Basho

A lavish collector's edition of the complete poems of eminent Japanese master of the haiku, Matsuo Basho-with a new index that contains the full Japanese text of the original poems.

Matsuo Basho (1644-1694) is arguably the greatest figure in the history of Japanese literature and the master of the haiku. Basho: The Complete Haiku of Matsuo Basho offers in English a full picture of the haiku of Basho, 980 poems in all.

In Fitzsimons's beautiful rendering, Basho is much more than a philosopher of the natural world and the leading exponent of a refined Japanese sensibility. He is also a poet of queer love and eroticism; of the city as well as the country, the indoors and the outdoors, travel and staying put; of lonesomeness as well as the desire to be alone. Basho: The Complete Haiku of Matsuo Basho reveals how this work speaks to our concerns today as much as it captures a Japan emerging from the Middle Ages. For dedicated scholars and those coming upon Basho for the first time, this beautiful collector's edition of Fitzsimons's elegant award-winning translation, with the original Japanese (including kanji, hiragana, and katakana), allows readers to enjoy these works in all their glory.