TheKokin Wakashū(Cổ kim hòa ca tập,"Collection of Japanese Poems of Ancient and Modern Times" ),commonly abbreviated asKokinshū(Cổ kim tập),is an early anthology of thewakaform ofJapanese poetry,dating from theHeian period.Animperial anthology,it was conceived byEmperor Uda(r. 887–897) and published by order of his sonEmperor Daigo(r. 897–930) in about905.Its finished form dates toc.920, though according to several historical accounts the last poem was added to the collection in 914.
The compilers of the anthology were four court poets, led byKi no Tsurayukiand also includingKi no Tomonori(who died before its completion),Ōshikōchi no Mitsune,andMibu no Tadamine.
Significance
editTheKokinshūis the first of theNijūichidaishū(Nhị thập nhất đại tập),the 21 collections of Japanese poetry compiled at Imperial request. It was the most influential realization of the ideas of poetry at the time, dictating the form and format of Japanese poetry until the late nineteenth century; it was the first anthology to divide itself into seasonal and love poems. The primacy of poems about the seasons pioneered by theKokinshūcontinues even today.
TheJapanese prefacebyKi no Tsurayukiis also the beginning of Japanese criticism as distinct from the far more prevalent Chinese poetics in the literary circles of its day. The anthology also included aClassical Chinesepreface authored byKi no Yoshimochi.The idea of including old as well as new poems was another important innovation, one which was widely adopted in later works, both in prose and verse. The poems of theKokinshūwere ordered temporally; the love poems, for instance, though written by many different poets across large spans of time, are ordered in such a way that the reader may understand them to depict the progression and fluctuations of a courtly love-affair. This association of one poem to the next marks this anthology as the ancestor of therengaandhaikaitraditions.
Structure
editThe exact number of poems in the collection varies depending on the textual tradition. One online edition,[1]which follows the Date Family text based on a manuscript prepared byFujiwara no Teika,contains 1,111 poems. The collection is divided into twenty parts, reflecting older models such as theMan'yōshūand various Chinese anthologies. The organization of topics is however different from all earlier models, and was followed by all later official collections, although some collections like theKin'yō WakashūandShika Wakashūscaled the model down to ten parts.
The following divisions of theKokinshūmention the Japanese names of the parts,[1]their modern readings,[2][3]and their English translations.[4]
| Topic | Parts | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Seasons | 1–2 | Spring | Xuân ca | haru no uta |
| 3 | Summer | Hạ ca | natsu no uta | |
| 4–5 | Autumn | Thu ca | aki no uta | |
| 6 | Winter | Đông ca | fuyu no uta | |
| 7 | Congratulations | Hạ ca | ga no uta | |
| 8 | Partings | Ly biệt ca | wakare no uta | |
| 9 | Travel | Ki lữ ca | tabi no uta | |
| 10 | Acrostics | Vật danh | mono no na | |
| Love | 11–15 | Love | Luyến ca | koi no uta |
| Miscellany | 16 | Laments | Ai thương ca | aishō no uta |
| 17–18 | Miscellaneous | Tạp ca | kusagusa no uta | |
| 19 | Miscellaneous Forms | Tạp thể ca | zattai no uta | |
| 20 | Traditional Poems from the Bureau of Song |
Đại ca sở ngự ca | ōutadokoro no on'uta | |
The compilers included the name of the author of each poem, and the topic(Đề,dai)or inspiration of the poem, if known. Major poets of theKokinshūincludeAriwara no Narihira,Ono no Komachi,HenjōandFujiwara no Okikaze,apart from the compilers themselves. Inclusion in any imperial collection, and particularly theKokinshū,was a great honour.
Manuscripts
editOn October 20, 2010,Kōnan Women's Universityannounced the discovery of a complete manuscript dating toc. 1220–1240.It is the oldest manuscript to contain both the Chinese and Japanese prefaces. It is split into two volumes, 15.9 cm tall by 14.6 cm wide, totaling 429 pages containing all 1111 poems. It is thought to be a copy of a manuscript made byFujiwara no Teika,but the identity of the copier is unknown. The manuscript was purchased from a used book store in 1982 for 4,280,000 yen.[5][6][7]
Translations
editA translation by Laurel Rasplica Rodd titledKokinshū: A Collection of Poems Ancient and Modernwas published in 1984 byPrinceton University Press.Torquil Duthie translated a selection of one-third of the anthology under the titleThe Kokinshū: Selected Poems,published in 2023 byColumbia University Press.Both translations won theJapan–U.S. Friendship Commission Prize for the Translation of Japanese Literature:Rodd's in 1982 and Duthie's in 2023.[8][9]
See also
editNotes
edit- ^abOnline edition of theKokin wakashuArchived2014-08-14 at theWayback Machineat theUVa Library Japanese Text InitiativeArchived2005-01-21 at theWayback Machine.
- ^Miner (1985), pages 186–187
- ^McCullough
- ^Brower, pg 482
- ^"Cổ kim hòa ca tập: Liêm thương sơ kỳ の tả bổn と phán minh giáp nam nữ tử đại sở tàng".Mainichi Shimbun.October 20, 2010.RetrievedOctober 22,2010.[permanent dead link][dead link]
- ^"Cổ kim hòa ca tập の tả bổn, liêm thương sơ kỳ の “Hoàn bổn” と xác nhận ".Yomiuri Shimbun.October 20, 2010. Archived fromthe originalon October 23, 2010.RetrievedOctober 22,2010.
- ^"Cổ kim hòa ca tập, hoàn toàn tả bổn kiến つかる＝ hán tự, 仮 danh tự văn phó きで tối cổ － giáp nam nữ tử đại".Yahoo! News.October 20, 2010.RetrievedOctober 22,2010.[permanent dead link]
- ^"Archive of past prize winners for the Japan-U.S. Friendship Commission Prize for the Translation of Japanese Literature".Donald Keene Center.Retrieved26 February2024.
- ^"Japan-U.S. Friendship Commission Prizes for the Translation of Japanese Literature".Donald Keene Center.Retrieved26 February2024.
References
edit- Saeki, Umetomo (1958).Nihon Koten Bungaku Taikei: Kokin Wakashū.Iwanami Shoten.ISBN4-00-060008-7.
- Kojima, Noriyuki; Eizō Arai (1989).Shin Nihon Koten Bungaku Taikei: Kokin Wakashū.Iwanami Shoten.ISBN4-00-240005-0.
- Miner, Earl;H. Odagiri; R. E. Morrell (1985).The Princeton Companion to Classical Japanese Literature.Princeton University Press. pp.186–187.ISBN0-691-06599-3.
- McCullough, Helen Craig(1985).Kokin Wakashū: The First Imperial Anthology of Japanese Poetry.Stanford University Press.ISBN0-8047-1258-1.
- Brower, Robert H.; Earl Roy Miner (1961).Japanese court poetry.Stanford University Press.LCCN61-10925.
External links
edit- Manuscript scans atWaseda University Library:1 volume(unknown year),2 volumes(unknown year),1 volume(unknown year),1553(Sanjōnishi Kin'eda),1510?(Ichijō Fuyuyoshi)