The Tosa Diary

Tsurayuki is best known as a poet and as the author of The Tosa Diary (935). In both respects he was a pioneer. As a poet, he was the primary compiler of the Kokinshu (905), the premier anthology of court poetry. In its vernacular preface, as opposed to the one in Chinese written by another author, he made the first statement about the poetics of verse in Japanese. His diary was the first written in vernacular Japanese by a man in the persona of a woman, a literary landmark because the custom of the time was for men to keep diaries in Chinese. Tsurayuki was greatly esteemed as a poet and calligrapher in his own time and has been venerated ever since.

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