An introduction to Haiku.

Before we go any further, let me say that I’m not an "expert" on Haiku, as it happens I have a well cultivated distrust of experts in any field, self-appointed or otherwise. I have a deep love for haiku, and attempt to write them myself. Eastern, as in anything from Turkey to Japan, verse of all types has been with me as long as I can remember, and through good fortune I’ve been able to live in many of the lands where they are as natural as breathing, not something that is considered to be "literary" or above the comprehension and consequent enjoyment of everyone - albeit each country has its commonly acknowledged masters, and the vast majority of people who live in them know and cherish their works.

There are thousands of books about and of haiku, written in most of the widespread languages of the world: for me to attempt to condense them and the ideas contained in them would be folly, so I’m not going to try. What I hope to do is give you some idea of haiku, what some people have said about them, and remain as impartial as it’s possible for me to be. If I can stimulate your interest in them sufficiently for you to want to explore them further, and try writing them for yourself, then I’ll be happy and have achieved what I set out to do in this brief introduction.

What follows was written as for the Eastern Forms section of the now defunct Poetry Forum in Compuserve, and the copyright is held by me. If you want to copy or reproduce it in part or whole for your personal use you are very welcome, otherwise you must contact me for my permission to distribute it.

Good luck,

Neil Harding

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On ants and poets

------------------ by Yoko Sugawa

When ten poets each endeavour to write about an ant, the result should be ten different ant haiku. If any of these haiku resemble another, the poet has only been observing the ant superficially or has based their haiku on their preconceptual image of an ant. Let us look not at our ants but rather into them. Surely the ant will speak to us. Ah!! Now quickly write down what caused that feeling of discovery. This is your ant and yours alone.

Your "ant" must now be expressed in a fixed poetic form. In Japanese a count of 17 syllables (5,7,5) is used. This expression should be in your own words, as they come naturally to you. If your haiku has captured a Truth, there is no need to decorate your poem with flowery words. One should, however, keep in mind some of the main characteristics of haiku.

1. To state without stating. In order to say ten things a haiku presents only two. Due to its length, every word is of the utmost importance.

2. A haiku is like a cross-section which gives the observer a new perspective and restimulates their thoughts on the object as a whole.

3. When juxtaposing one must be careful that the two elements do not fit together too well. Their relationship must be "surprising".

4. Seasonal words (kigo) are very important to haiku. However in the modern world where the seasons have lost much of their omnipotency and where we wish to share our haiku internationally a more relaxed stance on kigo may be called for. Kigo need not necessarily place a haiku in any particular season but could rather be included simply to relate the haiku to the natural world.

One cannot make good haiku simply by going about one's life in a day-to-day fashion. It is necessary to hone one's senses to the world around one and take an interest in all things great and small.

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Beginnings:

In the 9th to the 12th centuries Tanka were very popular in Japan, and had developed from Chinese verse forms and the ancient prayers, chants and songs to the gods. At some stage it was decided that it would be interesting to break the 5-7-5-7-7 syllabic count form of them into two parts, the first three lines being written by one poet, and the following two lines added by another. From there others thought it would be good to add a further 5-7-5 link, and then another 7-7 link - and so Renga were born and became very popular in their turn.

This popularity led to people collecting and writing the opening links for Renga, and eventually this "hokku" developed into a form in its own right, the haiku, with its own rules and traditions.

As western cultures came into contact with Japanese, the interest in their poetry and poetic forms spread rapidly, with versions and approximations of them being written in other languages. So far there are few, if any universally agreed rules for them in other tongues. Controversy about them still rages, with various "schools" of interpretation, transliteration and writing them abounding, even in Japan.

I have written brief introductory files to both Tanka and Renga, if you would like copies please let me know. Likewise, in the fullness of time, I hope to produce a document that explains in simple terms the various key japanese terms that are used in their verse.



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Some basics for writing haiku:

Form:

In Japanese haiku are written in one vertical line, and the language has natural pauses at the end of each 5-7-5 phrase. This is impossible to do in most other languages, so the convention of writing haiku using line breaks and having three separate lines became the most commonly accepted way of writing them.

The most commonly accepted transliteration is to use the natural syllabic counts in whatever language they are being written in, using three lines of 5, 7 and 5 syllables.

The next most common is to use a total of 12 syllables spread over three lines - the argument for the latter being that Japanese has a completely different way of weighting syllables and syllable length, and so by using less in other languages it most closely approximates this. It's also argued that in other languages, if one uses a strict 5-7-5 syllabic count that is native to them, they carry more information than in the Japanese equivalant.

It is probably best for beginners to start with the 5-7-5 structure, and then as they get a feel for haiku to experiment with other structures. Some of the great Japanese masters took liberties with them too, albeit from knowing the classic form and what they were doing with it, and why. There is nothing to prove that any of them is the best or only true method, some very good haiku have been and are being written using the various conventions.

Translations of Japanese haiku are almost impossible to achieve in 17 syllables, so you will see all sorts of attempts and variations of transliteration used, as well as the pitfalls of any translation process.

Imagery:

Haiku use direct images - things that human physical senses can detect - abstractions are very very very rarely found or used in them. They capture a moment, and in the best of them that moment extends to all moments in the mind, there is a leap of imagination triggered by the images used.


A good guideline is that there should be two concrete images, at the most three. If there are three then two of them relate to each other, and "swing" or "pivot" against the third.

Avoid using qualifiers such as adjectives and adverbs unless they are strictly necessary. For instance, If it’s necessary for the sky to be blue in haiku, then fine - if the importance of the sky is sky alone, irrespective of hue then don’t use the modifier "blue". Likewise avoid using words that imply a value judgement - eg: don’t say *ugly* duckling, unless its absolutely essential to the other related image/s in it. Its far better to let the images do the work, and leave room for the reader to become a part of the haiku moment, and wander in it.

Using comparatives - "as" "like" etc is not good in haiku, by all means if you want to use metaphor and simile, but let the images sitting side by side achieve it. Similarly connective words such as "of" are best avoided, and most often found at in shaky haiku at the beginning and end of the first two lines.

Pronouns (he, she, etc) are rarely found in haiku, there being a preference for universality.

In most haiku it’s commonly considered essential that they refer to nature in some way, but worth remembering that even buildings and objects are made from and comprised of bits of nature.


Language:

In Japan nearly everyone knows the works of their great poets and masters, and the images they have used - for instance by using the word "frog" or "deer" in a poem it opens out immense vistas of meaning based on previous poets and poems that have dealt with them..

Some of them are "season" words, that imply a season (or sometimes the change between them), and in the strictest definition of haiku a season word is considered essential. Poems that use the same form as haiku and don’ t include a season word are most often referred to as Senryu. In fact there are lists of season words, containing thousands of them, published in Japanese, and there is a movement afoot to compile similar agreed lists of them in other languages.

Also there are "cutting words" in Japanese that act as line breaks, and "pillow words" that have multiple meanings, much as puns and the like do in other languages.

Japanese is rich with these inter-related and cascading implications and images, with many words being able by implication and tradition to do the works of hundreds - very few other languages are. Which goes a long way to explaining why so many translations of haiku appear banal in other languages, and in my opinion why so many of them are when written by those who have little or no understanding of the inner sense and requirements of haiku.

So, what can we do in our efforts to achieve an approximation of Japanese in our own language? Difficult - but nowhere near impossible - we can use words that have multiple meanings, use nouns that can double as verbs and vice-versa. We can use words that convey a season, for most people, and we can use syntax, punctuation, spacing on the page, and line breaks to give the same effects as words do in Japanese - we have a different palette, maybe a limited palette in comparison to Japanese, but what we have is enough, more than enough. Perhaps, if anything, the joy of discovering our own colours, thinking deeply about them, playing with them, is no handicap at all.

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Philosophy, and recommended reading:


Haiku confirm and amplify a reverence for all living creatures, the world we live in and share, showing all aspects of beauty, love, and humour with a natural delight in living. Puns and all sorts of word play are a part of the tradition and integral to it. Negativity, demeaning things and sarcasm is not a part of haiku or the haiku spirit.

A large amount, if not all, Japanese poetry arises from Shinto, Zen Buddhism and the Zen moment - most of the acknowledged giants of it have been Zen masters. It helps if you have an inkling about it, beyond what is commonly known and often ridiculed in the west. For an excellent introduction to it as applied to poetry I highly recommend the "Penguin Book of Zen Poetry", edited and translated by Lucien Stryk and Takashi Ikemoto .

Stryk has also written some of the most accessible and interesting books on the subject and values of Zen if you want to know more, and most of his poetry shows the influence it has had in his life and writing. Charles Wright is another poet who has integrated a lot of eastern imagery and thought into his work, as has W S Merwin. There are of course many others, if you look you'll find them.

"The Japanese Haiku" by Kenneth Yasuda, published by Charles E Tuttle and Company gives a good insight into Haiku and some modern perspectives.

There are a lot of translations of the Japanese masters available - Basho, Issa, and Shiki to name only three, there are many more - see what you can find, and read them. The translations vary, a lot, so it’s also interesting and very worthwhile to compare the way various translators have done the classics. There are many contemporary writers of Haiku - worth reading and finding out which appeal to you, seek and you'll find.

As with most things, reading and seeing how others have achieved success, and failure, is the best way of beginning to learn how to write Haiku - then applying what you have enjoyed and learned by writing your own. Maybe you’ll find that Haiku are not for you, but the only way you’ll know is by looking for yourself with an open mind and finding out for yourself.

Have fun!

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