Bibliography for this paper

A partial list of sources consulted. Not all were actually useful in this instance, but nice to know about.

Inagaki Shisei. Nihon no kaidô handobukku. Sanseidô, 1993.
Isobe, Masaru. Edo haiga kikō: Buson no hanami, Issa no shōgatsu. Chūō Kōron Shinsha, 2008.
Kira Sueo. Bashō, Buson, Issa no sekai  kinsei haikai, haiga no bi: karā-ban. Bijutsu Shuppansha, 2007.
Miki, Takeshi; Miki, Yasuko. Nozarashi kikô: Eiyaku to sono kenkyû. Kyôiku shuppan sentaa, 1996.
Miki, Yasuko. Nozarashi kikô kochû shûsei. Kenkyû Sôsho, 2006.
Ogata, Tsutomu, Nozarashi kikô hyôshaku. Kadokawa sôsho 1998.
Ogata Tsutomu, Sasaki Jōhei, Okada Akiko. Buson zenshû, Vol. 6: Kaiga, iboku. Kōdansha, 1992-2001.
Okada, Rihei. Buson to haiga. Yagi Shoten, 1997.
Uwagawa, Shôsuke. Nozarashi kikô no kaishaku to hyôron. Ôfûsha, 1968.
Yayoshi, Kan'ichi. Bashô Nozarashi kikô no kenkyû,  Ôfûsha 1987.
Yayoshi, Kan'ichi, "Buson jihitsu Nozarashi kikô emaki no kôsatsu -- sono honbun keitô joretsu o chûshin ni," Kinsei bungei kô, No 2 1965 pp., 1-12.
Yoshizawa, Chû. Yosa Buson. Nihon bijutsu kaiga zenshû 19.  Shûeisha, 1980.

Haiku, travel, poetic elegance (風雅)

Looking now at the rather free-form Bashô to Buson no sekai.* The first chapter/section is about the expression "sleeping on a journey" (tabine たびね, which can also be written 旅寝 or 旅寐). The beginning of the chapter cites these two verses. I'm quoting them here in part because they're interesting, and in part because it's a windy autumn day in the ATL now.

しにもせぬ旅寝の果よ秋の暮

I didn't die
at the end of sleeping on my journey --
autumn twilight

たびねして我が句をしれや秋の風

sleeping on a journey
know my verses!
autumn wind

The first verse is included in the main text of Nozarashi kikô, when Bashô arrives at Ôgaki. The second one is only in the preface to the Nakagawa Jokushi 中川濁子 illustrated version. There's a handwritten comment by Bashô in the Sodô preface:

Nozarashi kikô in Buson's handwriting

I'm working on Buson jihitsu Nozarashi kikô emaki no kôsatsu - Sono honbun keitô joretsu o chûshin ni (Nozarashi kikô in Buson's handwriting - Centering on the compilation history of the main text) by Yayoshi Ken'ichi, in Kinsei bungei kô, No. 2, pp. 1-12, 1960.

It's very similar to what's in his book, but I just wanted to mention it because I love the article for being handwritten. I've posted an excerpt, left. How amazing, though. Considering these days typing on a keyboard itself seems a chore. I love the person's handwriting -- it's gorgeous. (Could it be done by Yayoshi himself? I only got a copy of the article itself by interlibrary loan. The next time I have a chance to go to Harvard-Yenching I'll check it out.)

He talks about the difficulty of identifying the owner of the piece, how he tried to track it down in the Itsuo Bijutsukan collection, where Sanseidô's Bashô kôza article by Professor Sugiura had claimed it was, and even asked Okada Rihei himself about it, but it turned out that this information was wrong. He also found another reference for it that was wrong, this time in a volume on Buson published by Heibonsha. So he ended up working from a reproduction published by Tôkyô Bijutsu sha. (A quick glance at recent photographs of the piece in books simply say it's owned by a "private collection." Mysterious!)

Buson and Bashô

I'm reading Eri Yasuhara's "Buson's Bashô: The Embrace of Influence," in Eleanor Kerkham's Matsuo Bashô's Poetic Spaces. Yasuhara asks the question, to what extent did Bashô "influence" Buson? Essentially, what is the nature of Buson's reception of Bashô? She notes that while thinking about "influence" has not been fashionable in US/European literary studies for a long time, it still is of interest in Japan. She says: in Japanese scholarship, Buson is often taken at his word in calling for a return to Bashô's ideals, that the period after Bashô is usually viewed as a decadent one, and then she cites (in elegantly translated passages) Buson's statements about how he felt he measured up to his predecessor. Next, she says, "When we return to some of Buson's activities as a painter-poet, the 'use' of his predecessor takes on the quality of outright appropriation" (248). She then discusses the major haiga works in which Buson creates illustrated versions of Oku no hosomichi and Nozarashi kikô. The text has a very nice analysis of the "Pilgrim's Willow" painting, and concludes with a biography of Buson.