All Formats & Editions

'It was with awe
That I beheld
Fresh leaves, green leaves,
Bright in the sun'

In his perfectly crafted haiku poems, Basho described the natural world with great simplicity and delicacy of feeling. When he composed The Narrow Road to the Deep North,... Read Full Overview

A classic translation of Basho's most famous travel journal

In the account which he named "The Narrow Road to Oku," Basho makes a journey lasting 150 days, in which he travels, on foot, a distance of 600 ri.

This was three hundred years ago, when the average distance covered by travelers was apparently 9 ri per day, so... Read Full Overview

In the seventeenth century, the pilgrim-poet Basho undertook on foot a difficult and perilous journey to the remote northeastern provinces of Honshu, Japan's main island. Throughout the five-month journey, the master of haiku kept a record of his impressions in a prose-poetry... Read Full Overview