NARROW ROAD TO THE INTERIOR by...

NARROW ROAD TO THE INTERIOR by Matsuo Basho, translated by Sam Hamill, illustrated by Stephen Addiss (Shambala: $10). In 1689, the celebrated poet Basho and his friend Sora embarked on a walking tour of the temples in the interior of northern Honshu. Hamill’s new translation captures the poet’s intimate style as he reflects on the physical and personal aspects of his secular pilgrimage. A master of the minimalist Haiku form, Basho delighted in the beauties of nature he beheld near a remote shrine: “Speechless before/ these budding green spring leaves/ in blazing sunlight.” But the ruined castle, where “three generations of the Fujiwara clan passed as though in a dream,” moved him profoundly and left him reflecting on the transitory nature of human accomplishments: “Summer grasses:/ all that remains of great soldiers’/ imperial dreams.”