This exploration of the life and times of a poet in late medieval Japan is a companion volume to the author's translation of "The Journal of Socho", the travel diary and poetic memoir of Saiokuken Socho (1448-1532), the preeminent linked-verse (renga) poet of his generation. "H. Mack Horton has succeeded admirably in bringing to life not only the rich humanity of Socho, his poetry, and his text, but also the literary world in which he was active . . . .[Song in an Age of Discord contains] rich, multifaceted contextualizations of Socho and his life in a time of turmoil and transition."