日EU文化交流50周年記念俳句イベント

Haiku is allegedly the shortest poem in the world. It is a rhymeless verse consisting of 17 syllables, with roots in Japan. The following definition comes close to Basho’s one: haiku is a short rhymeless poem, characterized by a prosodic pattern of 5-7-5 syllables (mora), including a season word (kigo), a cutting word (kireji), and, we might add: suggestiveness (yoin). Suggestiveness is a poetical effect that often if not generally involves imagination, metaphor, simile, fiction etc. Haiku in Japan went through a centuries-long process of development and maturation. As a form of word craft, it is inextricably intertwined with the genius of the Japanese language. Over the centuries countless poets have refined through haiku the expressive possibilities of the Japanese language and broadened its boundaries and in the process enriched it. It was given to the world by Japan and is now practiced globally. You can write haiku in almost every language in the world.

It is an ambition to have haiku become a UNESCO World Heritage. It is the dream of the late Professor Arima, the former president of the HIA and former minister of Education.

There are differences between the Western and Japanese interpretation of haiku.
We need to stress even more than before how haiku is partly a response to the world we live in today, how haiku in a way responds to a need in the spirit of the times we live in. Why?

Our world is highly organized, almost in a technocratic way. Everything is regulated not only by governments but also by the private sector. Everything is so perfectly organized, too perfect, too complicated that one failure disturbs the whole. If there is a hitch, a problem e.g. due to covid or a war then the supply lines get blocked.We are used to being well served as a consumer and do not realize how complicated our economy and our society has become. Haiku excels at the opposite, at simplicity.

The haiku poet looks at small things in nature or undergoes the seasons in all its forms. He or she tries to capture that observation, that experience, in seventeen syllables. He expresses in words what he experiences and conveys it clearly to the reader. There is not even usually a title on a haiku verse. The words must speak for themselves. Life can be simple in a not-so-simple society. That is what haiku teaches us.

The haiku poet is not blind to what is happening in the world and in nature but he or she has a deep desire for harmony. The poet knows that nature can be cruel and that the seasons can be capricious. But because of this, the poet seeks harmony even more. It is not because something does not always exist that one cannot yearn for it. On the contrary.

Because he is a man or woman longing for harmony he does not stand violence and war. It goes against all that he has in him or her. I cannot imagine a haiku poet who goes to war or who is wicked. Haiku, harmony and peace go together. Needless to say, in today’s world where invasion of another country, atrocities, war or its threat has reappeared close to us, that haiku is a sign of peace and thus particularly timely. An overwhelming majority of people wants to live a normal and happy life, caring for their loved ones.

To illustrate this, I will for once quote myself:

An old dog faithfully
Plodding at his masters’ side
Growing old together

Harmony also does not rhyme with negative feelings such as jealousy, avarice, revenge, humiliation, rivalry, anger, vanity, bullying, insults, etc. that sometimes make daily life or public life impossible. One cannot want to be harmonious in one part of ourselves and the opposite in another. That is unlivable and inconsistent. I know that many people live compartmentalized lives. A kind man or woman may be kind in his profession and insufferable at home or vice versa. Haiku unlearns that.

Haiku can also be a comfort to those who are suffering. Not because it is an escape from reality but because that same reality also has positive and hidden sides. The haiku poet does not allow himself to be absorbed by the bad in men but focuses on the small things that make life enjoyable and bearable.

I said that the poet is focused on the things around them. He or she is all attentive to everything that happens around them and to the repercussions this has in their heads and in their hearts. Attention is essential. Anyone who wants to mean something to people must see them, like nature, in their concrete way of life. Attention is also a form of respect for the other human being and everything else. The poet is in the present. He frees himself to accept things as they are, in their simplicity and beauty.

I add a nuance of my own. Haiku can also be about human experiences with nature and the season in the background. 

Through this, the haiku poet exercises himself in modesty. He acknowledges reality as it is. Through this focus on what is happening outside him or her, he forgets his Ego. His own will or vanity goes up in smoke when he comes into contact with the reality around him. It is then no longer about himself but about the other. Instead of self-centeredness, haiku is about other-centeredness. In this sense, haiku has an ethical dimension. It can make us a better person.

Poetry is a solitary activity but in haiku it does not stop there. The haiku poet has his verses discussed in haiku groups and sometimes adapts them. This is unthinkable in classical poetry. So there is also a social dimension to haiku poetry. Let us not forget that haiku is not only an ‘art’ but also a ‘craft’. One can always learn technically or learn to look and listen better. The social contact also humbles us.

I give another historical proof of why haiku is a social thing. Basho was known as a master of haikai. This was a sequence of linked verse, which was usually written by two or more fellow poets. Bashô, as a recognized master, would often write the first verse in such a sequence, which was called hokku, literally ‘initial verse’. A fellow poet would then link to the initial verse a fourteen syllable verse, called wakiku, or ‘added verse’. This in turn was followed by a third verse, again comprising seventeen syllables, and this one would in turn be followed by a fourteen syllable verse, etc. In some way a kukaï had a social dimension. A kukai is a haiku contest where the participants, the poets do the judging themselves.

For many writers the brevity of haiku poses a problem. How is it possible for poetry to be so short and yet still be poetry? The brevity and the honest, overt simplicity allow everyone to participate, making it a communal, social medium.

There are a lot of similarities between meditation and haiku. It presupposes the same ‘attention’. In the case of meditation, it is focusing on the mantra, a word repeated continuously during meditation. 

Of course, there are also a differences. The poet puts his experiences into words and into beauty. The meditator wants to distance himself from the agenda of the Ego by reciting the mantra. The mantra pushes aside the worries of the present. Therefore energy is released for the other, the neighbor, the cosmos, the divine, eternity. Less Ego means more Love. The poet, however, does not leave it at that and wants to share something and touch people through the power of words and underlying thoughts. Of course there is no contradiction between meditation and haiku. They can be practiced separately but they can also strengthen each other. At least that is my experience.

Needless to say, this othercenteredness doesn’t really respond to the spirit of the times, where there is a lot of individualization and individualism. Society is too atomized, fragmented, polarized, intolerant. It is sometimes the triumph of self-righteousness. Listening and respecting require an effort from the Ego. It becomes a little less Ego as a result. I already mentioned how the haiku poet cannot be anything but modest. Modesty is becoming a rare virtue in today’s world, especially in public life.

Individualism or egoism, of course, is something else than poetry, even haiku poetry, as an expression of an individual’s experience and feeling.

Masaoka Shiki (1867-1902) is recognized as the founding father of modern haiku. Under the influence of Western notions of literature and poetry, he held that literature, including poetry, should be realistic and an expression of the individual. But an Individual person is not a ‘ God deep in his heart’. I recall modesty.

A haiku is short. That is why it is read twice. Sometimes haiku is compared to Twitter or X which is also limited to 280 characters. However, there is a big difference: a Twitter post usually contains a so-called opinion of its own, usually expressed negatively and aggressively. Haiku is not about the author and thus has nothing to do with self-conceit and vanity. So perhaps the opposite of Twitter.

I come back to haiku as a candidate for UNESCO heritage. We are promoting it more than eight years since Professor Arima established the Haiku UNESCO Promotion Council in 2017 supported by four major Haiku Associations in Japan and with 47 local authorities.  Parliament Members also established a supporting group in the Diet in same year. The President is Fumio Kishida, former Prime minister.

In Japan, many cultural assets want to be registered by UNESCO every two years. We are now on the way waiting to be registered from the Agency of Culture within Japan. It takes time to be investigated by the Agency. Once haiku is registered from the Cultural Agency, hopefully in two years we go for UNESCO in Paris.

We continue to work to bring Akito Arima’s last and his entire life’s wish of “world peace through haiku” to a good end. We are hopeful knowing that hope is a verb. We work so that our hope comes through. May I quote another of my verses?

All over the world
Poets sing of life and nature
This sharing makes peace

日本から参りました俳人の西村和子です。

この度は、ＥＵと日本の友好関係五十周年にあたり、俳句交流の機会を与えて下さったことに感謝致します。これもひとえに日ＥＵ俳句交流大使であるヘルマン・ファン＝ロンパイさんと、国際俳句協会の、今は亡き有馬朗人前会長をはじめとする皆さまの、長年にわたるご尽力の賜物と存じます。

私は1948年に生れました。第二次世界大戦後のベビーブームに生まれ、大学入学試験の折は受験戦争と言われ、結婚ブームのさなかに結婚し、出産した年が第二次ベビーブームでした。ひとつだけブームと無縁だったのが、十代の頃から、片隅の文学である俳句を作り続けてきたことです。何故こんなにも長い間俳句を作り、選び、味わってきたのか、俳句の魅力は何だろうと、最近考えるようになりました。

そのひとつは、短かいこと。どこでも作ることができる。覚えやすい。創作のための場所を選ばず、特別な道具はいりません。

ふたつ目は、季節をはじめとする日常に題材を求める詩であること。毎日の暮らしの中の、小さな感動や発見が、創作のたねになります。

最後に、句会の魅力が上げられます。句会の場では誰もが平等に作品を提出し、作者名は伏せたまま作品だけが評価され、共感者を得ることができるのです。句会に参加する時は、私は西村の妻でもなく、子供たちの母親でもなく、作者としての自分自身の存在を認められ、自覚することができました。この魅力にひかれて、飽きることなく俳句を作り続けてきたのだと思います。

この「句会」については、明日のワークショップで、詳しくご紹介します。

ところで、世界で一番有名な日本人は誰でしょう？
芭蕉です。

古池や蛙(かはづ)とびこむ水の音

よく知られている作品ですが、五・七・五の音数から出来ている世界でもっとも短い詩です。この日本語の五音、七音の連続による定型詩は、日本最古の歌集「万葉集」に、すでにその形が見られます。さまざまな変遷を経て、正岡子規によって五・七・五が独立し、「俳句」が世界で一番短い詩となりました。

この五音、七音は、日本人にとって、とても心地よい韻律で、何よりも覚えやすいのです。現代でも、標語（スローガン）や、演歌、コマーシャルソングなどに、この韻律が見られるのは、暗誦しやすいからでしょう。

覚えやすいと言えば、私は十代の頃聞いたジャン・コクトオの詩

私の耳は貝のから
海の響をなつかしむ

が、忘れられません。七五調に訳されたからでしょう。

この定型を脱して、自由な韻律によって俳句を作る自由律の試みは、すでに百年前から一部の人々によって続けられています。

芭蕉の古池の句は世界各国の言葉で翻訳されていて、何と100通り以上あるそうです。以前私は日本語教師をしていた時、各国の生徒たちに、「水の音」はどんな音？と聞いたことがあります。「プドン」「ピッピッ」「ザブン」などさまざまでした。蛙の大きさにもよりますね。皆さんはどんな音を想像しますか。日本人は、たいてい「ポチャン」。小さな音です。

この句の季語は「蛙」、冬眠から出てきた春の動きですが、国によって想像するところは違うと思います。蛙の大きさからしてこれだけ差があるのですから。

俳句のキーワードが何故季語なのか。その源も日本文学の歴史に見ることができます。古来、詩のテーマとして「恋」「別れ」「旅」「悲哀」などと共に「季節」は日本の文学の始まりから、大きな関心事だったのです。

それは日本人の自然観によると思われます。西洋の人々が、自然を克服して文明を築き上げたのに対して、東洋の私たちは、自然の中の一部の存在であることを自覚し、自然の恩恵によって生きていると認識して、文化を作り上げてきました。
季語は想像の世界を呼び起こすものと、私は思っておりますが、キーワードを季語以外に求める作者もいます。

現在、日本の俳句人口は1000万人とも言われています。新聞には全国紙、地方紙を問わず、毎週、短歌・俳句欄があり、さまざまな職業の無名の人々が、作品を寄せています。その選者を私も務めておりますが、一週間に300句から400句、集まります。テレビ、ラジオにも俳句の番組があり、俳句のコンクールは毎月、全国各地で行われています。

今や「ハイク」は世界の人々がそれぞれの言葉で作り、味わう詩となりました。国際俳句協会への投句者は、32ヶ国にのぼります。

私の人生は平凡なものですが、俳句のおかげで心豊かなものになりました。俳句によって思い出が鮮かに蘇り、先人の名句によって励まされたり、慰められたりしました。こののちも人生をかけて完成を目ざしたいと思います。

お手元の小冊子は、私が今まで作った俳句の中からベスト100を選び、さらに20句、英語とフランス語に訳してもらったものです。エッセイと合わせて読んで、感想を聞かせていただければ嬉しいです。

俳句の魅力について、私の思うところを述べましたが、俳句の国際化によってさらに新たな展開が期待されます。これからは皆さまから「ハイク」の魅力を教えていただきたいと思います。

ところで、昨日私たちはファンロンパイさんご夫妻の案内で、カッザンドのハイクパークに行って参りました。そこで作った句を最後にご紹介します。

日本からご一緒した藤本はなさんの句

海静か二十の句碑や春を待つ

私は二句詠みました。

春遠からじ北海の潮境

寒風はぶつかり潮目混り合ふ

ありがとうございました。