tōzakariyuku Your voice grows more distant.18
SHINKOKINSHŪ, WINTER, NO. 627
sabishisa ni I wish there were another here
taetaru hito no who could bear
mata mo are na this loneliness;
iori narabemu we’d build our huts side by side
fuyu no yamazato in this wintry mountain village.19
SHINKOKINSHŪ, SUMMER, NO. 262
michinobe ni In the shade
shimizu nagaruru of a roadside willow
yanagi kage near a clear flowing stream
shibashi tote koso I stopped,
tachidomaritsure for just a while, I thought.20
KIKIGAKISHŪ, NO. 165
When I was living in Saga, I and others wrote poems in a light vein.
unaiko ga The sound of children
susami ni narasu playfully blowing
mugibue no straw whistles
koe ni odoroku wakes me from my
natsu no hirubushi summer afternoon nap.21
SHINKOKINSHŪ, TRAVEL, NO. 987
Composed when going to the eastern provinces.
toshi takete Did I ever imagine
mata koyubeshi to I would make this pass again
omoiki ya in my old age?
inochi narikeri Such is life!
Sayanonaka yama Sayanonaka Mountain.22
SHINKOKINSHŪ, MISCELLANEOUS, NO. 1613
On Mount Fuji, composed when carrying out religious practices in the eastern provinces.
kaze ni nabiku Trailing in the wind,
Fuji no keburi no Fuji’s smoke
sora ni kiete fades into the sky
yukue mo shiranu destination unknown,
waga omoi kana just like my own thoughts!23
SHINKOKINSHŪ, MISCELLANEOUS, NO. 1536
fuke ni keru As I ponder
waga yo no kage o my waning shadow
omou ma ni of life far gone,
haruka ni tsuki no in the distance
katabuki ni keri the moon sets.24
SHINKOKINSHŪ, BUDDHIST POEMS, NO. 1978
On looking at one’s heart.
yami harete Darkness dispels,
kokoro no sora ni and the moon shining clear
sumu tsuki wa in my heart’s sky
nishi no yamabe ya now seems to near
chikaku naruramu the western hills.25
[Introduction and translations by Jack Stoneman]
FUJIWARA NO TEIKA
Fujiwara no Teika (1162–1241), or Sadaie, was the son of Shunzei and heir to the Mikohidari house of poetry. Teika was recognized at a fairly early age as one of the most controversially innovative poets of his generation, and he was one of the four primary compilers of the Shinkokinshū. From the age of eighteen to the age of seventy-four, he kept a diary entitled the Meigetsuki. Between 1185 and 1199, he began to explore a new poetic style, which was criticized as “daruma” poems, or “incomprehensible” poems. Despite his audacious experiments with syntax and disdain for convention, Teika could also be remarkably conservative, especially in his later years, and notoriously called for a return to early classical models of composition. His dictum “new meanings, old words” is an emblem of the difficult demands he made for originality within the constraints of precedent. Few poets were able to follow Teika’s demands without resorting to tedious conventionalism. This fact, combined with his overwhelming influence as the patriarch of the dominant schools of court poetry for several centuries, is often blamed for the stultification of courtly waka after the thirteenth century. Forty-six of Teika’s poems were included in the Shinkokinshū.
ESSENTIALS OF POETIC COMPOSITION (EIGA NO TAIGAI , CA. 1222)
Essentials of Poetic Composition explains Teika’s approach to waka composition in his later years and reflects a fundamental technique of medieval aristocratic literature: allusive variation. Essentials of Poetic Composition divides poetic technique into three key notions: meaning (kokoro), diction (kotoba), and style (fūtei). The meaning (kokoro) of a poem should be neither “old” (inishie) nor “modern” (ima); instead, it should be “new” (atarashi). Teika usually uses the word kokoro in close relation to the “topic” (dai). Thus a more elaborate translation of the opening line would be: “For the meaning of the poem as it relates to the essence of the given topic, one should, above all, be innovative.” Diction (kotoba), by contrast, should be “old.” What kokoro and kotoba have in common here is that neither can be “modern.”
Teika also contrasts “modern poets”—from the latter half of the twelfth century—with “ancient poets” and strictly forbids drawing on either the diction or the meaning introduced by “modern poets”—that is, those writing in the past seventy or eighty years. For him, diction must be circumscribed and publicly recognized. “Old diction” is not a matter of age but of the canon. “Old words” refers to the poetic diction exemplified in the Three Collections (Sandaishū): the Kokinshū, Gosenshū, and Shūishū, the first three imperial collections of waka. The only exceptions are the poems of the Man’yōshū, primarily those by Hitomaro, Akahito, and Yakamochi, which are included in the Thirty-six Poets’ Collection (Sanjūrokuninshū), compiled by Fujiwara no Kintō in the mid-Heian period. With regard to “style” (fūtei), however, Teika notes that one should learn from poets both “old and new.” In summary, the meaning of the poem should be new; its diction should derive from the superior poems in the Three Collections: and the superior poems of both old and new poets should provide a model for poetic style.
Teika also is concerned about plagiarism and the lack of originality. His rules for allusive variation (honkadori) on a base poem are an extension of those he prescribed for kotoba and represent a solution to the difficulties imposed by the necessity of using only “old” diction. At the end of the preface, which is written in kanbun, Teika notes that “one should always keep in mind the scene [keiki] of old poetry and let it sink deep into the heart.” Keiki refers to not just the poetic scenes and images that appear in the poetic world but also its poetic associations. Significantly, Chinese poetry, which played a significant role in the development of Heian waka, became a major source for these associations. In the original text, certain lines appear to be notes—as they are in smaller print than that of the main text—and have been placed in parentheses in the translation.
As for the meaning [kokoro] of poetry, newness must come first. (One must seek a conception or an approach that has yet to be used.) When it comes to diction [kotoba], one must use old words. (One must not use anything not found in the Three Collections. The poems of ancient poets collected in the Shinkokinshū can be used in the same way.) The style [fūtei] of poetry can be learned from the superior poems of superior poets of the past. (One should not be concerned about the period but just learn from appropriate poems.)
Regarding the conception and diction of recent poets, even if it is a new phrase, one should be careful and leave it alone. (In regard to the poetry of those poets, one should never use the words from poems composed in the last seventy or eighty years.)
Poets frequently use and compose with the words of the poetry of the ancients. That already is a trend. But when using old poems and composing new poems, taking three out of the five measures [ku]26 is too much, and these poems will lack freshness. It is permissible to take three or four syllables more than two measures [ku]. However, it is too much if the content is the same and one uses words from old poems. (For example, using a foundation poem on flowers to compose on flowers or using a foundation poem on the moon to compose on the moon.) One should take a foundation poem on the seasons and compose on love or miscellaneous topics, or take a foundation poem on love and miscellaneous topics and compose on the four seasons. If done in this way, there probably will be no problems with borrowing from old poetry….
One should always keep in mind the scene [keiki] of old poetry and let it sink deep into the heart. One should learn in particular from the Kokinshū, The Tales of Ise, Gosenshū, Shūishū, and from super
ior poets in the Thirty-six Poets’ Collection. (Those who should come to mind from the Thirty-six Poets’ Collection are Hitomaro, Ki no Tsurayuki, Tadamine, Ise, Ono no Komachi, and so on.)
Even if one is not a master of Japanese poetry, in order to understand the seasonal scenes, the ups and downs of the human world, and the essence of things, one should always be sure to absorb the first twenty volumes of Bo Juyi’s Collected Works.27 (These deeply resonate with Japanese poetry.)
Poetry has no master. One simply makes the old poems one’s teacher. If one dyes one’s heart in the old style and learns from the words of one’s predecessors, who would not be able to learn to compose poetry? No one.
SHINKOKINSHŪ (NEW COLLECTION OF ANCIENT AND MODERN POEMS, CA. 1205)
The Shinkokinwakashū, better known as the Shinkokinshū, is an anthology of nearly two thousand Japanese poems (waka), all in the same standard prosodic form, thirty-one syllables in five measures. It was compiled and edited during the first two decades of the thirteenth century and was the eighth in what became a series of twenty-one anthologies of classical poetry created in response to an imperial edict, beginning with the Kokinshū (ca. 905) and ending with the Shinshokukokinshū (1439). Its title—literally, New Collection of Ancient and Modern Poems or New Kokinshū—implies that the Shinkokinshū was conceived and edited in calculated emulation of the first such imperially commissioned collection. The attempt to produce an anthology that would match, if not surpass, the achievements of the Kokinshū was widely deemed successful in the judgment of later generations. Its chronological scope is broader, not only because it postdates the Kokinshū by three centuries, but also because it includes poetry by authors of earlier periods deliberately excluded from the Kokinshū, and the range of styles encompassed is arguably richer. The question of which of these collections is superior, makes for better reading, or serves as a more reliable model for aspiring poets has been the subject of debate for several centuries and has not yet been resolved.
Following the precedent of the Kokinshū, the Shinkokinshū has two prefaces, one in Sino-Japanese kanbun and one in kana. The poems are arranged by topics into twenty volumes. The topics or poetic themes of these books generally follow the conventions established by the Kokinshū but, in their details, are much closer to the precedent of the Senzaishū (1187), the seventh imperially commissioned anthology. In chronological order from one through twenty, the topics consist of two books on spring; one on summer; two on autumn; one on winter; one each on felicitations, mourning, parting, and travel; five on love; three of miscellany; and one each on poems on Shinto and Buddhist topics. Quantitatively, the emphasis is on seasonal poems and poems of love, the favored genres for public, formal poetic composition. But the Shinkokinshū allows for considerably more coverage, compared with the Kokinshū, of “miscellaneous” topics, which tend to consist of personal reflections on the contingencies of life. The typology of the Shinkokinshū’s twenty books was sufficient to encompass the entire range of topics considered suitable, as of the late twelfth century, for the composition of court poetry and thus gives a rough overview of how the world of poetic experience was partitioned at the time. Given the immense authority accorded to the Kokinshū in the construction of this world, even the less conspicuous departures from its precedent are significant. That is, the Kokinshū contains virtually no poetry on specifically Buddhist topics, and its few more or less explicitly Shinto-inspired poems are mainly in the two books of miscellany. Anagrammatic (mono no na) poems, which make up the entire tenth book of the Kokinshū, have disappeared. All the poems in variant prosody (zōtai) have been omitted as well.
In each of the twenty books, but most noticeably in the books of seasonal and love poems and those on miscellaneous topics, the compilers took great care to arrange their materials into clusters of poems on the same conventional topics, such as “Beginning of Autumn” (risshū, the first seventeen poems in the first book of autumn), with common images or motifs (in this instance, “Autumn Winds”). These clusters were often linked by word associations (engo) to adjacent clusters. The effect of this was a sense of progression, with intermittent digressions, through the phases of seasonal change or movement toward the inevitable disappointments of a courtly love affair. The subtleties of such patterns were complicated and sometimes undermined by efforts to alternate sequences of recent poems—the “modern” of the anthology’s title—with those by “ancient” poets, and by deleting individual poems during the ultimately unfinished process of revising the anthology over many years.
Especially significant for appreciating the changes in the topography of decorum that the editors of the Shinkokinshū sought is the resulting exclusion of haikai (dissonant poems), which were included among poems of variant prosody (zōtai) in the Kokinshū.28 The question raised by the exclusion of haikai from the Shinkokinshū is one of many about the designs of this collection’s editors and, by extension, about the meaning of its title. Was the “renewal” of courtly poetic traditions suggested by its title meant to be a return to the origins, a restoration of the hallowed traditions of early court poetry, or an affirmation of new directions in poetic practice? Numerous and diverse answers have been proposed, but it is up to the reader to decide.
The poems translated here were selected from works by poets of the late twelfth century most prominently represented in the anthology, those who defined its distinctive aesthetic. As far as possible, the translations are literal in the sense that each word of the English answers to some word or wording of the Japanese. The poems are parsimonious in form and extravagant in sense, and if the English is ambiguous or occasionally obscure, it is (ideally) because the text is so to more or less the same degree. The poems achieve their depths and breadth through the exploitation of a received array of figures and an accepted vocabulary of connotations, as well as through techniques of punning (kakekotoba) and allusions to earlier classical poems (honka-dori) and subtexts (honsetsu), all of which made it possible for a single phrase or word to resonate well beyond its denotative sense. The commentary attempts to explicate some of what the poets presumably expected their readers to take for granted or recognize anew, supplies the honka (base poem) or honsetsu (subtext) in translation, and provides occasional citations from early commentaries or from the judgments of the poetry matches in which many of the poems originally were presented.
Spring 1
1
On the motif “Spring Begins.”
Miyoshino wa Fair Yoshino, mountains
yama mo kasumite now wrapped in mist:
shirayuki no to the village where snow
furinishi sato ni was falling
haru wa kinikeri spring has come.29
The Regent Prime Minister30
3
When the poet presented a hundred-verse set of poems, a poem on “Spring.”
yamafukami By a gate of pine
haru to mo shiranu in mountains too deep
matsu no to ni to know spring has come,
taedae kakaru one by one they fall,
yuki no tamamizu jewel drops of melting snow.31
Princess Shokushi32
4
For a fifty-verse set of poems composed for presentation to the retired emperor.
kakikurashi Cloud-darkened,
nao furusato no this ancient village:
yuki no uchi ni in falling snow
ato koso miene not a trace of spring,
haru wa kinikeri yet surely it has come.33
Kunaikyō34
23
On the topic “Lingering Cold,” for a hundred-verse poetry match at the poet’s residence.
sora wa nao Under skies still
kasumi mo yarazu awaiting mist,
kaze saete the wind chills
yukige ni kumoru a spring night’s moon
haru no yo no tsuki hiding in snow-fraught clouds.35
The Regent Prime Minister
24
At the Bureau of Poetry, on the motif “Spri
ng Mountain Moon.”
yama fukami In mountains deep
nao kage samushi a spring moon’s light
haru no tsuki still cold—
sora kakikumori the sky thickens with clouds
yuki wa furitsutsu as snow falls and falls.36
Echizen
25
On the topic “Spring Vista at a Waterside Village,” when Japanese poems were matched with poems in Chinese.
Mishima-e ya By the Bay of Mishima
shimo mo mada hinu even as frost lingers
ashi no ha ni spring winds
tsunogumu hodo no call forth new shoots
harukaze zo fuku from withered reeds.37
Michiteru
26
On the topic “Spring Vista at a Waterside Village,” when Japanese poems were matched with poems in Chinese.
yūzukuyo Evening of a new moon—
shio michikuru rashi the tide must be rising
Naniwa-e no in the Bay of Naniwa:
ashi no wakaba ni over the young shoots of reeds
koyuru shiranami crests of white waves.38
Hidetō
36
When some courtiers were making verses in Chinese and matching poems to them, a poem on “Water.”
miwataseba Gazing out over
yamamoto kasumu mist-shrouded foothills
Minasegawa beyond the river Minase,
yūbe wa aki to who could have thought
nani omoiken evenings are autumn?39
The Retired Emperor GoToba
37
For a poetry match at the residence of the regent prime minister, on the motif “Spring Dawn.”
kasumi tatsu Mist rises over
Sue no Matsuyama Far Pine Mountain—
honobono to faintly aglow,
nami ni hanaruru a sky of drifting clouds
yokogumo no sora parts from the waves.40
Fujiwara no Ietaka41
38
For a fifty-verse set of poems composed at the request of the cloistered Prince Shukaku.
haru no yo no A spring night’s
Traditional Japanese Literature Page 44