Japanese literature, at least before the Meiji era, was undoubtedly often influenced by Chinese literature. But some overstatements should be avoided. Recently a Japanese scholar demonstrated that the poem entitled “ A Dialogue on Poverty ” by the 8th century Japanese poet Yamanoe Okura, preserved in the Manyōshū, was influenced by the poem “On Poor Gentlemen” by T’ao Yüan-ming, a Chinese poet of the 4th century. This view, however, seems to me to be somewhat erroneous. In the first place, the feeling of the two poems is quite different. Yamanoe complains of poverty as a thoroughly hateful thing, while T’ao’s view is not quite so severe. If one is to look for Chinese influences in the poem, I believe better examples can be found. For instance Yamanoe’s lines :
“Wide as they call the heaven and earth, For me they have shrunk quite small;”
(The Manyōshū, Sasaki and Others, pp. 205-207)
would seem to derive from the Book of Odes
““ The heaven’s lid high，” not dare to stand up straight ; “ The earth’s crust thick,” not dare to not tread light ; ”
(Ezra Pound, The Classic Anthology Defined by Confucius, p.192)
while Yamanoe’s lines :
“ But I cannot fly away, Wanting the wings of a bird.”
seem to derive from the Book of Odes
“… I Clutch here at words, Having no force to fly.”
(Ibid, p.12)
Furthermore we may find in Yamanoe’s poem a manner of expression which is typically Japanese. It would be hard to find an equivalent in Chinese literature, for example, for the following statement of Yamanoe’s :
“ And stroking my scanty beard, I say in my pride, ‘ There’s none worthy, save I ! ’”
