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- ukiyo 浮世 this floating world -
transient world, other translations are available.
Basho also used the expression "
yo no xyz 世の ... xyy of this world
. ukiyo zooshi 浮世草子 books about the floating world .
Ukiyo-zoshi
Ukiyo (浮世, "Floating World")
described the urban lifestyle, especially the pleasure-seeking aspects, of Edo-period Japan (1600–1867).
The "Floating World" culture developed in Yoshiwara, the licensed red-light district of Edo (modern Tokyo), which was the site of many brothels, chashitsu tea houses, and kabuki theaters frequented by Japan's growing middle class. The ukiyo culture also arose in other cities such as Osaka and Kyoto.
The famous Japanese woodblock prints known as ukiyo-e 浮世絵, or "pictures of the Floating World", had their origins in these districts and often depicted scenes of the Floating World itself such as geisha, kabuki actors, sumo wrestlers, samurai, chōnin and prostitutes.
The term is also an ironic allusion to the homophone
"Sorrowful World" (憂き世 ukiyo), the earthly plane of death and rebirth from which Buddhists sought release.
© WIKIPEDIA !
source : ezoushijp
上下を着し世を千金と営む人も、
浮世一ツ分五厘と酔ふてくらす（春）
ukiyo ippun gorin 浮世一分五厘 （うきよ‐いっぷんごりん）
gorin - to borrow money at a rate of 5.5 percent (for one minute)
この世のはかなく価値がないことを銀目の一分五厘にたとえたもの。
世間を軽く見てのんきに世をすごすこと。
ukiyo sanpun gorin 浮世三分五厘ともいう。
○迷えば煩悩、悟れば菩提
○迷えば凡夫、悟れば仏
○迷う者は道を問わず
○浮世は色々無明の酔い
人間の仏心をくらます無明(一切の迷妄・煩悩の根源)の煩悩を酒の酔いにたとえていう。
- Reference - ukiyo-e
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花にうき世我が酒白く飯黒し
hana ni ukiyo waga sake shiroku meshi kuroshi
cherry blossoms in this fleeting world
my ricewine is white
my rice is black
Tr. Gabi Greve
Amid the blossoms' joy
a cruel world: My wine is cloudy and
My rice unmilled.
Tr. haikubandit
Drunk with blossoms
my rice wine is coloured white
& my rice is brown
and a preface in Chinese by Po Chu I
When we have a serious worry,
We realize the holy power of sake.
Only when we have suffered poverty,
Do we realize the divine value of money.
Tr. and Comment : Bill Wyatt
Basho age 40 天和3年.
The meter of this poem is 6-7-5.
He is quite poor and has to drink "nigorizake", a cheap white type.
His rice is not hulled and white, but "black", because he has to eat unhulled genmai brown rice.
So now he has to learn and study about the "God of Money" 銭の神 to change his poor living conditions.
. Ricewine, rice wine (sake, saké, saki) .
nigori or nigorizake (濁り酒)
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木曽の橡浮世の人の土産かな
. Kiso no tochi ukiyo no hito no miyage kana .
(autumn) chestnuts. souvenir from Kiso 木曽 floating world.
. koomori mo ideyo ukiyo no hana ni tori .
(spring) cherry blossoms. bats come out. floating world.
. tabine shite mishi ya ukiyo no susu harai (susuharai) .
(winter) end of year housecleaning. sleeping on the road. floating world
. tsuyu toku toku kokoromi ni ukiyo susugabaya .
(autumn) dew. floating world
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source : genchou/tokusyu
Basho no Sakura - cherry blossom haiku of Basho - collection
うらやまし浮世の北の山桜
urayamashi ukiyo no kita no yama-zakura / yamazakura
Written in the spring of 1692 元禄5年春.
so enviable:
far north of the floating world
mountain cherry blossoms
Tr. Barnhill
How delightful !
North of our world of woe
mountain cherries !
Tr. Robin D. Gill
Part of a letter to his student Kukuu 句空 Kuku in Kanazawa. KuKuu lived in a hermitage on mount Utatsuyama 金沢卯辰山 in Kanazawa. Basho had once visited him on his trip to Northern Echigo.
He wrote two poem collections
Kita no Yama 北の山 "Northern Mountain" and
Sooan Shuu 草庵集, "Grass Hut Collection".
kita no yama, the Northern Mountain, referes to Kanazawa, far in the North of Japan.
The meaning of this haiku:
You are lucky to live in the quietude of your Northern Mountain.
I am here in the petty everyday life (ukiyo) of Edo and have to worry about so many daily problems, like worrying about money, infighting of my students, illness in the family, my cramped living conditions and so many more.
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ukiyo no kita 浮世の北. 下巻 / 可吟
Poetry collection by haikai poet Kagin 可吟
source : www.wul.waseda.ac.jp
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Basho also used the expression "
yo no xyz 世の ... xyy of this world
(yono)
世にふるも更に宗祇の宿り哉
. yo ni furu mo sara ni Soogi no yadori kana .
(autumn) Sogi. life in this world, rain on the shelter of Sogi
Iio Soogi 飯尾 宗祇 Iio Sogi
世に匂へ梅花一枝のみそさざい
yo ni nioe / baika isshi no / misosazai
世に盛る花にも念仏申しけり
yo ni sakaru / hana ni mo nebutsu / mōshikeri
世の人の見付けぬ花や軒の栗
. yo no hito no mitsukenu hana ya noki no kuri .
(summer) sweet chestnut flowers. "people of this world"
For priest Kashin 僧侶可伸, in rememberance of Saint Gyooki 行基菩薩 Gyoki Bosatsu.
世の中は稲刈るころか草の庵
. yo no naka wa ine karu koro ka kusa no io .
(autumn) harvesting rice. in the world. my thatched hermitage
世の夏や湖水に浮む浪の上
yo no natsu ya / kosui ni ukamu / nami no ue
世を旅に代掻く小田の行き戻り
yo o tabi ni / shiro kaku oda no / yuki modori
- - - - -
椹や花なき蝶の世捨酒
kuwa no mi ya / hana naki chō no / yosute-zake
梅が香や見ぬ世の人に御意を得る
ume ga ka ya / minu yo no hito ni / gyoi o uru
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世直しの大十五夜の月見かな
yo naoshi no oojuugoya no tsukimi kana
the night of reforms
of moon viewing
on the fiftheenth . . .
Tr. Gabi Greve
yonaoshi "to re-do the world", reform, world-healing,
is also a concept of Pure Land Buddhism.
Maybe Basho is making resolutions for himself to improve his life, like we do on the Night of the New Year.
juugoya 十五夜（じゅうごや）night of the fifteenth
The deity revered on this night is Dainichi Nyorai 大日如来.
. meigetsu 名月 ( めいげつ) "famous moon" harvest moon .
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seken 世間 the every-day-world
花にいやよ世間口より風の口
hana ni iya yo / seken guchi yori / kaze no kuchi
雨の日や世間の秋を堺町
. ame no hi ya seken no aki o Sakai choo .
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- - - - - Kobayashi Issa 小林一茶
浮草や浮世の風のいふなりに
ukikusa ya ukiyo no kaze no iu nari ni
floating plants
move to the changing winds
of the floating world
Tr. Chris Drake
This hokku is from the sixth month (July) of 1821. The word ukikusa is a traditional general word used in waka, renga, and haikai that means literally "floating plants." In Issa's time three different plants had also given this name by botanists, but these technical terms were not widely used. In contemporary Japanese the word refers to one specific kind of floating plant, duckweed. Floating plants were also called "rootless plants" (nenashi-gusa), since their roots hang unconnected in the water.
To Issa their unrooted, free-floating existence provides an interesting perspective on the human world as well. The commonly used term "floating world" has various meanings: the painful, difficult, impermanent world as taught by Buddhism; the everyday world of poverty and economic struggle to survive; the dreamlike world of constant change and uncertainty; the present world as opposed to the next world; ordinary, mundane daily life, human society; this-worldly enjoyment and entertainment; contemporary, stylish. Issa himself commonly refers to the floating world to refer to: a painful situation or existence; the world of physical necessity, economics, measurement; the everyday mundane world; the visible world as imperfect; an existence dominated by desire, want, greed, clinging; conspicuous change amid general impermanence.
In this hokku Issa seems to be focusing on the rootless, directionless way most people live in the floating world of daily existence. He says the water plants do whatever the changeable winds "tell them to do," so he is probably talking about plants and ordinary human society at the same time. Instead of choosing their lives, most people are content to follow whatever fickle winds of fashion and thinking are popular at the moment, floating here and there like rootless water plants. Issa himself had clear goals and sometimes went against the prevailing wind, as when he struggled to return to his hometown, but ultimately he almost surely includes himself among the floating plants, since in the True Pure Land school of Buddhism to which he belonged it is believed that all humans have imperfections, failings, and weaknesses and are dependent on others, especially on Amida Buddha. Issa was not a yes man, but he was acutely aware of his own limitations and dependence on Amida.
Chris Drake
. WKD : ukikusa 萍 (うきくさ) all kinds of floating water weeds .
我垣やうき世の葛の花盛り
waga kaki ya ukiyo no kuzu no hanazakari
oh my hedge -
arrowroots of the floating world
are in full bloom
Tr. Gabi Greve
kuzu, ningen no kuzu 人間の葛 "people like arrowroots",
means : human trash, the lowest of humans.
- - - - - MORE of Issa and the floating world
. hana saite hon no ukiyo to nari ni keri .
. mizudori yo ima no ukiyo ni nebokeru na .
. naku na kari dokko mo onaji ukiyo zoya .
. Kobayashi Issa 小林一茶 in Edo .
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