2016 Volume 2016 Issue 26 Pages 15-31,118-117
The manuscript of the Eiga taigai 詠歌大概 held by the National Institute of Japanese Literature has been copied together with six other selections of poems. In this article, I examine its provenance and handwriting and show that it is in the hand of Shōkadō Shōjō 松花堂昭乗, and I also consider its position as a treatise on poetry and touch on connections with Shōjō's calligraphic activities.
First, with regard to its provenance and handwriting, I examine it in relation to the Wakan rōeishū 和漢朗詠集 in Shōjō's hand (copied in Keichō 慶長 17 [1612] and held by the Department of Japanese Literature, Faculty of Letters, Hōsei University). This manuscript of the Wakan rōeishū and the Eiga taigai held by the National Institute of Japanese Literature have bibliographical points in common, and it is to be surmised that they were transmitted together. Further, through a comparison with character shapes in the Wakan rōeishū and other works by Shōjō, the Eiga taigai held by the National Institute of Japanese Literature can be considered to be the work of Shōjō. That is to say, it may be assumed to have been copied by Shōjō around the same time as he copied the Wakan rōeishū.
Next, I examine textual characteristics of the Eiga taigai held by the National Institute of Japanese Literature by taking up “Poems by Thirty-Six New Immortal Poets” among the poems included in this work. Among manuscripts belonging to the same line of texts and predating Shōjō's text there is the Shin sanjūrokunin kasen 新三十六人哥仙 (Thirty-Six New Immortal Poets) in the hand of Reizei Tamehiro 冷泉爲廣 (copied in Eishō 永正 4 [1507] and held by Jingū Library), and through a comparison of the two texts it can be pointed out that Shōjō's “Poems by Thirty-Six New Immortal Poets” preserves the best text of these poems. It may also be noted that the text of these “Poems by Thirty-Six New Immortal Poets” was later copied by Shōjō or his disciples onto coloured square sheets of paper and handscrolls. It is to be surmised, in other words, that the existence of this work also became a wellspring for new works of calligraphy in Shōjō's circles.
