EARTH PILGRIMAGE/PELLEGRINO TERRESTRE/CHIKYU JUNREI by Ban'ya Natsuishi, English translations by the author and Jim Kacian, Italian by Luca Toma. Milan, Italy: Albalibre, 2007, 146 pp., 10.00 euro (paper)
It must be true, surely, that much of the understanding of Japanese culture held by people outside this country is randomly formed. Of course there will be influence from ideas circulating in the media, but of more immediate impact are likely to be direct and individual personal contacts: what we learn, understand, remember from people we have met. So too with the world of haiku.
Both the poets under review have traveled overseas and, more importantly, worked with other poets there. Kayoko Hashimoto, now retired, spent her life teaching. A native of Tokyo, she first composed a haiku at the age of 6, and the praise she garnered then set her on a lifelong path. Her family were acquainted with a distinguished woman haiku poet, and the author received instruction from one or two others. Haiku is very much a group activity, carried out under the direction of an established master, and the poet enlisted her mentor's help with the selection. Her new collection, a handsome hardcover volume in a slipcase, is bilingually presented, with the haiku printed horizontally, Japanese and English on facing pages.