Kenneth Yasuda (June 23, 1914 – January 26, 2002) was a Japanese-American scholar and translator.

Life and career

Yasuda was born on June 23, 1914, in

Auburn, California Auburn is a city in and the county seat of Placer County, California, United States. Its population was 13,776 during the 2020 United States census, 2020 census. Auburn is known for its California Gold Rush history and is registered as a Califo ...

. His poetry studies at the

University of Washington The University of Washington (UW and informally U-Dub or U Dub) is a public research university in Seattle, Washington, United States. Founded in 1861, the University of Washington is one of the oldest universities on the West Coast of the Uni ...

were interrupted by World War II, and he was

interned Internment is the imprisonment of people, commonly in large groups, without Criminal charge, charges or Indictment, intent to file charges. The term is especially used for the confinement "of enemy citizens in wartime or of terrorism suspects ...

at the

Tule Lake War Relocation Center The Tule Lake War Relocation Center, also known as the Tule Lake Segregation Center, was an Internment of Japanese Americans, American concentration camp located in Modoc County, California, Modoc and Siskiyou County, California, Siskiyou count ...

following the signing of

Executive Order 9066 Executive Order 9066 was a President of the United States, United States presidential executive order signed and issued during World War II by United States president Franklin D. Roosevelt on February 19, 1942. "This order authorized the fo ...

. He was later transferred to the

Jerome War Relocation Center The Jerome War Relocation Center was a Japanese American internment camp located in southeastern Arkansas, near the town of Jerome, Arkansas, Jerome in the Arkansas Delta. Open from October 6, 1942, until June 30, 1944, it was the last American ...

in 1943. After the war, he returned to the University of Washington where he received a BA in 1945.Yasuda, Kenneth. ''The Japanese haiku: its essential nature, history, and possibilities in English, with selected examples''. Tuttle, 1957. Inside back cover. Yasuda earned his

Doctorate A doctorate (from Latin ''doctor'', meaning "teacher") or doctoral degree is a postgraduate academic degree awarded by universities and some other educational institutions, derived from the ancient formalism '' licentia docendi'' ("licence to teach ...

Japanese Literature Japanese literature throughout most of its history has been influenced by cultural contact with neighboring Asian literatures, most notably China and its literature. Early texts were often written in pure Classical Chinese or , a Chinese-Japa ...

from

Tokyo University The University of Tokyo (, abbreviated as in Japanese and UTokyo in English) is a public research university in Bunkyō, Tokyo, Japan. Founded in 1877 as the nation's first modern university by the merger of several pre-westernisation era ins ...

Haiku legacy

Yasuda's best known book is ''The Japanese

Haiku is a type of short form poetry that originated in Japan. Traditional Japanese haiku consist of three phrases composed of 17 Mora (linguistics), morae (called ''On (Japanese prosody), on'' in Japanese) in a 5, 7, 5 pattern; that include a ''kire ...

: Its Essential Nature, History, and Possibilities in English, with Selected Examples'' (1957). His other books include ''A Pepper-pod: Classic Japanese Poems Together with Original Haiku,'' a collection of haiku and translations in English; ''Masterworks of the Noh Theater''; ''A Lacquer Box'', translation of waka and a translation of ''Minase Sangin Hyakuin'', a 100-verse

renga ''Renga'' (, ''linked poem'') is a genre of Japanese collaborative poetry in which alternating stanzas, or ''ku (''句), of 5-7-5 and 7-7 morae (sound units, not to be confused with syllables) per line are linked in succession by multiple poets ...

poem led by Sōgi and titled in English as ''Three Poets at Minase''. Yasuda's 1957 book consists mainly of material from his doctoral dissertation from 1955, and includes both translations from Japanese and original poems of his own in English. These had previously appeared in his book ''A Pepper-Pod: Classic Japanese Poems together with Original Haiku'' (Alfred A. Knopf, 1947). In ''The Japanese Haiku'', Yasuda presented some Japanese critical theory about haiku, especially featuring comments by early twentieth-century poets and critics. Yasuda's translations apply a 5–7–5 syllable count in English, with the first and third lines end-

rhyme A rhyme is a repetition of similar sounds (usually the exact same phonemes) in the final Stress (linguistics), stressed syllables and any following syllables of two or more words. Most often, this kind of rhyming (''perfect rhyming'') is consciou ...

d.(Yasuda observed that although rhyme, as understood in English, does not exist in the original Japanese, in translations thereof into English they should use all the poetic resources of the language). In the same book, Yasuda contended that 'the underlying aesthetic principles that govern the arts are the same for any form in Japanese or English' and would ensure the possibilities of

Haiku in English A haiku in English is an English-language poem written in a form or style inspired by Japanese haiku. Like their Japanese counterpart, haiku in English are typically short poems and often reference the seasons, but the degree to which haiku in Engl ...

being as popular as with its Japanese audience. In Yasuda's haiku theory the intent of the haiku is contained in the concept of a "haiku moment," 'that moment of absolute intensity when the poet's grasp of his intuition is complete so that the image lives its own life', (seventeen syllables corresponding to that 'moment', divided into three lines within 'one breath length' ). This notion of the haiku moment has been defined as 'an aesthetic moment' a timeless feeling of enlightened harmony as a poet's nature and environment are unified'The passing momentary experience that comes alive through the precise perception of the image.'Lowenstein Tom ed. 'Classic Haiku-Introduction' Duncan Baird PublishersLondon 2007 Yasuda's indirect influence was felt through the Beat writers;

Jack Kerouac Jean-Louis Lebris de Kérouac (; March 12, 1922 – October 21, 1969), known as Jack Kerouac, was an American novelist and poet who, alongside William S. Burroughs and Allen Ginsberg, was a pioneer of the Beat Generation. Of French-Canadian ...

's ''The Dharma Bums'' appeared in 1958, with one of its main characters, Japhy Ryder (based on

Gary Snyder Gary Snyder (born May 8, 1930) is an American poet, essayist, lecturer, and environmental activist. His early poetry has been associated with the Beat Generation and the San Francisco Renaissance and he has been described as the "poet laureate ...

), writing

haiku is a type of short form poetry that originated in Japan. Traditional Japanese haiku consist of three phrases composed of 17 Mora (linguistics), morae (called ''On (Japanese prosody), on'' in Japanese) in a 5, 7, 5 pattern; that include a ''kire ...

References

External links

{{DEFAULTSORT:Yasuda, Kenneth American writers of Japanese descent University of Washington College of Arts and Sciences alumni University of Tokyo alumni English-language haiku poets English-language writers from Japan Japanese–English translators Japanese-American internees 1914 births 2002 deaths 20th-century translators 20th-century poets People from Auburn, California