SOURCE: Ueda, Makoto. “Yoshimoto on the Art of Linked Verse: Verse-Writing as a Game.” In Literary and Art Theories in Japan, pp. 37-54. Cleveland, Oh.: The Press of Western Reserve University, 1967.

In the following excerpt, Ueda discusses Yoshimoto's views on particular aspects of linked verse, including how it should be judged, its social and personal usefulness, and how to seek elegance in its composition.

Japanese linked verse is a rare verse form in which a poem is the product of a combined effort by a team of poets. Most commonly, the poem consists of one hundred stanzas with, alternately, seventeen (5-7-5) and fourteen (7-7) syllables each. A small number of poets, directed by a leader, compose one hundred stanzas usually at one sitting; they may take turns to contribute a stanza, or they may wait for a volunteer, stanza by stanza. It is much like a group...