Akiko Kiso,

Japanese Japanese may refer to: * Something from or related to Japan, an island country in East Asia * Japanese language, spoken mainly in Japan * Japanese people, the ethnic group that identifies with Japan through ancestry or culture ** Japanese diaspor ...

: 木曽明子,

Kana The term may refer to a number of syllabaries used to write Japanese phonological units, morae. Such syllabaries include (1) the original kana, or , which were Chinese characters (kanji) used phonetically to transcribe Japanese, the most pr ...

: きそあきこ (born 1936) is a Japanese classical scholar who specialises in Greek literature. She is a professor emeritus at

Osaka University , abbreviated as , is a public research university located in Osaka Prefecture, Japan. It is one of Japan's former Imperial Universities and a Designated National University listed as a "Top Type" university in the Top Global University Project. ...

. She is the first Japanese scholar to publish on

Sophocles Sophocles (; grc, Σοφοκλῆς, , Sophoklễs; 497/6 – winter 406/5 BC)Sommerstein (2002), p. 41. is one of three ancient Greek tragedians, at least one of whose plays has survived in full. His first plays were written later than, or co ...

. Her work included reconstructions of the lost plays of ''

Epigoni In Greek mythology, the Epigoni or Epigonoi (; from grc-gre, Ἐπίγονοι, meaning "offspring") are the sons of the Argive heroes, the Seven against Thebes, who had fought and been killed in the first Theban war, the subject of the ''Thebai ...

'' and ''

Tereus In Greek mythology, Tereus (; Ancient Greek: Τηρεύς) was a Thracian king,Thucydides: ''History of the Peloponnesian War'' 2:29 the son of Ares and the naiad Bistonis. He was the brother of Dryas. Tereus was the husband of the Athenian prin ...

.'' She also worked on comparative approaches to Greek tragedy with emphasis on Japanese classical drama.

Biography

Kiso was born in Manchuria in 1936. In 1987, she completed her PhD in the Faculty of Letters,

Kyoto University , mottoeng = Freedom of academic culture , established = , type = National university, Public (National) , endowment = ¥ 316 billion (2.4 1000000000 (number), billion USD) , faculty = 3,480 (Teaching Staff) , administrative_staff ...

, with a dissertation entitled ''The Dissipative Works of Sophocles''. She is a former student of Chiaki Matsudaira ( jp). Until 1997 she worked as a professor in the Faculty of Liberal Arts at

. She then was appointed professor at

Kitami Institute of Technology is a national university in Kitami, Hokkaido, Japan. Founded as the Kitami Junior College of Technology on 6 January 1960, it was chartered as a university (Kitami Institute of Technology) on 6 January 1966. In 2004, it became part of the Nation ...

before retiring in 2002. The same year she returned to Osaka University as Emeritus Professor. An expert on

, Kiso was the first Japanese scholar to publish on his works. In 1984 Kiso published ''The Lost Sophocles'', which reconsidered fragments of Sophocles' lost works. It included reconstructions of ''

'' and ''

.'' The book also argued that since

Odysseus Odysseus ( ; grc-gre, Ὀδυσσεύς, Ὀδυσεύς, OdysseúsOdyseús, ), also known by the Latin variant Ulysses ( , ; lat, UlyssesUlixes), is a legendary Greek king of Ithaca and the hero of Homer's epic poem the ''Odyssey''. Odysse ...

appears in many fragments of lost plays, Sophocles must have favoured him as a character to write on. This work has been discussed in relation to Athena and justice by Rebecca Futo Kennedy. It was described by Justina Gregory as a work that "created fresh questions" about the use of the Sophoclean fragments. Kiso significantly collaborated with Mae J. Smethurst, an American scholar of classical literature, first translating ''The Artistry of Aeschylus and Zeami'' to Japanese. Subsequently she advised on Smethurst's ''Dramatic Action in Greek Tragedy and Noh: Reading with and Beyond Aristotle,'' as well as translating it to Japanese. This work compared the

Greek tragedy Greek tragedy is a form of theatre from Ancient Greece and Greek inhabited Anatolia. It reached its most significant form in Athens in the 5th century BC, the works of which are sometimes called Attic tragedy. Greek tragedy is widely believed t ...

form of theatre with

noh is a major form of classical Japanese dance-drama that has been performed since the 14th century. Developed by Kan'ami and his son Zeami, it is the oldest major theatre art that is still regularly performed today. Although the terms Noh and ' ...

- a Japanese form of dance drama.

Selected works

* Kiso, Akiko. "From Tragedy to Comedy The Dramaturgy of Euripides' Ion." ''西洋古典論集'' 14 (1996): 131-136. * Kiso, Akiko. "The Artistry of Aeschylus and Zeami: A Comparative Study of Greek Tragedy and No." ''The American Journal of Philology'' (1991): 552-555. * ''The Lost Sophocles'' (New York: Vantage Press, 1984) * Kiso, Akiko. "Notes on Sophocles’ Epigoni." ''Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies'' 18.3 (1977): 207-226. * Kiso, Akiko. "Sophocles, Aleadae: a Reconstruction." ''Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies'' 17.1 (1976): 5-21. * Kiso, Akiko. "Sophocles'" Phaedra" and the Phaedra of the "First Hippolytus"." ''Bulletin of the Institute of Classical Studies'' 20 (1973): 22-36.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Kiso, Akiko 1936 births Living people Japanese women academics Women classical scholars Japanese classical scholars Academic staff of Osaka University 20th-century Japanese women writers Japanese translators Kyoto University alumni