All Topics  
Masaoka Shiki

 
Masaoka Shiki

 
   Email Print
   Bookmark   Link
 

 

Masaoka Shiki
 
 
  Topics Masaoka Shiki Topic Home

was the pen-name of a Japanese author, poet
Poet

A poet is a person who writes poetry....
, literary critic, and journalist
Journalist

A journalist is a person who practices journalism, the gathering and dissemination of information about current events, trends, issues, and people while striving for viewpoints that aren't biased....
 in Meiji period
Meiji period

The , or Meiji era, denotes the 45-year reign of the Meiji Emperor, running, in the Gregorian calendar, from 23 October 1868 to 30 July 1912. During this time, Japan started its modernization and rose to world power status....
 Japan. His real name was Masaoka Tsunenori (?? ??), but as a child he was called Tokoronosuke. Later, he changed his own name Noboru.

Shiki also played baseball
Baseball

Baseball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two team sport of nine players each. The goal of baseball is to score run by hitting a thrown Baseball with a baseball bat and touching a series of four markers called base arranged at the corners of a ninety-foot square, or diamond. Players on one team take turns hitting against...
 in his early days and entered Japanese Baseball Hall of Fame
Japanese Baseball Hall of Fame

The Japanese Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum is a Museum which includes a library , reference rooms and Japanese Baseball Hall of Fame.It first opened in 1959 next door to Korakuen Stadium in Tokyo, Japan....
 in 2002.

i was born in Matsuyama city
Matsuyama, Ehime

is the capital Cities of Japan of Ehime Prefecture on the Shikoku island of Japan. It is located on the northeastern portion of the Dogo Plain. Its name means "pine tree mountain." The city was founded on December 15, 1889....
 in Iyo province
Iyo Province

was an old provinces of Japan of Japan in the area that is today Ehime Prefecture on Shikoku. Iyo bordered on Awa province , Sanuki province, and Tosa Provinces....
 (present day Ehime prefecture
Ehime Prefecture

is a Prefectures of Japan in northwestern Shikoku, Japan. The capital is Matsuyama, Ehime....
) to a samurai
Samurai

is the term for the military nobility of Pre-industrial society Japan. According to translator William Scott Wilson: "In Chinese, the character ? was originally a verb meaning to wait upon or accompany a person in the upper ranks of society, and this is also true of the original term in Japanese, saburau....
 class family of modest means.






Discussion
Ask a question about 'Masaoka Shiki'
Start a new discussion about 'Masaoka Shiki'
Answer questions from other users
Full Discussion Forum



Encyclopedia


was the pen-name of a Japanese author, poet
Poet

A poet is a person who writes poetry....
, literary critic, and journalist
Journalist

A journalist is a person who practices journalism, the gathering and dissemination of information about current events, trends, issues, and people while striving for viewpoints that aren't biased....
 in Meiji period
Meiji period

The , or Meiji era, denotes the 45-year reign of the Meiji Emperor, running, in the Gregorian calendar, from 23 October 1868 to 30 July 1912. During this time, Japan started its modernization and rose to world power status....
 Japan. His real name was Masaoka Tsunenori (?? ??), but as a child he was called Tokoronosuke. Later, he changed his own name Noboru.

Shiki also played baseball
Baseball

Baseball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two team sport of nine players each. The goal of baseball is to score run by hitting a thrown Baseball with a baseball bat and touching a series of four markers called base arranged at the corners of a ninety-foot square, or diamond. Players on one team take turns hitting against...
 in his early days and entered Japanese Baseball Hall of Fame
Japanese Baseball Hall of Fame

The Japanese Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum is a Museum which includes a library , reference rooms and Japanese Baseball Hall of Fame.It first opened in 1959 next door to Korakuen Stadium in Tokyo, Japan....
 in 2002.

Early life

Shiki was born in Matsuyama city
Matsuyama, Ehime

is the capital Cities of Japan of Ehime Prefecture on the Shikoku island of Japan. It is located on the northeastern portion of the Dogo Plain. Its name means "pine tree mountain." The city was founded on December 15, 1889....
 in Iyo province
Iyo Province

was an old provinces of Japan of Japan in the area that is today Ehime Prefecture on Shikoku. Iyo bordered on Awa province , Sanuki province, and Tosa Provinces....
 (present day Ehime prefecture
Ehime Prefecture

is a Prefectures of Japan in northwestern Shikoku, Japan. The capital is Matsuyama, Ehime....
) to a samurai
Samurai

is the term for the military nobility of Pre-industrial society Japan. According to translator William Scott Wilson: "In Chinese, the character ? was originally a verb meaning to wait upon or accompany a person in the upper ranks of society, and this is also true of the original term in Japanese, saburau....
 class family of modest means. His father, Tsunenao, was a low-ranking official, and his mother, Yae, was the eldest daughter of Ohara Kanzan, a teacher at the clan school. Shiki lost his father when he was five.

Literary career

Shiki was a strong advocate of modernization of Japanese poetry
Japanese poetry

Japanese poets first encountered Chinese poetry when it was at its peak in the Tang Dynasty. It took them several hundred years to digest the foreign impact, make it a part of their culture and merge it with their literary tradition in their mother tongue, and begin to develop the diversity of their native poetry....
, even coining the terms "haiku" (see Haiku
Haiku

' ', plural haiku, is a form of Japanese poetry, consisting of 17 Mora e , in three metrical phrases of 5, 7 and 5 morae respectively. Haiku typically contain a kigo, or seasonal reference, and a kireji or verbal caesura....
) (replacing hokku
Hokku

is the opening stanza of a Japanese orthodox collaborative linked poem, renga, or of its later derivative, renku . From the time of Matsuo Basho , the hokku began to appear as an independent poem, and was also incorporated in haibun , and haiga ....
) and "tanka" (see Tanka
Waka (poetry)

Waka or Yamato uta is a classical Japanese poetry form and one of the major genres of Japanese literature. The term was coined during the Heian period, and was used to distinguish Japanese-language poetry from Kanshi , Chinese-language poetry written by Japanese poets, and later from renga....
)(replacing waka
Waka (poetry)

Waka or Yamato uta is a classical Japanese poetry form and one of the major genres of Japanese literature. The term was coined during the Heian period, and was used to distinguish Japanese-language poetry from Kanshi , Chinese-language poetry written by Japanese poets, and later from renga....
).

Later life

Shiki suffered from tuberculosis
Tuberculosis

Tuberculosis is a common and often deadly infectious disease caused by mycobacterium, mainly Mycobacterium tuberculosis . Tuberculosis usually attacks the lungs but can also affect the central nervous system, the lymphatic system, the circulatory system, the genitourinary system, the gastrointestinal system, bones, joints, and even the...
 much of his life. In 1889, after coughing up blood, he adopted the pen-name of "Shiki". His illness was severely aggravated by a stint as a war correspondent
War correspondent

A war correspondent is a journalist who covers stories firsthand from a war. In the 19th century they were also called Special Correspondents....
 with the Imperial Japanese Army
Imperial Japanese Army

The Imperial Japanese Army , or literally Army of Empire of Greater Japan was the official ground based armed force of Imperial Japan from 1867 to 1945....
 during the First Sino-Japanese War
First Sino-Japanese War

The First Sino-Japanese War was a war fought between Qing Dynasty China and Meiji period Imperial Japan over the control of Korea. The Sino-Japanese War would come to symbolize the degeneration and enfeeblement of the Qing Dynasty and demonstrate how successful modernization had been in Japan since the Meiji Restoration as compared with the...
. Upon return from military service in 1895 he convalesced at Natsume Soseki
Natsume Soseki

' was the pen name of ', who is widely considered to be the foremost Japanese novelist of the Meiji Era . He is commonly referred to as Soseki....
's house in Matsuyama, but he realized that he was terminally ill. He continued to write vigorously, but was largely bed-ridden by 1898. He kept a series of journals dated 1901-1902, in which he described his physical deterioration and the progress of his illness in clinical detail. These journals also contain numerous tanka and haiku, which occurred to him while he was writing. He died in Tokyo on 19 September 1902.

Legacy

Shiki is today often credited with single-handedly revitalizing the poetry forms of haiku and tanka. Although his ideas and theories were regarded as revolutionary by his contemporaries, he mostly remained within the bounds of the traditionally established “rules” and formats, unlike his more radical free verse
Free verse

Free Verse poetry does not have a strict pattern of rhyming. It does not have regular meter, rhyme, fixed line length, or a specific stanza pattern....
 successors. His work has an austerity, and a freshness that remains popular today. He is now regarded as one of the four great masters of haiku, along with Basho
Matsuo Basho

was the most famous poet of the Edo period in Japan. During his lifetime, Basho was recognized for his works in the collaborative Renku form; today, after centuries of commentary, he is recognized as a master of brief and clear haiku....
, Buson
Yosa Buson

Yosa Buson, or Yosa no Buson , was a Japanese poet and Painting from the Edo period. Along with Matsuo Basho and Kobayashi Issa, Buson is considered among the greatest poets of the Edo Period....
, and Issa
Kobayashi Issa

, Japanese people poet and Buddhist priest known for his haiku poems and journals. He is regarded as one of the four haiku masters in Japan, along with Matsuo Basho, Yosa Buson and Masaoka Shiki....
.

See also

  • Haiku
    Haiku

    ' ', plural haiku, is a form of Japanese poetry, consisting of 17 Mora e , in three metrical phrases of 5, 7 and 5 morae respectively. Haiku typically contain a kigo, or seasonal reference, and a kireji or verbal caesura....
  • Japanese poetic diary


External links

at Aozora bunko
Aozora Bunko

Aozora Bunko Since its inception in 1997, Aozora Bunko has been both the compiler and publisher of a evolving on-line catalog. In 2006, Aozora Bunko organized to take on an added role as a public policy advocate in order to protect its current and anticipated catalog of freely accessible e-books....
  • at poem translations from 'Masaoka Shiki' by Janine Beichman