JAPANESE LITERATURE
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'Japanese literature' spans a period of almost two millennia. Early works were heavily influenced by cultural contact with China and Chinese literature, often written in Classical Chinese. But Japanese literature developed into a separate style in its own right as Japanese writers began writing their own works about Japan, although the influence of Chinese literature and Classical Chinese remained until the end of Edo period. When Japan reopened its ports to Western trading and diplomacy in the 19th century, Western literature had a strong effect on Japanese writers, and this influence is still seen today.
Japanese Literature is generally divided into four main periods: ancient, classical, medieval, and modern.
With the introduction of kanji from China, the first writing in Japan became possible. Before this, there was no writing system. At first Chinese characters were used in Japanese syntactical formats, and the literary language was classical Chinese; the result is sentences that look like Chinese but are phonetically read as Japanese. Chinese characters were later adapted to write Japanese, creating what is known as the man'yÅgana, the earliest form of kana, or syllabic writing. The earliest works were created in the Nara Period. These include ''Kojiki'' (712), a work recording Japanese mythology and legendary history; ''Nihonshoki'' (720), a chronicle with a slightly more solid foundation in historical records than ''Kojiki''; and ''Man'yÅshÅ«'' (759), a poetry anthology.
Classical Japanese literature generally refers to literature produced during the Heian Period, what some would consider a golden era of art and literature. ''The Tale of Genji'' (early eleventh century) by Murasaki Shikibu is considered the pre-eminent masterpiece of Heian fiction and an early example of a work of fiction in the form of a novel. Other important works of this period include the ''Kokin Wakashū'' (905), a waka-poetry anthology, and ''The Pillow Book'' (990s), the latter written by Murasaki Shikibu's contemporary and rival, Sei Shonagon, as an essay about the life, loves, and pastimes of nobles in the Emperor's court. The ''iroha'' poem, now one of two standard orderings for the Japanese syllabary, was also written during the early part of this period.
In this time the imperial court patronized the poets, most of whom were courtiers or ladies-in-waiting. Editing anthologies of poetry was a national pastime. Reflecting the aristocratic atmosphere, the poetry was elegant and sophisticated and expressed emotions in a rhetorical style.
Medieval Japanese Literature is marked by the strong influence of Zen Buddhism, where characters are priests, travellers, or ascetic poets. Also during this period, Japan experienced many civil wars which led to the development of a warrior class, and subsequent war tales, histories, and related stories. Work from this period is notable for its insights into life and death, simple lifestyles, and redemption through killing. A representative work is ''The Tale of the Heike'' (1371), an epic account of the struggle between the Minamoto and Taira clans for control of Japan at the end of the twelfth century. Other important tales of the period include Kamo no ChÅmei's ''HÅjÅki'' (1212) and Yoshida Kenko's ''Tsurezuregusa'' (1331).
Other notable genres in this period were ''renga'', or linked verse, and Noh theater. Both were rapidly developed in the middle of the 14th century, the early Muromachi period.
Literature during this time was written during the largely peaceful Tokugawa Period (commonly referred to as the Edo Period). Due in large part to the rise of the working and middle classes in the new capital of Edo (modern Tokyo), forms of popular drama developed which would later evolve into kabuki. The joruri and kabuki dramatist Chikamatsu Monzaemon became popular at the end of the 17th century. Matsuo BashÅ wrote ''Oku no Hosomichi'' (奥ã®ç´°é“, 1702), a travel diary. Hokusai, perhaps Japan's most famous woodblock print artist, also illustrated fiction as well as his famous 36 Views of Mount Fuji.
Many genres of literature made their début during the Edo Period, helped by a rising literacy rate among the growing population of townspeople, as well as the development of lending libraries. Although there was a minor Western influence trickling into the country from the Dutch settlement at Nagasaki, it was the importation of Chinese vernacular fiction that proved the greatest outside influence on the development of Early Modern Japanese fiction. Ihara Saikaku might be said to have given birth to the modern consciousness of the novel in Japan, mixing vernacular dialogue into his humorous and cautionary tales of the pleasure quarters. Jippensha Ikku (å返舎一ä¹) wrote ''TÅkaidÅchÅ« hizakurige'' (æ±æµ·é“ä¸è†æ —毛), which is a mix of travelogue and comedy. Tsuga Teisho, Takebe Ayatari, and Okajima Kanzan were instrumental in developing the ''yomihon'', which were historical romances almost entirely in prose, influenced by Chinese vernacular novels such as Three Kingdoms and ''Shui hu zhuan''. Two ''yomihon'' masterpieces were written by Ueda Akinari: ''Ugetsu monogatari'' and ''Harusame monogatari''. Kyokutei Bakin wrote the extremely popular fantasy/historical romance ''NansÅ Satomi Hakkenden'' (å—ç·é‡Œè¦‹å…«çŠ¬ä¼) in addition to other yomihon. SantÅ KyÅden wrote yomihon mostly set in the gay quarters until the Kansei edicts banned such works, and he turned to comedic ''kibyÅshi''. Genres included horror, crime stories, morality stories, comedy, and pornography—often accompanied by colorful woodcut prints.
The Meiji era marks the re-opening of Japan to the West, and a period of rapid industrialization. The introduction of brought free verse into the poetic repertoire; it became widely used for longer works embodying new intellectual themes. Young Japanese prose writers and dramatists struggled with a whole galaxy of new ideas and artistic schools, but novelists were the first to successfully assimilate some of these concepts.
In the early Meiji era (1868–1880s), Fukuzawa Yukichi and Nakae Chomin authored Enlightenment literature, while pre-modern popular books depicted the quickly changing country. Then Realism was brought in by Tsubouchi Shoyo and Futabatei Shimei in the mid-Meiji (late 1880s–early 1890s) while the Classicism of Ozaki Koyo, Yamada Bimyo and Koda Rohan gained popularity. Higuchi Ichiyo, a rare woman writer in this era, wrote short stories on powerless women of this age in a simple style in between literary and colloquial. Izumi Kyoka, a favored disciple of Ozaki, pursued a flowing and elegant style and wrote early novels such as ''The Operating Room'' (1895) in literary style and later ones including ''The Holy Man of Mount Koya'' (1900) in colloquial.
Romanticism was brought in by Mori Ogai with his anthology of translated poems (1889) and carried to its height by Shimazaki Toson etc. and magazines ''MyÅjÅ'' and ''Bungaku-kai'' in early 1900s. Mori also wrote some modern novels including ''The Dancing Girl'' (1890), ''Wild Geese'' (1911), then later wrote historical novels. Natsume SÅseki, who is often compared with Mori Ogai, wrote ''I Am a Cat'' (1905) with humor and satire, then depicted fresh and pure youth in ''Botchan'' (1906) and ''Sanshirô'' (1908). He eventually pursued transcendence of human emotions and egoism in his later works including ''Kokoro'' (1914) his last and unfinished novel ''Light and darkness'' (1916).
Shimazaki shifted from Romanticism to Naturalism which was established with his ''The Broken Commandment'' (1906) and Katai Tayama's ''Futon'' (1907). Naturalism hatched "I Novel" (Watakushi-shôsetu) that describes about the authors themselves and depicts their own mental states. Neo-romanticism came out of anti-naturalism and was led by Nagai Kafu, Jun'ichirÅ Tanizaki, Kotaro Takamura, Kitahara Hakushu and so on in the early 1910s. Mushanokoji Saneatsu, Shiga Naoya and others founded a magazine ''Shirakaba'' in 1910. They shared a common characteristic, Humanism. Shiga's style was autobiographical and depicted states of his mind and sometimes classified as "I Novel" in this sense. RyÅ«nosuke Akutagawa, who was highly praised by Soseki, wrote short stories including ''RashÅmon'' (1915) with an intellectual and analytic attitude, and represented Neo-realism in the mid 1910s.
During the 1920s and early 1930s the proletarian literary movement, comprising such writers as Kobayashi Takiji, Kuroshima Denji, Miyamoto Yuriko, and Sata Ineko produced a politically radical literature depicting the harsh lives of workers, peasants, women, and other downtrodden members of society, and their struggles for change.
War-time Japan saw the début of several authors best known for the beauty of their language and their tales of love and sensuality, notably Jun'ichirŠTanizaki and Japan's first winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature, Kawabata Yasunari, a master of psychological fiction. Hino Ashihei wrote lyrical bestsellers glorifying the war, while Ishikawa Tatsuzo attempted to publish a disturbingly realistic account of the advance on Nanjing. Writers who opposed the war include Kuroshima Denji, Kaneko Mitsuharu, Oguma Hideo, and Ishikawa Jun.
World War II, and Japan's defeat, influenced Japanese literature. Many authors wrote stories of disaffection, loss of purpose, and the coping with defeat. Dazai Osamu's novel ''The Setting Sun'' tells of a soldier returning from Manchukuo. Mishima Yukio, well known for both his nihilistic writing and his controversial suicide by seppuku, began writing in the post-war period. Kojima Nobuo's short story "The American School" portrays a group of Japanese teachers of English who, in the immediate aftermath of the war, deal with the American occupation in varying ways.
Prominent writers of the 1970s and 1980s were identified with intellectual and moral issues in their attempts to raise social and political consciousness. One of them, Oe Kenzaburo wrote his best-known work, ''A Personal Matter'' in 1964 and became Japan's second winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature.
Inoue Mitsuaki had long been concerned with the atomic bomb and continued in the 1980s to write on problems of the nuclear age, while Endo Shusaku depicted the religious dilemma of the Kakure Kirishitan, Roman Catholics in feudal Japan, as a springboard to address spiritual problems. Inoue Yasushi also turned to the past in masterful historical novels of Inner Asia and ancient Japan, in order to portray present human fate.
Avant-garde writers, such as Abe Kobo, who wrote fantastic novels such as ''Woman in the Dunes'' (1960), wanted to express the Japanese experience in modern terms without using either international styles or traditional conventions, developed new inner visions. Furui Yoshikichi tellingly related the lives of alienated urban dwellers coping with the minutiae of daily life, while the psychodramas within such daily life crises have been explored by a rising number of important women novelists. The 1988 Naoki Prize went to Todo Shizuko for ''Ripening Summer'', a story capturing the complex psychology of modern women. Other award-winning stories at the end of the decade dealt with current issues of the elderly in hospitals, the recent past (Pure- Hearted Shopping District in Koenji, Tokyo), and the life of a Meiji period ukiyo-e artist. In international literature, Ishiguro Kazuo, a native of Japan, had taken up residence in Britain and won Britain's prestigious Booker Prize.
Murakami Haruki is one of the most popular and controversial of today's Japanese authors. His genre-defying, humorous and surreal works have sparked fierce debates in Japan over whether they are true "literature" or simple pop-fiction: Oe Kenzaburo has been one of his harshest critics. Some of his best-known works include ''Norwegian Wood'' (1987) and ''The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle'' (1994–1995). Another best-selling contemporary author is Banana Yoshimoto.
Although modern Japanese writers covered a wide variety of subjects, one particularly Japanese approach stressed their subjects' inner lives, widening the earlier novel's preoccupation with the narrator's consciousness. In Japanese fiction, plot development and action have often been of secondary interest to emotional issues. In keeping with the general trend toward reaffirming national characteristics, many old themes re-emerged, and some authors turned consciously to the past. Strikingly, Buddhist attitudes about the importance of knowing oneself and the poignant impermanence of things formed an undercurrent to sharp social criticism of this material age. There was a growing emphasis on women's roles, the Japanese persona in the modern world, and the malaise of common people lost in the complexities of urban culture.
Popular fiction, non-fiction, and children's literature all flourished in urban Japan in the 1980s. Many popular works fell between "pure literature" and pulp novels, including all sorts of historical serials, information-packed docudramas, science fiction, mysteries, detective fiction, business stories, war journals, and animal stories. Non-fiction covered everything from crime to politics. Although factual journalism predominated, many of these works were interpretive, reflecting a high degree of individualism. Children's works re-emerged in the 1950s, and the newer entrants into this field, many of them younger women, brought new vitality to it in the 1980s.
Manga (comic books) have penetrated almost every sector of the popular market. They include virtually every field of human interest, such as a multi volume high-school history of Japan and, for the adult market, a manga introduction to economics, and pornography. Manga represented between 20 and 30 percent of annual publications at the end of the 1980s, in sales of some ¥400 billion per year.
Famous authors and literary works of significant stature are listed in chronological order below. For an exhaustive list of authors see List of Japanese authors:
Classical literature
★ ÅŒtomo no Yakamochi (c.717–785): ''Man'yÅshÅ«''
★ Sei Shonagon (c.~966–c.10??): ''The Pillow Book''
★ Murasaki Shikibu (c.973–c.1025): ''The Tale of Genji''
Medieval literature
★ Yoshida KenkÅ (c.1283–1352): ''Tsurezuregusa''
★ ''The Tale of the Heike'' (1371)
Early-modern literature
★ Ihara Saikaku (1642–1693)
★ Matsuo BashÅ (1644–1694)
★ Chikamatsu Monzaemon (1653–1725)
★ Ueda Akinari (1734–1809)
★ Santo Kyoden (1761–1816)
★ Jippensha Ikku (1765–1831)
★ Kyokutei Bakin (1767–1848)
★ ''Edo Meisho Zue'' (travelogue, 1834)
★ ''Hokuetsu Seppu'' (work of human geography, 1837)
Modern literature
★ Mori Ogai (1862–1922)
★ Ozaki Koyo (1867–1903)
★ Natsume SÅseki (1867–1916)
★ Izumi Kyoka (1873–1939)
★ Noguchi Yonejiro (1875-1947)
★ Shiga Naoya (1883–1971)
★ Ishikawa Takuboku (1886–1912)
★ Jun'ichirÅ Tanizaki (1886–1965)
★ RyÅ«nosuke Akutagawa (1892–1927)
★ Eiji Yoshikawa (1892–1962)
★ Kaneko Mitsuharu (1895–1975)
★ Miyazawa Kenji (1896–1933)
★ Kuroshima Denji (1898–1943)
★ Tsuboi Shigeji (1898–1975)
★ Ishikawa Jun (1899–1987)
★ Kawabata Yasunari (1899–1972)
★ Miyamoto Yuriko (1899–1951)
★ Tsuboi Sakae (1900–1967)
★ Oguma Hideo (1901–1940)
★ Kobayashi Takiji (1903–1933)
★ Ishikawa Tatsuzo (1905-1985)
★ Dazai Osamu (1909–1948)
★ Endo Shusaku (1923–1996)
★ Abe Kobo (1924–1993)
★ Mishima Yukio (1925–1970)
★ Inoue Hisashi (1933–)
★ Oe Kenzaburo (1935–)
★ Yamamoto Michiko (1936–)
★ Nakagami Kenji (1946–1992)
★ Murakami Haruki (1949–)
★ Murakami Ryu (1952–)
★ Yoshimoto Mahoko (1964–)
See List of awards and contests for Japanese literature for the complete list.
★ Donald Keene
★
★ ''Modern Japanese Literature'', Grove Press, 1956. ISBN 0-384-17254-X
★
★ ''World Within Walls: Japanese Literature of The Pre-Modern Era 1600–1867'', Columbia University Press © 1976 reprinted 1999 ISBN 0-231-11467-2
★
★ ''Dawn to the West: Japanese Literature in the Modern Era, Poetry, Drama, Criticism'', Columbia University Press © 1984 reprinted 1998 ISBN 0-231-11435-4
★
★ ''Travellers of a Hundred Ages: The Japanese as Revealed Through 1,000 Years of Diaries'', Columbia University Press © 1989 reprinted 1999 ISBN 0-231-11437-0
★
★ ''Seeds in the Heart: Japanese Literature from the Earliest Times to the Late Sixteenth Century'', Columbia University Press © 1993 reprinted 1999 ISBN 0-231-11441-9
★ Ema Tsutomu, Taniyama Shigeru, Ino Kenji, '' Kyoto ShobŠ© 1977 revised 1981 reprinted 1982
★ List of Japanese authors
★ List of Japanese classic texts
★ Japanese poetry
★ Aozora Bunko for a repository of Japanese literature
★ Japanese Text Initiative, University of Virginia Library Electronic Text Center
★ Japanese Literature, Kristina Kade Troost, Duke University Libraries
★ The Japanese Literature Home Page, Mark Jewel, Waseda University
★ Japanese Literature Resources Page, Fidel Fajardo-Acosta, Creighton University
★ A Mini-collection of Modern Japanese Literature, X. Jie Yang, University of Calgary
★ Premodern Japanese Texts and Translations, Michael Watson, Meiji Gakuin University
★ Bibliography for Research in Japanese Literature, Haruo Shirane, Columbia University
★ Japan Cultural Profile - national cultural portal for Japan created by Visiting Arts/Japan Foundation
★ Kamakura's Literary Figures at ã‹ã¾ãら GreenNet, the website of Kamakura City
History
Japanese Literature is generally divided into four main periods: ancient, classical, medieval, and modern.
Ancient literature (until 794)
With the introduction of kanji from China, the first writing in Japan became possible. Before this, there was no writing system. At first Chinese characters were used in Japanese syntactical formats, and the literary language was classical Chinese; the result is sentences that look like Chinese but are phonetically read as Japanese. Chinese characters were later adapted to write Japanese, creating what is known as the man'yÅgana, the earliest form of kana, or syllabic writing. The earliest works were created in the Nara Period. These include ''Kojiki'' (712), a work recording Japanese mythology and legendary history; ''Nihonshoki'' (720), a chronicle with a slightly more solid foundation in historical records than ''Kojiki''; and ''Man'yÅshÅ«'' (759), a poetry anthology.
Classical literature (794–1185; the Heian period)
Classical Japanese literature generally refers to literature produced during the Heian Period, what some would consider a golden era of art and literature. ''The Tale of Genji'' (early eleventh century) by Murasaki Shikibu is considered the pre-eminent masterpiece of Heian fiction and an early example of a work of fiction in the form of a novel. Other important works of this period include the ''Kokin Wakashū'' (905), a waka-poetry anthology, and ''The Pillow Book'' (990s), the latter written by Murasaki Shikibu's contemporary and rival, Sei Shonagon, as an essay about the life, loves, and pastimes of nobles in the Emperor's court. The ''iroha'' poem, now one of two standard orderings for the Japanese syllabary, was also written during the early part of this period.
In this time the imperial court patronized the poets, most of whom were courtiers or ladies-in-waiting. Editing anthologies of poetry was a national pastime. Reflecting the aristocratic atmosphere, the poetry was elegant and sophisticated and expressed emotions in a rhetorical style.
Medieval literature (1185–1600)
Medieval Japanese Literature is marked by the strong influence of Zen Buddhism, where characters are priests, travellers, or ascetic poets. Also during this period, Japan experienced many civil wars which led to the development of a warrior class, and subsequent war tales, histories, and related stories. Work from this period is notable for its insights into life and death, simple lifestyles, and redemption through killing. A representative work is ''The Tale of the Heike'' (1371), an epic account of the struggle between the Minamoto and Taira clans for control of Japan at the end of the twelfth century. Other important tales of the period include Kamo no ChÅmei's ''HÅjÅki'' (1212) and Yoshida Kenko's ''Tsurezuregusa'' (1331).
Other notable genres in this period were ''renga'', or linked verse, and Noh theater. Both were rapidly developed in the middle of the 14th century, the early Muromachi period.
Early-modern literature (1600–1868)
Literature during this time was written during the largely peaceful Tokugawa Period (commonly referred to as the Edo Period). Due in large part to the rise of the working and middle classes in the new capital of Edo (modern Tokyo), forms of popular drama developed which would later evolve into kabuki. The joruri and kabuki dramatist Chikamatsu Monzaemon became popular at the end of the 17th century. Matsuo BashÅ wrote ''Oku no Hosomichi'' (奥ã®ç´°é“, 1702), a travel diary. Hokusai, perhaps Japan's most famous woodblock print artist, also illustrated fiction as well as his famous 36 Views of Mount Fuji.
Many genres of literature made their début during the Edo Period, helped by a rising literacy rate among the growing population of townspeople, as well as the development of lending libraries. Although there was a minor Western influence trickling into the country from the Dutch settlement at Nagasaki, it was the importation of Chinese vernacular fiction that proved the greatest outside influence on the development of Early Modern Japanese fiction. Ihara Saikaku might be said to have given birth to the modern consciousness of the novel in Japan, mixing vernacular dialogue into his humorous and cautionary tales of the pleasure quarters. Jippensha Ikku (å返舎一ä¹) wrote ''TÅkaidÅchÅ« hizakurige'' (æ±æµ·é“ä¸è†æ —毛), which is a mix of travelogue and comedy. Tsuga Teisho, Takebe Ayatari, and Okajima Kanzan were instrumental in developing the ''yomihon'', which were historical romances almost entirely in prose, influenced by Chinese vernacular novels such as Three Kingdoms and ''Shui hu zhuan''. Two ''yomihon'' masterpieces were written by Ueda Akinari: ''Ugetsu monogatari'' and ''Harusame monogatari''. Kyokutei Bakin wrote the extremely popular fantasy/historical romance ''NansÅ Satomi Hakkenden'' (å—ç·é‡Œè¦‹å…«çŠ¬ä¼) in addition to other yomihon. SantÅ KyÅden wrote yomihon mostly set in the gay quarters until the Kansei edicts banned such works, and he turned to comedic ''kibyÅshi''. Genres included horror, crime stories, morality stories, comedy, and pornography—often accompanied by colorful woodcut prints.
Meiji, Taisho, and early Showa literature (1868–1945)
The Meiji era marks the re-opening of Japan to the West, and a period of rapid industrialization. The introduction of brought free verse into the poetic repertoire; it became widely used for longer works embodying new intellectual themes. Young Japanese prose writers and dramatists struggled with a whole galaxy of new ideas and artistic schools, but novelists were the first to successfully assimilate some of these concepts.
In the early Meiji era (1868–1880s), Fukuzawa Yukichi and Nakae Chomin authored Enlightenment literature, while pre-modern popular books depicted the quickly changing country. Then Realism was brought in by Tsubouchi Shoyo and Futabatei Shimei in the mid-Meiji (late 1880s–early 1890s) while the Classicism of Ozaki Koyo, Yamada Bimyo and Koda Rohan gained popularity. Higuchi Ichiyo, a rare woman writer in this era, wrote short stories on powerless women of this age in a simple style in between literary and colloquial. Izumi Kyoka, a favored disciple of Ozaki, pursued a flowing and elegant style and wrote early novels such as ''The Operating Room'' (1895) in literary style and later ones including ''The Holy Man of Mount Koya'' (1900) in colloquial.
Romanticism was brought in by Mori Ogai with his anthology of translated poems (1889) and carried to its height by Shimazaki Toson etc. and magazines ''MyÅjÅ'' and ''Bungaku-kai'' in early 1900s. Mori also wrote some modern novels including ''The Dancing Girl'' (1890), ''Wild Geese'' (1911), then later wrote historical novels. Natsume SÅseki, who is often compared with Mori Ogai, wrote ''I Am a Cat'' (1905) with humor and satire, then depicted fresh and pure youth in ''Botchan'' (1906) and ''Sanshirô'' (1908). He eventually pursued transcendence of human emotions and egoism in his later works including ''Kokoro'' (1914) his last and unfinished novel ''Light and darkness'' (1916).
Shimazaki shifted from Romanticism to Naturalism which was established with his ''The Broken Commandment'' (1906) and Katai Tayama's ''Futon'' (1907). Naturalism hatched "I Novel" (Watakushi-shôsetu) that describes about the authors themselves and depicts their own mental states. Neo-romanticism came out of anti-naturalism and was led by Nagai Kafu, Jun'ichirÅ Tanizaki, Kotaro Takamura, Kitahara Hakushu and so on in the early 1910s. Mushanokoji Saneatsu, Shiga Naoya and others founded a magazine ''Shirakaba'' in 1910. They shared a common characteristic, Humanism. Shiga's style was autobiographical and depicted states of his mind and sometimes classified as "I Novel" in this sense. RyÅ«nosuke Akutagawa, who was highly praised by Soseki, wrote short stories including ''RashÅmon'' (1915) with an intellectual and analytic attitude, and represented Neo-realism in the mid 1910s.
During the 1920s and early 1930s the proletarian literary movement, comprising such writers as Kobayashi Takiji, Kuroshima Denji, Miyamoto Yuriko, and Sata Ineko produced a politically radical literature depicting the harsh lives of workers, peasants, women, and other downtrodden members of society, and their struggles for change.
War-time Japan saw the début of several authors best known for the beauty of their language and their tales of love and sensuality, notably Jun'ichirŠTanizaki and Japan's first winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature, Kawabata Yasunari, a master of psychological fiction. Hino Ashihei wrote lyrical bestsellers glorifying the war, while Ishikawa Tatsuzo attempted to publish a disturbingly realistic account of the advance on Nanjing. Writers who opposed the war include Kuroshima Denji, Kaneko Mitsuharu, Oguma Hideo, and Ishikawa Jun.
Post-war literature
World War II, and Japan's defeat, influenced Japanese literature. Many authors wrote stories of disaffection, loss of purpose, and the coping with defeat. Dazai Osamu's novel ''The Setting Sun'' tells of a soldier returning from Manchukuo. Mishima Yukio, well known for both his nihilistic writing and his controversial suicide by seppuku, began writing in the post-war period. Kojima Nobuo's short story "The American School" portrays a group of Japanese teachers of English who, in the immediate aftermath of the war, deal with the American occupation in varying ways.
Prominent writers of the 1970s and 1980s were identified with intellectual and moral issues in their attempts to raise social and political consciousness. One of them, Oe Kenzaburo wrote his best-known work, ''A Personal Matter'' in 1964 and became Japan's second winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature.
Inoue Mitsuaki had long been concerned with the atomic bomb and continued in the 1980s to write on problems of the nuclear age, while Endo Shusaku depicted the religious dilemma of the Kakure Kirishitan, Roman Catholics in feudal Japan, as a springboard to address spiritual problems. Inoue Yasushi also turned to the past in masterful historical novels of Inner Asia and ancient Japan, in order to portray present human fate.
Avant-garde writers, such as Abe Kobo, who wrote fantastic novels such as ''Woman in the Dunes'' (1960), wanted to express the Japanese experience in modern terms without using either international styles or traditional conventions, developed new inner visions. Furui Yoshikichi tellingly related the lives of alienated urban dwellers coping with the minutiae of daily life, while the psychodramas within such daily life crises have been explored by a rising number of important women novelists. The 1988 Naoki Prize went to Todo Shizuko for ''Ripening Summer'', a story capturing the complex psychology of modern women. Other award-winning stories at the end of the decade dealt with current issues of the elderly in hospitals, the recent past (Pure- Hearted Shopping District in Koenji, Tokyo), and the life of a Meiji period ukiyo-e artist. In international literature, Ishiguro Kazuo, a native of Japan, had taken up residence in Britain and won Britain's prestigious Booker Prize.
Murakami Haruki is one of the most popular and controversial of today's Japanese authors. His genre-defying, humorous and surreal works have sparked fierce debates in Japan over whether they are true "literature" or simple pop-fiction: Oe Kenzaburo has been one of his harshest critics. Some of his best-known works include ''Norwegian Wood'' (1987) and ''The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle'' (1994–1995). Another best-selling contemporary author is Banana Yoshimoto.
Although modern Japanese writers covered a wide variety of subjects, one particularly Japanese approach stressed their subjects' inner lives, widening the earlier novel's preoccupation with the narrator's consciousness. In Japanese fiction, plot development and action have often been of secondary interest to emotional issues. In keeping with the general trend toward reaffirming national characteristics, many old themes re-emerged, and some authors turned consciously to the past. Strikingly, Buddhist attitudes about the importance of knowing oneself and the poignant impermanence of things formed an undercurrent to sharp social criticism of this material age. There was a growing emphasis on women's roles, the Japanese persona in the modern world, and the malaise of common people lost in the complexities of urban culture.
Popular fiction, non-fiction, and children's literature all flourished in urban Japan in the 1980s. Many popular works fell between "pure literature" and pulp novels, including all sorts of historical serials, information-packed docudramas, science fiction, mysteries, detective fiction, business stories, war journals, and animal stories. Non-fiction covered everything from crime to politics. Although factual journalism predominated, many of these works were interpretive, reflecting a high degree of individualism. Children's works re-emerged in the 1950s, and the newer entrants into this field, many of them younger women, brought new vitality to it in the 1980s.
Manga (comic books) have penetrated almost every sector of the popular market. They include virtually every field of human interest, such as a multi volume high-school history of Japan and, for the adult market, a manga introduction to economics, and pornography. Manga represented between 20 and 30 percent of annual publications at the end of the 1980s, in sales of some ¥400 billion per year.
Significant authors and works
Famous authors and literary works of significant stature are listed in chronological order below. For an exhaustive list of authors see List of Japanese authors:
Classical literature
★ ÅŒtomo no Yakamochi (c.717–785): ''Man'yÅshÅ«''
★ Sei Shonagon (c.~966–c.10??): ''The Pillow Book''
★ Murasaki Shikibu (c.973–c.1025): ''The Tale of Genji''
Medieval literature
★ Yoshida KenkÅ (c.1283–1352): ''Tsurezuregusa''
★ ''The Tale of the Heike'' (1371)
Early-modern literature
★ Ihara Saikaku (1642–1693)
★ Matsuo BashÅ (1644–1694)
★ Chikamatsu Monzaemon (1653–1725)
★ Ueda Akinari (1734–1809)
★ Santo Kyoden (1761–1816)
★ Jippensha Ikku (1765–1831)
★ Kyokutei Bakin (1767–1848)
★ ''Edo Meisho Zue'' (travelogue, 1834)
★ ''Hokuetsu Seppu'' (work of human geography, 1837)
Modern literature
★ Mori Ogai (1862–1922)
★ Ozaki Koyo (1867–1903)
★ Natsume SÅseki (1867–1916)
★ Izumi Kyoka (1873–1939)
★ Noguchi Yonejiro (1875-1947)
★ Shiga Naoya (1883–1971)
★ Ishikawa Takuboku (1886–1912)
★ Jun'ichirÅ Tanizaki (1886–1965)
★ RyÅ«nosuke Akutagawa (1892–1927)
★ Eiji Yoshikawa (1892–1962)
★ Kaneko Mitsuharu (1895–1975)
★ Miyazawa Kenji (1896–1933)
★ Kuroshima Denji (1898–1943)
★ Tsuboi Shigeji (1898–1975)
★ Ishikawa Jun (1899–1987)
★ Kawabata Yasunari (1899–1972)
★ Miyamoto Yuriko (1899–1951)
★ Tsuboi Sakae (1900–1967)
★ Oguma Hideo (1901–1940)
★ Kobayashi Takiji (1903–1933)
★ Ishikawa Tatsuzo (1905-1985)
★ Dazai Osamu (1909–1948)
★ Endo Shusaku (1923–1996)
★ Abe Kobo (1924–1993)
★ Mishima Yukio (1925–1970)
★ Inoue Hisashi (1933–)
★ Oe Kenzaburo (1935–)
★ Yamamoto Michiko (1936–)
★ Nakagami Kenji (1946–1992)
★ Murakami Haruki (1949–)
★ Murakami Ryu (1952–)
★ Yoshimoto Mahoko (1964–)
Awards and contests
See List of awards and contests for Japanese literature for the complete list.
Resources
★ Donald Keene
★
★ ''Modern Japanese Literature'', Grove Press, 1956. ISBN 0-384-17254-X
★
★ ''World Within Walls: Japanese Literature of The Pre-Modern Era 1600–1867'', Columbia University Press © 1976 reprinted 1999 ISBN 0-231-11467-2
★
★ ''Dawn to the West: Japanese Literature in the Modern Era, Poetry, Drama, Criticism'', Columbia University Press © 1984 reprinted 1998 ISBN 0-231-11435-4
★
★ ''Travellers of a Hundred Ages: The Japanese as Revealed Through 1,000 Years of Diaries'', Columbia University Press © 1989 reprinted 1999 ISBN 0-231-11437-0
★
★ ''Seeds in the Heart: Japanese Literature from the Earliest Times to the Late Sixteenth Century'', Columbia University Press © 1993 reprinted 1999 ISBN 0-231-11441-9
★ Ema Tsutomu, Taniyama Shigeru, Ino Kenji, '' Kyoto ShobŠ© 1977 revised 1981 reprinted 1982
See also
★ List of Japanese authors
★ List of Japanese classic texts
★ Japanese poetry
★ Aozora Bunko for a repository of Japanese literature
External links
★ Japanese Text Initiative, University of Virginia Library Electronic Text Center
★ Japanese Literature, Kristina Kade Troost, Duke University Libraries
★ The Japanese Literature Home Page, Mark Jewel, Waseda University
★ Japanese Literature Resources Page, Fidel Fajardo-Acosta, Creighton University
★ A Mini-collection of Modern Japanese Literature, X. Jie Yang, University of Calgary
★ Premodern Japanese Texts and Translations, Michael Watson, Meiji Gakuin University
★ Bibliography for Research in Japanese Literature, Haruo Shirane, Columbia University
★ Japan Cultural Profile - national cultural portal for Japan created by Visiting Arts/Japan Foundation
★ Kamakura's Literary Figures at ã‹ã¾ãら GreenNet, the website of Kamakura City
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