We are only too familiar with those books in which a foreign visitor, usually from a Western country, gives their impressions of Japan. In this slim volume, by contrast, a Japanese poet evokes his response to a Western country: Ireland.
Mutsuo Takahashi is one of the most versatile and highly regarded of contemporary poets. Born in Kyushu in 1937, he began writing at an early age and was soon hailed for his mythically based, sometimes homoerotic, poems. Since then his work has developed in a variety of ways, and he has become a master of both traditional and modern styles. Selections of his work have also appeared in English.
This new volume incorporates most of the contents of a collection of poems called "Saku no Mukou," or "Beyond the Hedge," that Takahashi published in the year 2000. The elegant original boxed edition had a gold and red cover design reminiscent of the 1890s, and a title-page in Latin, a minor exercise in Occidentalism. Most of the contents, including the title poem, are included in the new book, though differently arranged.