The image of birds in the Japanese poetic work of Matsuo Basho and its translations

In the article below we define the poetic text and aim to delineate the types of contemporary Japanese poetry. Currently the notion of haiku is becoming more and more popular, for these reasons we try to bring to light the most pertinent characteristics of Japanese poetry. In the context of this article, it is a type of texts closely related to the specifics of the source language, in which they were created, the Japanese language. Kigo is a specific concept for Japanese poetic texts, used intensively by the famous poet Matsuo Basho. Kigo represents the totality of words that suggest a certain season in a haiku. There are symbolic elements well known throughout the world, such as snow for winter, multi-coloured leaves - autumn, flowering trees - spring, heat, or some types of fruit - summer. Birds can also be included in these categories of specific notions. It is amazing how the presence of a tender, winged creature can instantly suggest the season the author is trying to emerge us into. The image of birds is often accompanied by auditory effects, but also by cognitive associations based on general knowledge about nature, but also on the reader’s personal memories.