Oku no Hosomichi (meaning Narrow Road to Oku [the Deep North]) is a major work by Matsuo Bashō. Oku no Hosomichi was written based on a journey taken by Bashō in the late spring of 1689. He and his traveling companion Sora departed from Edo (modern-day Tokyo) for the northerly interior region known as Oku, propelled mostly by a desire to see the places about which the old poets wrote. Travel in those days was, of course, very dangerous to one’s health, but Bashō was committed to a kind of poetic ideal of wandering. He travelled for about 156 days all together, covering thousands of miles mostly on foot. Of all of Bashō’s works, Oku no Hosomichi is best known.

During his lifetime, Bashō was recognized for his works in the collaborative haikai no renga form; today, after centuries of commentary, he is recognized as the greatest master of haiku (then called hokku). He is quoted as saying, “Many of my followers can write hokku as well as I can. Where I show who I really am is in linking haikai verses.” This short anthology of haiku by Bashō and his pupils features poetry in their original Japanese, with translations and commentary in English by Basil Hall Chamberlain, a professor of Japanese at Tokyo Imperial University.