Coming Clean on Kigo
by
John Bird — last updated 8 July, 2007
Introduction
Haiku Dreaming Australia is closely related
to the 'issue' of kigo. As the Dreaming editor I feel obliged to explain my
position, although not necessarily to persuade others to share it. What follows
is a summary of my opinion on kigo.
I have nothing to add to the many excellent writings and public
discussions about the use of kigo in haiku written in languages other than
Japanese. Rather than revisit these well-canvassed arguments I simply state my
conclusions based on them. Any elaboration is related to my Australian
perspective. The Australian Haiku Society (AHS) has endorsed the Dreaming
project but the opinions expressed here are my own.
My start point is that, whether I like it or not, kigo exist, and have done so for
hundreds of years. Further, kigo are used by most of the world's haiku poets,
including many who write haiku in English. Ignoring kigo is not an option.
I must make some accommodation with it.
The Easy Part
As a minimum, I want to know which words in my own haiku might signify a
season to informed readers. This knowlege makes it less likely I'll write
nonsense haiku.
More importantly a working knowlege of common kigo, and the facility to
quickly check on others, lets me more fully appreciate other poets' haiku,
including translations from Japanese.
I satisfy these basic needs with my own kigo list – selected
translations from Japanese saijiki, reduced by me to a minimum. I have a searchable
copy on my computer desktop and I carry a one-page hard copy. My list contains, for
example, 'spider' but not 'Dolls Festival'.
For more serious reading I use the on-line, searchable
resource The Five Hundred Essential Japanese Season Words
1 and
William Higginson's Haiku World 2
The Tougher Decisions
For clarity, below I assert what are really only the opinions I hold at this stage.
In Australia we do not have, and are unlikely to ever acquire the equivalent of
the Japanese kigo culture. That is uniquely Japanese. When we use the
translation of a Japanese kigo to signify a season in Australia its full import is lost
(perhaps fortunately) on most Australian readers.
Japanese kigo, in addition to indicating season, carry
haiku-enriching associations and connotations but these are based on a tradition
we do not share. These associations are not self-evident or easily apprehended
by us. In our hands kigo is a crude and inappropriate tool for indicating seasonality.
Kigo are not essential for the haiku we make. For me 'Australian kigo' is an oxymoron.
(I am not interested in whether our poems should be called 'haiku' if they do not
contain a kigo.)
Seasonality. The value of locating our haiku within the seasonal cycle is a given,
particularly when something in nature familiar to the reader is used to do so.
However many seasonal words do not translate well between regions and hemispheres,
and a seasonal reference is inappropriate in many haiku. Season indicators are
important but not essential.
Data banks and other reference sources, in which one can research the seasonality
of selected words and phrases, in any country, are probably useful for research.
And perhaps such lists of what-happens-when-in-which-country will eventually be
endorsed by world and national haiku bodies, but let's not hold our breath.
There will never be a 'collection of Australian kigo', an
Australian saijiki to which Australian poets
adhere. Even a collection of agreed season words is unlikely. Arrival at this
bloody-minded position was liberating for me: it resolved my 'kigo wavering',
stopped me wasting time on their futile pursuit, and freed me to seek kigo
alternatives. Let's look closer at why I dismiss Australian kigo/season words.
* I can't imagine separate saijiki for Broome, Alice Springs and
Melbourne. Perhaps seven regional saijiki would be needed to cover our continent.
* For that matter, how many seasons? Two as in the 'top end'?
Four as in Tasmania? Seven as observed by Aborigines in the SW of our country?
* Botanists tell me that some species of 'wattle', once my favourite
candidate as a late-winter kigo, is in bloom somewhere in Australia every day of
the year. What season for wattle?
* Perhaps we could get all Australians to standardise kigo on Canberra,
our national capital; pigs might fly.
* And who may elevate a word to the status of 'Australian kigo'? An
Hungarian tourist? The local cloudcatchers haiku group? Does AHS have the
interest, expertise and clout to arbitrate?
* Anyhow, would Australians settle for sharing haiku only with
those poets who subscribe to our saijiki? No, and amen.
What do we lose by abandoning the search for the golden boomerang, ‘Australia Kigo’?
Only the false hope of finding something that will do for us what kigo do for
haiku in Japanese.
Beyond Kigo?
Professor Haruo Shirane3 hit the nail on the head
when he said haiku should draw on the poet's 'historical, cultural and literary past'.
Without the depth such linkages bring to haiku, their three(?) short lines are
hard-pressed to qualify as poetry. In Australia's case seasonal words will contribute
only a little to that cause but there are many other candidates words for making
the connections that Shirane advocates:
'Uluru', 'Dreaming', 'boomerang', 'convict', 'first fleet', 'squatter', 'shearer',
'Anzac', 'Phar Lap' etc. Such words, broadly understood and used within Australia,
are there for the finding. These loaded words, as with 'the loaded dog' are capable
of opening up the 'Y axis" for us.
But what do we call these words or phrases that link a poem to our historical,
cultural and literary past, but do not necessarily indicate a season? Not kigo.
I suggest national-symbolic keywords. [I don't know who coined that phrase but I
am in their debt.]
The history of Europeans in Australia is less than 300 years old but how fortunate we
are to share this continent with Aborigines, Indigenous Australians, with the
longest continuous cultural history of any group of people on Earth. They are recognised
to have arrived in Australia from 40,000 to 70,000 years ago. Their myths, legends
and Dreaming, their affinity with nature, are potential treasure troves of
Australian-symbolic keywords.
But these keywords can not be prescribed; their usage can not be enforced;
only future generations can decide if their effectiveness persists. They must be
allowed to evolve from the work of many poets over a long period. And they will,
they will, if we write and share haiku about Australia.
I caution against premature attemps to identify and list these keywords. Discourse,
advocacy and argument could be counter-productive, a distraction. Keywords have to
earn their own place. As our haiku give them the chance to do so, we poets
will influence what part of Australian history stays alive; we will be helping to
shape... enough! Back to writing!
And so to
Haiku Dreaming Australia, the vehicle to encourage and preserve the
best of haiku on Australian themes.
....... John Bird
Last updated: 8 July, 2007