For Andrew Fitzsimons, translating Matsuo Basho’s haiku was both a physical and internal journey.
During his quest to render Basho’s complete works into English, the Tokyo-based writer and professor at Gakushuin University traveled to places associated with Japan’s master poet: from the riverbanks of Fukagawa, Tokyo, which inspired his famous “Oku no Hosomichi” (“The Narrow Road to the Deep North”), to his birthplace in Iga, Mie Prefecture, and his grave in Otsu, Shiga Prefecture. However, it was Fitzsimons’ imagined travels to the interior spaces of Basho’s mind that proved to be the most relevant for his translations.
Basho: The Complete Haiku of Matsuo Basho, by Matsuo Basho,Translated by Andrew Fitzsimons.472 pagesUNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA PRESS, Poetry.