POETRY DISCUSSION: Haikus, Modernism and Imagism
mikefacts
English235HaikusModernismJaponism2025.docx2
Haikus, Imagism and Modernism
Haiku and Hokku:
A Japanese verse form most often composed, in English versions, of three unrhymed lines of five, seven, and five syllables. A haiku often features an image, or a pair of images, meant to depict the essence of a specific moment in time.
Not popularized in Western literature until the early 1900s, the form originates from the Japanese hokku, or the opening section of a longer renga sequence. In this context, the hokku served to begin a longer poem by establishing a season, often with a pair of seasonal images.
The following are some examples of haikus and hokkus. Each of you will be assigned one of these haikus. I will ask you to paraphrase the haiku and count its syllables. Keep in mind that the Japanese haikus are translated into English and may not fit the expected 5-7-5 model in English.
1. Kobayashi Issa (Translated by Robert Haas)
All the time I pray to Buddha 8
I keep on 3
killing mosquitoes. 5
2. The snow is melting
and the village is flooded
with children.
3. Goes out,
comes back—
the love life of a cat.
4. Under the evening moon
the snail
is stripped to the waist.
5. Mosquito at my ear—
does he think
I’m deaf?
6. Even with insects—
some can sing,
some can’t.
Basho (Japanese, 1644-1694)
7. I come weary, In search of an inn— Ah! These wisteria flowers!
(translated by William George Aston)
8. The cry of the cicada Gives us no sign That presently it will die.
9. An ancient pond! With a sound from the water Of the frog as it plunges in.
10. Yosa Buson (Japanese, 1716-1784)
The light of a candle is transferred to another candle— spring twilight.
(Edited by Edith Shiffert)
11. Richard Wright (famous 20th century African-American writer)
The neighing horses
are causing echoing neighs
in neighboring barns
Jack Kerouac (Canadian-American, 1922-1969, author of On the Road)
12. The bottoms of my shoes
are clean
From walking in the rain
13. In my medicine cabinet
the winter fly
has died of old age
14. Useless! Useless!
—heavy rain driving
into the sea
15. After the shower among the drenched roses the bird thrashing in the bath.
16. Early morning gentle rain, two big bumblebees Humming at their work
17. The windmills of Oklahoma look in every direction.
18. Sonia Sanchez (African American writer, 90 years old)
love between us is
speech and breath. loving you is
a long river running.
Modernism
https://www.utoledo.edu/library/canaday/guidepages/Modernism2.html
Modernism is a period in literary history which started around the early 1900s and continued until the early 1940s. Modernist writers in general rebelled against clear-cut storytelling and formulaic verse from the 19th century. Instead, many of them told fragmented stories which reflected the fragmented state of society during and after World War I.
Many Modernists wrote in free verse….[Modernism’s varied] writing styles further demonstrate the way the scattered state of society affected the work of writers at that time.
Emily Dickinson and Walt Whitman are thought to be the mother and father of the [Modernist] movement because they had the most direct influence on early Modernists. Some time after their deaths, the Imagist poets began to gain importance.
Imagism
An early 20th-century poetic movement that relied on concrete images drawn in precise, colloquial language rather than traditional poetic diction and meter. T.E. Hulme, H.D., and William Carlos Williams were practitioners of the imagist principles as laid out by Ezra Pound in the March 1913 issue of Poetry.
[Imagist poets] felt that the following rules should apply when writing poetry:
1. Direct treatment of the "thing," whether subjective or objective.
2. To use absolutely no word that does not contribute to the presentation.
3. As regarding rhythm: to compose in the sequence of the musical phrase, not in sequence of a metronome.
The following is the most famous example of imagism. It is by Ezra Pound:
19. “In a Station of the Metro”
The apparition of these faces in the crowd; Petals on a wet, black bough.
Instructions for analyzing this poem are in the module on Canvas.
20. One of the most seminal of the Modernist poets is William Carlos Williams. Read his famous poem, “The Red Wheelbarrow,” on Poetry Foundation’s website:
https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/45502/the-red-wheelbarrow
Please analyze and interpret the poem. When was it written? What was going on in the world at that time? ( Look up the American farm crisis in the 1920s). And what is the poem about? Does “The Red Wheelbarrow” feel underwritten, as if something has been left out? In addition, note its form. Count syllables in each verse, line by line. Is there anything intentional going on here? Do you like the poem? Do you hate it? (You’re allowed to hate it). Is it really a poem?
Japonisme
Japonisme is a French term coined in the late nineteenth century to describe the craze for Japanese art and design in the West. This occurred after Japan opened up its doors again to trade after being shut off from the world for centuries.
https://www.khanacademy.org/humanities/becoming-modern/avant-garde-france/impressionism/a/japonisme
When Japan ended its long period of isolationism and began to open its doors to trade in the middle of the 19th century, it had a profound influence on fine art first and later on literature (in the form of haikus).
Japanese Ukiyo Art and its Influence on Impressionism. Cool website!
