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Japanese haiku is often analyzed from the point of view of its visual and allusive expressions, but there are not few haiku poems that explore sound and the impression it makes on us. Well-known examples are, of course, “the sound of water” from the so-called “frog poem” by Matsuo Bashō (1644-1694), and the same author’s way to express the deafening noise of the cicadas as “silence”. Interpretations based on Zen, paradox, and synesthesia have been explored by others, but in this paper, I will focus on what I define as polyphonic effects. I will analyze a selection of the numerous examples of sound-haiku found among the work of Yosa Buson (1716-1784). As he, besides being the most important haiku poet of his age, also was a leading painter, the picturesque qualities of his work have often been stressed, but he seems to have had a particularly keen ear for the richness of the sounds of his world, which often gives his works a vivid- here-and-now quality. He can use sounds of varying tone color, intensity, volume, and distance to create three-dimensional polyphonic effects. I will discuss how these sound compositions may be a development of the common haiku technique of juxtaposition and speculate about influences from the drama music of his age, when music is said to have been mainly a heterophonic matter.

Mitsuhashi Takajo (1899-1972) is regarded as one of the most original of the haiku poets active in pre- and postwar Japan. She started studying haiku for Hara Sekitei, a poet of traditionalist lineage, but she soon turned away from the simple realism and focus on natural scenery, typical for early 20th century haiku, and started to explore more subjective and challenging subjects. The aggressiveness of some of her poems have become well known, interpreted as expressing a feminist perspective and the frustration over being a woman in a patriarchal society. As in most modern haiku, her work is strongly autobiographical, and many of the turbulent shifts, both in her private life and in Japanese society, before, during, and after the war, is reflected in her poems. In the postwar period, Takajo started to collaborate with avant-garde poets in Tomizawa Kakio’s circle, and her work became even more experimental.

In this paper, I will discuss Takajo’s development as a poet and show how her oeuvre offers examples of several of the stylistic movements that make up the history of 20th century haiku. Her poems usually include a seasonal reference and adhere to the 5-7-5 rhythm of traditional haiku. However, she uses these conventions in ways different from the objective visuality of the traditionalists. Already in early works, an interest in human society and psychology links her to the Shinkô (New style) poets and the Ningen tankyûha (The explorers of the human condition). Like many other female poets in her generation, she sometimes uses homely themes, but seldom in the simplistic style of the so-called Daidokorohaiku (Kitchen haiku); rather she uses these for enigmatic juxtapositions typical for the avant-garde style, pushing the boundaries of language expression. She also shows a flexibility in register, sometimes using classical poetic language, but sometimes writing in colloquial Japanese, at times even using childish expressions, thus becoming a forerunner for later poets such as Tsubouchi Nenten and Ikeda Sumiko. 

This paper is part of a larger research project, which investigates modern Japanese haiku by female poets.

Eyelight, in the eyes of a human portrayed on film, is a cinematographic means to augment the vividness of expressed emotions. This is used by both cinematographers and stills photographers, and it is also expressed in Anglo-Saxon, Arabic, and Japanese literatures. Here, the effect of using eyelight in the cornea of the human eye on film is examined by eye-tracking individuals on a Swedish university campus, in order to study their perceptual responses to film characters, with, or without, a glimpse of light in their eyes. The participants’ perceived capacity to discern the emotional states of the film characters was also tested. Eye-tracking data were analysed for entry time, fixation time, dwell time, hit ratio and revisitors, while emotional decoding was captured through a self-report survey, and by open questions. Our results demonstrated that film viewers’ attention is captured 49% faster, and 11% less time is used per fixation to film characters’ eyes, when eyelight is used. In addition, 58% of our participants claimed that emotions were easy to discern from eyes in the eyelight condition, whereas only 36% claimed that emotions were easy to discern under the no-eyelight condition. Although our results concern the subjective impression of one’s ability to discern the emotions of each film character, they offer preliminary support for the idea of using eyelight to enhance emotional communication in film and stills photography.

In this paper I will present a research project which aims to understand the processes affecting a literary genre, when it is moved from the specific context of its original culture and becomes adapted to, and developed in, an entirely foreign environment. The genre in question is the Japanese haiku, which originated some 500 years ago, and which still is practiced actively in Japan and abroad.

More than a century has passed since the haiku started its journey over the world. Today, haiku-poetry has become an almost global movement, and there is a growing population of haiku enthusiasts, especially in Europe and North and South America. As in Japan, haiku is poetry that is written as much as it is read. A demand for receiving guidance in the art has created a market for introductory works and handbooks of various formats. Such educational texts give a view into the aims, aesthetics, values, and even preconceptions of the people engaged in this form of poetry. In Japan, a very large number of such handbooks have been published, often by leading poets. In other languages, the number of such publications is naturally smaller, but it is still large enough to make meaningful a comparative study of the views about haiku within different cultural contexts. 

My aim is to cover the most important works of this kind written in English and Swedish and compare the arguments in these with a selection of handbooks written in Japanese, which are chosen from poets of different backgrounds, covering the spectrum from traditionalists to avant-garde poets. Thus, the diversity within the Japanese haiku scene will be reflected. I will discuss some of the differences found concerning attitudes towards, realism, metaphors, seasonality, language rhythm and prosody. 

Until the beginning of the 20th century, in Japan, writing haiku had been an activity that mostly concerned men. However, in the early decades of this century, an increasing number of women began to express themselves in this poetry format. In the beginning, haiku by women were called “kitchen haiku”. This name was taken from the “kitchen column” in the most influential haiku journal, the hototogisu, of the early modern haiku movement. Not without pejorative connotations, this word still gave a, at least, partly adequate description of the topics often used by female poets. At this age, more than ever, haiku had become an autobiographic art and a frequent occurrence of household topics in the works by female authors was an inevitable consequence of the situation of women in the Japanese society. It is also undeniable that such topics brought entirely new perspectives to the genre. 

In this paper, my aim is to make a critical evaluation of the notion of “kitchen haiku” and show that it includes less obvious aspects. It is true that many poems in this style have a homely character, focussing on quiet everyday themes and family life, but this does not give the whole picture. Investigating the works of leading female poets of the early and mid-20th century, with a special focus on Takeshita Shizunojo (1887-1951) and Mitsuhashi Takajo (1899-1972), I will show that the topic of rage and frustration is conspicuous. This is strikingly different from the mainstream haiku poetry by male authors in the same age, where such topics are rarely found, and implies that expressions of anger may be understood from a gender perspective. I will reflect over how much the individual biographies of the authors can explain such topics, or if they should be seen as a general frustration with the roles forced upon women by the surrounding society. I will also show how such themes result in new ways of expression, often in the form of bold metaphors, that are likely an important formative force behind the avantgarde haiku movement in the postwar period.