This book is a must have for any fan of Kiri-E, or Masayuki Miyata. His illustrations are beautiful...it is easy to see why he has become one of Japans modern masters of this traditional artform. Great Stuff!

If anyone adores the simple beauty and truth of haiku, this is the text to own. Not only are the Japanese characters printed alongside the inquisitive English translations, but the accompanying collages are breathtaking interpretations of the works. The entire book is a work of art.

The story is mediocre and the illustrations are somber and static. This book was a great disappointment to my child.

This book is simple, entertaining, lovely and smart. I enjoyed reading it and wished for more, even though I am considerably over the targeted age level. The poems in the story are enough to make the reader interested in more haiku.

What a beautifully illustrated, powerfully written book! I was so surprised that my wildly energetic little boy (who does love books) wanted to read this book again and again. I love how the author teaches some Japanese words and how the pictures capture the essence of Japanese life in a simpler era. And I'm always thrilled when a children's book incorporates authentic, adult-level literature (the three haiku used would delight readers of any age.) The best picture is that of Basho's house and the cherry tree and the forest and the river from a bird's eye view, like a map, or rather, like all maps should be!

For anyone who likes Urdu poetry this is a good one Ghalib's imagery in his poetry is very vivid. I love the way Ghalib describes his feelings etc. you can really see it.The only thing i was disappointed about was that in the translation from Urdu to English it loses its power and depth overall it was pretty good. Ghalib was truly a great poet

I read the sample review of the book on the web.
The translation of the Haiku is Wrong in the highest degree and completely fails to convey the original spirit, often even reversing the original meaning.
Try Robert Aitken's "A Zen Wave" instead, if you want to get into Basho's spirit.

Poetry translation is a thankless task, and in the final analysis it is rarely successful. Even when it is successful, it is usually for the wrong reasons. Lessing's translations of Shakespeare into German are a case in point; they are something of a minor classic in German literature, but that's because Lessing was a good poet himself. That doesn't mean that his translations are faithful.

Oriental poetry in English has a similar fate. We are used to accepting translations of Chinese poetry into blank verse, which is the last thing it resembles structurally in Chinese. However, it is true that the sentiment that we expect in blank verse tends to resemble the sentiments expressed in Chinese poetry, although it would be a mistake to carry that too far.

Then there is haiku, of which Basho is probably the greatest master. We all think we know what haiku is supposed to be - seventeen syllables (5-7-5), no rhyme, and a "surprise" at the end. This has become so familiar that the haiku has actually become a genre in English poetry. It doesn't take into account the almost stream-of-consciousness sensibility that haiku normally express in Japanese, and it can't, due to the limitations on what is acceptable sentence structure in English.

What I feel Mr. Yuasa achieved in his translation was to bring some of the Japanese sensibility of wabi and sabi into Basho's work, not by his translations of the poems themselves, but in his translation of Basho's commentary. This was a stroke of genius on his part. Anybody who has attempted translations of haiku feels the frustration of not being able to convey the atmosphere inherent in the poems; after all, there's only so much you can do with seventeen syllables! By letting the intimate loveliness of Basho's own commentary shine through, he provides a proper setting for the poems themselves. An excellent bit of work.

I periodically re-read this book as a reminder that all one truly "has" in life is one's experience. In his mastery of haiku Basho pares life down to one's experience and response to the present moment. In his travels it is not the destination that is important but the journey itself, an evocation of the transience of life.

With this book of translations, the importance of the contribution of Takashi Ikemoto's professional knowledge and advice becomes quite evident. The quality of Stryk's translations has obviously suffered without Ikemoto's valuable in-put. The haiku reading public deserves better than another mediocre book of Japanese haiku translations. The book was not published on the merits of the translations, but rather, on the merits of Stryk's past achievements and accomplishments. The book is heavily flawed in nearly every aspect. Lucien Stryk's translations fall far short of the previous accomplishments made in this field by other translators prior to this project and difficult undertaking. There are many technical flaws, actual errors, and omissions in this book of translations. Here are a few examples from his book to back up my accusations:

In my new robe this morning- someone else.

This is the first haiku in the book, so Stryk gets himself into deep trouble from the onset. First of all, someone else is not wearing Basho's robe. Basho has just put on the new silk robe given to him as a gift from his beloved disciple Ransetsu. This should have been footnoted, especially since it ties in with Stryk's main theme. It is the first day of spring (according to the old lunar calendar) which was celebrated as New Year's Day. It is therefore not just any morning as suggested in Stryk's translation, but a special one that haiku poets and the people of Japan have been fond of for many generations. The literal translation of the last line is: Who do I look like? Basho is being both humorous and playful, light-hearted with his disciple. It is a display of affection and Basho is saying that he feels like a new man and does not want nor expect a serious response from his haiku pupil. It is not a question at all; it's a compliment, a way of saying thanks, a way of expressing complete satisfaction and comfort!

Since Stryk decided to name the book On Love And Barley, I feel that he has a responsibility to his readership to emphasize and stress the theme of love whenever appropriate, and like the example given above, he failed to do this. Because of his neglect, there is a conspicuous lack of unity and cohesion in the overall presentation. The order of the haiku as they appear in the book seems arbitrary, as if the haiku were randomly tossed together without much fore-thought. Many of the haiku are taken out of context (haiku that were originally part of a renga or haibun). These should have been footnoted, but weren't. It seems in every possible area where Stryk could have gone wrong, he did go wrong!

Another example from the book:

Parting, straw-clutching support.

All Lucien Stryk says about this haiku in his footnote is that this haiku is another parting poem meant for Basho's friends. This book, unlike many books of Japanese haiku translations, does not include the Japanese (Romanized) versions. But the above haiku is very well known, so I took the time and looked it up. The Japanese word mugi does not mean straw. Guess what, it means barley! The word barley should definitely have been used, especially in view of the fact that the word is part of the title that Stryk assigned to the book, and he didn't use it! Shame on him! The cat/love/barley haiku previously quoted is the ONLY haiku in the book with the word barley in it. This haiku should have included the word too. It is my opinion that the love/barley theme is stronger in this haiku than it is in the cat/barley haiku if it is adequately translated and properly footnoted. The Japanese phrase chikara ni tsukamu (the second line) means more accurately than clutching, clutching convulsively or with great intensity. Basho was departing on what was to be his last journey, from the outskirts of Edo (Tokyo) on the way to his birthplace (near Ueno outside of Kyoto) three months prior to his death. Stryk's translation is ambiguous. To many readers it appears that Basho is doing the clutching and that is simply not true! He was departing from his friends on a dirt path next to a field of barley and out of an involuntary and spontaneous nervous reaction due to the intense grief of parting, his friends (not Basho) were intensely grasping the barley stalks by the pathway as they were saying their final farewells to him. Basho noticed this subtle anxiety of theirs, was deeply moved, and out of mutual love and affection for his friends and disciples, wrote the above haiku for them in their honor, thus immortalizing the tender and deeply felt emotions of their strong and close friendship. Another example:

Orchid - breathing incense into butterfly's wings.

A woman of high society by the name of Miss Butterfly (as in Madame Butterfly) owned a teahouse and requested that Basho compose a haiku for her on his return from Ise shrine. It was the custom in those days for the upper class women to perfume their clothing in the smoke of sandalwood or with other aromatics. The haiku is obviously in praise of her beauty, (not just her physical beauty, but her grace and beauty in natural surroundings or perhaps the tea-house) and once again Lucien Stryk failed to footnote this haiku that so appro-priately ties in with the book's main theme. A better translation might read something like this:

perfuming her wings in the orchid's fragrance oh beautiful butterfly!

There are many more examples that I can give where Stryk made serious omissions and errors, but in 1,000 words I cannot give any more examples. I do suggest that readers interested in good Basho haiku translations look elsewhere. At $7.96, this book is no bargain.

At a time when Milton and Dryden were producing their prolix epics, the Japanese Zen monk Basho was paring poetic language down to its very essence, managing to pack as much philosophy and metaphysics, narrative, evocation of place and custom, human behaviour and emotion in 17 syllable haikus as the Englishmen did in endless cantos. Unfortunately, the non-Japanese reader will never be able to appreciate Basho - his poetic art is such an inseparable union of form and content, that an inability to translate the former means an inability to understand the latter; while any attempt to replicate the 17-syllable structure in a completely alien language and mindset would be grotesque.

So, from the start, Lucien Stryk's admirable attempt to evoke the spirit of Basho is doomed. The reader can do other things with his translations, however. The compression of the haiku actually gives the reader a lot of freedom to construct narratives, moods and feelings from the barest hints: of the peasant monk Basho travelling throughout Japan, visiting temples; eating; meeting friends and passers-by; passing mountains, trees, seas, rivers, waterfalls, gardens; sleeping in fields or on the side of the road; looking at the moon or a butterfly; sights transformed by sounds or smells.

It probably helps if you know something about Japan and Buddhism to appreciate the allusions packed in the poetry, and Stryk's introduction (which also briefly posits Basho's aims and technique, and his position in the tradition of the genre) and notes are of some help. The movement of the poems are remarkably fluid and expansive within such narrow limits, with their hierarchies of nature, fusion of the senses and questioning of reality all cohering to create the oneness with nature that was Basho's ideal.

The overwhelming mood is one of serenity, of passive marvelling at the riches of nature, of plays of light or wind, of unexpected, tiny, revelatory details; but there is also an acknowledgement of human folly, poverty, war ('Summer grasses, all that remains of soldiers' dreams'), decay and death - Basho's deathbed poem is truly desolating.

To be honest, I was much more engaged by the sketches by Taige that accompany the text, effortlessly combining the representation of nature with abstract thought that Basho strove for in his poetry (although other reasons for my dissatisfaction seem to be more precisly located in the reader Ty Hadman's very valuable comment below).

Basho book on table-

Cezanne fruit bowl too

It's time to party

I want to know about Sabi in Oku no hoshomichi. But i cant'n reat about it anywhere. Can you help me?

There are perhaps half a dozen English versions of this, Basho's most famous "travel journal"--the Oku no hosomichi--currently available. If you have not read this version, you may justifiably wonder how this could be considered one of the two pillars of Japanese literature (with The Tale of Genji).

Translating the haiku in this work is devilishly difficult. I don't believe that Corman has delivered the goods 100% of the time, but his are still the best versions available, overall.

In the meantime, Corman is the only one who has managed to create in English prose something that remotely resembles the prose of the Japanese text. Basho did NOT write ordinary Japanese prose, so any translation into English that sounds like something you might hear on commercial radio or TV, or reads like a current novel by you-name-it, is woefully inadequate.

Corman's version has been slighted by others, claiming that it "sounds like Corman's own poems" (it does not) or it's written "as if Jack Kerouac went on the journey". (This last is amazing, as I cannot think of a style more distant from Kerouac in contemporary American English.)

Rather, Corman has tried to let the unique toughness and terseness of Basho's language cross the translation barrier.

This translation is closer to Basho than any other I've seen, and I've read probably just about every English translation of it ever published in an edition of 500 or more--and the original.

Kudos to Robert Hass for seeing it back into print!

As a foreign woman who also lived in Japan for some years, I was interested to read Lesley Downer's book. I was disappointed, however, by the seeming lack of sympathy and "connection" with the Japanese people she met along the way and by her apparent inability or unwillingness in key situations to pay respect by "doing as the Romans do." As a J-E translator, I also wondered about the absence of credits for all the haiku and other quoted English text in the book --- it is clear that not all the translations are hers, yet no one else is referenced.
Her accounts of the northwestern mountains did make me want to visit that area, however. In general, however, I felt the book was overshadowed by a negativity about the Japanese and their values and ways. I wonder if she has ever wished she could rewrite the book with a bit more sympathy.
On a practical note, I think parts of the book are rendered unnecessarily difficult to understand and follow for someone with no Japanese language ability. For example, she continually refers to cicadas as "semis," when the English word would suffice and be clearer.
Nevertheless, I think this book would be interesting for anyone who has spent time in Japan and who has some Japanese language ability.

Lesley Downer retraces Matsuo Basho's famed 17th century journey to unknown northern Japan documented in his book "On the Narrow Road to the Deep North." Ms. Downer rediscovers a "lost" Japan. The journey and the writing are well worth the effort.

The small book devotes two pages each to about three dozen authors, spiritual seekers and fictional characters. One page briefly describes the person and something about their life and philosophy; the second provides a supposedly complete list of the small number of items each person lived with or took on a trip. It's thought provoking as to how much - or how little - stuff we really need to live a good life. At the same time it's a VERY brief book that can be read in about 30 minutes. Because there is a bibliography listing one or more sources for or about each person this book might best be considered an introduction/reference for those wanting to study the philosophy of simplicity. It's also a good inspirational gift for someone who wants to simplify their life. Too bad publishers don't provide little books like this for a more reasonable price.