Influenced by the Buddhist view of human life as transient, and by the Buddhist distrust of love, the compilers of the Kokinwakashū in the five books of love poems structured the development of an imaginary romance according to a pattern of blossoming, flourishing and decline. It is interesting to note that the different stages of this romance are described from beginning to end through impressive images of water. A mountain torrent running swiftly suggests the intense agitation of feelings caused by love. Waterfalls and waves are very effective to express people’s rising rumors about a love affair, whereas rivers and sometimes oceans offer an obvious metaphor for lover’s tears of grief and tears of longing. In some cases, an heartless woman who refuses her suitor is described as a desolate bay, while an abandoned lover feels like vanishing bubbles on running water. According to the first imperial anthology, love is a force of nature whose power is great enough to destroy man but it is also an impermanent and unreliable thing like a mountain torrent which continuously brings wherever it wants its agitated water.

Immagini d'acqua nelle poesie d'amore del Kokinwakashu

NEGRI, Carolina
2009-01-01

Abstract

Influenced by the Buddhist view of human life as transient, and by the Buddhist distrust of love, the compilers of the Kokinwakashū in the five books of love poems structured the development of an imaginary romance according to a pattern of blossoming, flourishing and decline. It is interesting to note that the different stages of this romance are described from beginning to end through impressive images of water. A mountain torrent running swiftly suggests the intense agitation of feelings caused by love. Waterfalls and waves are very effective to express people’s rising rumors about a love affair, whereas rivers and sometimes oceans offer an obvious metaphor for lover’s tears of grief and tears of longing. In some cases, an heartless woman who refuses her suitor is described as a desolate bay, while an abandoned lover feels like vanishing bubbles on running water. According to the first imperial anthology, love is a force of nature whose power is great enough to destroy man but it is also an impermanent and unreliable thing like a mountain torrent which continuously brings wherever it wants its agitated water.
2009
L'acqua non è mai la stessa. Le acque nella tradizione culturale dell'Asia
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Utilizza questo identificativo per citare o creare un link a questo documento: https://hdl.handle.net/10278/31697
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