How much do you know about Haiku poetry?

Haiku: A Traditional Japanese Poetry Form

• Haiku is a short form of poetry that originated in Japan.

• Traditional Japanese haiku consists of three phrases composed of 17 phonetic units, known as on, in a 5-7-5 pattern, with a kireji (cutting word) and a kigo (seasonal reference).

• Haiku was given its current name by the Japanese writer Masaoka Shiki at the end of the 19th century.

• Haiku is traditionally printed as a single line in Japanese, while haiku in English often appear as three lines.

• There are several other forms of Japanese poetry related to haiku, such as tanka, as well as other art forms that incorporate haiku, such as haibun and haiga.

• In Japanese haiku, a kireji, or cutting word, typically appears at the end of one of the verse's three phrases.

• On is a sound unit counted in Japanese verse, and traditional haiku usually consists of 17 on.

• Haiku traditionally contains a kigo, a word or phrase that symbolizes or implies the season of the poem.

• The Bashō school promoted standalone hokku by including many in their anthologies, thus giving birth to what is now called "haiku".

• Masaoka Shiki was a reformer and modernizer who popularized his views by verse columns and essays in newspapers.

• R. H. Blyth was an Englishman who lived in Japan and produced a series of works on Zen, haiku, senryū, and on other forms of Japanese and Asian literature.

• Haiku was introduced to the post-war English-speaking world through Blyth's works.The History and Development of Haiku Poetry in Different Languages

• Kenneth Yasuda's critical theory about haiku includes the concept of a "haiku moment" based on personal experience, which provides the motive for writing a haiku. He considered that haiku translated into English should utilize all of the poetic resources of the language.

• Harold G. Henderson's An Introduction to Haiku: An Anthology of Poems and Poets from Bashô to Shiki was a revision of his earlier book and translated every hokku and haiku into a rhymed tercet (ABA), whereas the Japanese originals never used rhyme.

• Haiku was introduced in France by Paul-Louis Couchoud around 1906.

• Nobel laureate Rabindranath Tagore composed haiku in Bengali and also translated some from Japanese.

• In 1992, Nobel laureate Czesław Miłosz published the volume Haiku in which he translated from English to Polish haiku of Japanese masters and American and Canadian contemporary haiku authors.

• The former president of the European Council, Herman Van Rompuy, is a haijin (haiku poet) and known as "Haiku Herman."

• The Japanese poet Yone Noguchi was one of the first advocates of English-language hokku.

• Richard Wright is considered the first noteworthy American minority writer to produce haiku.

• In Italy, the national haiku association was founded in Rome in 1987 by Sono Uchida, the well-known Japanese haijin and the ambassador of Japan in Vatican.

• In Spain, several prominent poets experimented with haiku, including Joan Alcover, Antonio Machado, Juan Ramón Jiménez, and Luis Cernuda.

• The Mexican poet José Juan Tablada is credited with popularizing haiku in his country, reinforced by the publication of two collections composed entirely in that form.

• In Yugoslavia, development of haiku poetry began during the 1960s, and the first haiku books were written.

• Haibun is a combination of prose and haiku, often autobiographical or written in the form of a travel journal.

• Haiga is a style of Japanese painting based on the aesthetics of haikai, and usually including a haiku.