indexeng

Max Verhart

The many shapes of haiku

Until only a few decades ago haiku was so explicitly Japanese phenomenon, that to speak of ‘Japanese haiku' was really to use a pleonasm. But it no longer is. For haiku has taken root in many other countries and is developing there in often very own ways. As a result it nowadays is quite correct to speak of Japanese haiku as distinct from, say, American, German, French, Dutch and Polish haiku – to name just a few countries where a haiku culture has come into being. This global distribution is sometimes labelled ‘world haiku.'

But ‘world haiku' of course originates in Japan, where this short poem has a remarkable long history of over a 1000 years. The oldest poems already have characteristics that are still being used. Many poems had five lines, with respectively 5-7-5-7-7 onji (a concept generally compared with what we call a syllable, though the two do not fully match). That form, at the time referred to as waka, is still being written, though it is presently known as tanka.

In later centuries linked poetry became popular. Linked poems were the product of the collaboration of two or more poets, alternately contributing stanza's with 5-7-5 and 7-7 onji respectively. The shortest linked poem only had two stanzas of 5-7-5 and 7-7 onji. But longer ‘chains' were also written: 12, 36 or 100 stanzas long for instance. Such a longer linked poem was called a renku (later on: renga) and had to comply with quite some rules.

The opening stanza of a renku had the 5-7-5 form and was called a hokku. In all its briefness it had to be a complete poem in itself. As an independent poem the hokku much later became known as haiku. One of the oldest is this one by Moritake (1472 – 1549):

was that a blossom 
returning to its branch? 
ah – a butterfly

But it was Matsuo Basho (1644–1694) who brought haiku to its fullest bloom and regard. His two probably most famous poems are these:

on a bare branch
a crow is perching --
autumn evening

the old pond  
a frog jumps in --
sound of water

The most important haiku poets after Basho are Taniguchi Buson (1715-1783), Kobayashi Issa (1763-1827) and Masaoka Shiki (1867-1902). These four men are considered to be the great ones of haiku and in all the world there is hardly an anthology of classical Japanese haiku without any poems by them.

Haiku in Japan developed into a real folk art, practised by poets in all strata of the society. Also various schools of haiku came into being, each with its own poetical principles. It therefore is certainly not right to think of an unequivocal notion of what haiku was or should be. And that variety of opinions still exists and evolves today.

Though haiku had become an essential part of the Japanese cultural climate, this compact form of poetry remained virtually unknown outside of the country's boundaries. This is not strange at all, for the Japanese society under the powers that reigned was an absolutely closed world into which nobody from the world outside had access. With one small exception.

That exception was the Dutch trading settlement on the small artificial island of Deshima in the harbour of Nagasaki. Apart from the fact that the chief of that colony regularly visited the shogun in the capital city of Edo, the Dutch hardly were allowed to set foot on Japanese soil. But that did not prevent contacts between the Dutch and the Japanese. In these contacts cultural exchange had its place, and haiku was part of that. For as it happens the first Westerner known to have written haiku was Hendrik Doeff (1777-1835), one of these Dutchmen. He was on Deshima from 1798 till 1817 and became chief of the settlement. He was interested in the language, for he compiled a Dutch-Japanese dictionary. Moreover, two of his haiku have been found in Japanese publications from the period of Doeff's stay in Japan. He probably wrote them in Japanese. Here's one:

lend me your arms, 
fast as thunderbolts, 
for a pillow on my journey

This haiku supposedly refers to a young lady he saw slicing tofu very fast, while he was in an inn during a journey to visit the shogun. But there is no proof at all that Doeff still was interested in haiku after his return to the Netherlands. And certainly he played no role in spreading haiku outside of its country of origin. For that only took place in the 20th century.

The first half of that century already saw some publications concerning this literary phenomenon, but the real interest only was sparked in the second half. In the English language area especially Reginald H. Blythe gave a powerful impulse. From 1949 till 1952 he published four volumes with an introduction to and translations, analyses and explanations of classical haiku. These books reached many people and inspired quite a number of them to try their own hand at haiku. In the Netherlands a similar role was played by Mrs. J. van Toorn. As a middle-aged woman she started to learn Japanese with the purpose of being able to read these small poems in their original language. Later on she published a volume of translations, with a general introduction and commentary, that was reprinted many times. Here too the book inspired many people to write haiku themselves.

Initially writing haiku by non-Japanese in many cases was a matter of imitation. One tried as it were to write in a Japanese spirit. This involved the application of all sorts of rules. To start with the 5-7-5 pattern was to be strictly adhered to, where these numbers stood for the required number of syllables per line. Furthermore haiku was considered to be a nature poem. And every haiku had to contain a reference to one of the seasons. Many people also assumed that haiku were supposed to have a Zen character. Widespread was the belief that the poet was not allowed to refer to himself in the poem. Another notion was that personification and metaphor were inadmissible. And this is not an exhaustive list of rules.

Though it does not take great effort to find exceptions on all these requirements among classical Japanese haiku, many saw them as quite absolute in writing and judging haiku in their own language. Maybe it might even be said that these western imitators initially tried to write haiku in a more (supposedly) Japanese manner than the Japanese themselves were doing. I have named this initial phase the adoption phase.

In a following phase some poets adapted haiku to their own poetical inclinations and to the language and cultural context in which they were writing themselves. This meant among other things that besides nature other subjects as well were dealt with, that the poet himself could appear in his haiku, that personification and metaphor were no longer unacceptable and that the 5-7-5 pattern wasn't sacred anymore. In short: haiku started a development of its own outside of the country of its origin. I have named that the adaptation phase.

Maybe the difference between both phases can also be characterized as the difference between goal and means. In the adoption phase the goal was to write haiku, in the adaptation phase haiku was no longer a goal for the poets, but a means to express their own poetical sensitivity in a new way.

No doubt all this is a very much simplified presentation of the matter. For on the one hand it is certainly not true that the views held in the adoption phase are outdated at present: they still have their adherers and practitioners – and with still fine results, one might add. On the other hand, there were and are western poets who from the start have made haiku subservient to their poetical needs and inclination: they simply skipped the adoption phase. That way too impressive results have been and are achieved.

All in all the image has become rather varied. There now is room for different opinions and practices. In that respect history as we know it from within Japan repeats itself: as we saw there, we now encounter in the rest of the world different schools and styles. This is an indication of haiku having matured in new languages and other cultural traditions.

This also can be concluded another way: the developments outside of Japan by now influence the ways of thinking about haiku in the country of its origin itself. In 1999 the global development of haiku was subject of two interesting meetings there. The first one was a symposium in Tokyo, organised by the Gendai Haiku Kyokai (Modern Haiku Association). Western poets like Martin Berner from Germany, Alain Kervern from France and Stephen Gill (Penname Tito) from Great Britain (but living in Japan ) had an important input there, next to for instance Ban'ya Natsuishi, president of the Gendai Haiku Kyokai and a prominent contemporary haiku poet himself.

One conclusion of this symposium was that ‘seasonal words are not absolutely necessary for global haiku', and that new keywords can be of great importance. This refers to words with a great power of expression that can transcend national boundaries, such as ‘mother,' ‘war,' ‘sea,' ‘love,' ‘mountain,' and so on. This puts in perspective the importance of kigo (season words), that used to have a rather absolute validity in traditional Japanese haiku.

But maybe even farther reaching than that was the conclusion that ‘in any language the rhythm of haiku should not merely serve to maintain a fixed form. It is necessary to use the linguistic characteristics of each language, such as hard and soft or long and short sounds, in order to create a rhythm that will match the content of the poem.' This puts the form of haiku in a subordinate position to its function. In Japan the 5-7-5 rhythm is as it were embedded in the language, but that can be quite different in other languages. And a haiku should allow to fully employ the intrinsic qualities of any language it is written in.

A third conclusion was that ‘in global haiku the greatest emphasis should be placed on the poets originality.' This is completely in line with the previous conclusions and can even be considered as the umbrella, covering them.

A few months later in Matuyama, the town where Shiki was born and lived, an international convention took place that more or less elaborated on the Tokyo symposium. It resulted in a declaration, that again stated that the 5-7-5 pattern is characteristic for Japanese, but that the use of that pattern in other languages holds no guarantee of a similar effect. The relation between haiku and nature is also considered as very Japanese, but it is acknowledged that in a global perspective the content of a haiku will have a closer relation with the own social and cultural characteristics of every country. In the declaration too the notion of keywords pops up.

Both in Tokyo and Matsuyma attention was given to the use of cutting words. This refers to Japanese words that may add a certain feeling or emphasis to the poem, but that have hardly or even no equivalents in other languages. It was concluded at both meetings that it would be futile to force that technique on other languages.

All in all it was established in Tokyo as well as in Matsuyama that form and literary technique are subordinate to the poetical expressiveness a poet strives for, and not the other way round. And that overall conclusion mirrors the development of haiku outside Japan: begun as an imitation, haiku was more and more made subservient to the own poetical ideas and inclinations of the poets employing it. So now that development was in the country of origin recognized as logical and justified. At least, the Tokyo symposium and the Matsuyama Convention concluded that. But no doubt there are, both within and outside of Japan, quite different opinions, including opposing ones.

However, as we can see the global distribution of haiku has led to a situation in which several characteristics of haiku have lost the more or less absolute nature that once was attributed to them. That is to say: they are still permitted and valid, but no longer only true and required. But in that perspective one question becomes more and more urgent: what then is essential for a haiku? What is the indispensable characteristic that makes a poem a haiku?

The Matsuyama Declaration states about this, that to be recognised worldwide as a haiku, the poem should be short and should have the essential spirit of haiku. The shortness of the form does not really need much elaboration. Suffice it to record that a haiku outside of Japan is most commonly being written in three short lines, though one, two and even four line haiku also can be found. But saying that a haiku should have the spirit of haiku is rather rephrasing the question than answering it. How does one define that haiku spirit? Can it be defined? The Matsuyma Declaration, a document that is not very readable anyway, seems to locate that spirit in the relation between man and nature.

Personally I think that the spirit, the essence of haiku is ultimately elusive. It therefore is not possible to catch that spirit in an ultimate and closed definition, acceptable for (almost) everyone. All the time debates flare up again, both in meetings and on the internet, about what is essential for a haiku and what is not. I think everyone in the end has to make up his own definition. As I did. I arrived at it by comparing the essence of haiku with the essence of the scarecrow. A scarecrow can be defined as: a material construction, making the impression of a person, with the function to frighten off birds; scarecrows can have many shapes, but mainly consist out of suggestion. Similarly: a haiku is a meagre construction of words, with the function to evoke the experience of being; haiku can have many shapes, but mainly consists out of suggestion. And there you have my personal definition as it is at present.

To reach a good understanding of haiku, it is useful to take note of the opinions of others and have discussions about it. But it especially requires that one reads haiku, preferably lots of haiku, both classical and modern ones, from Japanese and non-Japanese origin. That way one may learn to discern which haiku are the good ones, the ones you can really relate to, and which are the bad ones that don't really speak to you. I am absolutely convinced that, in addition to reading about haiku and exchanging views with others, reading haiku is the best, if not the only way, to really get an understanding of what this form of poetry is all about.

With that in mind I recommend Gwiazda za Gwiazda. This anthology gives the readers a fine opportunity to get to know the haiku of many poets from several European countries. Most poems were written in recent years, most of them originally in the poet's own language. Thus this volume provides insight in the way haiku developed on this continent, showing the richness of the possibilities a form that short has to offer.

Previously published in Polish in Gwiazda za Gwiazda, antologia haiku europejskiego, 2005.

Reprinted by permission of the author.