CHŌKA

chōka: translation

Thechōkaor “long poem” (sometimes called anagauta) is one of the two forms of poetry used by the Japanese poets whose work was collected in the eighth-century anthology calledThe MAN’YŌSHŪ(the other form being theTANKA, or “short poem”). Thechōkacould be composed in any number of verses—though in practice, the longestchōkain theMan’yōshūis 149 lines. Thechōkaalternates lines of five and seven syllables, and ends with a final couplet of two seven-syllable lines. In effect, the last five lines of achōkaare identical in form to the more populartanka: 31 syllables in five lines of five, seven, five, seven, and seven syllables.Further, thechōkawas typically followed by one or two (or even more) short poems calledhanka—a word from the Chinese meaning “a verse that repeats.” Thesehanka, usually in the five-line form of thetanka, acted as envoys, detailing, enlarging, or summarizing the theme of the longer main body of the poem. Of the 4,516 poems anthologized inTheMan’yōshū, only 265 arechōka. These, however, are generally the most memorable poems in the collection, particularly those attributed to the acclaimed poet HITOMARO Kakinomoto, called the “Saint of Poetry.” One of his best-known poems is thechōka“On leaving his wife as he set out from Iwami for the capital.”The main body of the poem consists of 24 lines and ends with these verses:

Farther and farther my home falls behind,

Steeper and steeper the mountains I have crossed.

Like dripping summer grass.

(Nipon Gakujutsu Shinkokai 1965, 32)

The poem is accompanied by twotanka-likehanka, the last of which reads:

With loud rustling sounds;

But I think only of my love,

Having left her behind.

(Nipon Gakujutsu Shinkokai 1965, 32)

The effective but understated emotion that gives the poem its lyrical appeal is characteristic of thechōkain theMan’yōshū. Althoughchōkacontinued to be composed after the collection intheMan’yōshū, none of these is particularly effective, and thechōkawas soon virtually completely displaced by thetankaamong Japanese poets.

■ Keene, Donald.Seeds in the Heart: Japanese Literature from Earliest Times to the Late Sixteenth Century. Vol. I,A History of Japanese Literature. New York: Columbia University Press, 1999.

■ Miner, Earl, Hiroko Odagiri, and Robert E. Morrell.The Princeton Companion to Classical Japanese Literature. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1985.

■ Nipon Gakujutsu Shinkokai, trans.The Manyoshu. With a new foreword by Donald Keene. 1940.New York: Columbia University Press, 1965.