- Title Pages
- Dedication
- Acknowledgments
- List of Abbreviations
- Introduction
-
Forty About Hen-jo-dai-kyoku-ryū -
Forty-One The Central Place of Grace [en] in the Poetic Process -
Forty-Two Verses on the Moon, Flowers, and Snow -
Forty-Three The Verse of Ineffable Remoteness (Yōon) -
Forty-Four Renga Rules and Buddhist Precepts: -
Forty-Five Poetry and Zen Meditation, the Cosmic Body, and the True Word -
Forty-Six The Link Betwee Maeku and Tsukeku -
Forty-Seven The Nature and Goal of Criticism -
Forty-Eight Selecting Friends of the Way -
Forty-Nine The Close Link and the Distant Link -
Fifty On the Issue of the Ultimate Style -
Fifty-One Discipline in the Mind-Ground -
Fifty-Two Orthodoxy and Plurality -
Fifty-Three Reclusion -
Fifty-Four The Impartiality of Divine Response -
Fifty-Five Heredity, Social Status, and the Way -
Fifty-Six The Mark of Temporality in Talent, Training, and Fame or Obscurity -
Fifty-Seven The Difficulty of Achieving the Way: -
Fifty-Eight Mutually Supportive and Antagonistic Arts -
Fifty-Nine The Practice of Poetry in Our Time -
Sixty The Question of the True Buddha and the Ultimate Poem -
Sixty-One The Ten Virtues -
Sixty-Two Epilogue - Appendix: Biographical Notes
- Bibliography
- Character List
- Index of First Lines
- Subject Index
The Verse of Ineffable Remoteness (Yōon)
The Verse of Ineffable Remoteness (Yōon)
- Chapter:
- (p.145) Forty-Three The Verse of Ineffable Remoteness (Yōon)
- Source:
- Murmured Conversations
- Publisher:
- Stanford University Press
This chapter focuses on Shinkei's view of superior poetry and a medieval hermeneutic that, paradoxically, locates the poetic sublime beyond language. Shinkei laments the tendency of people to ignore verses whose diction and figuration have a certain ineffable remoteness (yōon. His emphasis is not the words or their particular arrangement, or even the sense they are (or are not) making, but rather their evocation of the ambiguity of things. This does not mean a rejection of the poem's diction, configuration, and meaning, but rather an attempt to highlight their combined effect as the place where value resides. In order to produce the ineffable, the mental/spiritual discipline and concentration of the seeker after Buddha-wisdom are required. The point is the temporality of phenomena, their relativity, and, consequently, their emptiness. Shinkei views the sublime, which he equates with the ultimate Dharma Body (dharmakāya), as the poem that is a meditation on emptiness.
Keywords: Shinkei, ineffable remoteness, yōon, Japanese poetry, sublime, emptiness, temporality
Stanford Scholarship Online requires a subscription or purchase to access the full text of books within the service. Public users can however freely search the site and view the abstracts and keywords for each book and chapter.
Please, subscribe or login to access full text content.
If you think you should have access to this title, please contact your librarian.
To troubleshoot, please check our FAQs , and if you can't find the answer there, please contact us.
- Title Pages
- Dedication
- Acknowledgments
- List of Abbreviations
- Introduction
-
Forty About Hen-jo-dai-kyoku-ryū -
Forty-One The Central Place of Grace [en] in the Poetic Process -
Forty-Two Verses on the Moon, Flowers, and Snow -
Forty-Three The Verse of Ineffable Remoteness (Yōon) -
Forty-Four Renga Rules and Buddhist Precepts: -
Forty-Five Poetry and Zen Meditation, the Cosmic Body, and the True Word -
Forty-Six The Link Betwee Maeku and Tsukeku -
Forty-Seven The Nature and Goal of Criticism -
Forty-Eight Selecting Friends of the Way -
Forty-Nine The Close Link and the Distant Link -
Fifty On the Issue of the Ultimate Style -
Fifty-One Discipline in the Mind-Ground -
Fifty-Two Orthodoxy and Plurality -
Fifty-Three Reclusion -
Fifty-Four The Impartiality of Divine Response -
Fifty-Five Heredity, Social Status, and the Way -
Fifty-Six The Mark of Temporality in Talent, Training, and Fame or Obscurity -
Fifty-Seven The Difficulty of Achieving the Way: -
Fifty-Eight Mutually Supportive and Antagonistic Arts -
Fifty-Nine The Practice of Poetry in Our Time -
Sixty The Question of the True Buddha and the Ultimate Poem -
Sixty-One The Ten Virtues -
Sixty-Two Epilogue - Appendix: Biographical Notes
- Bibliography
- Character List
- Index of First Lines
- Subject Index
