Haibun (俳文, literally,haikai writings) is aprosimetric literary form originating in Japan, combiningprose andhaiku. The range ofhaibun is broad and frequently includesautobiography,diary,essay,prose poem,[1]short story andtravel journal.
The term "haibun" was first used by the 17th-century Japanese poetMatsuo Bashō, in a letter to his discipleKyorai in 1690.[2] Bashō was a prominent early writer ofhaibun, then a new genre combining classical prototypes,Chinese prose genres and vernacular subject matter and language.[2] He wrote somehaibun as travel accounts during his various journeys, the most famous of which isOku no Hosomichi (Narrow Road to the Interior).
Bashō's shorterhaibun include compositions devoted to travel and others focusing on character sketches, landscape scenes, anecdotal vignettes and occasional writings written to honor a specific patron or event. HisHut of the Phantom Dwelling can be classified as an essay while, inSaga Nikki (Saga Diary), he documents his day-to-day activities with his disciples on a summer retreat.
Traditionalhaibun typically took the form of a short description of a place, person or object, or a diary of a journey or other series of events in the poet's life.[3]Haibun continued to be written by laterhaikai poets such asYosa Buson,[4]Kobayashi Issa[5] andMasaoka Shiki.[3]
Haibun is no longer confined to Japan, and has established itself as a genre in world literature[6][7] that has gained momentum in recent years.[8]
In theHaiku Society of America 25th anniversary book of its history,A Haiku Path, Elizabeth Lamb noted that the first English-languagehaibun, titled "Paris," was published in 1964 by Canadian writer Jack Cain.[9] However, an earlier example is Carolyn Kizer's "A Month in Summer," an extended haibun with 21 haiku and one tanka, published in 1962. Her piece (identified as a haibun) first appeared inKenyon Review.[10]
James Merrill's "Prose of Departure", fromThe Inner Room (1988), is a later example.John Ashbery also included several experiments with haibun in his 1984 collectionA Wave.
The first contest for English-languagehaibun took place in 1996,[11] organized by poet and editor Michael Dylan Welch, and judged by Tom Lynch andCor van den Heuvel. Anita Virgil won first prize, and honorable mentions (in alphabetical order) went to Sydney Bougy, David Cobb, and John Stevenson. The contest resulted in the publication ofWedge of Light (Press Here) in 1999. As credited by Welch,[12] the first anthology of English-languagehaibun wasBruce Ross'sJourney to the Interior: American Versions of Haibun (Tuttle), published in 1998.[13][non-primary source needed]
Jim Kacian and Bruce Ross edited the inaugural number of the annual anthologyAmerican Haibun & Haiga (Red Moon Press) in 1999; that series, which continues to this day, changed its name toContemporary Haibun in 2003 and sponsored the parallel creation in 2005 ofContemporary Haibun Online, a quarterly journal that added Welshhaibun authorKen Jones to the founding editorial team of Kacian and Ross.
Ahaibun may record a scene, or a special moment, in a highly descriptive and objective manner or may occupy a wholly fictional or dream-like space.[citation needed] The accompanying haiku may have a direct or subtle relationship with the prose and encompass or hint at the gist of what is recorded in the prose sections.
Several distinct schools of Englishhaibun have been described,[14] includingReportage narrative mode such as Robert Wilson'sVietnam Ruminations,Haibunic prose, and theTemplum effect.
Contemporary practice ofhaibun composition in English is continually evolving.[15] Generally, ahaibun consists of one or more paragraphs of prose written in a concise, imagistichaikai style, and one or more haiku. However, there may be considerable variation of form, as described by editor and practitioner Jeffrey Woodward.[16]
Modern English-languagehaibun writers (aka, practitioners) includeJim Kacian,Bruce Ross,Mark Nowak,John Richard Parsons,Sheila Murphy, Nobuyuki Yuasa,[17] Lynne Reese,[18] Peter Butler,[19]Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick,[20] and David Cobb, founder of the British Haiku Society in 1990 and author ofSpring Journey to the Saxon Shore, a 5,000-word haibun which has been considered seminal for the English form of kikōbun (i.e., travel diary).[21]
