Japanese Aesthetics

Mono no Aware

This is where mono no aware comes in. With this mood, acceptance of impermanence and insubstantiality is elevated into an aesthetic sensibility, a state of mind that actually appreciates this ephemerality. This does not mean impermanence is welcomed or celebrated. There is still sadness present in mono no aware, a sorrow at this transiency, of the loss of people and things that are precious to us. However, this melancholy is suffused with a quiet rejoicing in the fact that we had the chance to witness the beauty of life at all, however fleetingly. We are sighing rather than weeping. This mood was captured with particular genius by the poet Matsuo Bashō (1644-1694), arguably the greatest master of the Haiku. Many of his poems are revered as perfectly articulating mono no aware, perhaps above all this...

Summer grasses —

the only remains

of warriors’ dreams. 

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