The Haiku Form

This book is a discussion of the HAIKU form of poetry (traditionally a syllabic count form of 5 - 7 - 5 syllables in the three lines of the poetic form). There is a brief history of the Japanese form, and of its origin as a prefatory element to some types of longer poems, although it has become a self-contained form on its own. There are a few Japanese haiku poems with English translations interspersed throughout the text; sometimes several are given for comparison and contrast of various translations. There are a number of English language (untranslated) haiku as well.
There are many interesting points in the book, including the use of SEASON WORDS, or at least season feelings, in traditional haiku. The author includes both traditional Japanese season words and some that may be used in English poetry as well. She has also included various ideas such as the "pillow-words," "cutting-words," and "pivot-words" concepts from Japanese prosody. She addresses the roles of punctuation, various kinds of rhyme and near-rhyme, rhythms, and such other more or less familiar English poetic techniques as alliteration and assonance, and the uses of words and their relationships as
relevant to their use in the haiku form.
This book has extensive notes, an index, and an annotated bibliography. It is written from a scholarly point of view, but it has interesting points (especially about technique) for the poet and writer. This book will be of interest to artists, writers, linguists, historians, folklorists, and many others, especially those interested in Japanese literature and culture.