Programming Lessons from Japanese Poetry
Talkat PythonAsia 2026 · on Saturday, 2026-03-21· at 16:15· Yuchengco Hall 5th Flr. Y507 (Workshop Room 1)·
summary
Maps specific Zen of Python aphorisms to haiku features, citing Bashō, Buson, Issa and Shiki and showing code snippets where denser formatting drops readability while the sparser version wins; notes an odd audience count of about 3.5 people familiar with haiku; argues quick prototyping (now aided by AI) matters but not every idea ships; contrasts explicit code with haiku-friendly ambiguity; recommends concrete practices: simplicity, sparsity, objectivity.
AI-written summary · about
chapters (7)
- 0:00Welcome
- 1:11Personal haiku journey
- 4:51What defines a haiku
- 8:46Zen of Python vs haiku
- 17:23Explicitness in code and poetry
- 20:12Software lessons from haiku
- 23:22Summary
related talks
02h 05mWhy We’re Teaching Programming Wrong: A Haskell Perspective
26mSurviving Without Python
43mJust for Fun: Rediscovering Coding as a Hobby
21mPeople, The Good Parts
46mThe Zen of Programming. A personal journey towards writing beautiful code.
52mThe Zen of Programming
46mStaying Human While Coding
34mWhat I Learned about Code Review Teaching 8th Grade Poetry