects to cite examples of the point under discussion. In most such cases servicable examples can be found in the complete versions of poems he cites else­ where. The numbers of these poems that can do double-duty are noted at the appropriate places in the text. Among them, however, there were none that could serve to illustrate Norinaga’s remarks on his handling of conceits and words related by traditional association. I have therefore taken the liberty of adding two examples not of the author’s choice. Where comment on examples has seemed necessary, it is enclosed in

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brackets. All Kokinshu poems are identified by their Kokka taikan num­ bers. Quotations bearing no numbers are from other sources. A

K O K IN S H U

TELESCOPE

bt * ] of courtly speech. Moreover, the language of women is often more familiar than that of men, tending as women do to unguarded revelations of their feelings; it will thus often be more in keeping with the tone of a poem. For this reason, one should prefer language of a feminine cast. One may also make use of so-called substandard speech [jj'fz d b]- For example, in formal speech, we refer to ourselves as f o t z i L , but normally this is contracted to 7 $ '> [790] or 7 '> [42, 1007]; the more proper 7 i//\ is contracted t o 7 S /-i% ' b t l t t to V l / - t , T t l l f to X U'-T [cf. 202]. Then again, 7 & and d [ i L ( t §

962.

fr
^SZJk2 A'ri'V*-

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E

J r ' y p M - M ? A xU H k h z r r T U 'i- '' O Often the position of words must be changed in translation. For in­ stance: t { til?|$£ [157; “from regret does he sing, the mountain hototogisu?”]. In translating this, I have moved y|5A to the head of the poem: *9 A A t 7 / -ft B,| < # [“does the hototogisu sing so because of lingering regrets (for the passing of the short summer night)?”]. Or again: t X [281; “ ‘view them even into the night,’ (commands) the illumining moon­ light”]. This I translate: 3 7 f 7 f ' S 3 [“ ‘view them even into the night,’ (commands) the light of the moon as it illumines (the autumn leaves)”]. Or yet again: X, A & [852; “how desolate as I gaze across (the garden)”]. Here I move A>tz to the head of the poem: h u t ? ? / # b n D A d r '- V i/ 'y& x .jU u [“when I gaze across (the garden), how desolate I feel, and, oh, how lonely it all looks”]. Such are some of the differences in the way things are expressed in courdy speech and in die vernacular. There are also cases in which the position of particles must be changed in translation. For instance: b © 9 A-S (t •£ [42; “yet are the blos­ soms as fragrant as ever in the past”], where P denotes strong emphasis. In the vernacular, one would say 1L f j , placing particular emphasis upon these words so as to convey something of the ring of classical P . But verbal emphasis cannot be expressed in writing, and so here I have added "7 as a written equivalent of P , translating I b t f IE# / 5 * . Every occurrence of p presents problems of this sort.

i t o-£ ic £ y O' § c 1 1M if 0 ^ &A o m C 3k L < Z t i f r l z f t t s

7 » y / 'f'N .'M * ^ 7 ^

b T ^ X —4 - J - y y

^ i y f v y x —-'Nltb'T hV\n m y h 7h y _ - y - v ' s # 3 ?y

t n7

7 1

tj^yxz/yt) y

T b ri-tx T 7 7 7

b 7 ^ '/

7 7 lL

[is y ^ y y y ra y ;L ]

42. ° 7

' b ! ’f + + 7

There are two principal wave ,., „ - . denotes a contrast, as in 7E C p 7, a *1 ^ ^ f USeC*'

t^le one’ *t [268; “though

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the blossoms scatter, shall even the root wither?”]. Here it is the same as 21 -?• in the vernacular. For the other usage, there is no exact transla­ tion, as in such poems as |i|MIC Cl -?• Y A r ) ] r k

MLb-r

i> ix iv [In poem 111, the gloss ~9" h is written in katakana to indicate not on y e word in the original that is translated, but also that it is the intended pronunciation of J§1. Cf. 536 below.] §lLA > -f 111.

iA A L£> -f

c &*^ T ^ 3 T M K l5 )* ‘t f A 5 § t i m t C D f r Z Z f c t t b & b b b O j L j i j F U iF y b 7 A - b f

V j - y ^ T fS 'y l✓ t

N O R IN A G A O N T H E T R A N S L A T IO N O F WAKA

^ = -3 -1 )7 '/

219

lH:6iJ77iF7'>iFV'7flr7 7 ;L 7 7 := . ir

7 h

nht 7 t;

7 7 7 'f

The particle t>, as in t z . L-5?3if £) [33. “whose sleeve has brushed the plum in my garden?”; 94] or IS 4)T-2>A>;& [nu­ merous occurrences; “loves”], I translate as 7 7 . I expect that 7 7 derives originally from fj. [Poem 33 also offers an interesting demonstration of what Norinaga does when 7 •€" and -ir occur in the same poem. Although, as he states above, he often translates both as if , he avoids doing so when they occur together. Here he renders CL•€" with i f and 4r with the highly colloquial y'7f\]

a T —d t p 7 7 7

l f b T 7 - 3 ^ - 7 P 7 7;WN -? h

m / ie v t 7 7

Interrogative 7 is always 7 in the vernacular. W here it occurs in mid-sentence, I move it to the end, as in # 7 ' t § ?b 7 do 7 § [ 10; “the spring, is it early? the blossoms, are they late?”], which I trans­ late # 7 / ^ 7 7 7 f] \ E tib 7 4 7 7 [“is spring early or are the blos­ soms late?”]. [Again, translation and quotation differ considerably.] fi

10.

# 71: £7b7i3-?-§ t $ >b f r t s y < T ft A,0j Cft® £ [“the mountain cherry, surely hidden in the rising spring mists”] translates nicely as |i| / 18ft ft ft ft ft t T )\/~f ft y ft — [“though the mountain cherry surely is hidden in mist”]. And M A / A ( iJ tf t, mentioned previously corresponds to M f tf t H g f t A ^ in the vernacular. Depending upon the wording of the poem, it can sometimes be translated in this fashion. § < ft Y-yn y - y y y ^ /

0 7 ® A'

74 r h

b Ay •*$> 7 7 7 AAA

7

•7 T 7 A "

222

H A RPER

WB-

45.

ii'ii!tab§ °A (D nt> 0 © if It S # o g t L^

& ■¥> y^

?j>A

^ I 7 7 y rt^ x 7 »|

fTIKk

•Wr©lKA) 5 L , !LA>-f 762.

L£>f

n o r in a g a o n t h e t r a n s l a t io n o f

O D - t 1) f '

U ~r i s v

h x V 77

223

w a k a

lit J P A ^ f

^ h'yUTr-fe^ ^ ^ 3S because is the same as § The $ S becomes i t fp through a process of euphonic change [ilffgi], and the b is dropped from t i . b . Its original meaning is thus approxiS 4/ ° f 6 L - For instance- when t o ® * ^ L is transla ted ^ *9“‘i 7 both 6 L and ^ ^ indicate conjecture on the basis of seeing someone who appears to be beset by cares. I might mention in passing that it is a great mistake to assume that the only difference between b A and b L is one of degree of doubt, and to use them in this way in one’s own compositions. For example, Bf MT. b b A [“I expect the autumn rains fall”] means 7 7 7 1 ), and Iff |;|;j,$-.€> b L [284; “the autumn rains appear to fall”] means IffM A 7 tk+f ^ ~j~. If you consider the meanings of vernacu­ lar T y and "9~ T , you will see the difference.

284.

b L o m i-a n x i-tfi'A '

uj—

b L

M © ^< b b * .

fcfc-tfc

O Classical /■)'&' (n£) is much the same as vernacular A A Often, however, the syntax of courtly speech makes its meaning obscure. In translation, there­ fore, the word order must be altered, or else words must be added. Since, as a rule, this word represents a sigh of grief and often bears some latent mean­ ing, in translation this latent meaning must be added [583, 792, 852]. O There are various ways to translate9 9 , Where it simply concludes the poem and refers back to nothing that precedes it, as in S {J-A *99 9 [3, 5, 21; “while snow falls”], I translate it as A , following which I append the latent meaning that it bears because conclusive 9 9 always bears some latent meaning, which can be ascertained from the overall sense of the poem. S L 6T 3.

±AAL ? % M T j t p ;!✓ I translate (7 0,17 4 , and 17 f t as 7 4 ; as, for example, # ^ 7 r - - 7 - y [4, spring has come! ] as ^ 7? *74* Where it concludes a sentence containing C there too I sometimes append V 4 . When (7 £ and 17 f t occur in mid-sentence and do not mark a break, I make no special attempt to render it in translation.

4.

S 0 3* >K# li2f cici7 0 9 o - r y w y y

^

y

y

lifts R if'i'p t ], or upon the effect of tradi­ tionally associated words [792; #J©^©|5|© ± L], the differences be­ tween courtly and vernacular speech make it all but impossible to translate by simple substitution. In such cases, I have added whatever words might be needed to produce a vernacular translation that makes good sense. hV ' L frl 0 (7 5 Aand 0 indicate the number of the line, and 0 indicates the upper hemistich.

O The short notes in hiragana that follow some translations are added to compensate for shortcomings and inadequacies of the translation, or else to note some small point that I wished to make in connection with that translation [numerous examples].

O There is much more that I should like to say on the subject of translating ancient poetry into the vernacular of the present day, but to do so would be tedious. For the moment I shall make only these few random remarks; let the reader infer all that I omit. I expect that further consideration would yield somewhat more appropriate renditions for some of the poems I have translated here, but that would require time, and I am unable to devote myself exclusively to this project. Thus I

N O RIN AGA O N T H E T R A N SL A T IO N O F W A K A

229

generally have settled for whatever wording happened to come to mind. Should those with some knowledge of poetry have better ideas, they are welcome to augment, omit, or revise what I have done. Motoori Norinaga N O TE S 1. Yokoi Chiald Qurozaemon; 1738-1801), a high-ranking retainer (h eya yo n in ) of the Owari Tokugawa; and Uematsu Arinobu (Chobei; 1752-1813), a ron in of the same domain who had taken up the trade of carving printing blocks. Yokoi’s contribution to the project consisted not only in underwriting the “enormous expense” of publish­ ing both K ojiki d en and T ok agam i , but also in exercising the influence of his position to persuade the reluctant publisher Eirakuya Toshiro to undertake the printing, binding, and sale of the volumes. Eirakuya was of course delighted when Norinaga’s works turned out to be a great commercial success as well as a credit to his national reputation as a publisher. Uematsu, who undertook the carving of the blocks, had long served as a sort of academic courier between Norinaga and Yokoi, whose official duties in Nagoya left him no time to visit his mentor in Matsusaka. He also accompa­ nied Norinaga on his trips to Kyoto and Kii, and Norinaga often lodged with Uematsu on his visits to Nagoya. See Yamada Kanzo, M oto o ri N orina ga 0 z en d en (Shikai Shobo, 1938), 290-301; Ueda Mannen, et al., eds., K okugakusha denk i shiisei (1934—35; reprinted Meicho Kankokai, 1967) 1:534—36; and Uematsu Shigeru, U em atsu A rinobu (Nagoya: Aichi Ken Kyodo ShiryO Kankokai), passim. 2. In Okubo Tadashi, ed., M otoori N orinaga z enshu [hereafter referred to as MNZ\, vol. 3 (Chikuma Shobo, 1969). The metaphor of the tide seems not to be original with Norinaga. A guide to the Shimabara licensed quarter published in 1681 is called Shujak u to m ega n e ^ fK JM t j I ji , which suggests that more thorough investigation might reveal further instances of the telescope metaphor prior to Norinaga’s use of it. 3. The claim to primacy must be phrased tentatively because another translation of the same anthology, Kokin wakashii hinakotoba by Ozaki Masayoshi (1755-1827), was published a few months earlier in 1796. Norinaga’s translation seems to have been completed by 1794, but, owing to delays in production, Ozaki’s was the first to appear in print. No hint of the circumstances of this extraordinary coincidence is anywhere recorded, other than in a letter from Norinaga to his son Haruniwa (Kansei 8.9.18) in which he states that Ozaki “appears to have stolen T ok agam i" (M N Z 3:12). Okubo makes no special claims for Norinaga’s work in his introduction to the M N Z edition, but elsewhere he describes it as “the first attempt at vernacular translation of the classics” (Z oho k aitei S hin ch o N ihon bungak u j i t e n [Shinchosha, 1988], 1243). Ozaki is best known as the author of two highly regarded works, G unsho ich ira n and H yakunin isshu yiiga ta ri.

4. M N Z 3:5-13. 5. For example, T am ak atsum a , in M N Z 1:284. 6. Norinaga’s thoughts on this matter are discussed in greater detail by Okubo in his introduction. 7. See K ora i f u t e i sho , in N KBZ 5 0 : 2 8 8 : ^ © ^ ^ i j s f z t z S ^ W i & W T

0.

8. See “Seiryoden no ushitora no sumi no,” M akura no soshi , in N KBZ 19:88-91. 9. See p. 210; the same thought is reiterated in slightly different words on p. 209. 10. No. 747, Narihira’s famous “tsuki ya aranu,” is expanded from 31 to 225 syllables. 11. r $ T F t C * , 9 § < ^ ( D S t £ Kokin wakashii

230

H A RPER hinakotoba (Undated woodblock edition), 6:20b.To

focused rheme/ is immediately apparent with respect to Japanese if we recall that when a theme is judged to be evident, it is most often not mentioned. Even when a message’s theme is mentioned, the focused information is usually in the rheme, as when no particle marks the theme (for example, Aruji yurushl-tE -kerl ‘The master forgave him’), or when it is marked witEgaarticle wa or m o.'s In such cases, the predicator’s inflection is the unmarked shushi, which func­ tions in main clauses to establish information as text. This is why themes marked with wa, mo, and zero have shushi closure: none of these three options shifts the message’s primary focus away from the rheme. A figure like hana zo . . . nioI-kerU thus represents a departure from this normal message structure; its predicator is inflected as referred-to information, in the rentai. A way to make hana ‘blossoms’ the focal point of a message that is ideationally (but not textually) similar to that offered by clause (14) would be to include it in the rheme, and place other, referred-to infor­ mation in front. This produces a different, but still “A is B” kind of nominal clause: . . . nioI-kerU wa hana n a rl ‘what exudes a fragrance . . . is the blossoms.’ The inflection of the main predicate here is the un­ marked shushi, the bearer of news; the referential niol-kerU is in the theme, where it “belongs.” In the process, zo has become unnecessary; it is called for only if we wish to move the ‘blossoms’ up front to the theme but still treat them as the point of the message. If we would present them as both the starting point and the news of the message, we need zo to identify them as such. And doing so involves a comple­ mentary move, marking the rheme as established information with the referential rentai. Example (14), then, illustrates this rhetorical gesture, which simultaneously promotes the theme to bearer of news and de­ motes the rheme to supporting cast. The image of a seesaw is helpful in visualizing these two complementary aspects of the single shift in focus that takes place: as the theme soars up into prominence, the rheme drops to the ground of uncontested, assumed information. If we would get to the point of our message even as we begin it, this calls for more language, specifically morphology (the focus particles, the rentai inflection). It is interesting to note that similar principles of message structure apply to clauses in today’s English as well. The stress that marks focused information falls most easily on the rheme of English clauses, on their “second half.” Since English is not a verb-final language, this stress does not coincide with the predicator, as it may in Japanese. In “The blossoms

388

Q U IN N

breathe a fragrance of old,” stress falls naturally On “a fragrance of old’’’ (with perhaps secondary stress on “fragrance”). The news in this particular message is therefore not what it is in Tsurayuki’s poem (14) above. This English clause structures its message in a way that corresponds to a rather different Japanese phrasing, something along the lines of hana (wa) mukashi no ka sU. To get the kind of focus used in Tsurayuki’s original into English, we must use either marked syntax or marked stress. The marked syntax route rearranges the clause in a structure known as “cleft” and yields “W hat breathes a fragrance of old” [= assumed infor­ mation] “is the blossoms” [= newly focused information]. The most eas­ ily stressed word here is clearly “blossoms.” To put primary stress on “breathes” or “fragrance” requires a special effort, and a special, con­ trastive intent. While the syntax of this clause is marked, the message structure is not, since the point—die information that makes a differ­ ence—is still in the rheme, and the stress with it. It is also possible to make the “blossoms” the point of the English message without calling on a syntactic transformation, if we employ offnorm stress. This method yields “The blossoms exude a fragrance of old.” Yet another way to restructure the message is with a syntactic transformation that facilitates stress of the “blossoms,” by clefting with “It”: “It is the blossoms that exude a fragrance of old.” The structure of unmarked, single-clause messages, then, in Japanese or in English, can be described in the pattern: THEME (assumed/referring) —> RHEME (focused/identifying).19 Clauses structured so as to convey the message in this normative way relate the point (in the rheme) to some assumed or already established information, whether this is overtly mentioned as the theme in the same clause or not. To repeat: kakari-musubi with zo departs from this normative stag­ ing of a message by putting the news—the ideational entity the clause identifies—first, in the theme (in [14], hand), following it with already established information in the rheme (:mukashi no ka ni nioI-kerU). This is the only reason the predicator in a kakari-musubi clause comes in its rentai form: because it is not the point, but rather, information that is established and assumed or referred to in the making of a point. In a similar way, English phrasings such as ‘The blossoms are what breathes a fragrance of old’ or alternatively, ‘It is the blossoms that breathe a fragrance of old’

P O IN T O F V IE W IN T H E C L A U SE

389

are simply syntactic means for getting the focused, stressed word to the starting point of the message. In both of these examples, the assumed or presupposed information is expressed in subordinate syntax, which is analogous to the rental inflection in Japanese; both are structurally subordinated because rather than being the point of the message, they rather support it. In the second example, this subordination is comple­ mented by the “It-cleft” syntax, which is, like kakari-musubi, a grammati­ cal device for placing a message’s primary focus in an off-norm position. To refocus a clause’s message in English, one uses marked stress and/ or the cleft figure. Both earlier Japanese and today’s English, then, employ special grammatical tools when presenting a message’s crucial information in a slot where it usually is not found. W e must compensate, as it were, syntactically (for example, by clefting), morphologically (focus particles, the rental inflection), or suprasegmentally (for example, the off-norm stress of “The blossoms are . . .”). Functionally speaking, the particle zo is analogous to the “It is” of the English cleft construction since both single out the element to be identified. Both zo and these off-norm message structures in English nicely illustrate a simple and basic semiotic principle: put some information in a place where it isn’t usually found, and it must be tagged. Otherwise, it might be taken for what usually occurs there. It is for these reasons that we characterize the English structure known in formal grammar as cleft, or the Japanese kakarimusubi, as a “marked” structure. Let us return to two of the examples cited earlier, and examine the use of kakari-musubi in asking a particular kind of question. Doubted Identity ka: 15. ika de ka makarA-mU, kura[k]U-te how by DI withdrawMZ-SUPss be darkRY-CHK I------- 1 ‘How is it I shall go—it’s dark, and . . . ’ 16. nado ka ito hisashik[u]ari-tsurU why DI very be long (time)RY-beRY-EXOPFRT I— I ‘Why is it [you] have been so long?’

(GM 1:238)

(GM 2:337)

These examples show ka used as it usually was, with question words, in this case ika ‘how’ and nado ‘why.’ In modern Japanese, too, there is an interesting co-occurrence of content interrogatives and no-nominalized “extended”-0 predicates. Although ka is freely used in today’s Japanese to mark both yes-no and content questions, it is no longer productive

390

Q U IN N

with the interrogative words themselves, except in the sense of indefinites (dare ka iku no ‘Is it that someone is going to go?’). Nevertheless, it is intriguing that predicators nominalized with no so frequendy comprise the rheme in clauses with content interrogatives as theme. Sentences like (17), for example, are not nearly so loaded as those like (18) and (19). 17. Do shite yat-TA ka why do-PF DI ‘W hy did [you] do it?’ 18. Do shite yat-TA no ka why do-PF REF DI ‘W hy is it that [you] did it?’ 19. Do shite yat-TA no da why do-PF REF COP ‘W hy is it that [you] did it?’ Example (17) seems more likely to occur embedded in a larger structure, such as Do shite yatta ka wakaranai ‘W hy [someone] did it [I] don’t know’ than by itself as an independent sentence. Example (18) is also quite amenable to such embedding; while probably not as commonly embedded as (17), it would not occur alone. In fact, in present-day Japanese it is very common to find wo-nominalized rhemes when the same clause begins with a content interrogative word in the theme, provided the speaker’s interaction with her addressee is familiar or casual enough to allow (1) a content question of any kind and (2) the indication that one is familiar with what one asks about.21 W ith respect to (18), it is presupposed that the deed was in fact done, whatever the reason, and the ‘doing’ is consequently referentialized, marked with no as assumed, in the asking of the real question, ‘W hy.’ A more careful style of speech would avoid indicating that one is assuming anything and might yield, for example, Do shite shimashita ka ‘W hy did [someone] do it?’ Of course, such a question might very well be avoided out of deference, especially if the agent of the act referred to is the addressee. But when a speaker feels free to ask an information question, and to do so with some indica­ tion of familiarity with the circumstances involved, the unfocused and assumed part of that question is regularly referentialized with no. This is no more a rule of grammatical agreement than kakari-musubi was, but it displays a remarkably similar way of distinguishing the focused from the assumed. A similar convention applies in as unrelated a language as Mandarin, where such questions are usually posed in the relational clause_pattern

P O IN T O F V IE W IN TH E C L A U SE

391

of /copula shi . . . + nominalizer del, as in Ni shi co'ng nar lai de ‘Where is it you’ve come from?’ De, attached to the predicator, performs the same function as no does in Japanese, which is to mark information as referrable, as the assumed, presupposed part of the message (lai DE, that someone has in fact ‘come’). The focus of the message, as in Japanese, is on the content of the question (cong nar ‘from where’). Similarly in English, the subordinate complement in “W hy is it that . . . ?” marks the assumed information with “that,” which seems a natural enough choice given the deictic (‘pointing,’ referring) origins of this word. The complementizer no in present-day Japanese,-^ in Mandarin, and “that” in English all serve to mark information as referable as they simultaneously nominalize it. In the content questions reviewed above, this part of the clause is referred to (and thus assumed) in the process of asking who, what, when, where, why, how, and so on. Content question words (