Nishiyama Sōin
Nishiyama Sōin was a haikai-no-renga poet of the early Tokugawa period. He founded the Danrin school of haikai poetry, which aimed to move away from the serious 'bookishness' popular in Japanese poetry at the time and become more in touch with the common people, infusing a spirit of greater freedom into their poetry.
Sōin's haikai became the transition between the light and clever haikai of Matsunaga Teitoku and the more serious and aesthetic renku of Matsuo Bashō.
