Hattori Ransetsu

Hattori Ransetsu (1654 – 1707) was an Edo samurai who became a haikai poet under the guidance of Matsuo Bashō.[1]

R. H. Blyth considered Ransetsu to be Bashō's most representative follower.[2]

Poetry

Ransetsu's poetry is low-keyed and austere, reflecting the sabi aspect of Bashō's writing,[3] but showing a real empathy with all living creatures.[4]

A critical contemporary called him "a man of small calibre...he seems to have flowers, but has no fruit".[5]

R. H. Blyth would later partially concur, saying that "even his death verse, beautiful and justly famous as it is, has something nerveless about it:

A leaf falls,

Totsu! Another leaf falls,

Carried by the wind".[6]

Diary

Ransetsu wrote a diary about his 1705 travels in Southern Japan, highlighting such exotic features as "snake-strawberries", and "southern barbarians, be they devils or be they human beings".[7]

See also

References
  1. Nobuyuki Yuasa trans., The Narrow Road to the Deep North (1966) p. 66 and p. 155
  2. R H Blyth, >A History of Haiku Vol I (1963) p. 139
  3. R H Blyth, >A History of Haiku Vol I (1963) p. 139-40
  4. S Addiss, The Art of Haiku (2012) p. 132
  5. R H Blyth, >A History of Haiku Vol I (1963) p. 140
  6. R H Blyth, >A History of Haiku Vol I (1963) p. 140
  7. R H Blyth, >A History of Haiku Vol I (1963) p. 143
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