Introduction
cism so enduring is that he was not merely a theorist, but a craftsman talking of what he knew at first hand.
Soon Sachio published in the same journal a second series of articles on the “New Theory of Poetry.”[1] Like a sonnet sequence in the West, Japanese classical poems of thirty-one syllables frequently came in sequence, but each poem was always considered as independent. Almost accidently, Shiki discovered a new method of composing upon one subject a series of poems organically related, and again it was Sachio who successfully tried it out in his creative work. He compares it with landscape gardening.
“A dignified old tree can stand alone in the garden. So, a long lay can fully express complex thoughts and emotions. But with smaller shrubs, it is best to group them in an harmonious whole, and a series of poems on the same subject, each voicing its different phases, clusters together naturally.”
This method of composition was used effectively by such able poets as Akahiko Shimaki, Mokichi Saito, and others, and it gave their work an extraordinary wholeness and integrity.
- ↑ November, 1901, to May, 1902; v. 4 nos. 11–12, v. 5 nos. 1–5.
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