If you want to learn about poetry — if you want to “access” it — what you need to do is find great poems you like, figure out which are worth rereading and then reread them. ~ Robert Pinsky Pinsky goes on to suggest that you learn what they’re doing and bring what you’ve learned … Continue reading Haibun Commentaries: Exploring the Work of Exemplary Writers
Category: Articles, Commentaries & Reviews
A Commentary on Basho’s Hiraizumi
"Haraizumi" is single passage (aka chapter/haibun) from Basho's The Narrow Road to the Deep North (Ono no Hosomichi) "Poetry is the revelation of a feeling that the poet believes to be interior and personal which the reader recognizes as his own." ~Salvatore Quasimodo Part I: Commentary Bashō's travel journals are some of the earliest examples … Continue reading A Commentary on Basho’s Hiraizumi
Haibun Titles are Important!
Very little has been done in the way of informed critical study of the haibun form, particularly when compared with the number of haiku studies. While there's been a good deal of emphasis in haibun about the importance of the link between the haibun's prose and the link-shift with it's important little sidekick, the haiku, … Continue reading Haibun Titles are Important!
English-language Haibun
Basho by Sugiyama Sampu Basho's contribution to English-language haibun and a definition and examples of Contemporary Haibun with comparisons to other short genres including memoirs, journal entries, travel journals, personal essays and flash or short fiction. . . . Continue reading . . . -> English-language Haibun
Basho’s Haibun “Hiraizumi”: A Commentary
Field at present day Hiraizumi ruins site, Japan . . . all that remains of soldiers' dreams. Bashō's travel journals, purportedly the earliest examples of haibun, are accounts of his late-in-life walking journeys through Japan. They are often cited as important reading for serious students of the form. More generally, they are held up as … Continue reading Basho’s Haibun “Hiraizumi”: A Commentary
A Monk’s Journey with Basho
courtesan and monk, we sleep under one roof together, moon in a field of clover ~ Basho "A Monk's Journey" is haibun with a mix of my prose intertwined with translations of Basho's haiku. It was first published in the journal Simply Haiku. I present it to show how writers can work in conversation, so … Continue reading A Monk’s Journey with Basho
Billy Collins & The Writer’s Gaze
What the oven is to the baker,and the berry-stained blouse to the dry cleaner,so the window is to the poet. ~ Billy Collins fall morning / a nuthatch outside my window / inside my poem This essay-haibun is and exploration of a poem by Billy Collins, past Poet Laureate of the U.S., about how writers focus … Continue reading Billy Collins & The Writer’s Gaze
Ray Rasmussen: All Things Haibun Blog 