The Haiku Foundation Forums

Hi Nicole,

re Tohta Kaneko and the squid haiku (he worked in a bank for a while) check out the discussion:
http://www.thehaikufoundation.org/2009/05/11/envoy-1-part-1/

Ignore the Fathers Day Poems comment which I've just reported as spam.

re:

Quote from: Nicole Andrews on August 23, 2015, 12:59:13 PM
Hi,

I would like some clarity on why this is a haiku, when it is using an image as a metaphor, ' squids/bank clerks....and using the word ' like,' and the whole,  sounding like a statement...?
Is it the translation ? Or do I see a clear space ahead where there is no such thing as a western haiku, just a short poem based on a metaphor?

                                               like squids
                                               bank clerks are fluorescent
                                               from the morning
                                   
                                                                          Kaneko Tota

First of all this is but one of the many versions in English from a Japanese-Language haiku.

Should haiku contain simile, which this looks like, or metaphor?  Well Tohta Kaneko was always a rebel, and witnessed the heated arguments of his father and fellow haiku poets, so he's lived and breathed haiku for other 90 years. :)

There is a huge amount of variety in Japanese haiku, not just in the late 1800s when it evolved, but throughout the 20th Century, and already in our newly born 21st century.  It's exciting, isn't it? :)

If haiku has a form, it's not a convenient paint by numbers one, thank goodness.  But it drives 'mainstream' poets mad as they can't really conquer and defeat what they perceived was its form.

Western haiku, and other haiku from outside Japan, have always gone their way, and even in Japan it happens. :)

Quote from: Nicole Andrews on August 23, 2015, 12:59:13 PM


                                               like squids
                                               bank clerks are fluorescent
                                               from the morning
                                   
                                                                          Kaneko Tota

Is ' the morning ' the second image/catalyst?

I'd say the morning commute to work is a strong image, and people in suits, including Japanese salarymen, are highly visible making their way to banks and offices, on foot, trains, and other means.

Japan has their famous fluorescent squids:
http://www.goweirdfacts.com/blue-beach.html

The seasonal reference is in place as it's March, and Kaneko is good at creating his own kigo.

I think some haiku experts who regularly write, read, and speak Japanese, understand its multi-systems of language is different, and that is reflected in their English version.

Quote from: Nicole Andrews on August 23, 2015, 12:59:13 PM
Hi,

I would like some clarity on why this is a haiku, when it is using an image as a metaphor, ' squids/bank clerks....and using the word ' like,' and the whole,  sounding like a statement...?
Is it the translation ? Or do I see a clear space ahead where there is no such thing as a western haiku, just a short poem based on a metaphor?

                                               like squids
                                               bank clerks are fluorescent
                                               from the morning
                                   
                                                                          Kaneko Tota

Is ' the morning ' the second image/catalyst?

Regards
Nicole

I

Regarding joshi, this is touched on here:

The Formation of Allusive Resilience in Waka and Its Relevance to Meiji Shintaishi
Dean A. Brink, Saint Martin's University
http://www.simplyhaiku.com/SHv4n2/reprints/Brink.html

Hi Jack,

Quote from: Jacklack on August 10, 2015, 08:47:55 PM
Hi, Everyone!

I have always used the m dash, but I'm wondering about the use of the colon.

What I call visual punctuation or visual punctuation symbols i.e. , ; : - – ... and the period.   These were more extensively used in 20th Century haiku, from quaint English-language attempts at translation or versioning Japanese-language haikai verses in classic times, to the longer, oft-5-7-5 haiku composed in English.

As you'll know Nick Virgilio enabled a lot of people to write haiku rather than 5-7-5 verse that was often hit and miss due to the syllable counting and overkill of visual punctuation aka VP or VPS, not to be confused with VPL :)

But of course there is nothing wrong, and everything right about bringing back normative techniques of VPS into haiku poetry, however incredibly brief the 'form' appears.

Quote
Lately, I've found that I might use one or the other to achieve a different result... I started this thread thinking many people on the site have been writing longer than me, and might have a more ready defense for one or the other... or could articulate a preference. I suppose writing this thread is also making me work through what I think, haha.

The longer haiku certainly facilitated the use of VPS and required it, such as James Hackett and Mabson Southard etc...

As English-language haiku aka ELhaiku became even more minimalist than a 575 count, there appeared less of a need, but also more people had learnt to interpret all the white spaces in and around the shorter haiku.

Quote
For me, the m dash is about immediate juxtaposition, or fragmentation, or further explanation of a second subject in line two that differs more distinctly from the first subject in line one--it also serves as the "cutting word" in English-language haiku in the same way an ellipse, !, comma, or colon does, too.

Does VPS equal kire?    The cutting word aka kireji often set a tone, a mood, explained, perhaps the question mark (?) we often use in prose has some sort of aspect of this, and the exclamation mark (!) although both feel like shouting matches in very short haiku. :)

Quote
Now the colon: I have only recently encountered the colon reading Nick Virgilio's work. It seems to me he is using the colon over the m dash to the same purpose as the m dash. I don't often see him employ the m dash, and it appears to me to be just a stylistic concern for that reason. I also often find the Japanese Masters (Basho, Issa, Buson, Shiki) are translated with an m dash, though I believe Nick Virgilio's body of work is as meritorious as the best of the Japanese Masters.

Nick Virgilio's work would be originally in English, whereas Basho, Issa, Buson, Shiki we would need to look at the original Japanese, or at least modern Japanese.

The m–dash was often an affectation, a fad, as was the ellipsis... or . . .

It wasn't always meant as VPS as in punctuation, but either purely visual or a deliberate attempt to slow down the reader.   A close reader will know how and why to read a haiku, whether it's intended to be speed-read as some monostich haiku are, or slowed down reading, often the case with three-line haiku.

Quote
In my own writing, I have not been consistent. With this thread I aim to change that. If I want to separate or provide a "cutting word" for a juxtaposition of images, I think, first, is my image drastically different, or similar? For example, I wrote a haiku comparing snowflakes to stars using the m dash:

the spider hanging
snowflakes from the eve--
Orion's Belt

Are you able to type the M–dash instead of two N-dashes together?   I'm guessing you have a PC computer which doesn't easily allow that without multiple keystrokes and codes? With Mac computers it's two key strokes of Alt and the +/= tab.

I love:

the spider hanging
snowflakes from the eve

That's highly original, and I've read over a million or two haiku since 1993.   :)

Quote
Whereas, in a different haiku, when wanting to provide for that juxtaposition of images, but where the second image in mind functions almost like an explanation of the first, I would use a colon:

Mother's Day:
we wait at home
for our florist

The Mother's Day punctuation quite clearly states that this special day entailed waiting at home for the florist.  What is intriguing is the use of the personal pronoun of 'our' which takes out any possible flatness of a cause and effect poem.

Quote
What do you think? Do you prefer the m dash or colon? Is there a difference, or is it about style? Should we use them to different purposes? If editors are reading our haiku, what are they thinking when they see an m dash over a colon, or vice versa?

All best,
Jack

When you don't use a colon for the spider and snowflakes haiku the poem works:

the spider hanging
snowflakes from the eve–
Orion's Belt

Because you are not telling us that it's a direct comparison technique.  It could be a spider's web iced over up high, and then you notice Orion's Belt.

An interesting topic to bring up, and I look forward to replies here, as well as new topics for discussion elsewhere.

Here's an earlier thread, and I've highlighted Don Baird's take on it:

Quote—      For a break that is similar to hyphen, a sort of "that is" feeling; & or, general pause; still connective but not as much as ellipsis.

;       For a greater disjunction

:       For two parts that are very equal in balance ... two halves that make a whole ... but of equal strength ... and also for the greatest disjunction.

Don Baird

http://www.thehaikufoundation.org/forum_sm/index.php?topic=5486.0

Your post has me thinking again about using more VPS! :-) 

warm regards,

Alan

ORIGINAL POST IN FULL

Quote from: Jacklack on August 10, 2015, 08:47:55 PM
Hi, Everyone!

I have always used the m dash, but I'm wondering about the use of the colon.

Lately, I've found that I might use one or the other to achieve a different result... I started this thread thinking many people on the site have been writing longer than me, and might have a more ready defense for one or the other... or could articulate a preference. I suppose writing this thread is also making me work through what I think, haha.

For me, the m dash is about immediate juxtaposition, or fragmentation, or further explanation of a second subject in line two that differs more distinctly from the first subject in line one--it also serves as the "cutting word" in English-language haiku in the same way an ellipse, !, comma, or colon does, too.

Now the colon: I have only recently encountered the colon reading Nick Virgilio's work. It seems to me he is using the colon over the m dash to the same purpose as the m dash. I don't often see him employ the m dash, and it appears to me to be just a stylistic concern for that reason. I also often find the Japanese Masters (Basho, Issa, Buson, Shiki) are translated with an m dash, though I believe Nick Virgilio's body of work is as meritorious as the best of the Japanese Masters.

In my own writing, I have not been consistent. With this thread I aim to change that. If I want to separate or provide a "cutting word" for a juxtaposition of images, I think, first, is my image drastically different, or similar? For example, I wrote a haiku comparing snowflakes to stars using the m dash:

the spider hanging
snowflakes from the eve--
Orion's Belt

Whereas, in a different haiku, when wanting to provide for that juxtaposition of images, but where the second image in mind functions almost like an explanation of the first, I would use a colon:

Mother's Day:
we wait at home
for our florist

What do you think? Do you prefer the m dash or colon? Is there a difference, or is it about style? Should we use them to different purposes? If editors are reading our haiku, what are they thinking when they see an m dash over a colon, or vice versa?

All best,
Jack

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http://www.kenjoneszen.com
http://www.kenjoneszen.com/haibun
http://www.kenjoneszen.com/haiku-as-buddhist-practice
http://www.kenjoneszen.com/publications



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.

From Kim Richardson of Alba Publishing:
With great sadness I report that Alba author Ken Jones, dear friend, teacher, and haijin 'par excellence,' passed away last Sunday, 2nd August. May his soul's journey into the light be swift and joyous. He lives on through his writings, teachings, and friendships.


Ken's last book:

Beyond Mindfulness:
Living Life through Everyday Zen - Talks and Writings
by Ken Jones

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Paperback. 236pp
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Website:
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Hi Carl,

Quote from: Carl on July 07, 2015, 08:45:26 AM

Hi Alan

Thank you for the further link. I can't be alone in finding the whole situation extremely sad. I agree that one of the best defences/practices is to write from personal experience. It is my much preferred material gathering technique. It still leaves open the possibility of inadvertent plagiarism. Whilst out walking this morning I crossed the grass in our local park. The sun was shining on the dew in the grass and mushrooms were pushing through. In a flash of what I hope was inspiration I saw the mushrooms as nails and thought of

morning walk
mushrooms nail the lawn
to the earth

Okay it needs much work!

Well, both myself and my wife Karen Hoy, a published and anthologised haiku poet, enjoyed the haiku! :-)

Quote
But how am I to know that someone else hasn't had the same thought about mushrooms and published such a line somewhere. Or whether I have read it in amongst the hundreds if not thousands of haiku I have read over the last few months or before and forgotten. I did an Internet search and found nothing but who knows whether my search was thorough enough? There are hundreds of thousands of haiku published in magazines that are unsearchable.

I haven't personally seen a poem about mushrooms being nailed down, so I'd consider submitting it.   I have read a few million haiku in twenty plus years. :)

Quote
It would be incredibly sad for an innocent poet to be branded a plagiarist for true inspiration that mirrored another's. The label once attributed would be nigh on impossible to remove.

Well one famous poet who writes haiku has been caught out in his longer poems, and another very famous haiku poet has been mentioned.  Doesn't seem to have slowed them down.  The key phrase is 'innocent poet' so please don't let it stop you writing.

After all every time we speak we plagiarise, because someone else said good morning, hello, goodbye, and please etc... before us.  Do we bandaid our mouths, and our hands?

Quote
There can be no guaranteed solution. So it appears one must write from and with the best of intentions at all times in the ever present fear that what one is writing may not be unique.

You can write from fear if you wish, that's an interesting technique.   Sometimes I write from great sadness, even to the extent that tears are falling.

Quote
And, on occasion, one must be prepared to give up the authorship of a loved poem because of an inadvertent similarity to a previous work.

That has happened a few times, but considering the millions of haiku written by people outside Japan it's still a rare occurrence.

Quote
The only alternative is to not write at all. So wrote in fear or do not write. Rather takes the pleasure out of it doesn't it?

And also do not speak any word said before, or write letters, or email, or eat, as that's been before.  Or do what the rest of us do, and continue with our art. :)

warm regards,

Alan

Quote from: Carl on July 07, 2015, 08:45:26 AM
Hi Alan

Thank you for the further link. I can't be alone in finding the whole situation extremely sad. I agree that one of the best defences/practices is to write from personal experience. It is my much preferred material gathering technique. It still leaves open the possibility of inadvertent plagiarism. Whilst out walking this morning I crossed the grass in our local park. The sun was shining on the dew in the grass and mushrooms were pushing through. In a flash of what I hope was inspiration I saw the mushrooms as nails and thought of

morning walk
mushrooms nail the lawn
to the earth

Okay it needs much work!

But how am I to know that someone else hasn't had the same thought about mushrooms and published such a line somewhere. Or whether I have read it in amongst the hundreds if not thousands of haiku I have read over the last few months or before and forgotten. I did an Internet search and found nothing but who knows whether my search was thorough enough? There are hundreds of thousands of haiku published in magazines that are unsearchable.

It would be incredibly sad for an innocent poet to be branded a plagiarist for true inspiration that mirrored another's. The label once attributed would be nigh on impossible to remove. There can be no guaranteed solution. So it appears one must write from and with the best of intentions at all times in the ever present fear that what one is writing may not be unique. And, on occasion, one must be prepared to give up the authorship of a loved poem because of an inadvertent similarity to a previous work. The only alternative is to not write at all. So wrote in fear or do not write. Rather takes the pleasure out of it doesn't it?

Regard

C

Hi Carl,

This is another reason why I prefer using direct personal experience as much as possible.   The body poetic i.e. the poet themselves experiences enough day to day incidents to create their own unique poetry.

I also use my imagination and this may form part of a haiku or a whole haiku, but my main default is my own life and how it interacts with the larger life out there.

Where plagiarism may occur is when someone puts pressure on themselves to produce a lot of poems, and a number of solo poetry collections.

Here's just one numerous pieces on plagiarism ever since Ira Lightman became a plagiarism investigator:
https://overland.org.au/previous-issues/issue-214/debate-anthony-hayes-and-ira-lightman/

Alan

Hi Carl,

Quote from: Carl on July 04, 2015, 08:28:06 AM
'All art is plagiarism or revolution' so wrote Paul Gaugin.

When we speak or think we are plagiarising the original speakers and thinkers too. ;)

Quote
A recent post on one of the boards threw up an interesting point about which I as a newbie am rather interested. What happens when you write a line or a complete haiku that closely resembles a previously published or unpublished work?

As a deliberate act?

Quote
Haiku are by their brevity susceptible to accidental similarities.

And Ira Lightman has proved it happens with much larger poems too.

Quote
The advice to newbie poets is to read as many haiku as possible.

I think it's the responsibility of all poets at all their stages to read other poets, and that should include haiku writers.

Quote
That is sage advice. It is also a problem.

But so is bad or ineffective poetry if we don't read the work of others.  If it was good enough for Milton, Chaucer, Shakespeare, Basho and everyone after them and they created original works, I think we are safe too. :)

Quote
Good lines are taken in by the subconscious and one can find oneself having a line pop up sometime later which you think is a moment of inspiration but is in fact the forgotten line from a previously read work.

This is where we need to read a lot and also double-check our work before we send it out.

Quote
I have had great delight in reading back issues of notable haiku magazines. In one such issue there was a raging debate between a reviewer and a well known haiku poet who was accused by the reviewer of publishing a poem closely resembling a previous work. Was there a need to include a note of the previous work or not? It was mooted but never decided.

Are you sure it was an accusation and not part of an article?  I've read a few such things over the years. 

Quote
Is there a need to include a note when the poem is modelled on a previous work?

If there's a conscious act to model a haiku on another haiku, and it's an allusion, a different matter, then I'd suggest this is a mistake.  Can you give an example?

Quote
It seems many of the Japanese haiku masters regularly took inspiration or whole lines from previous works.

This was before the New Romantics changed everything, and not just in the West, it influenced Japan through the 1850s onwards: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Romanticism#Basic_characteristics

Quote
Did they make such acknowledgments?

As the haikai and waka poets knew literature and poetry from history right up to their current it wasn't often necessary, but now we are focused on original works, everything has changed.

Quote
I can't find any reference to them doing so.

A few books might be of use:
http://www.modernhaiku.org/bookreviews/Carter2011.html
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Haiku-Before-Masters-Translations-Classics-ebook/dp/B005X9BDT0/ref=sr_1_35?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1436193141&sr=1-35&keywords=Basho+haiku
http://www.amazon.co.uk/1020-Haiku-Translation-Heart-Basho/dp/1419627651/ref=sr_1_11?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1436192992&sr=1-11&keywords=Basho+haiku
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Haiku-Handbook-Write-Share-Teach/dp/4770014309/ref=sr_1_58?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1436193274&sr=1-58&keywords=Basho+haiku

Even a well-known poet and haiku writer was simply caught plagiarising his longer poetry, not his haiku.

Quote
I have seen advice to newbie poets to rework previous haiku to get a feeling for content and form. In such cases it is undoubtedly just an exercise and not an invitation to publish works such as 'slightly old/rather old/ really old/extremely old pond, frog/dog/aardvark jumps in, the sound of the water'.

I think this is two separate things:

A private exercise to get under the skin of well-written haiku over the years by reworking them. Home use only.

Both serious and comedic nods to Basho's old pond haikai, most of us have done this, and there is this famous book:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/One-Hundred-Frogs-Renga-English/dp/0834801760
http://www.amazon.co.uk/product-reviews/0834803356

Enjoy this too:
http://www.bopsecrets.org/gateway/passages/basho-frog.htm

Quote
This problem may also account for some poets choosing to become ever more revolutionary in their writing as intimidated by Mons Gaugin.

That's one view. :)   But writers for hundreds of years have absorbed other writers and transitioned to their own voice.   Fresh approaches are always needed, just as Basho, Shiki, Yamaguchi, Natsuishi, and Tohta etc...

Quote
It can lead to what to my novice mind are completely impenetrable haiku that seem to make no sense at all.

Haiku is a genre, not just a form, and just there are certain novels, science fact, and science fiction, and poetry, that is not obvious at first, until we learn to push our reading skills, so haiku can, on occasion, need the reader to be a full participant.

Quote
This in an effort to either get away from the problem or simply explore new forms.
Is there in fact anyway to check one's work for originality? Is this an accepted issue with haiku? What do people do?

I was on a panel of judges that voted for part of a bigger computer program that is used in criminal detection, but alas it wasn't popular.   It would have been amazing to analyse at least a million haiku and haikai. :)

Quote
I gather that in olden days haiku were written largely for the enjoyment of small social groups where the issue of copyright and accusations of plagiarism were unlikely.

Do you mean last century, as haiku is barely 140 years old in Japan, and a hundred years outside Japan?  If we include haikai verses, hokku etc... then people knew previous haikai and other literature and would appreciate all the allusions, and using large parts of previous poems or works of literature - much easier in Japanese than other languages.

Quote
Now however (with the evidence of at least one vehement debate in a noted haiku publication albeit rather old) with people more alive to the value of their original work and the EU ever ramping up the matter of copyright what is a struggling poet to do?

A struggling poet, well most poets don't make a lot of money, but we do work hard keeping on top of developments, and read, read, read, and buy other poets' books too. :)

Just enjoy reading lot of different types of poetry, and also of literature.

Quote
I have not perhaps for lack of looking seen this debate much vented on the net. Perhaps it is the elephant/frog in the room/pond.

Most of us keep ourselves well-read.   There is a wealth of material on the internet, but it means hours of work, sometimes each day.  As a jobbing poet, whether paid or not, I have to read a lot to stay aware of developments in haiku etc...

Quote
Any guidance would be much appreciated. As a newbie I accept that I may not have much that is original to say and if someone has said it before and better then what is to be done?
Regards
Carl

Gosh, you are hard on yourself.  :)  We all bring something to haiku, your voice is different, we need different voices.

warm regards,

Alan


QUOTE IN FULL

Quote from: Carl on July 04, 2015, 08:28:06 AM
'All art is plagiarism or revolution' so wrote Paul Gaugin.
A recent post on one of the boards threw up an interesting point about which I as a newbie am rather interested. What happens when you write a line or a complete haiku that closely resembles a previously published or unpublished work?
Haiku are by their brevity susceptible to accidental similarities. The advice to newbie poets is to read as many haiku as possible. That is sage advice. It is also a problem. Good lines are taken in by the subconscious and one can find oneself having a line pop up sometime later which you think is a moment of inspiration but is in fact the forgotten line from a previously read work.
I have had great delight in reading back issues of notable haiku magazines. In one such issue there was a raging debate between a reviewer and a well known haiku poet who was accused by the reviewer of publishing a poem closely resembling a previous work. Was there a need to include a note of the previous work or not? It was mooted but never decided.
Is there a need to include a note when the poem is modelled on a previous work? It seems many of the Japanese haiku masters regularly took inspiration or whole lines from previous works. Did they make such acknowledgments? I can't find any reference to them doing so.
I have seen advice to newbie poets to rework previous haiku to get a feeling for content and form. In such cases it is undoubtedly just an exercise and not an invitation to publish works such as 'slightly old/rather old/ really old/extremely old pond, frog/dog/aardvark jumps in, the sound of the water'.
This problem may also account for some poets choosing to become ever more revolutionary in their writing as intimidated by Mons Gaugin. It can lead to what to my novice mind are completely impenetrable haiku that seem to make no sense at all. This in an effort to either get away from the problem or simply explore new forms.
Is there in fact anyway to check one's work for originality? Is this an accepted issue with haiku? What do people do?
I gather that in olden days haiku were written largely for the enjoyment of small social groups where the issue of copyright and accusations of plagiarism were unlikely. Now however (with the evidence of at least one vehement debate in a noted haiku publication albeit rather old) with people more alive to the value of their original work and the EU ever ramping up the matter of copyright what is a struggling poet to do?
I have not perhaps for lack of looking seen this debate much vented on the net. Perhaps it is the elephant/frog in the room/pond.
Any guidance would be much appreciated. As a newbie I accept that I may not have much that is original to say and if someone has said it before and better then what is to be done?
Regards
Carl

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TSA "Special Event" Contest, October 2015

The Tanka Society of America is pleased to announce a tanka prose contest that will take place this fall.

This fifteenth-anniversary special event is open to members and nonmembers alike. There is no entry fee, and the first-place winner will receive a 2016 TSA membership.

Please see the submission guidelines at the TSA website for details. The guidelines also are included in the spring/summer issue of Ribbons.
weblink:
http://www.tankasocietyofamerica.org/tsa-contest/tanka-prose-contest

.


NOTE:
The TSA have quite a bit going on this year. Refer to their calendar on the website to help you keep track of the various activities (including the next Ribbons deadline): http://www.tankasocietyofamerica.org/calendar



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Brass Bell: Alan Summers
http://brassbellhaiku.blogspot.co.uk/2015/07/brass-bell-alan-summers.html?showComment=1435751718842

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Received my copy today, and your chapbook, I'm happy! :-)

Hi Mark,

Quote from: Mark E. on June 15, 2015, 12:03:34 PM
Just curious:  Anyone heard about the results for 2015 ukiahaiku contest? Winners were supposedly announced in late April but no listing on the web site and no replies for the contest organizers...

Here's the results, enjoy! :)

First Place

distant chanting
the saffron threads of crocus
at sunrise

Patricia Daharsh
Pinellas Park, Florida, USA


Second Place

low tide
the moon stuffed
among shells

Ailoaei Cristina
Romania


Third Place

anniversary –
under fallen leaves,
the butterfly

Rita Odeh
Haifa, Israel


First Honorable Mention

war memorial
the black-tipped wings
of a snow goose

Cynthia Rowe
Double Bay, New South Wales, Australia

Second Honorable Mention

watching them
go down the park slide
raindrops and freckles

Darrell Lindsay
Nacogdoches, Texas, USA

Third Honorable Mention

after the tempest
a fishing boat towed
by the rainbow

Constantin Stroe
Bucharest, Romania

Fourth Honorable Mention

empty second chair –
the entire garden is filled
with forget-me-nots

Cristina Oprea
Iasi, Romania

Fifth Honorable Mention

home alone?
talking to the snowman
in my backyard

Archana Kapoor Nagpal
Bangalore, Karnataka, India

- end -

I'm delighted to announce that my very first online publication of a haibun has just been published.

Normally my haibun are in print magazines, including a forthcoming anthology, but it's wonderful to have one, albeit a more unusual one from me, on a web magazine! :)

drummin rein spiders and elephants
https://theotherbunny.wordpress.com/2015/06/06/drummin-rein-spiders-and-elephants/


warm regards,

Alan

Hi Nicole,

Quote from: Nicole Andrews on May 18, 2015, 05:02:07 AM
Hi Alan,

I have used my own photography and haiku, I'm not brilliant at the text inclusion as I'm limited in my technology and find it frustrating to stamp software template writing onto the photo. Sandi Pray is one of the most interesting haiga artists that I've found. It would be interesting to see some British artists as the American approach is very different.
The validation issue comes about from the isolation of the studio and lack of peers, but particularly with haiga and haibun, which have particular criteria, meaning there is a right way and a wrong way...although skill in any genre is through dogged adherence and practice.

What I want to hear...note to self...YOU'RE ON THE RIGHT TRACK, KEEP GOING !!!!!

Regards
Nicole

That was one of the main features of the With Words shahai course:
http://area17.blogspot.co.uk/2015/01/shahai-combining-your-haiku-your.html

We had North American artists, one from England, and one from mainland Europe.  The English participant is also a student of mine where we meet up, and she hadn't been doing haiku for quite some time but she got herself back up to speed, and produced some startling work off of one of Karen's prompts.

I regularly produce shahai myself, often at NaHaiWriMo, and will put together a submission when I have more time.

Sandi does both haiga and shahai and I asked permission from her as we wanted her examples shown.  She grasps better than most people how to make everything work together.   You'll be blown away by the two North American writers though. :)

Have you considered curating your own photography exhibition that includes shahai as others have done?

I still think Western haiga, and shahai, and haibun are in their infancy.  As a Red Moon Anthology editor for many years (2000-2004) I witnessed a lot of work across the genres as I literally subscribed to every single subscription magazine, and read everything online too.   I don't know how many do that today, but it was very expensive to subscribe to every publication around the world, and incredibly time consuming, and to carry so much work in my head too, but it was worth it! :)

At that time haibun was male-dominated and the main practitioners I submitted for consideration were Arwyn Evans (Wales) and Michael McClintock (USA) followed by David Cobb (England) and Ken Jones (Wales).   Today I'd say the leading haibun writers are women, with Roberta Beary (USA) in particular.

I have seen powerful photography on my course, and hope to see equally strong work that gets the hair on my neck standing up! :)

warm regards,

Alan

Hi Nicole,

Quote from: Nicole Andrews on May 18, 2015, 03:59:50 AM
Hi Alan,

Thanks for mopping up the gravy...good to get clarification on shahai, I like to paint my own ( haiga ) rather than use photo's, I have found it near impossible to find interesting ' art ' haiga. The internet is limited in the treasures it displays and I find you still need to get lucky...or know the right links...the confusion lies with a need for validation from outside myself, that is the weed in my garden that needs pulling...have trowel...am digging.

Regards
Nicole

Regarding shahai, it refers to the person's own photographs, and photography is a skill in its own right.   I try to diplomatically persuade people on Facebook not to use other people's photographs.

Shahai is a fully integrated artwork, with the person using a well took photo, a crafted haiku, or tanka, and font choice positioned well and not just dropped onto the photo.

There is not a strong choice of well-crafted haiga, I must admit, but there are exceptions like Sandi Pray, and Ron Moss, to mention but two people.

You say:
...the confusion lies with a need for validation from outside myself, that is the weed in my garden that needs pulling...have trowel...am digging.

Do you mean from the public and/or peers giving you validation?  For instance I give only suggestions, and never rewrites, and the photographer we use has the same teaching skills, where none of us are judgemental, just offering our advice, but without the individual moving away from their own voice.

There does need to be some interaction with people as regards our artwork as it's a type of communication after all, and I've always been personally rewarded by overhearing the public talk about my work.  They don't know I'm the author at times, so it's unbiased. :)

warm regards,

Alan