著者

土田 耕督

出版者

美学会

雑誌

美学 (ISSN:05200962)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.69, no.1, 2018

---

In the beginning of the thirteenth century, during the Shin-kokin period, waka poetsfollowed classicism, reusing words and subjects from old poems. At the same time, theywere in pursuit of atarashiki kokoro, or new content. New kokoro does not representperfect newness that has never been composed; it represents content that overlaps withthe classics. Moreover, the word atarashi has ambiguity; while new content is indeedideal, novel subjects and how to use words are avoided. On the other hand, the wordmezurashi means a kind of unexpectedness achieved by using old words in differentcontexts from past works. Mezurashi becomes especially significant in post-Shin-kokinwaka.Nevertheless, since the fifteenth century, old poetry has begun to be ignored, and thefocus has shifted to the kokoro of an individual poet. Atarashi, implying a newness thatnobody has composed before, is emphasised and involves mezurashi. Such idealisationof novelty, which is regardless of differences from the old, brings the modern meaningof 'originality' to medieval waka.However, the classicism of waka never died until the modern era. Autonomoussystems that identify differences from the classics as a norm have existed; thereby wakahas acquired the extendibility and sustainability of composition.