wakibitos

(Quoted from Japan An Illustrated Encyclopedia, Kodansha, 1993)

Also known as Kobayashi Issa. Haiku poet of the late Edo periiod (1603-1868). Real name Kobayashi Nobuyuki. In addition to Issa, which means “a cup of tea,” he used a number of other pen names. Born as the first son of a middle-class farmer in Kashiwabara, Shinano Province (now Nagano Prefecture), he was educated by a village teacher who wrote haiku under the pen name of Shimpo. Issa’s mother died when he was three, and five years later his father married again. The stepmother was cold to Issa, and a lifelong family struggle began.

In 1777 he wen to Edo (now Tokyo). In 1787 he was studying haiku under Chikua, a poet of Katsushika group, which was interested in reviving the style of Basho (1644-94). Following Chikua’s death in 1790, Issa decided to live the life of a haiku-priest. He spent the following 10 years or so on a series of wandering journeys. During this period, Issa visited many poets, especially in the Kansai (Kyoto-Osaka) area, and gathered his poems in such collections as Kansai kiko (1791) and Kansai kucho (1794).

In 1801 his father died, and Issa wrote about this experience in Chichi no shuen nikki (1801, Diary of My Father’s Death). Carrying out his father’s wish, he decided to settle in his natiive village, but negotiations with his half-brother prevented his settling until 1813. During this period, he went back and forth between Edo and Kashiwabara and gathered his poems in collections that included Kyowa kucho (1803) and Bunka kucho (1804-08).

In 1814 Issa married a 27-year-old woman named Kiku. Four children were born in quick succession, but none of them lived long. The birth and death of his second child, Sato, inspired Issa to write Oraga Haru; translated as The Year of My Life, 1972), the best known of all his works; it was written in Haibun (haiku mixed with prose passage). Poems written after settling in his native village were gathered in such collections as Shichiban nikki (1810-18), Hachiban nikki (1819-21), Kuban nikki (1822-24). and Bunsei kucho (1822-25).

His style is characterized by a bold acceptance of down-to-earth language, by the introduction of animal images, by the use of personifiction and the free exercise of a comic spirit, and by the frequent expression of a stepson mentality and an obsession with poverty. These unconventional elements were, however, combined with the high seriousness Issa inherited from Basho.