~by Gregg Rowe~
I do not know if this will help in the debate or cause further confusion, but I have been writing Haiku's and Tankas since I was twenty and learned the form in college.
This debate of what truly is a Haiku has been going on since the Japanese poem has been translated into the English Language.
The Haiku falls into two categories:
(1) An unrhymed Japanese poem recording the essence of a moment keenly perceived in which nature is linked to human nature. It usually consists of 17 onji (Japanese sound-symbols) in three parts of 5-7-5 onji each.
(2) An adaptation in English of (1) usually written in one to three lines with no specific number of syllables. It rarely has more than 17 syllables. Sometimes written in three lines of 5, 7, and 5 syllables each.
Though in the past English language haiku were often written in three lines of 5, 7 and 5 syllables each, most are now written in a free-verse form of fewer than 17 syllables.
This comes closer to the Japanese 'form' because 10 to 14 syllables in English approximate the spoken length of 17 onji in Japanese.
Even in Japanese haiku is not a 'form' in the same sense that a sonnet or triolet is a form in English.
This is demonstrated by the fact that the Japanese differentiate haiku from senryu -- a type of poem that has exactly the same 'form' as haiku but differs in content from it.
Actually, there is no rigid form for Japanese haiku.
Seventeen onji is the norm, but some 5 per cent of 'classical' haiku depart from it, and so do a still greater percentage of modern Japanese haiku.
To the Japanese and to English language haiku poets, it is the content and not the form alone that makes a haiku.
That content is nature.
All Japanese classical haiku, as well as most modern ones, contain a kigo (season word: a word that indicates a season of the year) which ensures that nature will be in the poem, senryu do not.
While there is no season-word tradition or rule in English language haiku, a season if not expressly indicated is usually felt or implied.
Nature in some sense must be present, and in some particular object -- not generalized or allegorized.
Haiku poets may find it in some unlikely places however.
Nature can be found on city streets as well as in the woods.
It is wherever there is light or darkness, sound or silence, heat or cold -- in whatever can be seen, heard, smelled, or touched.
Haiku relates us to nature through the senses.
'Coming to one's senses' in haiku's means seeing things as they are, realizing reality as it is -- seeing one thing so clearly, we see the oneness of all things.
A few additional rules of leniency we adopted to help English writers learn the craft of Haiku and Tanka writing:
The emergence of the one liner as a common form of haiku and senryu (see Sato: From the Country of Eight Islands -- 1981), the growing practice of writing longer works , such as sequences and renga; and the increasing importance of human relationships, especially sex and love, as a subject matter.
Though many poets have been moving towards more freedom for the haiku form in the early seventies, especially away from the restrictions of the 5-7-5 syllable count, it was only in the latter half of the decade that the one-line form became more than an occasional exception to the 'three-line rule'.
The three-line form, with no set syllable count, remains the standard, but some of the best haiku in English have been written in one liner, and the form is now widely used.
PS: You will notice that SEASONAL and NATURE are mentioned in this article that I have written, and that is what I expect in my HAIKU Contests. The first line seasonal, the second line nature, the third line brings them together. This is the traditional Haiku, and when I ask for it in a contest, this is the form I expect. Any deviation from this form will be further explained in the rules when running a contest.
This debate of what truly is a Haiku has been going on since the Japanese poem has been translated into the English Language.
Included in the list
- Dear Uni and Winnie (Writing & Contest Advice): • next in list
- Improving your poetry: • next in list
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Comments
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I think and hope so that those who haven't enough on other colomms, read at last this one to. It defines and reveals with another use of language the way poets should inteprete haiku. I still think students should start to learn along that 575 line to have a base, to be bound to formulate within this context lines and learn to get everything in. It's much easier for them to get grip but they also should learn when they reach that certain grade of understanding to get lose from these boundries. That is just the same as what graded writers should learn that youngsters or less experienced writers have to go that path. And in time will laugh about theyre silly comments. Acceptation from those who have to learn is as important as ones own development.
I appreciate this column as much as the others.
Wim -
Much applause for shedding more light on a form so often misused and misunderstood. I recently took haikumonk's haiku class and it was so helpful in learning the form. People still tell me that haiku have to be 5/7/5 syllables and those comments drive me crazy!
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