Natsume Soseki is known to be a keen Chinese literature lover since his youth, and composed a large number of Chinese-style poems throughout his lifetime. Soseki notably displayed an affection for Tao Yuanming (365?-427). Soseki’s poem composition increased towards his late years, and influence from Tao is generally observed. The subject of the present work is an extract from the opening paragraph of Tao’s poem The Return. Following the magazine editor Takita Choin’s suggestion, Soseki calligraphed a few pieces of extracts from the poem in 1916, and the present work might be one of them. 

The Return was written after Tao’s resignation from his post of a low-ranking official as a prefectural governor, to which he felt ill-suited by nature, and return to the countryside. The poem praises the poet’s reclusion life, free of worldly cares and simply obeying the heavenly command, as the right way of living. The extract written in the present work starts with the yearning: “Get out of this and go back home,” expressing the poet’s determined will of leaving the wrong past behind and leading the right life from now on. 

Living a discontented life as a teacher, Soseki must not only admire Tao’s poems, but also the poet’s way of living as depicted in The Return.

Natsume Soseki
(novelist; 1867–1916)
Tokyo-born novelist. His name is Kinnosuke. Went to study in the United Kingdom after working as a high normal school and junior high school teacher. Became a lecturer of English at the First Higher School and Tokyo Imperial University. Started writing under Takahama Kyoshi’s urge. Starting with I Am a Cat, his varsetile body of writings include Sanshiro, And Then, The Gate, Kokoro, and unfinished last novel Light and Darkness. Composed over three thousand haiku, and produced extraordinary literati paintings in his late years. His works explore sophisticated issues in depth, and have been known to the world.