was a Japanese

samurai The samurai () were members of the warrior class in Japan. They were originally provincial warriors who came from wealthy landowning families who could afford to train their men to be mounted archers. In the 8th century AD, the imperial court d ...

best known for his haibun, a scholar of

Kokugaku was an academic movement, a school of Japanese philology and philosophy originating during the Edo period. scholars worked to refocus Japanese scholarship away from the then-dominant study of Chinese, Confucian, and Buddhist texts in favor of ...

, and

haikai ''Haikai'' ( Japanese 俳諧 ''comic, unorthodox'') may refer in both Japanese and English to ''haikai no renga'' ( renku), a popular genre of Japanese linked verse, which developed in the sixteenth century out of the earlier aristocratic renga. ...

poet. He was born , and took the pseudonym Tatsunojō. His family are believed to be descendants of

Hōjō Tokiyuki was a samurai of the Hōjō clan who fought both for and against the Imperial Court. His father was Hōjō Takatoki, a Shikken, Shogunal Regent and ''de facto'' ruler of the Kamakura shogunate. Biography Tokiyuki had fought against both the ...

Life

Yayū was born in

Nagoya is the largest city in the Chūbu region of Japan. It is the list of cities in Japan, fourth-most populous city in Japan, with a population of 2.3million in 2020, and the principal city of the Chūkyō metropolitan area, which is the List of ...

, the first son of who served the

Owari Domain The Owari-Han, also known as the Owari Domain, was a significant feudal domain in Tokugawa shogunate, Japan during the Edo period. Situated in the western region of what is now Aichi Prefecture, it covered portions of Owari Province, Owari, Mino ...

. He inherited the Yokoi House's patrimony at twenty-six and held important posts of the Owari Domain. He was for example ''yōnin'' (manager of general affairs), ''Ōbangashira'' (chief of guard) and ''Jisha-Bugyō'' (manager of religious affairs). In 1754, at age 53, he retired for health reasons. Yayū moved to (now in

Naka-ku, Nagoya is one of the 16 Wards of Japan, wards of the city of Nagoya in Aichi Prefecture, Japan. As of 1 October 2019, the ward has an estimated population of 90,918 and a population density of 9,693 persons per km2. The total area is 9.38 km2. G ...

), and lived in the hermitage. He was a prolific and respected composer of haibun,

Classical Chinese Classical Chinese is the language in which the classics of Chinese literature were written, from . For millennia thereafter, the written Chinese used in these works was imitated and iterated upon by scholars in a form now called Literary ...

poems, waka and Japanese satirical poems, and was an adept of the

Japanese tea ceremony The Japanese tea ceremony (known as or lit. 'Hot water for tea') is a Culture of Japan, Japanese cultural activity involving the ceremonial preparation and presentation of , powdered green tea, the procedure of which is called . The term "Japa ...

Works

Yayū also excelled in

Japanese martial arts Japanese martial arts refers to the variety of martial arts native to the country of Japan. At least three Japanese terms (''budō'', ''bujutsu'', and ''bugei'') are used interchangeably with the English phrase Japanese martial arts. The usage ...

, studied

Confucianism Confucianism, also known as Ruism or Ru classicism, is a system of thought and behavior originating in ancient China, and is variously described as a tradition, philosophy, Religious Confucianism, religion, theory of government, or way of li ...

and learned

from Mutō Hajaku (武藤巴雀) and Ōta Hajō (太田巴静). Hajaku and Hajō were pupils of Kagami Shikō (各務支考), a leading disciple of Matsuo Bashō. Mori Senzō (森銑三), a student of old Japanese literature, compared his '' hokku'' to senryū, and said they were not as interesting as his ''haibun''. Yayū has been described as a master of ''haibun'', and Nagai Kafū 永井荷風　called Yayū's ''haibun'' a model of Japanese prose. * "Uzuragoromo" (鶉衣)　: An anthology of ''haibun'', partially translated in ''Monumenta Nipponica'', vol. 34, no. 3, Autumn 1979, by Lawrence Rogers. * "Rayō Shū", "Tetsu Shū" (蘿葉集), (垤集): Anthology of haiku. * "More Oke" (漏桶): Anthology of '' renku'' * "Kankensō" (管見草): Essay on ''haikai'' * "Rain Hen" (蘿隠編): Prose and poetry in

* "Gyō-Gyō-Shi" (行々子):　An anthology of Japanese satirical poems

References

* "Zoku Kinsei Kijinden" (続近世畸人伝) by Ban Kōkei (伴蒿蹊) (in Japanese) * "Haika Kijin-Dan" (俳家奇人談) by Takenouchi Gengen-ichi (竹内玄玄一) (in Japanese) {{DEFAULTSORT:Yokoi Yayu Kokugaku scholars Japanese essayists Japanese Confucianists 1702 births 1783 deaths Writers of the Edo period 18th-century Japanese poets Japanese Buddhists Japanese haiku poets

Life

Works

See also

References