Fujiwara no Yoshitaka


Fujiwara no Yoshitaka was a Japanese waka poet of the mid-Heian period. One of his poems was included in the Ogura Hyakunin Isshu. He produced a private waka collection, the Yoshitaka-shū.

Biography

Yoshitaka was born in 954, the son of Fujiwara no Koretada.
He served as ushōshō. He was the father of the respected calligrapher Yukinari.　When his father died, Yoshitaka considered ordaining as a Buddhist monk. In the same year his son was born, which dissuaded him from pursuing a religious career.
He died in 974, at age twenty, of smallpox, on the same day as his twin brother.

Poetry

Twelve of his poems were included in imperial anthologies, and he was listed as one of the Late Classical Thirty-Six Immortals of Poetry.
The following poem by him was included as No. 50 in Fujiwara no Teika's Ogura Hyakunin Isshu:
He left a private collection, the Yoshitaka-shū.