Oritaku Shiba no Ki (折りたく柴の記, "Told Round a Brushwood Fire") is an autobiographical text written by Japanese Edo-period scholar-official Arai Hakuseki (1657–1725).
801 in the Shin Kokin Wakashū poetry anthology:[1] This poem was written by Emperor Go-Toba.
He argues that Hakuseki did not have a talent for waka and hence he could not have based the title on this poem.
Further, in a correspondence with Mura Kyūsō (室鳩巣), Hakuseki writes about his father saying "They would burn brushwood and talk of things past and present throughout the night".
[3] Oritaku Shiba no Ki has been translated into English by Joyce Ackroyd and released in 1979 under the title Told Round a Brushwood Fire and published by Princeton University Press.