Travel and Encounter in Early Modern Japan Main Menu Course Description Edo Period Ihara Saikaku Matsuo Bashō

Unit 3.3

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Sometimes this is overtly humorous.  You read, for instance, the poet Nishiyama Sōin’s take on a canonical poem by the twelfth-century poet, Saigyō.
 
Saigyō’s poem:  “Thinking to gaze at them, I grew extremely close to the cherry
blossoms, making the parting ever so painful.”
 
Sōin’s haiku:  “Thinking to gaze at the cherry blossoms . . . I hurt my neck.”

Othertimes, rather than humor, a haiku derives its power from a startling or unprecedented image.  Consider the decidedly quotidian and unromantic focus of this haiku by Bashō:
 
“Bitten by fleas and lice, I slept in a bed / A horse urinating all the time /
Close to my pillow.”