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Unpublished haiku by Soseki Natsume found at ex-colleague's home

WAKAYAMA -- Unpublished haiku poems by Soseki Natsume (1867-1916), one of Japan's most celebrated writers, have been discovered at his former colleague's home here.

The haiku were found attached to a letter Natsume wrote to his former colleague Takehiko Ikai at a secondary school in Matsuyama, Ehime Prefecture, today's Matsuyama Higashi High School, according to Ikai's great granddaughter Tomoko Matsuda, 55, who held a news conference on June 10. The school is known as the setting for Natsume's 1906 novel "Botchan."

Natsume had written a letter to Ikai in 1896 as he was leaving Matsuyama to teach at a high school in Kumamoto Prefecture. In the letter, Natsume apologized for his absence when Ikai visited him to say farewell and expressed his gratitude for Ikai's tanka poems he had received.

"Natsume's unpublished haiku are rarely found. It shows the writer's polite manner that he took time to write a heart-felt letter just before he moved," said Mariko Noami, an assistant professor of modern Japanese literature at the National Institute of Japanese Literature, who confirmed the handwriting on the letter.

Three haiku were found in the Wakayama house. The one written at the end of the letter and another one on a separate paper strip are believed to be unpublished.

June 11, 2014(Mainichi Japan)

☆ 漱石さんのお人柄が偲ばれるエピソードだ。「he took time to write a heart-felt letter just before he moved」が暖かい。

☆他方、漱石さんは、肩書きや権力で理不尽なことを言う者に対しては、ほとんど容赦がなかったと言っていい。次の日記など、痛烈を通り超して爽快感さえ覚えますよ、漱石さん。

「文科大学にて神話を科目に入れんとするの議を起す。総長浜尾新「神話」の神の字が国体に関係ある由にて抗議を申し込む。明治四十二年の東京大学総長の頭脳の程度はこの位にて勤まるものと知るべし。」（夏目漱石・明治42（1909）年7月26日）Super！