Tomorrow is International Haiku Poetry Day (what do you mean, you didn’t know?!), and what better way to celebrate than a blog post commemorating this beloved genre of poetry. Established in 2007, Haiku Poetry Day aims to encourage creativity, the sharing of poetry, and, of course, appreciation of the haiku. The haiku form originated in Japan in the mid-1600s, but it wasn’t until the 1900s that they started appearing in Western literature. Now, most of us are familiar with the Haiku (typically 3 lines, with a syllable pattern of 5-7-5) and are popular thanks to their simple style.
Whilst Haikus tend to celebrate the natural world, the ones below are slightly different – inspired by great novels and summarised into haiku form. That’s right, novels of around 80,000 words summed up into 17 syllables – because now that exam season is nearly upon us, we don’t all have time to chow down on a great big book.
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, by Roald Dahl
A factory tour
Goes terribly wrong because
Children are awful.
Life of Pi, by Yann Martel
Shipwrecked boy on boat
Richard Parker hides there too
Believe what you will.
Pride and Prejudice, by Jane Austen
Liz is prejudiced,
Darcy is proud. They must make
a perfect couple.
Frankenstein, by Mary Shelley
Frankenstein wasn’t
the monster; maybe he was?
Regency sci-fi.
The Lord of the Flies, by William Golding
Boys stranded without
parental supervision
vote each other off
Great Expectations, by Charles Dickens
Pip’s expectations
are great. But Miss Havisham’s,
sadly, are greater.
If you feel like reading the full novels, you can find them all in the Classics section in Filton LRC. Alternatively, if you would like to create your own Haikus, all of us in the LRC would love to check them out.
Haiku creds go to some clever people on the internet at Wellington City Library and Barnes & Noble. You can read more of their haiku/novel amalgamations here:
http://www.wcl.govt.nz/blogs/teens/index.php/book-lists/classic-novels-in-haiku/
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/blog/9-great-novels-summarized-as-haikus/
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