Customer Reviews

Haiku Guy (Soffietto Editions)

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If anyone out there has not yet read this book, you really owe it to yourselves. It's a rare book indeed, all about haiku and haiku poets, and that alone should make it mandatory (I feel certain you'll be recognizing with an "aha", much of what goes on within your own minds as you formulate your haiku moments). . . but rarer yet because it combines the story telling aspect of a novel with the didacticism of a textbook, though avoiding the dry pedantry of many other instructional texts. The book is written in funny, imaginative epidsodes, hop-scotching through time, depicting the life of Buck Teeth, an aspiring haiku poet who sojourns to the home of Issa, "Cup of Tea", as David calls him. We are confronted in a very real way with not only that which makes up the "substance" of genuine haiku, but also some rather profound, yet understated, revelations concerning the workings of the mind, and the greater sensibility and guiding aesthetic behind it. Truly, this is a very intelligently written book, and a definite must read for any serious haiku poet. And I must mention, that David is one of the few "haiku scholars" who can avoid letting his education get in the way of his humor. . . if fact, until reading this book, I thought the term, "haiku scholar" was completely oxymoronic.

Zolo

Only a true believer in the positive addictions of haiku writing, reading and being, and an ardent student of haiku literature and its most popular philosophic and aesthetic landscapes, legends, lore, and personalities, could write such droll entertainment as found in this first short novel by David G. Lanoue. What we have here is a kind of paean to the realities and mythologies of haiku, set in a wind-blown, temporary world where time and lastingness are without meaning and one-breath is the duration of human wisdom.

The protagonist of this tale can be viewed as the literary tradition of haiku itself, and its uncanny survival generation to generation, age to age, even country to country, culture to culture, language to language -- in a world peopled by fools who move from mystery to mystery in ardent pursuit and need of haiku's redeeming, simple cogence. It is the nature, spirit and character of the haiku poem that this novel reveals; the text is replete with over sixty fine examples. The people are just passing through, but in their passing they play their brief, essential roles as revelators.

Plot? There is none -- not exactly a plot, anyway. Actions and events are spontaneous, neither predictable nor linear. The novel flows like time-consciousness flows. Past, present, and future intermingle in a joyful, convincing chaos that creates its own inevitable order and comfortable familiarity. Lanoue thrusts his characters into a Buddha-dream world of random events and meetings, misdirection, hopeless desire and grasping, at the center of which we find the great poet Cup-of-Tea (Kobayashi Issa) in his later years, living in Kashiwabara village. Seeking the Master's guidance comes the clueless and desperate wannabe village poet, Buck-Teeth. Out of their meeting Lanoue weaves a narrative fabric colored by Old Japan and haiku's literary history, real and imagined, with new threads added from the bars, cafes and shrines of New Orleans' dingy and holy Bourbon Street. Here is a tale that conveys with memorable force a comic vision of the creative process.

I enjoyed this book immensely. It has a very "light" feel, but it also has substance. I like the mix of humor and pathos, but most of all I love the spirit of fun and invention and creativity. It's infectious and inspiring. And I learned some more about haiku.

The less said about the plot the better, as the joy of discovery is surely one of the main reasons to read this book yourself.

A tremendous read. Like many of David Lanoue's haiku, his novel about Haiku Guy is a simple story with a lot of hidden text under the surface. You don't need to catch all the subtext or know the details of Buddhism to enjoy the book, but it's even more fun when you do. I recommend this book very highly and I'd suggest you savor it rather than devour it quickly. I also know that David has at least two more novels in this style in manuscript form. Somebody out there needs to contact David about publishing them. I want more. I think a lot of people do.

There is so much to say about this book - its multidimensions....the interplay of the writer with the characters, and with the reader; just WHO the writer is - writer, student, mentor, seeker, guide; the incarnations of the characters; the shifting time frames with theme preserved throughout; the part the reader takes on quite inadvertently just because s/he is reading it....it's wonderful. I can't say enough. But I CAN highly recommend this book and encourage you to buy it and read it now, and again, and again. You won't want to put it down, I guarantee you! I am anxious to read more of Dr. Lanoue's thoughtful and entertaining writing - future books? I hope so!

Before reading this epic novel, my life was in totaly shambles. in fact, when i wasn't loathing my existence in this universe i was usually loathing the very existence of the universe. but then this book came along. and forever altered my perception of reality. suddenly birds were singing. grass was green and growing. the once feculent sky was blue and my life fell into order from the chaos that once engulfed it. i don't use the word hero very often as it is a powerful title, but i can say without hesitation that david lanoue is the greatest american hero to ever have lived.

What's with all these peoms? They're SUPER short.