Scope and Contents

Karl Young wrote the introductory biographical essay on Kitasono Katue. Of interest is that some conventional and visual poems by Katue were written in English. This book includes the sole interview of Katue translated into English that appeared in Yu #8, 1975. Examples of poems from the late 1920s to early 1930s that are reproduced in this book are Japanese concrete poems. -- Source of annotation: Marvin or Ruth Sackner.

Scope and Contents

Karl Young wrote the introductory biographical essay on Kitasono Katue. Of interest is that some conventional and visual poems by Katue were written in English. This book includes the sole interview of Katue translated into English that appeared in Yu #8, 1975. Examples of poems from the late 1920s to early 1930s that are reproduced in this book are Japanese concrete poems. -- Source of annotation: Marvin or Ruth Sackner.

Scope and Contents Using Kitasono as a window on Japanese literature in the twentieth century, John Solt analyzes the relationship of Japanese writers to foreign literary movements and the influences of Japanese writers on world literature. He also provides a critical analysis of Kitasono's poetic working methods with several translations of poems written in Japanese to English. He mentions that in the late 1920s, Katue published "Collection of White Poems" that was translated by Solt. This is a constellation long before Gomringer declared this form, concrete poetry, e.g. white residence - white table - pink noblelady - white distant view - blue sky, etc. Solt records the following. "Other Western poets took notice of the VOU translations. High praise came from Hugh Gordon Porteus, who wrote in Criterion in 1939, "The most fruitful experiments with language are likely to continue to emerge from those who concern themselves with images and their relations, rather than with idle wordspinning. Nothing...