Man 'yoshu Book 16: A New English Translation Containing the Original Text, Kana Transliteration, Romanization, Glossing and Commentary.

• Author: Kupchik, John

Man 'yoshu Book 16: A New English Translation Containing the Original Text, Kana Transliteration, Romanization, Glossing and Commentary. By ALEXANDER VOVIN. Leiden: BRILL. 2021. Pp. xviii + 199. $168.

Alexander Vovin's new English translation of Man'ydshu (MYS) Book 16 is the tenth book of the MYS he has translated since 2009. Vovin considers his translation and analysis of Book 16's 104 poems (MYS 3786-3889) to be "academic" rather than "literary" (p. ix), and 1 would agree with that assessment. He gives equal weight to detailed linguistic and philological discussions on the one hand, and clear descriptions of the important cultural and historical backgrounds of the words, poems, and poets on the other. This helps make the book accessible to researchers from a wide range of fields and is a welcome improvement upon the previous English translations of Book 16 by Jan L. Pierson, Honda Heihachiro, and Suga Teruo.

In MYS 16 we find a hearty dose of playfulness and humor, along with a smattering of vulgarity, unlike in any other book of the eighth-century poetic anthology. To give an idea of what sort of content the reader can expect. Vovin notes (p. 1) that this is the only Old Japanese (OJ) text to include attestations of the words kuso 'feces', mar- 'to defecate', kapa kuma 'privy, toilet', tapusaki 'loincloth', and waki kusa 'armpit hair". However, the common MYS themes of love and longing are also found in many of the poems, written in more conventional vocabulary.

The book begins with a helpful introductory chapter that describes general background information. the poetic sequences, previous scholarship, the script (including some of the more unusual features, described on p. 7), loanwords, a brief discussion on the possible compiler of the book, and the textual history. In addition, all of the Man 'yogana (Chinese characters used as phonograms in the MYS) attested in the poems in this book are presented (pp. 11-24), with all possible readings (ongana. kungana, disyllabic ongana, disyllabic kungana, trisyllabic kungana) listed. After the introduction, each poem is presented in the original script followed by a transliteration in kana, a romanization, a glossing with a morphemic analysis, a translation, and a commentary. Prefaces and postscripts to the poems written in Chinese are presented in the original script, followed by a translation and commentary. Throughout the book Vovin displays a refreshing aversion to embellishment and an overarching focus on linguistic accuracy. In his own words, he states, "I have endeavored to make the translation as literal as possible without violating English usage" (p. ix). He achieved this difficult goal in most cases, but some of his translations would have benefited from a slightly less literal interpretation, such as the translation of poem 3829 (p. 98): "Do not give a hot meal from a water leek to me who asked for a sea bream covered by a garlic in vinegar and soy sauce."

MYS 16 is also of great importance...