The Penguin Book of Japanese Verse

Translated by Geoffrey Bownas and Anthony Thwaite

London: Penguin, 1964; Pages: lxxvi,243

This eclectic collection of Japanese poetry covers most styles, starting from the third century and ending with the mid-twentieth. It provides a decent overview of waka, and includes such diverse entries as folk songs, lullabies, along with the classic tanka, and the later haiku, renga, and senryû. Given this diversity (which was a stated goal of the compilers), it is no surprise that the material is uneven. Although Bownas and Thwaite include recognizably superior poems, they opted for the inclusion of many lesser ones, presumably out of desire to provide a faithful picture of Japanese verse. While this attitude is admirable, I question its usefulness, especially when the book is clearly intended for nonspecialists like me. I care less about getting a "true" picture than about reading fine poetry, much of which is not present in this volume. I also found the 20th century poets the translator chose particularly uninspired, if not quite annoying.

The book, however, is not without merits. The long introduction is an excellent starting point for exploration of Japanese poetry even if the authors delve into gory (and extraneous) technicalities about the language. Without prior knowledge of Japanese, I found their discussion of meter, rhyme, etc. quite distracting. On the other hand, the introduction provides a very clear description of crucial concepts, such as pillow words and pivot words, essential for grasping the classical verse. The section on subjects and styles is also quite good, even if the poems they picked are not the best exemplars.

One final word about the translation. It is quite good (the book has been accepted in the Japanese Literature Translation Series of UNESCO) but it is missing good explanatory notes. There are some notes stuck at the end of the book but they are clearly insufficient. In many cases the authors do not even hint that there exist alternative translations and interpretations of the poems. This is a problem insofar as they chose an inferior version for inclusion.

What would a poetry review be without a few really good examples? Here's one from Princess Nukada (the same who wrote the famous piece judging autumn superior season to spring):

I waited and I
Yearned for you.
My blind
Stirred at the touch
Of the autumn breeze.

Or, the ending of the great poem by Hitomaro, On leaving his wife, where he describes riding away while her small figure recedes in the distance:

You yellow leaves that cover
The autumn mountain, cease
You falling for a while,
For I would see my love.

Here's one from the Edo Period's Morikawa Kyoroku:

Autumn so soon:
Drizzling on the crags,
First tinted maples.

Still, such a pity that the translators wasted space with inferior poetry when they could have included more of the abundant better one.

December 10, 2001

@book{bownas-thwaite-64,
   title     = {The Penguin Book of Japanese Verse},
   author    = {Geoffrey Bownas and Anthony Thwaite},
   year      = {1964},
   publisher = {Penguin Books},
   address   = {London},
   isbn      = {0-14-058527-3},
   note      = {Notes, poet index, introduction; Pp. lxxvi, 243}
}