haiku vs. haiku

[AlanSummers]

Hi Sandra

I won't use emoticons as I don't like them either, although I do use a lot of these ;-) or :-) but I promise not to use them further in this post to you. 

I'm not aware of any baiting (in a bad way) from the post started by a person calling themselves lulu.  As that naughty Jim Kacian has used pseudonoymns on THF before, although I think I was the only one to see that, it could be Jim getting a healthy feisty discussion going. ;-)

We can't continually have one foot dragging in the past of what we think both Japanese and non-Japanese was, or should be.  Good writers will always push, stretch, and test the boundaries.  I am sure Basho wasn't the first to do this re old pond, and crow etc...

I'm sorry if you don't find our replies to the question illuminating, but after all, this discussion is open to everyone, and you are free to leave an opinion, breaking the haiku, or otherwise, down to its basic components maybe?  I think that would be fascinating to any reader to see that, even if you are not familiar, as you say, with modern haiku or modernist haiku.

I think that's what John McManus did?  I found his breakdown analysis fascinating, and I am sure he doesn't purport to understand gendai haiku, and yet it was incredibly useful.

We are here to stretch ourselves, not only as writers, but as readers, and we need more difficult reading to happen otherwise our once sharp reading and writing knives will in deed become dull.

Alan

Thanks for the replies Jack, Alan and John.

I took the question at face value and in good faith and didn't see any baiting going on so was sorry that the replies that Lulu was receiving weren't that illuminating as I was going to be interested to read them myself.

The "hmm", Jack, was merely intended as a thoughtful gap filler, waiting for one of the many erudite posters to come along and help Lulu (and me) out. I wasn't hinting at anything.

My knowledge of modernist haiku, as you term them, is almost nil, but I am trying hard to learn and THF threads are one of the few places where I might do that, even if I do often find the discussion beyond me, but that's my fault, not the posters.

So, due to my general dullness and ignorance, it wasn't until I read John's thoughts that your text began to make sense.

I will go and have a look at the other thread, as you suggest and will try to keep my naivete to myself in future. (I daresay one of the emoticons would work well here but I hate them.)

I do hope Scott will drop in and share his viewpoint as the author.

[AlanSummers]

Just doing a search engine check on "blue apple" painting brought this up:
http://dailypaintings.riahills.com/2011/04/blue-apple-2.html

Ria Hills says:
This is the second blue apple I've painted. I've had a number of requests for another so here it is!
I don't know if I'd eat a blue apple but I love the way it looks.
Blue is one of the few colors my colorblind husband can see. A red apple would appear as khaki colored to him.

Another painting (sold):
http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-CfPOGANfxZE/TatkP80YlGI/AAAAAAAAAw0/0LlUgWdZEx4/s1600/La+Pomme+Bleue+DP4.17.11.jpg

There must be something in the psyche when we see a blue apple.  Blue isn't a colour we associate with food, despite grapes and eggplants having aspects of blue.

On artist Janett Marie's website a commentator said:

leigh said...

    i'm sure this apple is part of "blue heaven"! there's gotta be a song....elvis maybe? better tell martha to start bakin us a pie for the party! wonder where you get blue apples???


And of course Mondrian! ;-)

Piet Mondrian's Blue Apple Tree Series also makes me believe that possibly Scott Metz was influenced by it, and that Jim Kacian may be using one of his many disguises. <grin>

What fun.

More comments please, and looking forward to what you all have to say.

Alan

[AlanSummers]

So Jim, as you are watching, is lulu and you an item? <grin>

As in, a nom de plume I mean. ;-)

Alan

[Jim Kacian]

hi all

just for the record — t'aint me!

j

[AlanSummers]

Darn it! ;-)

But as you've posted, what is your take on the verse?

I don't think I'm biased when I find it extraordinary, and my wife, a highly experienced writer (and also writes haiku) respected it and presumed it was a haiku straightaway even though I didn't give any context when I read it out.

Alan

hi all

just for the record — t'aint me!

j

[Jack Galmitz]

The rallying call of the "imaginary" qua BLUE APPLE
puts into QUESTION the real
and will of necessity CREATE the MIRROR (reflection) of
what is REAL
THE BLUE APPLE is the REAL of
language as such
having no NATURAL or NECESSARY relat
ionship with what is OUTSIDE
the play of SIGNIFIERS/SIGNIFIEDS
Of language
to a WORLD
so it postulates that the
real of LANGUAGE
REPRODUCES ITSELF
AD INFINITUM
in that them mirror (an image by the way that Metz constantly uses in his HAIKU);
OR,
are we looking
at the constitution of an IDENTITY-read BLUE APPLE,
by way of the MIRROR STAGE
when REALITY is FRAGMENTARY,
an illusion of WHOLENESS?
OR
would a BLUE APPLE
so so butiful
NOT CREATE ANOTHER
in tribute!

[Jack Galmitz]

OR
Todorov's FANTASTIC
in which the laws of
NATURE
must be changed to
UNDERSTAND
an event;
a CHALLENGE
to HAIKU as NATURE
pome

[Jack Galmitz]

           
cloudless
a day balanced
on the blue apple

  Scott Metz

[Paul Miller]

blue apple
it gives birth
to a mirror

- Scott Metz

I am hesitant to step into these kinds of discussions since definitions of haiku and our reactions to them are personal, and often pointless, but here goes... My definition of haiku is undoubtedly different than others, as like definitions of religion/spirituality it probably should be. That said, I require from a haiku: participation on the part of the reader, and a transference of meaning from poet to reader. Add in the fact that this poem is essentially two parts (blue apple) and (it gives birth to a mirror) and I am satisfied. I wouldn't call it a classical or traditional haiku, but I'd call it a haiku.

My first requirement seems easily satisfied; Metz doesn't tell me what to make of the scene's parts. I have to determine/feel that myself.

Requirement two. The most interesting feature to me is the switch of expectation. Normally we see images in a mirror, or in other words, the mirror captures or creates an image; in this case Metz has the object creating the mirror, or realizes that without the object the mirror is pointless. There is also a nice redundancy, where the object creates the mirror which creates the object which creates the mirror etc... It is also possible that "it" doesn't even relate to the apple. Now, I don't know what a blue apple is, but it seems to fit nicely in this perceptually shifted scene. Perhaps a sad apple, or one tinted with a blue urban light. Perhaps an offshoot of 'blue moon', that we only have this perception occasionally. That also works for me. In the end I am left with existential questions of myself and my place in this world. The same questions apply to me. Do I have value outside of myself, or do I need a mirror (society?) to make myself whole?

A nice haiku. 

Paul Miller

[Mariu Moreno]

Or, if we look at another gentre-painting- we can see the disruption from classical representation to say cubism.  Here what was previously "represented" as "real" was broken up, analyzed, and re-assembled to depict objects from various viewpoints, thus representing the subject in a greater context than had previously been tried.

Lulu, the poem is magical. Sometimes we have to be less rational to enter a poem.

Cheers from Argentina!

Mariu

[AlanSummers]

Lulu asked a good tough question, and I love your response Mariu because we have to do that, be less rational, after all we aren't filling out a prescription form.

Alan

Or, if we look at another gentre-painting- we can see the disruption from classical representation to say cubism.  Here what was previously "represented" as "real" was broken up, analyzed, and re-assembled to depict objects from various viewpoints, thus representing the subject in a greater context than had previously been tried.

Lulu, the poem is magical. Sometimes we have to be less rational to enter a poem.

Cheers from Argentina!

Mariu

[haikurambler]

If 'show not tell' is the primary 'poetic' engine utilised by haiku and if we remove it and apply non-haiku formal elements to that engine, what happens? Do we have a haiku - even if it looks the same? Some people get around this not-really-a-haiku problem by declaring a non-rhyming tercet to be; haiku inspired, a micropoem, a senryu.. Would it not be easier to give whatever is using the 'show not tell' instrument in three lines (with maybe some elements plucked from haiku, or not) its own product name? You know, rather than riding on the coattails of the major brand.

[AlanSummers]

Hi John,

Interesting argument.

I think the Japanese gendai haiku poets have not only had that argument used against them, but in the 1940s were imprisioned and even tortured.

Nowadays prison and torture don't occur for them, but they still have a tough time.

If we look at Basho who broke the rules with his old pond poem which he insisted was hokku, or Ozaki and Santoka who continuously broke the rules, and Santoka is even more popular than Basho and Issa, then what is haiku, and to who?

Just thinking out aloud, and aware that this argument in different shades has been put forward to a few others who only think haiku can be a set template routine.

I'm with the ones who push boundaries myself, from Basho onwards, and I wish I could aspire to write like them and not just admire their guts in saving the genre time after time. ;-)

It's good to have these challenging questions and arguments because art wouldn't survive if it was too easy.

Alan

If 'show not tell' is the primary 'poetic' engine utilised by haiku and if we remove it and apply non-haiku formal elements to that engine, what happens? Do we have a haiku - even if it looks the same? Some people get around this not-really-a-haiku problem by declaring a non-rhyming tercet to be; haiku inspired, a micropoem, a senryu.. Would it not be easier to give whatever is using the 'show not tell' instrument in three lines (with maybe some elements plucked from haiku, or not) its own product name? You know, rather than riding on the coattails of the major brand.

[haikurambler]

Browser error - will update with a reply...

[AlanSummers]

Hi John,

Thanks for prompt reply. ;-)

You said:
If 'show not tell' is the primary 'poetic' engine utilised by haiku

I'm curious as I've never seen this written down anywhere.  It doesn't feel very Japanese, or classic, modern or contemporary haiku inside and outside Japan.

It's been a fad to say this a lot for all kinds of poetry, but it would slow down creativity if we used this exclusively and not selectively.

You said:
if we ... apply non-haiku formal elements to that engine, what happens?
[see original quote in full below in context]

It depends if you see haiku as poetry, or literature, or something else.  Didn't Blyth say haiku wasn't poetry?

I tend to feel that haiku is elusive and it is and it isn't poetry, and the same re literature, so it's even freer to pull other techniques into itself.  Haiku, though small, is big enough to absorb many new techniques.

But also, non-Japanese haiku writers merely scratch the surface in using the amount of techniques a proficient Japanese haiku writer would use.

all my best,

Alan

If 'show not tell' is the primary 'poetic' engine utilised by haiku and if we remove it and apply non-haiku formal elements to that engine, what happens? Do we have a haiku - even if it looks the same? Some people get around this not-really-a-haiku problem by declaring a controversial, non-rhyming tercet to be; haiku inspired, a micropoem, a senryu.. Would it not be easier to give whatever is using the 'show not tell' instrument in typically three lines (with maybe some elements plucked from haiku, or not) its own product name? You know, rather than it riding on the coattails of a major brand.