Early Modern Japan

Renewed interest in the collaborative form haikai no renga 誹諧の連歌 was an integral part of the mid-eighteenth century "Back to Bashō" movement, in which Yosa Buson 与謝蕪村 (1716-1783) and his associates condemned the commercialized practices that characterized contemporary haikai and argued for a return to the ideals of Matsuo Bashō 松尾芭蕉 (1644-1694). After the death of Bashō, who had made ga 雅, or elegance, central to his poetry, game-like forms came to rival linked verse and hokku composition in popularity. Buson and his colleagues in the "Back to Bashō" movement opposed this trend. In their efforts to imitate Bashō, they made linked verse a cornerstone of their practice. In this paper, I will discuss one of the Buson school's verse sequences, Susuki mitsu 薄見つ (Seeing miscanthus), written by Buson, Takai Kitō 高井其董 (1741-1789), Wada Ranzan 和田嵐山 (d. 1773), and Miura Chora 三浦樗良 (17291780) in the ninth month of 1773 (Anei 2) and published shortly afterwards in the anthology Kono hotori – Ichiya shi kasen この辺り一夜四歌 仙. I will argue that for Buson and his colleagues, linked verse composition was an act of resistance to the more popular trends of the day, and a marker of solidarity among poets of different schools who shared the same goals. It was central to their efforts to reclaim haikai from the status of a game and return to the standards set for it by Bashō. Because this sequence was written in the context of the "Back to Bashō" movement, it will be helpful to begin by tracing the origins of the movement and explaining the process by which it came to shape the haikai of the midto late eighteenth century. The "Back to Bashō" movement lasted roughly from the 1730s to the 1790s. In addition to Buson, Chora, and Kitō, other major "Back to Bashō" poets were Tan Taigi 炭太祇 (1709-1771), Katō Kyōtai 加藤暁台 (17321792), Chōmu 蝶夢 (1732-1795), Kaya Shirao 加舎白雄 (1738-1791), and Hori Bakusui 堀麦 水 (1718-1783). The movement had followers all over the country, due in part to the itinerant habits of many of its members. The "Back to Bashō" poets were reacting to what they saw as the degenerate state of the haidan in the early decades of the eighteenth century. In the first place, haikai became increasingly popular, and a variety of different factions competed to attract the growing numbers of students. Older, long-established groups like the Teimon 貞 門 and Danrin 談林 schools continued to attract followers. Also, Bashō's disciples formed schools of their own, collectively called the Shōmon 蕉門. And finally, there was a growing number of other groups not affiliated with either the Teimon, Danrin, or Bashō traditions. Furthermore, the Shōmon itself divided into two major factions, the urban and the rural. The urban school chose to emulate the style of Bashō's early career, favoring a style that was close to that of the Danrin school in its emphasis on complexity of language and humor. The rural faction – further divided into the Mino and Ise schools – made Bashō's late work their model, and aimed to produce verse in the light or karumi style of his later years. Both the urban and rural schools claimed to preserve Bashō's authentic teachings, of which there were multiple, competing versions. In addition to the proliferation of factions, another important change took place: verse styles that had originated in the Genroku period achieved new prominence. Haikai as practiced by Bashō mainly takes two forms, linked verse and hokku 発句. However, a wide range of other varieties developed, collectively termed zappai 雑誹, or miscellaneous haikai. One such variety was called maekuzuke 前句付, where a haikai verse marker or tenja 点者 set a verse (maeku 前句) and his – or, occasionally, her – disciples would write a link-