Not Seeing Snow: Musō Soseki and Medieval Japanese Zen offers a detailed look at a crucial yet sorely neglected figure in medieval Japan. It clarifies Musō’s far-reaching significance as a Buddhist leader, waka poet, landscape designer, and political figure. In doing so, it sheds light on how elite Zen culture was formed through a complex interplay of politics, religious pedagogy and praxis, poetry, landscape design, and the concerns of institution building. The appendix contains the first complete English translation of Musō’s personal waka anthology, Shōgaku Kokushishū.
目次
Zen in the Generations Before Musō: The Growth of the Gozan System in Medieval Japan 1 - 27 A Master Defined: Musō Soseki in Muchū mondōshū 28 - 59 Beneath the Ice: Musō Soseki and the Waka Tradition 60 - 104 Blossoms before Moss: Medieval Views of Musō Soseki’s Saihōji 105 - 143 Changing Agendas at Musō Soseki’s Tenryūji 144 - 178 Epilogue 179 - 181 Appendix: Shōgaku Kokushishū 183 - 236 Bibliography Index
