Taking in songs, dramas, tales, diaries and above all, poetry, this revelatory anthology roams over mountains and along perilous shores to show how profoundly travel has inspired the Japanese imagination. Included here are selections from the 8th-century Manyoshu, a massive trove of poems; the genre-defying Pillow Book of a thousand years ago; Abutsu's Diary of the Waning Moon; A Tale Unaskedby concubine-turned-nun Lady Nijo; and the brilliant haiku that Basho composed on his journeys.