Part 1: So It Begins
In 1689, the Japanese poet Matsuo Basho, along with his companion Sora, set out from his home in Edo (now Tokyo) on a long and dangerous journey to travel through the north of Japan. The road was dangerous enough that many think his reason for selling his house before he left was that he did not expect to make it back. He documented his adventure on the road in a book combining both prose and poetry (specifically haiku), The Narrow Road to the Deep North.
333 years later, a certified genius I set out to read and review this famous travel log. What I want is, to the best of my abilities, to endow this review of Narrow Road with a bit of the feeling and impression I had while reading it. Thus, this review will also consist of both prose and poetry. To avoid any confusion, know that I will use quotation marks and italics when quoting Basho, otherwise it’s from me. For example: here’s Basho, upon leaving his friends and setting out on his journey (note that the translator converted the three-line, five-seven-five syllable haiku structure into four lines and a variable number of syllables for the English translation, I will comment on this later):
“The passing spring
Birds mourn
Fishes weep
With tearful eyes”
And this one is from me, as we set out on our own journey through this review:
Wanting a review
But subjected to haiku
You: disappointed.
Part 2: Seasons Don’t Fear the Weeper
Basho cries a lot:
“I wept bitterly in front of the tombstones of the two young wives, remembering how they had dressed up their frail bodies in armor after the death of their husbands.”
“Indeed, many a feat of chivalrous valor was repeated here during the short span of the three generations, but both the actors and the deeds have long been dead and passed into oblivion. When a country is defeated, there remain only mountains and rivers, and on a ruined castle in spring only grasses thrive. I sat down on my hat and wept bitterly till I almost forgot time.”
“In this ever-changing world where mountains crumble, rivers change their courses, roads are deserted, rocks are buried, and old trees yield to young shoots, it was nothing short of a miracle that this monument alone had survived the battering of a thousand years to be the living memory of the ancients. I felt as if I were in the presence of the ancients themselves, and, forgetting all the troubles I had suffered on the road, rejoiced in the utter happiness of this joyful moment, not without tears in my eyes.”
“But if this ever-changing world in which we’re living makes you give in and cry, say live and let die.”
Ok, ignore the last one. But the first three examples are legitimate. Basho is intimately connected with his emotions, particularly when they involve the past. I think this was perhaps the main thing that surprised me about Narrow Road. Basho possesses a deep knowledge of the past (martial, historical, religious, and literary), and it guides the sites that he visits. I expected the book to describe an expedition through Japan as it was in 1689, but at times it felt more like a journey through a memory of an even older country: of battles won and lost, holy priests, ancient trees immortalized in poetry. For anyone like myself unfamiliar with the historical references, using the footnotes is essential.[1]
A thing about Basho’s Japan that stuck out to me was the amount of hermits or hermitages that Basho and Sora encountered. They visit the old hermitage of the priest Buccho, who had been a significant influence for Basho, and Basho notes that it reminds him of another hermitage, albeit an older one, of the priest Genmyo.[2] Later on they come by a priest living alone under a tree. Before leaving, Basho himself had lived in a solitary hut constructed by his students. This left me with many questions. How common was this, exactly? Was this regional? I’ve seen hermits referenced in medieval European stories, but I didn’t get the impression that it was normal. And how often do people do this now? Basho doesn’t seem to be puzzled by this at all, but I found this way of living fascinating.
Deep in the mountains
A priest sits still, listening
To cheerful birdsong.
One other unusual thing about his account was how popular poetry appears to have been. I lost track of the amount of poet friends that Basho visits. His companion and servant Sora writes poems, some of which are recorded in Narrow Road. A farmer guiding Basho and his horse asks for a poem out of the blue. Here’s Basho’s humble account of his time at Oishida:
“I was told that the old seed of linked verse once strewn here by the scattering wind had taken root, still bearing its own flowers each year and thus softening the minds of the rough villagers like the clear note of a reedpipe, but that these rural poets were now merely struggling to find their way in the forest of error, unable to distinguish between the new and the old style, for there was no one to guide them. At their request, therefore, I sat with them to compose a book of linked verse, and left it behind me as a gift. It was indeed a great pleasure for me to be of such help during my wandering journey.”
Great pleasure, indeed. But seriously, between all of the hermits and all of the poets, how many people were left to, I don’t know, grow food? How productive/rich was Japan in 1689? Besides the hermits and priests, most of the people that Basho sees from the road are, in fact, farmers, and the non-poets he visits in the cities are merchants. Yes, I know that the people Basho visited were not a random sample of the general population, but overall I still finished this book thinking Japan was much better off at this time than I had originally thought.
Part 3: About the Poetry and Translation
My copy of Narrow Road is from a translation by Nobuyuki Yuasa, who also supplied the introduction. There he states that his choice of a four-line stanza was “the closest approximation of natural conversational rhythm” that is central to haiku. In fact, “this translation is primarily intended for lovers of poetry.” I was relieved by this - I had been concerned that the five-seven-five form would be adhered to strictly, to the poetry’s detriment, but this was not the case. I found the poetry to be beautiful and had no complaints with the structure, but if you really need your poems to total seventeen syllables in three lines like my English teacher in fourth grade, this translation is not for you.[3] I quoted one of Basho’s haiku earlier, but for further reference, here is what the translation of his justifiably most famous haiku looks like with this style. From the introduction:
“Breaking the silence
Of an ancient pond,
A frog jumped into water -
A deep resonance.”
One useful thing about Narrow Road, or really the introduction in the copy I have, is the background information regarding the development of haiku poetry. For example, you learn of linked verse (renga), where strings of poems are tied together in one long chain by a group of poets, each of whom would link their poem to the preceding one through “witty association or verbal play”. Basho wrote linked verse with priests and his poet friends (and of course those “rough villagers”) on his journey, and in fact furthered the art by linking verses on a deeper, spiritual level. Personally, I don’t have poet friends or rough villagers with which to write. Nevertheless…
Part 4: The Travelers of Eternity
…I’d like to share my own parting linked verse with you concerning this book and what reading it has done for me. Basho took to the road, carrying not more than a few possessions, on a journey he may have thought would be his last. I can’t help but feel inspired by Narrow Road - I feel like I’d rather travel a safe road than a dangerous one, but in any case Basho’s travels have given me a bit of wanderlust. This is of course a cliche, but it’s hard not to see the parallels between a long, difficult journey and life itself. For me, at least, The Narrow Road to the Deep North has served as a reminder to seek adventure, and enjoy the beauty in the simple things along the way.
In the beginning of Narrow Road, Basho writes:
“Days and months are travelers of eternity. So are the years that pass by…I myself have been tempted for a long time by the cloud-moving wind - filled with a strong desire to wander.”
So to take his starting point as our ending point:
Even the long years
Till the end of time itself
Edge forward, faster.
Running now, and running, and
Never stopping, on and on.
And here we are, look:
Loathe to leave the light and warmth.
Tomorrow, not now.
Reach, pull open the curtains -
All the clouds - carried by wind.
Voyages call us
Echoing in the cold wind
“Leaves falling, leave now.”
Ever cautious, we stop and -
Remain, and then - step outside.