Who the heck was Bashō?

trumpet vines
cover a railroad fence
silence of no train


In 17th century Japan, Matsuo Bashō was a teacher of renga who made his living by traveling around Japan teaching people this art. Renga is a linked poem that is composed by two or more people, usually three who alternately add each verse. It was highly competitive. Each new verse had to be related to the previous one as well as take the poem in an interesting new direction. Renga often consisted of 100 verses and could even be as long as a 1000.

Renga started out as a court art but by Bashō's time it had become popular with everyone, including the middle class. Bashō popularized the hokku or starting verse, a three line verse that introduced the renga. A famous poem by Bashō is

old pond--
frog leaps in
water's sound

As you can see from this, Bashō wrote about the natural world but with a sense of humor. He began a series of journeys during which he also introduced another literary form, the haibun, which is a mixture of haiku and prose. He wrote The Narrow Road to the Interior in this form about his travels. Travel in those days in Japan was extremely dangerous and the poet did not expect to survive his travels. Yet he went anyway. The pull of the road or the mountain path.

By the way, the poet was originally named Matsuo Kinsaku. After his followers planted a banana tree next to his simple hut, he renamed himself Bashō after this kind of tree.