THE HERITAGE OF SYMBOLISM - THE “AESTHETIC” STYLE OF KITAHARA HAKUSHŪ AND MURAYAMA KAITA

Aug 22, 2026

Upload by Dozel

The paper examines how late nineteenth-century French poetry shaped Japanese poetics through Ueda Bin’s influential translations, focusing on Kaichōon (The Sound of the Tide, 1905) and its dense presence of symbolism-associated writers. It traces the emergence and conceptual vocabulary of European symbolism, including Moréas’s manifesto claims, then connects these aesthetic ideas to Japanese literary practice via anthologies and poets influenced by Bin. It further highlights the Pan no Kai (Pan Society), linking cross-arts interaction, café-like debate, and the formation of a Japanese “aesthetic” poetics around Kitahara Hakushū and Murayama Kaita.

LanguageEnglish

CategoryLiterature

FormatPDF

Pages28

Reading Time43 min

AccessFree to download

The Heritage of Symbolism: The “Aesthetic” Style of Kitahara Hakushū and Murayama Kaita

French symbolism and Ueda Bin’s translations

Moréas’s manifesto and the constructed genealogy of symbolism

Kaichōon’s influence and the Pan Society (Pan no Kai)

Japanese “aesthetic” poetics and major poets

“The Heritage of Symbolism: The ‘Aesthetic ’ Style of Kitahara Hakushū and Murayama Kaita” Jeffrey Angles Proceedings of the Association for Japanese Literary Studies 4 (2003): 237–263. PAJLS 4: Japanese Poeticity and Narrativity Revisited. Ed. Eiji Sekine. THE HERITAGE OF SYMBOLISM: THE “AESTHETIC” STYLE OF KITAHARA HAKUSHŪ AND MURAYAMA KAITA Jeffrey Angles The Ohio State University KAICHŌON (THE SOUND OF THE TIDE), THE PAN NO KAI (PAN SOCIETY), AND JASHŪMON (HERETICAL FAITH) The Japanese encounter with late nineteenth-century French poetry through introductory surveys and translations by Ueda Bin (1874–1916) had a profound impact on Japanese poetics. Perhaps the most influential of his work was the collection Kaichōon (The Sound of the Tide, 1905) .1 Although it contained translations of poets as diverse as Sappho and Shakespeare, over half of Kaichoōn consisted of translations of French and Belgian poets, especially writers directly associated with symbolism or retroactively claimed by its adherents as progenitors of the school.2 1 Ueda Bin, Kaichōon, ed. Kenmochi Takehiko, Kobori Keiichirō, Mori Ryō and Yasuda Yasuo, Meiji Tasihō yaku shishū, Nihon kindai bungaku taikei 52 (Tokyo: Kadokawa Shoten, 1971) 169–264. 2 Kaichoōn includes a number of works important in the development of European symbolism, such as “Paraboles,” “Chanson d’automne,” and “Mon rêve familier” by Paul Verlaine (1844–1896) and “Soupir” by Stéphane Mallarmé(1842–1898), but it also includes the work of other authors associated with the symbolist school, such as the Belgian poet Emile Verhaeren (1855–1916), the French poets Henri de Régnier (1864–1936) and Albert Samain (1858–1900), and the Greek-born poet Jean Moréas (1856–1910) . Although literary historians often speak of symbolism as a movement with clear founders and adherents, in reality, it is a broad concept that has been retroactively constructed and reconstructed throughout literary history. Kenneth Cornell’s survey of French literary magazines and manifestos ofthe late nineteenth century suggests that even as the term gained currency in the mid-1880s, there was little writing that was recognizably identifiable as “symbolist,” partly because the authors using the term at this early date wrote more criticism than poetry; as a result, they produced few practical examples to illustrate what the “symbolist” style actually was. Kenneth Cornell, The Symbolist Movement (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1951) 42. A manifesto published in Figaro in September 1886 by Jean Moréas gave the nascent symbolist movement both its name and a lineage of “symbolist”poets that included Verlaine, Mallarmé, Charles Baudelaire (1821–1867), and Théodore Faullain de Banville (1823–1891) . Moréas claimed that symbolist writing should consist of an “archetypal and complex style” made up of “good language” that has been “restored and modernized” and fashioned into phrases of“unpolluted words.” He claimed symbolist art would possess ambiguous and suggestive expressions that could, in the language of Neo-Platonism, point to the Yosano Tekkan (1873–1935) noted that this anthology gave “the same nourishment to Meiji and Taishō poetry that Po Chü-I’s Works had afforded Heian literature,” and it inspired young poets as diverse as Kanbara Ariake (1876–1952) and Miki Rofū (1889–1964).3 One group that fell under the spell of Kaichoōn was the Pan no Kai (Pan Society), an organization founded to promote interactions between visual artists and poets and to imitate the café discussions of art and literature common to France in the late nineteenth century. The society, which poet and playwright Kinoshita Mokutarō (1885–1945) had named after the mischievous Greek god of shepherds and flocks, first met in a restaurant on the Sumida River on December 12, 1908. In attendance were the founders of the art and poetry journal Hōsun (Square Inch of Feeling): Yamamoto Kanae (1882–1946), an oil painter who would later pl

FAQs

How did Ueda Bin’s translations influence Japanese poetics?

Ueda Bin’s introductory surveys and translations introduced late nineteenth-century French poetry to Japan, with Kaichōon serving as a particularly influential collection rich in symbolism-associated French and Belgian writers.

Why does the paper argue that symbolism is not a simple movement with clear founders?

The paper treats symbolism as a broad retroactively constructed concept, shaped by changing literary usage and manifestos, rather than as a movement with a fixed set of originators and practitioners.

What role did the Pan no Kai (Pan Society) play in transmitting aesthetic ideas?

The Pan no Kai organized interactions between visual artists and poets and sought to imitate French café discussions of art and literature, with members reading Bin and deliberating on art history, impressionism, and related debates.

Aug 22, 2026

Upload by Dozel