|
|
|
|
Senryu
|
| |
|
| |
is a Japanese form of short poetry similar to haiku in construction: three lines with 17 or fewer "on" (not syllables) in total. However, senryu tend to be about human foibles while haiku tend to be about nature, and senryu are often cynical or darkly humorous while haiku are more serious. Unlike haiku, senryu do not include a kireji (cutting word), and do not generally include a kigo, or season word.
form is named after Edo period haiku poet Senryu Karai (????, 1718-1790), real name Karai Hachiemon, whose collection launched the genre (and hence his name) into the public consciousness.
Discussion
Ask a question about 'Senryu' Start a new discussion about 'Senryu' Answer questions from other users |
Encyclopedia
is a Japanese form of short poetry similar to haiku in construction: three lines with 17 or fewer "on" (not syllables) in total. However, senryu tend to be about human foibles while haiku tend to be about nature, and senryu are often cynical or darkly humorous while haiku are more serious. Unlike haiku, senryu do not include a kireji (cutting word), and do not generally include a kigo, or season word.
Form and content
The form is named after Edo period haiku poet Senryu Karai (????, 1718-1790), real name Karai Hachiemon, whose collection launched the genre (and hence his name) into the public consciousness. A typical example from the collection:
- ??? dorobo wo
- ?????? toraete mireba
- ????? wagako nari
- The robber,
- when I catch,
- my own son
This senryu, which can also be translated "Catching him / you see the robber / is your son," is not so much a personal experience of the author as an example of a type of situation (provided by a short comment called a maeku or fore-verse, which usually prefaces a number of examples=senryu) and/or a brief=witty rendition of an incident, from history or the arts (plays, songs, tales, poetry, etc.). In this case, there was a historical incident of legendary proportion.
Some senryu skirt the line between haiku and senryu. The following senryu by Shuji Terayama copies the haiku structure faithfully, down to a blatantly obvious kigo, but on closer inspection is absurd in its content:
- ????? kakurenbo
- ????? mittsu kazoete
- ???? fuyu ni naru
- Hide and seek
- Count to three
- Winter comes
Terayama, who wrote about playing hide-and-go-seek in the graveyard as a child, thought of himself as the odd-guy out, the one who was always "it" in hide-and-go-seek. Indeed, the original haiku included the theme "oni" (the "it" in Japanese is a demon, though in some parts a very young child forced to play "it" was called a "sea slug" (namako)). To him, seeing a game of hide-and-go seek, or recalling it as it grew cold would be a chilling experience. Terayama might also have recalled opening his eyes and finding himself all alone, feeling the cold more intensely than he did a minute before among other children. Either way, any genuinely personal experience would be haiku and not senryu in the classic sense. If you think Terayama's poem uses a child's game to express in hyperbolic metaphor how, in retrospect, life is short, and nothing more, then this would indeed work as a senryu. Otherwise, it is a bona fide haiku. There is also the possibility that it is a joke about playing hide and seek, only to realize (winter having arrived during the months spent hiding) that no one wants to find you.
Some modern haiku are more similar to senryu than to traditional Japanese haiku. Most Western haiku and senryu poets no longer adhere to the 5-7-5 form, which, according to many, is suitable for the Japanese language but may lead English poets to produce over-long and sometimes stilted poems.
Manchester poet John Cooper Clarke recited the following self-composed senryu on Irish television in 1986:
- To express oneself
- in seventeen syllables
- is very diffic
However, while amusing, such a poem is actually neither a haiku nor a senryu, but a commentary about haiku and the oversimplified perception that it should have seventeen syllables.
English-language senryu publications
In the 1970s, Michael McClintock edited Seer Ox: American Senryu Magazine. In 1993, Michael Dylan Welch edited and published Fig Newtons: Senryu to Go, which was likely the first anthology of senryu. Although there are currently no journals devoted solely to senryu, one can regularly find senryu and related articles in some haiku publications. For example:
- journal has a regular senryu column edited by Alan Pizzarelli.
- has also regularly published senryu.
- Senryu regularly appear in the pages of Modern Haiku, Frogpond, Tundra, and other leading journals for haiku.
Senryu awards
The Haiku Society of America has the annual Gerald Brady Memorial Awards for best unpublished senryu with a $100 first prize ().
Since about 1990, the Haiku Poets of Northern California has also been running a senryu contest, as part of its San Francisco International Haiku and Senryu Contest, with a first prize of $100 ().
External links
|
| |
|
|
