Basho's work not only established haiku as a full-blooded, independent genre, but also helped the latter take a dominant place in Japanese poetry.
It is impossible to talk about haiku poetry without becoming acquainted with some of Basho's theoretical positions. This is necessary in order to understand the new things that Issa contributed to the general treasury of haiku poetry.
The genre of haiku (or rather, haikai no renga for that time) became a unique form of protest against the aristocratically elevated waka style. Therefore, it was quite natural that the main emphasis in the poetics of haikai no renga was on the use of the language of the urban lower classes, which was replete with vulgarisms. We can say that at that time this was the only thing that distinguished haiku as a genre. Basho realized that common words alone could not impart any noticeable aesthetic value to the new movement, and he advocated more significant and profound differences from the waka style. In his opinion, the images of haiku should have been drawn from everyday reality, the subject of poetry should have been everything that surrounds a person in his everyday life. In other words, the haiku poet was obliged to depict something in which the language of salon aristocratic poetry, limited by the framework of a pre-established theme, was powerless. Basho wrote, for example: “If you describe a green willow tree in the spring rain, this theme is good for renga. But if you describe a crow carrying swamp snails in a rice field, that’s good for a haiku.”
Basho also understood something else: in order for a new genre to acquire aesthetic value, it should not borrow either the images of traditional aristocratic poetry, or those humorous, deliberately rude images of haiku that were opposed to this poetry. He opposed these two extremes, calling on poets to look for the beautiful, the poetic in everyday life, in what they were so accustomed to that they stopped noticing, or in which they saw something trivial, unworthy of the high genre of poetry. Among the haiku poets, Basho was the first to establish a certain range of images for this poetic form, thereby establishing it as an independent genre of Japanese poetry.
IN early poems forms of haikai no renga, ideas and images often did not form a semantic unity; the objects or phenomena being compared also had nothing in common with each other. Basho argued that the author's perception must be in accordance with reality. But his work least of all corresponds to the principles of naturalism. The poet called on his fellow writers to find truthful correspondences in nature, believing that the subjective principle should be in harmonious combination with the object of poetic depiction. According to Basho, “true symbolic representation” is the basis of haiku composition. “The most important thing is to see. Capturing is a matter of secondary importance. To see, to understand, means to create,” the poet wrote.
At first, in the examples of haikai no rengi, the transition from one part to another depended almost entirely on the play of words - a certain word in the first part of the poem became, as it were, a pretext for introducing into the second part a word more or less related to the first. There was also a more complex way of connecting the first and second parts, in which the idea expressed in the first part of the poem was interpreted or developed in its second part.
Basho put forward the principle of unity of feeling, according to which the entire poem from beginning to end should be imbued with one feeling, one mood.
Kobayashi Issa (1763-1827), having created his own individual style of haiku poetry, achieved no less mastery than his great predecessor. Issa managed to recreate everything that Basho came to, without relying on his theoretical principles. He continued to liberate haiku by masterfully using dialect words and vernaculars in his poetic language. Issa was not such a virtuoso of haiku as the famous Japanese poet and artist Buson (1716-1783), who, for all his brilliance, had too refined a perception to arouse truly universal love. You can admire him, but nothing more. The main thing that distinguishes Issa’s work is his humanism. The poet's personality is in complete harmony with the content of his works. It is impossible to detect even the slightest discrepancy in them. His poems are poems about life, in which, with the sincere words of a simple peasant, he expresses deep love and closeness to people, to nature.
Issa's poetry very often turns to nature. In communicating with her, the poet finds his happiness. However, nature appears in him in a special meaning, not at all the same as that given to it by European poets, for example, the poets of the English “lake school”. She is not the embodiment of her creator, as, for example, in Wordsworth. Issa doesn't try to find Primum Mobile in her. Therefore, in his poems, man does not appear as a transformer of nature, as its eternal enemy - he is a part of it.
Issa sees everything through the eyes of a child seeing the world for the first time. He never ceases to be amazed. He notices everything that others pass by. The poet paints unique pictures of nature and never tires of admiring its beauty:
What a beauty!
Through the holes in the shoji
The Milky Way is visible.
The spring wind is so light,
What seems like a mouse
Drinks from Sumidagawa.
To the rhythm of the songs of the shepherd bird
They are in a hurry, running
Clouds across the sky.
Reading the last haiku, you clearly imagine a wandering poet with a beggar’s knapsack on his back. Leaning on his traveling staff, he listens to the cheerful song of the “swamp shepherdess,” looking enchanted at the blue spring sky, across which white clouds are racing.
The subject of the image in his poems is life, and he perceives it not as physical existence, an aimless “vanity of vanities.” For him, life is a priceless gift of nature. To live means to help all living beings inhabiting the world. In his haiku, every blade of grass, every insect lives according to the same laws as a person. He treats the snail, firefly, cicada, and grass as equals, thereby defending the equality of not only people, but also all living things in nature. I think this was a kind of protest against social inequality in contemporary society.
Matsuo Basho is the third name of the poet, by which he is known to Japan and the world. His real name is Jinsichiro Ginzaemon.
Biography of Matsuo Basho
The future poet was born into the family of a poor but educated samurai. Matsuo Basho's father and older brother were calligraphy teachers. But he chose a different fate for himself. His thirst for learning arose early and remained with him forever. While still a young man, Basho began to diligently study Chinese literature. Among his idols was the great Chinese poet Li Bo. Based on his name, which means "White Plum", Basho was called Tosei "Green Peach". This was Basho's middle name. He took the first one - Munefusa - as soon as he started writing poetry.
Diligently studying Chinese and Japanese poetry, Matsuo Basho gradually came to understand that poets have a special place among people. In addition to literature, he studied philosophy and medicine. True, after some time he realized that books could not study either man or nature, and at the age of 28 he left his native place. Matsuo Basho was prompted to take this step by the untimely death of his master, the prince’s son. They were brought together by their love of poetry. Basho became a monk (which freed the samurai from serving the feudal lord) and went to the largest Japanese city - Edo (modern Tokyo). His family tried to persuade him to abandon his “reckless act,” but he was adamant.
In Edo, the aspiring poet began to attend a poetry school. And soon he himself became a poetry teacher for young people, most of whom were as poor as himself. Poverty did not bother Basho. He felt like a follower of Buddhist monks, for whom spiritual improvement was above all material benefits. He lived in a house donated by the father of one of his students on the outskirts of Edo. Wanting to decorate his habitat, he planted a banana tree (basho in Japanese).
Probably, the noise of wide banana leaves inspired the poet’s last pseudonym - Basho. With this name he entered the history of Japanese and world poetry. Basho did not manage to live long in his hut decorated with a banana tree. She burned down. From that time (1682) until the end of his days he was a wanderer, like many poets before him. Traveling poets are a Japanese tradition. They walked around their country, looking for the most beautiful places, then described them in poetry and gave them to people. During his ten years of wandering, Matsuo Basho also traveled many roads and saw a lot of people. He left his impressions in travel diaries and in poetry. There are five “journey diaries” in total. In the memory of the Japanese, Matsuo Basho, whose biography we reviewed, remained a poet in a monastic robe and with a traveling staff.
Key dates in the life of Matsuo Basho:
1644 - born in the castle city of Ueno, Iga Province;
1672 - left hometown and went to Edo (Tokyo) with a volume of his poems;
1684 - left Edo and went to travel around Japan;
1694 - died in Osaka.
Poems by Matsuo Basho
He wrote poems that were unusual for our perception in just three lines. The Japanese call them haiku. It is no coincidence that this poetic form arose in Japan. Its appearance is due to the entire structure of Japanese life, which takes place in a closed geographical space - on the islands. This circumstance, apparently, shaped the Japanese tendency towards asceticism and minimalism in everyday life: a light empty house, a rock garden, bansai (small trees). This also influenced laconicism in art.
Literature, especially poetry, also expressed the Japanese inner desire for small things. An example of this haiku is three lines, the length of which is strictly defined. The first has 5 syllables, the second has 7, the third has 5. In fact, haiku was formed as a result of cutting off the last two lines from the tank (5-7-5-7-7). In Japanese, haiku means opening verses. There is no rhyme in haiku, which we are accustomed to when reading Russian poets. In fact, the Japanese never had rhymes - that’s just their language.
Almost every haiku must have “seasonal words” that indicate the time of year. Winter plum, snow, ice, black color - these are images of winter; singing frogs, sakura flowers - spring; nightingale, cuckoo, “bamboo planting day” of summer; chrysanthemums, yellow leaves, rain, moon - autumn.
What sadness!
Suspended in a small cage
Captive cricket.
Sadness - because winter is coming. The cricket in the cage is her sign. In China and Japan, chirping insects (cicadas, crickets) were kept in small cages in the house during the winter, like songbirds. And they were sold in the fall.
Haiku is usually divided into two parts. The first line of the poem is its first part, which indicates the picture, the situation and sets the mood.
The May rain is endless.
The mallows are reaching somewhere,
Looking for the path of the sun.
In this haiku, the first line captures a monotonous slow-motion phenomenon and sets up a wave of despondency and melancholy.
The second part of haiku should be contrasted with the first. In this poem, stillness is compared with movement (“stretching”, “searching”), grayness, despondency - with the “sun”. Thus, the poem contains not only a compositional, but also a semantic antithesis.
Each haiku is a small painting. We not only see it, but also hear it - the sound of the wind, the cry of a pheasant, the singing of a nightingale, the croaking of a frog and the voice of a cuckoo.
The peculiarity of haiku is that it creates pictures with hints, often expressed in one word. Japanese artists do the same.
What can you write about in haiku? About everything: about his native land, about his mother, father, friend, about work, art, but main topic haiku is nature... The Japanese love nature and it gives them great pleasure to contemplate its beauty. They even have concepts that denote the process of admiring nature. Hanami is admiring the flowers, Tsukimi is admiring the moon, Yukimi is admiring the snow. Collections of haiku were usually divided into four chapters: “Spring”, “Summer”, “Autumn”, “Winter”.
But the poems of Matsuo Basho were not only about flowers, birds, wind and the moon. Together with nature, people always live in them - he plants rice sprouts, admires the beauty of the sacred Mount Fuji, freezes in winter night, looks at the moon. He is sad and cheerful - he is everywhere, he is the main character.
I dreamed of an old story:
An old woman abandoned in the mountains is crying.
And only a month is her friend.
The poem captures echoes ancient legend about how one man, believing his wife’s slander, took his old aunt, who replaced his mother, to a deserted mountain and left her there. Seeing the clear face of the moon rise above the mountain, he repented and hastened to bring the old woman back home.
Matsuo Basho often speaks allegorically about a person and his life. Here's how in this, one of the most famous, haiku of this author:
Old pond.
A frog jumped into the water.
A splash in silence.
Haiku are seemingly very simple, uncomplicated, it seems that it is not at all difficult to write them. But it seems so only at first glance. In fact, behind them lies not only the hard work of the poet, but also knowledge of the history and philosophy of his people. Here, for example, is one of Basho’s recognized masterpieces:
On a bare branch
Raven sits alone.
Autumn evening.
It seems like nothing special, but it is known that Matsuo Basho reworked this poem many times - until he found the only the right words and did not put them in their places. With the help of several precise details (“hints”), the poet created a picture of late autumn. Why did Basho choose the raven out of all the birds? Of course, it's no coincidence. This is the all-knowing raven. It symbolizes Buddhist detachment from the bustle world, that is, with its deep meaning, haiku is addressed to a person - his loneliness. Behind the images of nature, Matsuo Basho always hides moods and deep thoughts. He was the first in Japan to imbue haiku with philosophical thoughts.
Haiku is that part of the culture that was part of the life of every Japanese.
Main features of haiku:
- a certain number of syllables in three lines (5-7-5);
- contrasting one part of the poem with another;
- lack of rhyme;
- the presence of “hints”;
- the use of “seasonal words”;
- conciseness;
- picturesqueness;
- affirmation of two principles: nature and man;
- designed for the co-creation of the reader.
Don't imitate me too much!
Look, what's the point of such similarities?
Two halves of melon. For students
I want it at least once
Go to the market on holiday
Buy tobacco
"Autumn has already arrived!" -
The wind whispered in my ear,
Sneaking up to my pillow.
He is a hundred times nobler
Who does not say at the flash of lightning:
"This is our life!"
All the excitement, all the sadness
Of your troubled heart
Give it to the flexible willow.
What freshness it blows
From this melon in drops of dew,
With sticky wet soil!
In the garden where the irises have opened,
Talking with your old friend, -
What a reward for the traveler!
Cold mountain spring.
I didn’t have time to scoop up a handful of water,
How my teeth are already creaking
What a connoisseur's quirk!
For a flower without fragrance
The moth descended.
Come quickly, friends!
Let's go wander through the first snow,
Until we fall off our feet.
Evening bindweed
I'm captured...Motionless
I stand in oblivion.
Frost covered him,
The wind makes his bed...
An abandoned child.
There's such a moon in the sky,
Like a tree cut down to the roots:
The fresh cut turns white.
A yellow leaf floats.
Which shore, cicada,
What if you wake up?
How the river overflowed!
A heron wanders on short legs
Knee-deep in water.
How a banana moans in the wind,
How the drops fall into the tub,
I hear it all night long. In a thatched hut
Willow is bent over and sleeping.
And it seems to me that there is a nightingale on a branch...
This is her soul.
Top-top is my horse.
I see myself in the picture -
In the expanse of summer meadows.
Suddenly you will hear “shorkh-shorkh”.
Longing stirs in my soul...
Bamboo on a frosty night.
Butterflies flying
Wakes up a quiet clearing
In the sun's rays.
How the autumn wind whistles!
Then only you will understand my poems,
When you spend the night in the field.
And I want to live in autumn
To this butterfly: drinks hastily
There is dew from the chrysanthemum.
The flowers have faded.
The seeds are scattering and falling,
It's like tears...
Gusty leaf
Hid in a bamboo grove
And little by little it calmed down.
Take a close look!
Shepherd's purse flowers
You will see under the fence.
Oh, wake up, wake up!
Become my comrade
Sleeping moth!
They fly to the ground
Returning to old roots...
Separation of flowers! In memory of a friend
Old pond.
A frog jumped into the water.
A splash in silence.
Autumn Moon Festival.
Around the pond and around again,
All night long all around!
That's all I'm rich with!
Easy, like my life,
Gourd pumpkin. Grain storage jug
First snow in the morning.
He barely covered
Narcissus leaves.
The water is so cold!
The seagull can't sleep
Rocking on the wave.
The jug burst with a crash:
At night the water in it froze.
I woke up suddenly.
Moon or morning snow...
Admiring the beauty, I lived as I wanted.
This is how I end the year.
Clouds of cherry blossoms!
The ringing of the bell floated... From Ueno
Or Asakusa?
In the cup of a flower
The bumblebee is dozing. Don't touch him
Sparrow friend!
Stork nest in the wind.
And underneath - beyond the storm -
Cherry is a calm color.
Long day to go
Sings - and doesn’t get drunk
Lark in spring.
Over the expanse of fields -
Not tied to the ground by anything -
The lark is ringing.
It's raining in May.
What is this? Has the rim on the barrel burst?
The sound is unclear at night...
Pure spring!
Up ran up my leg
Little crab.
Today is a clear day.
But where do the drops come from?
There is a patch of clouds in the sky.
It's like I took it in my hands
Lightning when in the dark
You lit a candle. In praise of the poet Rika
How fast the moon flies!
On motionless branches
Drops of rain hung.
Steps important
Heron on fresh stubble.
Autumn in the village.
Left for a moment
Farmer threshing rice
Looks at the moon.
In a glass of wine,
Swallows, don't drop me
Clay lump.
There once was a castle here...
Let me be the first to tell you about it
A spring flowing in an old well.
How the grass thickens in summer!
And only one-sheet
One single leaf.
Oh no, ready
I won't find any comparisons for you,
Three day month!
Hanging motionless
Dark cloud in half the sky...
Apparently he's waiting for lightning.
Oh, how many of them there are in the fields!
But everyone blooms in their own way -
This is the highest feat of a flower!
I wrapped my life around
Around the suspension bridge
This wild ivy.
Blanket for one.
And icy, black
Winter night... Oh, sadness! Poet Rika mourns his wife
Spring is leaving.
The birds are crying. Fish eyes
Full of tears.
The distant call of the cuckoo
It sounded wrong. After all, these days
The poets have disappeared.
A thin tongue of fire, -
The oil in the lamp has frozen.
You wake up... What sadness! In a foreign land
West East -
Everywhere the same trouble
The wind is still cold. To a friend who left for the West
Even a white flower on the fence
Near the house where the owner is gone,
The cold poured over me. To an orphaned friend
Did I break off the branch?
The wind running through the pines?
How cool is the splash of water!
Here intoxicated
I wish I could fall asleep on these river stones,
Overgrown with cloves...
They rise from the ground again,
Fading in the darkness, chrysanthemums,
Nailed by heavy rain.
Pray for happy days!
On a winter plum tree
Be like your heart.
Visiting the cherry blossoms
I stayed neither more nor less -
Twenty happy days.
Under the canopy of cherry blossoms
I'm like the hero of an old drama,
At night I lay down to sleep.
Garden and mountain in the distance
Trembling, moving, entering
In a summer open house.
Driver! Lead your horse
Over there, across the field!
There's a cuckoo singing.
May rains
The waterfall was buried -
They filled it with water.
Summer herbs
Where the heroes disappeared
Like a dream. On the old battlefield
Islands...Islets...
And it splits into hundreds of fragments
Sea of a summer day.
What bliss!
Cool field of green rice...
The water is murmuring...
Silence all around.
Penetrate into the heart of the rocks
Voices of cicadas.
Tide Gate.
Washes the heron up to its chest
Cool sea.
Small perches are dried
On the branches of a willow...What coolness!
Fishing huts on the shore.
Wooden pestle.
Was he once a willow tree?
Was it a camellia?
Celebration of the meeting of two stars.
Even the night before is so different
For an ordinary night! On the eve of the Tashibama holiday
The sea is raging!
Far away, to Sado Island,
The Milky Way is spreading.
With me under the same roof
Two girls... Hagi branches in bloom
And a lonely month. At the hotel
What does ripening rice smell like?
I was walking across the field, and suddenly -
To the right is Ariso Bay.
Tremble, O hill!
Autumn wind in the field -
My lonely moan. In front of the burial mound of the early deceased poet Isse
Red-red sun
In the deserted distance... But it’s chilling
The merciless autumn wind.
Pines... Cute name!
Leaning towards the pine trees in the wind
Bushes and autumn herbs. An area called Sosenki
Musashi Plain around.
Not a single cloud will touch
Your traveling hat.
Wet, walking in the rain,
But this traveler is worthy of song too,
Not only hagi are in bloom.
O merciless rock!
Under this glorious helmet
Now the cricket is ringing.
Whiter than white rocks
On the slopes of a stone mountain
This autumn whirlwind!
Farewell poems
I wanted to write on the fan -
It broke in his hands. Breaking up with a friend
Where are you, moon, now?
Like a sunken bell
She disappeared to the bottom of the sea. In Tsuruga Bay, where the bell once sank
Never a butterfly
He won't be anymore... He trembles in vain
Worm in the autumn wind.
A secluded house.
Moon... Chrysanthemums... In addition to them
A piece of a small field.
Cold rain without end.
This is how the chilled monkey looks,
As if asking for a straw cloak.
Winter night in the garden.
With a thin thread - and a month in the sky,
And the cicadas make a barely audible sound.
The nuns story
About his previous service at court...
There is deep snow all around. In a mountain village
Children, who's the fastest?
We'll catch up with the balls
Ice grains. Playing with children in the mountains
Tell me why
Oh raven, to the noisy city
Is this where you fly from?
How tender are the young leaves?
Even here, on the weeds
At a forgotten house.
Camellia petals...
Maybe the nightingale dropped
A hat made of flowers?
Ivy leaves...
For some reason their smoky purple
He talks about the past.
Mossy gravestone.
Under it - is it in reality or in a dream? -
A voice whispers prayers.
The dragonfly is spinning...
Can't get a hold
For stalks of flexible grass.
Don't think with contempt:
“What small seeds!”
It's red pepper.
First I left the grass...
Then he left the trees...
Lark flight.
The bell fell silent in the distance,
But the scent of evening flowers
Its echo floats.
The cobwebs tremble a little.
Thin threads of saiko grass
They flutter in the twilight.
Dropping petals
Suddenly spilled a handful of water
Camellia flower.
The stream is barely noticeable.
Swimming through a thicket of bamboo
Camellia petals.
The May rain is endless.
The mallows are reaching somewhere,
Looking for the path of the sun.
Faint orange aroma.
Where?.. When?.. In what fields, cuckoo,
Did I hear your migratory cry?
Falls with a leaf...
No, look! Halfway there
The firefly flew up.
And who could say
Why don't they live so long!
The incessant sound of cicadas.
Fisherman's hut.
Mixed up in a pile of shrimp
Lonely cricket.
White hair fell.
Under my headboard
The cricket does not stop talking.
Sick goose dropped
On a field on a cold night.
A lonely dream on the way.
Even a wild boar
Will spin you around and take you with you
This winter field whirlwind!
It's already the end of autumn,
But he believes in future days
Green tangerine.
Portable hearth.
So, heart of wanderings, and for you
There is no peace anywhere. At the travel hotel
The cold set in on the way.
At the scarecrow's place, perhaps?
Should I borrow some sleeves?
Sea kale stems.
The sand creaked on my teeth...
And I remembered that I was getting old.
Mandzai came late
To a mountain village.
The plum trees have already bloomed.
Why so lazy all of a sudden?
They barely woke me up today...
The spring rain is noisy.
sad me
Give me more sadness,
Cuckoos distant call!
I clapped my hands.
And where the echo sounded,
The summer moon is growing pale.
A friend sent me a gift
Risu, I invited him
To visit the moon itself. On the night of the full moon
ancient times
There's a whiff... The garden near the temple
Covered with fallen leaves.
So easy, so easy
Floated out - and in the cloud
The moon thought.
Quails are calling.
It must be evening.
The hawk's eye went dark.
Together with the owner of the house
I listen in silence to the evening bells.
Willow leaves are falling.
White fungus in the forest.
Some unknown leaf
It stuck to his hat.
What sadness!
Suspended in a small cage
Captive cricket.
Night silence.
Only behind the picture on the wall
The cricket is ringing and ringing.
Dewdrops sparkle.
But they have a taste of sadness,
Don't forget!
That's right, this cicada
Are you all drunk? -
One shell remains.
The leaves have fallen.
The whole world is one color.
Only the wind hums.
Rocks among cryptomerias!
How I sharpened their teeth
Winter cold wind!
Trees were planted in the garden.
Quietly, quietly, to encourage them,
Autumn rain whispers.
So that the cold whirlwind
Give them the aroma, they open up again
Late autumn flowers.
Everything was covered with snow.
Lonely old woman
In a forest hut.
Ugly Raven -
And it's beautiful in the first snow
On a winter morning!
Like soot sweeps away,
Cryptomeria apex trembles
A storm has arrived.
To fish and birds
I don't envy you anymore... I'll forget
All the sorrows of the year. New Year's Eve
Nightingales are singing everywhere.
There - behind the bamboo grove,
Here - in front of the river willow.
From branch to branch
Quietly the drops are running...
Spring rain.
Through the hedge
How many times have you fluttered
Butterfly wings!
She closed her mouth tightly
Sea shell.
Unbearable heat!
Just the breeze blows -
From branch to branch of willow
The butterfly will flutter.
They are getting along with the winter hearth.
How old my familiar stove maker has aged!
Strands of hair turned white.
Year after year everything is the same:
Monkey amuses the crowd
In a monkey mask.
I didn’t have time to take my hands away,
Like a spring breeze
Settled in a green sprout. Planting rice
Rain comes after rain,
And the heart is no longer disturbed
Sprouts in rice fields.
Stayed and left
Bright moon... Stayed
Table with four corners. In memory of the poet Tojun
First fungus!
Still, autumn dew,
He didn't consider you.
Boy perched
On the saddle, and the horse is waiting.
Collect radishes.
The duck pressed to the ground.
Covered with a dress of wings
Your bare legs...
Sweep away the soot.
For myself this time
The carpenter gets along well. Before New Year
O spring rain!
Streams run from the roof
Along wasp nests.
Under the open umbrella
I make my way through the branches.
Willows in the first down.
From the sky of its peaks
Only river willows
It's still raining.
A hillock right next to the road.
To replace the faded rainbow -
Azaleas in the sunset light.
Lightning in the dark at night.
Lake water surface
Suddenly it burst into sparks.
The waves are running across the lake.
Some people regret the heat
Sunset clouds.
The ground is disappearing from under our feet.
I grab a light ear...
The moment of separation has arrived. Saying goodbye to friends
My whole life is on the way!
It's like I'm digging up a small field,
I wander back and forth.
Transparent waterfall...
Fell into a light wave
Pine needle.
Hanging in the sun
Cloud... Across it -
Migratory birds.
The buckwheat has not ripened
But they treat you to a field of flowers
Guest in a mountain village.
The end of autumn days.
Already throwing up his hands
Chestnut shell.
What do people feed on there?
The house pressed to the ground
Under the autumn willows.
The scent of chrysanthemums...
In the temples of ancient Nara
Dark buddha statues.
Autumn darkness
Broken and driven away
Conversation of friends.
Oh this long journey!
The autumn twilight is thickening,
And - not a soul around.
Why am I so strong
Did you sense old age this fall?
Clouds and birds.
It's late autumn.
Alone I think:
“How does my neighbor live?”
I got sick on the way.
And everything runs and circles my dream
Through scorched fields. Death Song
* * *
Poems from travel diaries
Maybe my bones
The wind will whiten - It is in the heart
It breathed cold on me. Hitting the road
You are sad listening to the cry of monkeys!
Do you know how a child cries?
Abandoned in the autumn wind?
Moonless night. Darkness.
With cryptomeria millennial
The whirlwind grabbed him in an embrace.
The ivy leaf is trembling.
In a small bamboo grove
The first storm murmurs.
You stand indestructible, pine tree!
And how many monks have lived here?
How many bindweeds have bloomed... In the garden of the old monastery
Drops dewdrops - tok-tok -
The source, as in previous years...
Wash away the world's dirt! The source sung by Saigyo
Dusk over the sea.
Only the cries of wild ducks in the distance
They turn vaguely white.
Spring morning.
Over every nameless hill
Transparent haze.
I'm walking along a mountain path.
Suddenly I felt at ease for some reason.
Violets in the thick grass.
From the heart of a peony
A bee slowly crawls out...
Oh, with what reluctance! Leaving a hospitable home
young horse
He happily plucks the ears of corn.
Rest on the way.
To the capital - there, in the distance, -
Half the sky remains...
Snow clouds. On a mountain pass
The sun of a winter day,
My shadow freezes
On the horse's back.
She is only nine days old.
But both fields and mountains know:
Spring has come again.
Cobwebs above.
I see the image of Buddha again
At the foot of the empty. Where the Buddha statue once stood
Let's hit the road! I'll show you
How cherry blossoms bloom in distant Yoshino,
My old hat.
I've barely gotten better
Exhausted, until the night...
And suddenly - wisteria flowers!
Soaring larks above
I sat down in the sky to rest -
On the very ridge of the pass.
Cherries at the waterfall...
To those who love good wine,
I'll take the branch as a gift. Dragon Gate Waterfall
Like spring rain
Runs under a canopy of branches...
The spring whispers quietly. Stream near the hut where Saigyo lived
The past spring
In the distant harbor of Vaca
I finally caught up.
On Buddha's birthday
He was born
Little deer.
I saw it first
In the rays of dawn the face of a fisherman,
And then - a blooming poppy.
Where it flies
The pre-dawn cry of the cuckoo,
What's there? - Distant island.
Japan)
In this Japanese name, the surname (Matsuo) comes before the personal name.
Basho's poetry and aesthetics significantly influenced Japanese literature of that time; the “Bashō style” determined the development of Japanese poetry for almost 200 years.
Biography
Matsuo Basho was born in Iga Province (present-day Iga City, Mie Prefecture), the exact day and month are unknown. There are two theories about the place of birth: the Akasaka theory (the current city of Iga former city Ueno, Akasaka village) and the Tsuge theory (present-day Iga city, Tsuge village). This is because it is unknown when exactly the Matsuo family moved from Tsuge to Akasaka before or after Basho's birth. He was born into a poor family of samurai Matsuo Yozaemon (Japanese: 松尾与左衛門). Basho was the third child and second son in the family; in addition to his older brother, he had four sisters: one older and three younger. Basho's father died when he was 13 years old (1656). Over the years, Basho bore the names Kinsaku, Hanshichi, Toshitiro, Chuemon, Jinsichiro (甚七郎). Basho (芭蕉) is a literary pseudonym, translated meaning “banana tree”.
The father and elder brother of the future poet taught calligraphy at the courts of wealthier samurai, and already at home he received a good education. In his youth, he was fond of Chinese poets, such as Du Fu (at that time, books were already available even to middle-class nobles). From 1664 he studied poetry in Kyoto.
He was in the service of the noble and wealthy samurai Todo Yoshitada (藤堂良忠, 1642-1666), with whom he shared a passion for the genre haikai- a popular Japanese form of collaborative poetic creativity. In 1665, Yoshitada and Basho, with several acquaintances, composed a hundred-strophe haikai. Yoshitada's sudden death in 1666 marked the end peaceful life Matsuo, and eventually he left the house. Having reached Edo (now Tokyo), from 1672 he was stationed here on public service. The life of an official, however, turned out to be unbearable for him, he left the service and became a poetry teacher.
It is believed that Basho was a slender man of small stature, with thin, graceful features, thick eyebrows and a prominent nose. As is customary among Buddhists, he shaved his head. His health was poor and he suffered from indigestion all his life. Based on the poet's letters, it can be assumed that he was a calm, moderate person, unusually caring, generous and faithful to his family and friends. Despite the fact that he suffered from poverty all his life, Basho, as a true Buddhist philosopher, paid almost no attention to this circumstance.
Basho left behind seven anthologies, in the creation of which his students also took part: “ Winter days" (1684), " Spring days" (1686), " Stalled field" (1689), " Gourd pumpkin" (1690), " Monkey's Straw Cloak"(Book 1, 1691, Book 2, 1698), " Bag of coal"(1694), lyrical diaries, prefaces to books and poems, letters containing judgments about art and the creative process in poetry. Travel lyrical diaries contain descriptions of landscapes, meetings, historical events. They include their own poems and quotes from the works of prominent poets. The best of them is considered "On the Paths of the North"(“Okuno hosomichi”, 1689). Basho's poetry and aesthetics significantly influenced Japanese literature of that time; the "Bashō style" determined the development of Japanese poetry for almost 200 years.
Basho titled his story about his trip to Japan "Weathered travel notes» . After a year of quiet reflection in his hut, in 1687, Basho published a collection of poems, “Spring Days.” (Japanese: 春の日 haru no hi) - himself and his students, where the world saw the poet’s greatest poem - “ Old Pond" This is a milestone in the history of Japanese poetry. Here is what Yamaguchi Mochi wrote about this poem in his study “Impressionism as the dominant trend in Japanese poetry”: “The European could not understand what there was not only beauty, but even any meaning at all, and was surprised that the Japanese could admire things like that. Meanwhile, when a Japanese hears this poem, his imagination is instantly transported to an ancient Buddhist temple, surrounded by centuries-old trees, far from the city, where no human noise can be heard at all. At this temple there is usually a small pond, which, in turn, perhaps has its own legend. And then, at dusk in the summer, a Buddhist hermit comes out, having just looked up from his sacred books, and approaches this pond with thoughtful steps. Everything around is quiet, so quiet that you can even hear a frog jump into the water...”
Not only the complete impeccability of this poem from the point of view of the numerous prescriptions of this laconic form of poetry (although Basho was never afraid to violate them), but also the deep meaning, the quintessence of the beauty of Nature, the peace and harmony of the soul of the poet and the surrounding world, make us consider this haiku a great work of art .
Basho didn't really like the traditional technique marukekatombo, search hidden meanings. It is believed that Basho expressed in this poem the principle of mono no aware - "sad charm."
In the simplicity of images lies true beauty, Basho believed, and told his students that he strives for poems “small like the Sunagawa River.”
Philosophical and aesthetic principles of Basho's poetry
Deep influence on japanese art contributed to the Zen school of Buddhism, which came to Japan from China. The principles of Zen entered the practice of art, becoming their basis, forming a characteristic style of Japanese creativity, distinguished by brevity, detachment and a subtle perception of beauty. It was Zen, which determined the artist’s worldview, that allowed Basho to turn the emerging literary movement “haikai” (literally “comic”) into a unique phenomenon, a way of perceiving the world in which creativity is able to aesthetically perfectly reflect the beauty of the surrounding world and show a person in it without using complex structures, with minimal means, with the accuracy necessary and sufficient for the task.
Analysis of the creative heritage of the poet and writer allows us to identify several basic philosophical and aesthetic principles of Zen that Basho followed, which determined his views on art. One of these is the concept of “eternal loneliness” - wabi (vivikta dharma). Its essence lies in a special state of detachment, a person’s passivity, when he is not involved in the movement, often fussy and not filled with any serious meaning, of the outside world. Wabi leads us to the concepts of hermitism, to leading the lifestyle of a recluse - a person is not just passive, but consciously chooses the path of escaping a hectic life, retiring in his humble abode. Detachment from the material world helps on the path to enlightenment, to finding a true, simple life. Hence the emergence of the ideal of “poverty,” since excessive material worries can only distract from the state of peaceful sadness and prevent one from seeing the world in its original beauty. Hence minimalism, when in order to feel the beauty of spring, it is enough to see blades of grass emerging from under the snow, without the need to contemplate the lush cherry blossoms, the melting of snow and the riot of spring streams.
The characteristic rejection of generally accepted ethics characteristic of Zen, however, does not mean its absence. IN Japanese culture ethics in Zen is embodied in ritual forms, through which the expression, albeit very meager, of attitudes towards the surrounding world and people occurs. The corresponding ideas are embodied in the Japanese aesthetic worldview wabi-sabi.
Living in a modest hut is not only and not so much following your desires, it is, more importantly, directly the path of creativity, which finds expression in poetry.
Matsuo Basho.Another sign of reduced ethics in Zen, which is also evident in the poetry of the Japanese, can be considered the use of humor in describing various phenomena of the surrounding world. Basho is able to smile where it would seem necessary to show compassion or pity, or he laughs where another would experience dubious tenderness. Detachment and calm contemplation are what allow the artist to have fun in various difficult situations. As the philosopher Henri Bergson noted, “... step aside, look at life as an indifferent spectator: many dramas will turn into comedies.” Indifference, or, in other words, insensitivity, is rooted in Zen, but it is hardly possible to reproach Basho for indifference, since for him laughter is a way to overcome the adversities of life, including his own, and most importantly - the ability to really laugh at oneself, sometimes even quite ironically, describing the hard life of wandering:
Matsuo Basho.The principle of “eternal loneliness,” freeing the creator from the bustle of the world, leads him along the road from utilitarian interests and goals to his highest destiny. Thus, creativity acquires a sacred meaning; it becomes a guideline on the path of life. From the entertainment that it was in his youth, from the way to achieve success and gain recognition by defeating his rivals, as it seemed in his heyday, in later years the poet’s view of poetry changes to the point of view that it was his true passion. purpose, it was precisely this that led him along life path. The desire to free this sacred meaning from any signs of commercialism, to protect it, makes Basho write in the afterword to the poetry collection “Minashiguri” (“Empty Chestnuts”, 1683): “Wabi and poetry (fugue) are far from everyday needs. These are beetle-eaten chestnuts that people did not pick up when visiting Saigyo’s hut in the mountains.”
Memory
see also
Notes
- German National Library, Berlin State Library, Bavarian State Library, etc. Record #118653369 // General regulatory control (GND) - 2012-2016.
- Concise Literary Encyclopedia - M.: Soviet Encyclopedia, 1962.
- BNF ID: Open Data Platform - 2011.
- SNAC - 2010.
- Babelio
- Matsuo Basho // Japan from A to Z. Popular illustrated encyclopedia. (CD-ROM). - M.: Directmedia Publishing, “Japan Today”, 2008. -
- (pseudonym; another pseudonym - Munefusa; real name - Jinsichiro) (1644, Ueno, Iga Province, - 10/12/1694, Osaka), Japanese poet, verse theorist. Born into a samurai family. From 1664 he studied poetry in Kyoto. Was in public service from 1672 in... ...
- (1644 94), Japanese poet. The pinnacle examples of philosophical lyrics in the haiku genre, full of elegant simplicity and harmonious perception of the world; comic renga (chain poems). The legacy of Matsuo Basho and his students amounted to 7 anthologies, including... ... Modern encyclopedia
- (1644 1694), Japanese poet. Philosophical lyrics in the haiku genre (about 2 thousand), full of elegant simplicity and harmonious perception of the world; comic renga (chain poems). The legacy of Matsuo and his students amounted to 7 anthologies, including... ... encyclopedic Dictionary
MATSUO Basho- (other pseudonym Munefusa; real name Jinsichiro) (164494), Japanese poet, poetry theorist. Poems: ok. 2000 haiku; comic renga. Poetic the legacy of M. and his students consisted of 7 anthologies: “Winter Days” (1684), “Spring Days” (1686), “Dead ... ... Literary encyclopedic Dictionary
- (real name Munefusa, 1644–1694) great Japanese poet who played big role in the development of the haikai poetic genre. Basho was born in the province of Iga, in the central part of the island of Honshu, into a poor samurai family, and as a child he received good... ... All Japan
Basho (pseudonym; another pseudonym for Munefusa; real name Jinsichiro) (1644, Ueno, Iga Province, 10/12/1694, Osaka), Japanese poet, verse theorist. Born into a samurai family. From 1664 he studied poetry in Kyoto. Was in public service since... ... Great Soviet Encyclopedia
See Matsuo Basho. * * * BASE BASE, see Matsuo Base (see MATSUO Base) ... encyclopedic Dictionary
Professional sumo tournament Matsuo Basho (1644 1694) Japanese poet List of meanings of a word or phrase with links to the corresponding ones... Wikipedia
Basho- BASHO, see Matsuo Basho... Biographical Dictionary
Buson: Portrait of Basho Matsuo Basho (Japanese 松尾芭蕉 (pseudonym); at birth named Kinzaku, upon reaching adulthood Munefusa (Japanese 宗房); another name Jinsichiro (Japanese 甚七郎)) is a great Japanese poet, theorist of verse. Born in 1644 in Ueno, ... ... Wikipedia
Books
- Poems (2012 ed.), Matsuo Basho. Matsuo Basho is a great Japanese poet and verse theorist. Born in 1644 in the small castle town of Ueno, Iga Province (Honshu Island). Died October 12, 1694 in Osaka. Feeling the ideological...
- Basho, Basho Matsuo. Matsuo Basho is a great Japanese poet and verse theorist. Born in 1644 in the small castle town of Ueno, Iga Province (Honshu Island). Died October 12, 1694 in Osaka. Feeling the ideological...
