History Of Japanese Poetry

The Japanese poetry has a very prosperous history. The Japanese artists created their own culture after the introduction of the Chinese poetry to them many years ago. The poems in Japan are called as “Wakas”, which means Japanese poems. The traditional Japanese poems are easy to understand with deep expressive thoughts and sentiments. The traditional Japanese poems have grass root connections in the Japanese history.

The history of Japanese poems started with the Nara period from 710-794. The first written poem was recorded in the beginning of the 8th century when a writing system adopted from China was introduced. Two famous government projects of that era, the “Kojiki” meaning ‘record of ancient matters, and “Nihon Shoki” meaning ‘Chronicle of Japan’ were written between years 712 to 720. The “Kojiki” comprises of the collection from the ancient legends, myths and other stories, while the “Nihon Shoki” contains history of Japan in chronological order.

One of the records written in the beginning of the year 713 by the officials depicts the topography, legends and ancient history of the several territories in Japan. This period recorded the most radiant product of literature in the traditional Japanese history known as the “Man’yoshu”, which means ‘collection of 10,000 leaves’ and comprises of four thousand five hundred poems written by emperors, artists and anonymous people in the year 759. “Kokinshu” or “Kokin Wakashu” literally meaning ‘collection of ancient and modern poems’ was composed in the year 905 and was recorded as the 1st poetry to be published on orders from the Emperor.

The literary culture in the Japanese history started flourishing in the 11th century with the introduction of hiragana alphabets taken from the Chinese characters. This was the first time when females were involved in developing literature. A novel by the name of “Genji Monogatari” was written by one of the Japanese women author Murasaki Shikibu while the other “Makura No Soshi” was written by Sei Shonagon.

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