Basho - great Japanese poet, verse theorist . Born in 1644 in the small castle town of Ueno, Iga Province (Honshu Island) . He died on 12 October 1694 in Osaka .. Sensing the ideological limitations and thematic narrowness of modern Japanese poetry, Base in the early eighties turned to classical Chinese poetry of the VIII-XII centuries. Basho's poetic works belong to the haiku style, a very special form of lyrical miniature. For the rest of his life, Basho traveled, drawing strength in the beauties of nature. His followers followed him in droves, everywhere he was met by the ranks of admirers - peasants and samurai .. His travels and his genius gave a new heyday to the prose genre, so popular in Japan - the genre of travel diaries, which originated in the X century.