Teika P Teika P The Life and Works of a Medieval Japa nese Poet Paul S. Atkins University of Hawai‘i Press Honolulu © 2017 University of Hawai‘i Press All rights reserved Printed in the United States of Amer i ca 22 21 20 19 18 17 6 5 4 3 2 1 Library of Congress Cataloging- in- Publication Data Names: Atkins, Paul S. (Paul Stephen). Title: Teika : the life and works of a medieval Japa nese poet / Paul S. Atkins. Description: Honolulu : University of Hawai‘i Press, [2017] | Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: LCCN 2016032550 | ISBN 9780824858506 (hardcover ; alk. paper) Subjects: LCSH: Fujiwara, Sadaie, 1162-1241. | Poets, Japanese—1185-1600— Biography. Classification: LCC PL791.Z5 A85 2017 | DDC 895.61/22 [B]— dc23 LC rec ord available at https:// lccn . loc . gov / 2016032550 University of Hawai‘i Press books are printed on acid- free paper and meet the guidelines for permanence and durability of the Council on Library Resources. For Mikiyo Contents Acknowl edgments ix Introduction 1 Chapter One. A Documentary Biography 9 Chapter Two. The Bodhidharma Style and the Poetry Contest in Six Hundred Rounds 43 Chapter Three. Teika’s Poetics 88 Chapter Four. Spirit of Han, Genius of Yamato 124 Chapter Five. Teika after Teika: A History of Reception 164 Conclusion 210 Notes 215 Works Cited 245 Index 257 vii Acknowl edgments In researching and writing this book I have received help from many people and organ izations to whom I am deeply grateful. Professor Akase Shingo of Kyoto Prefectural University sponsored my stay there as a visiting researcher during academic year 2001–2002. An expert on medieval Japa nese poetry and especially the works of Teika, Professor Akase gave freely of his time and energy, offering ad- vice, providing tutorials in reading waka poetry and kambun, and introducing me to leading scholars in the field. He made me into a scholar of waka. The Japan Society for the Promotion of Sciences (JSPS) awarded me a generous postdoctoral research fellowship that made my visit pos si ble. The members of the Meigetsuki Research Group (Meigetsuki kenkyūkai), led by Professor Gomi Fumihiko of the University of Tokyo, admitted me to their ranks and gave me information and advice. I am especially grateful to Professors Kanechiku Nobuyuki, Kikuchi Hiroki, and Tabuchi Kumiko. At the University of Washington, where I researched and wrote most of this book, I would like to acknowledge my former department chairs, Michael Shapiro and William Boltz; my divisional deans, Mi- chael Halleran, Ellen Kaisse, Robert Stacey, and Michael Shapiro; my departmental adminstrator, Youngie Yoon; and all of my colleagues, including Davinder Bhowmik and Ted Mack. David Knechtges and Ken Pyle have been staunch supporters of my work. Kathleen Wood- ward helped me every step of the way. Librarian Keiko Yokota- Car ter (now at the University of Michigan), her successor Azusa Tanaka, and their colleagues at the East Asia Library made sure I had all the books I needed. The University of Washington Japan Studies Program supported this proj ect with multiple research grants and a publication subsidy. I received funding from the Walter Chapin Simpson Center for the ix x Acknowl edgments Humanities, the Royalty Research Fund, the East Asia Center, and the Department of Asian Languages and Liter a ture. Some of the books I used were purchased with funds from an endowment established in the memory of Professor Andrew L. Markus, my distinguished late pre de ces sor, by his family and friends. I received research travel funds from the Takashi and Lily Hori Endowment for Japanese Language and Lit er a ture. At Montana State University, where I began this proj ect, I bene- fited greatly from the encouragement of Brett Walker. I received finan- cial support from the Dean of the College of Arts and Letters. The National Endowment for the Humanities awarded me a sum- mer stipend. The Northeast Asia Council of the Association for Asian Studies gave me a grant for a research trip to Japan. Some of the research included in this book was first presented at meetings of the Waka Workshop, an almost-annual gathering of waka scholars in North Ameri ca, to read texts together and present new ideas. I benefited from feedback from many people who attended. The hosts of the workshops I attended were Joshua Mostow, Christina Laf- fin, and Stefania Burk (University of British Columbia); Haruo Shi- rane (Columbia University); Torquil Duthie (University of California, Los Angeles); Steven Car ter (Stanford University); and Edward Ka- mens (Yale University). I gave lectures on earlier drafts of this material at the Rocky Mountain Southwest Regional Japan Seminar, the University of Brit- ish Columbia, the University of Washington, the Association for Asian Studies annual meeting, the University of Colorado, Japan Women’s University, and the Congrès Asie & Pacifique. I am grateful to my hosts and for those who gave me valuable suggestions. For their support of this proj ect in vari ous ways, I thank Steven Car ter, Edward Kamens, Stephen Miller, and Laurel Rodd. I would like to acknowledge the Namikawa family of Kyoto and Robert Singer, of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, for provid- ing housing to me and my family during the memorable year we lived in Kyoto. Tom Hare taught me to read classical Japa nese and made me into a scholar. He has supported me in this project and in my career in many ways for almost twenty- five years. I am proud to call him my teacher and my friend. I thank my family, especially my parents. My wife, Mikiyo, sus- tained me with her love and care. Thank you. Teika Introduction t is the middle of the night. Let us say it is an autumn night in Kyoto, Ithe capital, and the year is 1450. A man cannot sleep, despite the coolness of the night, despite his comfortable situation. He is seventy years old, a Zen monk who once trained at the storied Tōfukuji temple among other places, but now more than that or anything else, he is a poet who writes in the thirty- one- syllable waka form. He has written tens of thousands of these little poems, many of which he lost forever when his house burned down. But he kept writing. He was once pun- ished by the shogun, the most power ful man in the country, and had his lands confiscated. But he eventually got his lands back, and the shogun is now dead, assassinated by one of his own generals. The poet is still alive. He is alive, but he cannot sleep. He cannot sleep because he is thinking of a poem. It is a love poem written two centuries earlier by the poet’s hero, who was, of course, another poet. Let us say it is this poem: shirotae no / sode no wakare ni / tsuyu ochite / mi ni shimu iro no / akikaze zo fuku1 At a parting of pure white sleeves, dew falls and the autumn wind blows in a color that soaks my soul. 1 2 Introduction What a marvel— what a mystery! A man and a woman are in love. He rises in the early dawn to go, before anyone can see him leave. They embrace, their white underrobes nearly indistinguishable from each other. She weeps; he weeps. It is chilly in the autumn morning. There is still dew on the grass outside. The wind blows. It sinks right through them. Every thing seems white. How could the wind have a color? he won ders. And how could one possibly learn to write like this? He keeps reciting the poem to itself, teasing out its impossible secrets. The minutes pass. An hour passes. Now he is completely awake. He tries to think of something else, but winds up thinking of another love poem by the same poet. It is no use. Eventually he has an unsettling feeling: he is losing his mind. This is more or less a true story, although the details are uncer- tain. The poet and monk is the person known to us today as Shōtetsu (1381–1459), an astonishingly prolific poet who left behind a collec- tion of thoughts and remarks titled Conversations with Shōtetsu (Shōtetsu monogatari). Despite not having been born into one of the old aristocratic families that controlled the practice of waka poetry, Shōtetsu absorbed and mastered their linguistic and aesthetic conven- tions, becoming a master of the form. His hero was Fujiwara no Teika (1162–1241), author of the poem quoted above. It and a handful of others were cited by Shōtetsu in his Conversations as inimitable para- gons of the form. Shōtetsu wrote, “When it comes to love poetry, noth- ing from ancient times to the pres ent has been able to equal Teika’s poems.”2 Moreover, he really did say, “Sometimes on awaking from sleep I happen to think of one of Teika’s poems and feel as if I were about to lose my mind.”3 Although Shōtetsu studied with one of Teika’s descendants, who over the years since Teika’s death had split into ri- val families and factions, he regarded himself as a disciple of Teika, not any par tic u lar school. He hung a picture of Teika in his house. 4 He even declared, famously, “In this art of poetry, those who speak ill of Teika should be denied the protection of the gods and Buddhas and condemned to the punishments of hell.”5 This book is an attempt to answer the question, “Why Teika?” Why did Shōtetsu revere Teika and not someone else? Why did tea masters a century later spend great sums to acquire samples of Teika’s calligraphy, mount them on scrolls, and hang them in their alcoves? Was Teika’s poetry truly superb? Why? Was it especially difficult? How so? What do those scraps of calligraphy say, and was it their content, Introduction 3 the handwriting, or the identity of the author that conferred value on them? A combination of all three? Fujiwara no Teika (also called Sadaie) is widely and properly known as one of the most influential figures in the history of Japa- nese lit er a ture and one of the most skillful practi tion ers of the very durable thirty- one- syllable poetic form alternately known as waka (lit- erally, “Japa nese song”), tanka (“short song”), or simply uta (“song”).