Haiku Illustrated features 90 classic poems from four poets – Matsuo Bashō, Yosa Buson, Kobayashi Issa and Masaoka Shiki – which range across more than 200 years of Japanese poetry.
There are few rules to haiku, but they are strict: 17 phonetic sounds, a sense of cutting images or ideas, and a reference to a season. From those restrictions, poets have written about many things, from the year’s first blossom to aging, from mosquitoes humming to insects singing, from catching one’s shadow to cros...
Great Book of Simple Phrases
This haiku book is really great! It was so much fun to experience classical Japanese culture in the native language! The haikus themselves are simple and short, and a great gateway into native content. There are helpful translations on every page that really helped me make sure I got the gist of the haiku. There are lots of good vocabulary words, though some terms are dated and may be difficult to find in a dictionary. I also recommend having a Kireji (切れ字) table on hand while reading as so