Ohayo Gozaimasu
• Please have your Assignment #1 and Chart #1 out ready to
be stamped.
Facing your Literature Circle
• 15 minutes: review your assignments with
one another. I would like each of you to
share your findings and knowledge of your
subject.
• Ensure your name and assignment # (1A,
1C, etc. ) are on it.
• Have your chart out
• Stay on task
Book Group Discussion
You should be able to answer questions
about……..
• What are the four major Japanese
festivals?
• How are we seeing loneliness in the
novel? What is the cause of loneliness?
Is there a cure?
• What do we mean by emotional landscape
in the book? How does this relate to the
physical landscape? (Hint: think about
Sachi’s garden, Matsu’s garden, the storm,
etc)
• What can you say about the author’s
writing style?
What is the essence of
something?
Look at this
Ikebana
arrangement
of flowers.
What do you
notice? Can
you sketch the
essence?
What is important about
negative space?
Look at this garden….
How does this garden differ?
Which do you like better?
• Why?
“Nature does not happen; it is wrought
(made).” From “The Essence of Japan” by Donald Richie
“The arrangement is not only in
the branches, the leaves, the
flowers. It is also in the spaces
between.”
“Wood is carved with the grain so that the natural
shape can assert itself. … the Japanese carpenter
finds the shape within the tree. Or, within the rock,
for stone too has grain, and this the mason finds,
chipping away to reveal the form beneath.”
“There are no opposites…the opposites
are one.”
“As the single finger bends the branch, so the
social hand inclines the individual. If the unkempt
tree is not considered natural, then the unkempt
life is equally out of bounds.”
How can we apply the concept
of negative space to our novel?
• What is not being said?
• What is not being revealed, portrayed,
understood.
• How does Matsu portray elements of
negative space?
Japanese Poetry
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•
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•
•
Suggestion
Symbols
Simplicity
(Goal, means, result)
Imagination
Haiku
On a withered branch
A crow has settled –
autumn nightfall.
- Matsuo Basho
Even stones in streams
of mountain water compose
songs to wild cherries.
- Uejima Onitsura
On top of skeletons
they put a gala dress, and then –
the flower-viewing!
- Uejima Onitsura (1660-1738)
Have a Happy Break!
• Begin Assignment #2
• Begin Chart #2
• Read to page 70!
• Now let’s cast our wishes- think in the
spirit of Thanksgiving!
Tanka
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•
•
•
“short songs”
5 lines
31 syllables
5-7-5-7-7
This perfectly still
spring day bathed in the soft light
from the spread-out sky.
Why do the cherry blossoms
So restlessly scatter down?
- Ki no Tomonori
The clustering clouds –
Can it be they wipe away
The lunar shadows?
Every time they clear a bit
The moonlight shines brighter.
- Minamoto no Toshiyori
When I went to visit
The girl I love so much,
That winter night
The river blew so cold
That the plovers were crying.
- Ki Tsurayuki
Tanka Games!!!
Classmate poems
Think about the
essence of this
person.
I welcome you writing
even more than one.
Write it in tanka form.
It’s even cooler if it
connects with nature
Needs to be in my
hands by next week
Thursday.
Decorate these
beautifully.
Homework
• Read to page 113
• Book Group Project #3 is due the second class
period after break- get started? UP to you!
Sleep, rest, nap, meditate, chill out, do nothing,
zone out, be zen, sleep late, snooze in, eat.