Today, I write about “Narrow Road to the Deep North.”
“Narrow Road to the Deep Nort” is a travelogue written by Matsuo Basho 300 years ago.
Matsuo Basho is great haiku poet.
The following is opening sentences.
“The months and days are the travellers of eternity. The years that come and go are also voyagers.
Those who float away their lives on ships or who grow old leading horses are forever journeying, and their homes are wherever their travels take them.
Many of the men of old died on the road, and I too for years past have been stirred by the sight of a solitary cloud drifting with the wind to ceaseless thoughts of roaming. ”
1689, Basho and his traveling companion Kawai Sora departed from Edo (modern-day Tokyo ) for the northeastern area in Japan.
April 1,in Nikko (日光) , Basho wrote the following haiku poem.
あらたうと / Aratauto
青葉若葉の / Aoba wakaba no 
日の光 / Hi no hikari
How awe-inspiring!
On the green leaves, the young leaves
The light of the sun.
May 9, in Matsushima (松島), Basho was impressed by the beautiful scenery and was not able to write a haiku poem.
May 13, in Hiraizumi (平泉), Basho wrote the following haiku poem.
夏草や / Natsu kusa ya
兵どもが / Tsuwamono domo ga
夢のあと / Yume no ato
The summer grasses
Of brave soldiers’s dreams
The aftermath.
May 27, in Risshaku-ji , Basho wrote the following haiku poem.
閑さや/ Shizukasa ya
岩にしみ入る / Iwa ni shimiiru
蝉の声 / Semi no koe
The utter silence …,
cutting through the very stone
a cicada’s rasp
May 29, in Shinjo , Basho wrote the following haiku poem.
五月雨を / Samidare wo
あつめて早し / atsumete hayashi
最上川 / Mogami gawa
Gathering the rains of summer,
how swift it is
Mogami-gawa River
July 4, in Izumozaki, Basho wrote the following haiku poem.
荒海や / Araumi ya
佐渡に横たふ / Sado ni yokotau
天の川 / Amano gawa
Billow-crested seas!
Flowing towards Sado Isle
heaven’s Milky Way
September 6, this travelogue finished with Ogaki.
1694, He completed “Narrow Road to the Deep North.”
October,1694, He died at the age of 50.
Basho wrote 900 or more haiku poems during his life.
His haiku poem received excellent reviews and he was called a master of haiku.
His hometown is a ninja’s village.
Thus,there is a theory that Basho was actually a ninja or a spy and it is used as a subject of novels and so on.
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