Matsuo Bashô (1644-1694), known as one of Japan’s greatest poets, celebrated fûkyô (poetic eccentricity) as an important theme in his poetry. Why is deliberate eccentricity considered a poetic quality? What aesthetic, philosophical, and spiritual ideas are embodied in his eccentric personas? How the poetics of eccentricity formed and transformed over time and across cultures? This webinar explores these questions by examining selected poems and prose by Bashô, his predecessors, and disciples. Relevant Chinese classics are examined in discussing the cultural and philosophical contexts. The discussion draws on my book Bashô and the Dao: The Zhuangzi and the Transformation of Haikai.