WKD - Joy (ureshisa)

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Joy, pleasure (ureshisa, tanoshisa)

***** Location: Japan
***** Season: Various, see below
***** Category: Humanity

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Explanation

Usually the kigo itself carries the emotion and mood you want to express in your haiku, so you have to choose your kigo carefully.

Direct expressions of human emotinons are not often used in traditional Japanese haiku, but we have some kigo related to them, see the related words below.


"enjoy" is another word often used in translations.
Basho himself even used the simple AAAH!

ureshii 嬉しさ、うれしい、うれしき
tanoshii 楽しい、楽しさ、たのしい

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When the kids at grammar school in Japan start learning haiku, they are told to write two lines with something nice that makes them happy (or something that makes them sad) ... and the teacher will tell them later which kigo of the seaon would fit their mood.

Read the details of this teaching method here:

Teaching Haiku to Japanese Children



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Kigo for spring

I will check on this interesting kidai more later.

"joy in spring", shunki 春嬉（しゅんき）

spring is pleasant, haru tanoshi 春愉し（はるたのし）

pleasure of spring, shunkyoo 春興 (しゅんきょう)
... haru no kyoo 春の興（はるのきょう）
In the Edo period, haiku poets would come together for the first time in the New Year (which was equal to the first spring of the lunar calendar) and show publications of their works.


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Worldwide use


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Things found on the way


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HAIKU

Matsuo Basho

鷹一つ見付てうれしいらご崎
taka hitotsu mitsukete ureshi Iragosaki

Cape Irago -
I am so happy to observe
a solitary hawk

Tr. Gabi Greve, Hawk and Haiku

...

松島やああ松島や松島や
Matsushima ya aa Matsushima ya Matushima ya

Matsushima!
Aaah! Matsushima!
Matsushima!

Matsushima is one of the three most beautiful areas of Japan. Here Basho expresses his joy, exhilaration, emotion with a simple AAAH!

Basho, Oku no Hosomichi 2007
Gabi Greve

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Kobayashi Issa

永き日や嬉し涙がほろほろと
nagaki hi ya ureshinamida ga horo-horo to

a long day--
my tears of joy
rolling down



短夜の門にうれしき榎哉
mijika yo no kado ni ureshiki enoki kana

short summer night--
at the gate a happy
nettle tree



大根の二葉うれしや秋の風
daikon no futaba ureshi ya aki no kaze

two leaves of radish
rejoice!
autumn wind



小烏も嬉し鳴する稲ほ哉
ko-garasu mo ureshinaki suru inaho kana

the little crow
also weeps for joy...
heads of rice

Tr. David Lanoue

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Yosa Buson (1715-1783)

夏川を越す嬉しさよ手に草履
natsukawa o kosu ureshisa yo te ni zôri

O rio de verão —
Que alegria atravessá-lo
De sandálias à mão.

http://www.kakinet.com/caqui/antojapvn.shtml


so happy
to cross this summer river -
sandals in my hand
Tr. Gabi Greve

.....

目に嬉し戀君の扇真白なり
me ni ureshi koigimi no sen mashiro naru

my eyes feast
on this white folding fan
of my loved one
Tr. Keiko Izawa, 2007


grato ai miei occhi
di te amata il ventaglio
bianchissimo
Tr. ferro3


Radość w jej oczach
wachlarz ukochanego
czysty i biały
Tr. mruffka 89


Sakuo Nakamura had this comment (Translating Haiku Forum)

I think Buson is a colorist painter as well as Haijin. This ku belongs to his consciousness for beauty.
Buson's image inspires in me the color of his lover's cloth.
What color does come to your mind?

In my case, her cloth color is red that is reflecting the surrounding green in this season.
Suppose, there are red and green, and white.
The white enforces the contrast of red and green.

Then first line and the last line become fresh.
[目に嬉しso nice to look at]

[真白なる this white]

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Compiled by Larry Bole :

To my eyes it is delightful--
the fan of my beloved,
completely white.
trans. Sawa and Shiffert


What utter delight
to the eye--my dearest one's fan,
so perfectly white!

trans. Harold Henderson
Henderson notes:
"Fine fans were usually painted, quite often by famous artists."

So maybe there is a suggestion in the haiku that whoever's fan it is, that person is artless; meaning simple, natural, without guile or pretense, ingenuous, innocent. A white fan which hasn't been painted on might appeal to a lover of novelty such as Buson, who sometimes painted haiga on fans.



So happy to the eye,
The pure white fan
Of you whom I dearly love.

trans. Blyth
Blyth notes:
... In the verse above, the mere whiteness of the girl's fan, the fact that it is this colour and no other, is full of grateful significance to the lover, who does not however realize that the meaning of the colour of the fan is partly in his own feelings. At the moment, his emotion is white, and he sees rightly enough what a white fan is, what its whiteness means, why it is white.


delightful to the eye--
the fan of my beloved
is spotlessly white

trans. Ueda
Ueda notes:
Buson held ... hokku-writing meetings throughout 1774, usually producing several poems at each. He also composed many more hokku independently of the meetings. Here [is an example]:
[cited haiku]
[This] poem is another study of the human psyche, in this instance of the secret longing a young woman harbors toward a man. One summer day she observes him leisurely fanning himself, and the whiteness of the fan delights her because her instincts say it is indicative of his spotless character.


I find it interesting that Blyth makes it a girl's fan,
and Ueda makes it a man's fan.


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the whole valley
vibrates with joy
frog concert


summer morning -
the joy of life
unfolds

Look at the haiga HERE !


autumn mandala -
in my garden
with pure joy


© PHOTO and Haiku, Gabi Greve


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Related words

*****... Loneliness, sadness, melancholy and other emotions
sabishisa, kanashisa and more


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***** happiness, bliss (shiawase)
無上の喜び，至福



幸せは足元にあり俳句みち
shiawase wa ashimoto ni aru Haiku michi

happiness
is right at our footsteps -
haiku walk

Gabi Greve, November 2010






. Joy, Happiness, Bliss
An intercultural study.
By Edward Hoffman



List with Japanese HAPPINESS haiku
. しあわせ俳句集


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