This paper examined the phenomenon of “earthquake disaster poetry,” which was previously unseen and analyzed its various types by focusing on hundreds of Tanka composed by several poets just after the Great Kanto Earthquake in 1923. This analysis ...
This paper examined the phenomenon of “earthquake disaster poetry,” which was previously unseen and analyzed its various types by focusing on hundreds of Tanka composed by several poets just after the Great Kanto Earthquake in 1923. This analysis strived to show literary expressions, their features, and the role of poetry as earthquake disaster literature in modern-day Japan. Earthquake disaster Tanka can be typified as follows: works that keep the character as the literary record; works that describe feelings of trouble and psychological complication; and works that show the true character of humans manifested while injured. Lack of narration, which is often a versicle, was made up by the shape of the work, which was produced in collaboration. In addition, the characters gave vivid documentation of science. Tanka poets planned for sympathy between an imbalance of the senses, a state of panic, and a spirit state catabolized by an unrealistic disaster and the survivors who offered descriptions of God-like things. Earthquake disaster Tanka succeeded in goodness and vice by showing that the true character of humans comes into focus and by presuming the varied groups formed by the victims. Through this analysis, the following items were confirmed: messages as the things with which poetry responded to the most serious earthquake in modern Japanese times; a recovery of the aspect in detail; and the life formalized in literature.