Shido, The Way of Poetry

About the Book

Born in a wartime Relocation Center for Japanese-Americans in 1944, Tanaka uses the Zen parable to create a voice for those Americans who feel that they are ‘living in a cultural vacuum’ on the margins of society. These small stories are kata or form exercises in spiritual self-definition, where the reader is shown how to create his or her own virtual literary culture. At the same time, Shidó focuses on the process of writing poetry as a spiritual discipline in which the poems themselves become stepping stones to spiritual ends.

Originally published by the Journal of Ethnic Studies in 1982, Shidó is the companion volume to The Shino Suite, published by the Greenfield Review Press in 1981 and reprinted by Authors Choice Press in 2000. With these two texts, the reader can see the abrupt and often irreverent juxtaposition of theory and practice that is the mark of Tanaka’s literary style.

This iUniverse.com reprinting features all new illustrations by Seattle artist, Louise Kikuchi from her Zen Buddhist series, ‘Tao, Seeking a Way.’ It also includes, ‘Son3ts&Mot3ts,’ which follows the poet of the Way into cyberspace, and ‘StreetRac3r,’ one of the first poems ever written on street tuning a Honda Civic.

About the Author

Ronald Phillip Tanaka attended Pomona College and the University of California, Berkeley, where he took his Ph.D. in English. He is currently Professor of English at California State University, Sacramento. His other books include Systems Models for Literary-Macro Theory and The Shino Suite: Sansei Poetry.