Fujiwara-no-Kanefusa's dream tale of the old poet Kakinomoto-no-Hitomaro appears in Jukkin-sho and Kokin-chomonshu, the two collections of tales completed during the mid-Kamakura Period. Although this tale is often treated as a mere fantasy, it should be read in the context of the other dream narratives of the age. Indeed, with the beginning of the movement of reevaluating old poems, many dream tales or cases, in which such dead great men of letters as Kenri, Gyoson or Toshiyori appeared, were narrated and reported in order to authorize the tradition of each poetical school. Kanefusa's tale, one of the most representative dream tales of the Kamakura Period, also had the very function to make and preserve the literary tradition.
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