was a Japanese waka poet and poetry scholar of the late Heian period.Suzuki et al. 2009 : 106.
He was the secondMcMillan 2010 : 147 (note 84). son of , compiler of the Shika Wakashū.
Poetry The following poem by him was included as No. 84 in Fujiwara no Teika's Ogura Hyakunin Isshu: Japanese textRomanized JapaneseMcMillan 2010 : 172.English translationMcMillan 2010 : 86.ながらへば またこのごろや しのぼれむ 憂しとみし世ぞ 今は恋しきNagaraeba mata kono goro ya shinobaren ushi to mishi yo zo ima wa koishikiIf I live long, I may look back with yearning for these painful days— the world that now seems harsh may then appear sweet and good!
He was a member of the conservative Rokujō school of poetic composition, and Donald Keene has called him a "mediocre poet".Keene 1999 : 337 (note 154). Suzuki et al., however, say that his brilliant poetry scholarship put him at the top of the waka world in his day.Suzuki et al. 2009 : 106 "歌学にすぐれ、当時の歌壇の第一人者となる。"
He was one of the first to apply rules of choosing themes, participants and judges in the uta-awase poetry gatherings.Keene 1999 : 648. His standards of judging poetry, made him a rival of Fujiwara no Shunzei.Keene 1999 : 649-650.
About 1165, Emperor Nijō commissioned him to compile a waka anthology, which became the .Keene 1999 : 319. He compiled twenty books of 998 poems, a much larger anthology than its namesake, and submitted to the emperor expecting for it to be recognized as the seventh imperial anthology. The emperor died before its completion, and it remains consigned to the status of a private collection. Ultimately ninety-four of his poems were included in imperial collections.
Scholarship Kiyosuke is known primarily as the author of the and the . He was one of the first scholars to question the traditional 905 date of the Kokin Wakashū.
In the 1170s, Kiyosuke became the poetry tutor of Fujiwara no Kanezane of the Kujō family. He served as a judge for a number of poetry competitions hosted by Kanezane.
Legacy Kiyosuke's library was known and admired by other poets both in his lifetime and after his death. The poet Fujiwara no Teika of the rival Mikohidari poetic house described him as the "Confucian scholar" of waka. According to the 13th century Kokon Chomonjū, Kiyosuke left his waka library to his half brother .
References
Bibliography
External links E-text of his poems in Japanese.