, born , was the
pen-name
A pen name, also called a ''nom de plume'' or a literary double, is a pseudonym (or, in some cases, a variant form of a real name) adopted by an author and printed on the title page or by-line of their works in place of their real name.
A pen na ...
of a Japanese author,
tanka
is a genre of classical Japanese poetry and one of the major genres of Japanese literature.
Etymology
Originally, in the time of the ''Man'yōshū'' (latter half of the eighth century AD), the term ''tanka'' was used to distinguish "short poem ...
poet
A poet is a person who studies and creates poetry. Poets may describe themselves as such or be described as such by others. A poet may simply be the creator ( thinker, songwriter, writer, or author) who creates (composes) poems (oral or writte ...
, and
Buddhist
Buddhism ( , ), also known as Buddha Dharma and Dharmavinaya (), is an Indian religion or philosophical tradition based on teachings attributed to the Buddha. It originated in northern India as a -movement in the 5th century BCE, and ...
scholar active during the
Taishō and early
Shōwa periods of Japan.
Early life
Kanoko's maiden name was Ōnuki Kano. She was born in
Aoyama, Akasaka-ku (present day
Minato, Tokyo
is a special ward in Tokyo, Japan. It is also called Minato City in English.
It was formed in 1947 as a merger of Akasaka, Azabu and Shiba wards following Tokyo City's transformation into Tokyo Metropolis. The modern Minato ward exhibits th ...
), to an extremely wealthy family. Her father suffered from lung disease, and Kanoko was sent to the Ohnuki family estate in
Futako Tamagawa
is located in Setagaya, Tokyo, Japan, on the north-east bank of the Tama River. The area surrounding the station is commonly called Futako-Tamagawa, and often refers to the Tamagawa and Seta districts of Setagaya, but there is no precise definiti ...
,
Kawasaki, Kanagawa
is a Cities of Japan, city in Kanagawa Prefecture, Japan, one of the main cities of Greater Tokyo Area and Keihin Industrial Area. It is the second most populated city in Kanagawa Prefecture after Yokohama, and the List of cities in Japan, eight ...
, where she was raised by a governess. Her tutor encouraged her affinity for music, calligraphy and traditional dance, and introduced her to Japanese classical literature, especially the ''
Tale of Genji
Tale may refer to:
* Narrative, or story, a report of real or imaginary connected events
* TAL effector (TALE), a type of DNA binding protein
* Tale, Albania, a resort town
* Tale, Iran, a village
* Tale, Maharashtra, a village in Ratnagiri distri ...
'' and .
Literary career
Okamoto was influenced greatly by her older brother, Shosen, and his classmate
Jun'ichirō Tanizaki
was a Japanese author who is considered to be one of the most prominent figures in modern Japanese literature. The tone and subject matter of his work ranges from shocking depictions of sexuality and destructive erotic obsessions to subtle por ...
who studied at the First Higher School and
Tokyo Imperial University
, abbreviated as or UTokyo, is a public research university located in Bunkyō, Tokyo, Japan. Established in 1877, the university was the first Imperial University and is currently a Top Type university of the Top Global University Project by ...
. While still a student at the Atami Gakuen girls' high school, Kanoko called on the poet,
Yosano Akiko
Yosano Akiko (Shinjitai: , seiji: ; 7 December 1878 – 29 May 1942) was the pen-name of a Japanese author, poet, pioneering feminist, pacifist, and social reformer, active in the late Meiji era as well as the Taishō and early Shōwa eras of ...
, and this encounter prompted her to start contributing to the
poetry magazine
''Poetry'' (founded as ''Poetry: A Magazine of Verse'') has been published in Chicago since 1912. It is one of the leading monthly poetry journals in the English-speaking world. Founded by Harriet Monroe, it is now published by the Poetry Foundat ...
("Bright Star"). Along with Yosano, she joined
Hiratsuka Raichō
Hiratsuka Raichō (, transliterated according to the historical kana orthography; born Hiratsuka Haru, ; February 10, 1886 – May 24, 1971) was a Japanese writer, journalist, political activist, anarchist, and pioneering feminist in Japan.
...
,
Tamura Toshiko
was the pen-name of an early modern feminist novelist in Shōwa period Japan. Her birth name was .
Biography
Tamura was born in the plebeian Asakusa district of Tokyo,Esashi, p.37 where her father was a rice broker. At the age of seventeen ...
, and others, to be one of the initial contributors to the influential ''
Bluestocking
''Bluestocking'' is a term for an educated, intellectual woman, originally a member of the 18th-century Blue Stockings Society from England led by the hostess and critic Elizabeth Montagu (1718–1800), the "Queen of the Blues", including Eliz ...
'' () journal, helping to set the course for women writers and feminist ideas, in 1911. Later, she played an active part as a key contributor to another journal, ("
Pleiades
The Pleiades (), also known as The Seven Sisters, Messier 45 and other names by different cultures, is an asterism and an open star cluster containing middle-aged, hot B-type stars in the north-west of the constellation Taurus. At a distance of ...
"). She published , the first of her five anthologies, in 1912.
Okamoto Kanoko is an authority on
Buddhism
Buddhism ( , ), also known as Buddha Dharma and Dharmavinaya (), is an Indian religion or philosophical tradition based on teachings attributed to the Buddha. It originated in northern India as a -movement in the 5th century BCE, and gra ...
, after she plunged into Buddhist practice and research during her marriage to the famous cartoonist
Okamoto Ippei.
In 1908, she met cartoonist
Okamoto Ippei while on a holiday in
Karuizawa, Nagano
is a resort town located in Nagano Prefecture, Japan. , the town had an estimated population of 20,323 in 9897 households, and a population density of 130 persons per km². The total area of the town is . Karuizawa is one of the oldest and most ...
, together with her father. However, her family was extremely opposed to the relationship, and she created a scandal by moving in together with him in 1910 without marrying. Their eldest son, the ''
avant-garde
The avant-garde (; In 'advance guard' or ' vanguard', literally 'fore-guard') is a person or work that is experimental, radical, or unorthodox with respect to art, culture, or society.John Picchione, The New Avant-garde in Italy: Theoretical ...
'' painter
Tarō Okamoto
was a Japanese artist, art theorist, and writer. He is particularly well known for his avant-garde paintings and public sculptures and murals, and for his theorization of traditional Japanese culture and avant-garde artistic practices.
Biograph ...
, was born the next year. However, Kanoko's family life was filled with tragedy. Soon after she moved in with Ippei, her brother and then her mother died. Her eldest daughter was born with mental health problems, and soon died. Her common-law husband was opposed to her independence, jealous of her artistic successes and was unfaithful. Her younger son was also born with weak health, and died in infancy.
These problems led Okamoto to turn to religion. She was first interested in
Protestant Christianity
Protestantism is a Christian denomination, branch of Christianity that follows the theological tenets of the Reformation, Protestant Reformation, a movement that began seeking to reform the Catholic Church from within in the 16th century agai ...
, but did not find it to her liking. She then turned to the
Jodo Shinshu sect of
Buddhism
Buddhism ( , ), also known as Buddha Dharma and Dharmavinaya (), is an Indian religion or philosophical tradition based on teachings attributed to the Buddha. It originated in northern India as a -movement in the 5th century BCE, and gra ...
, as expounded by
Shinran
''Popular Buddhism in Japan: Shin Buddhist Religion & Culture'' by Esben Andreasen, pp. 13, 14, 15, 17. University of Hawaii Press 1998, was a Japanese Buddhist monk, who was born in Hino (now a part of Fushimi, Kyoto) at the turbulent close of ...
, which was the start of her work as a researcher of Buddhism, about which she wrote numerous essays.
After releasing her fourth ''tanka'' anthology ("My Last Anthology") in 1929, she decided to become a novelist. She took her whole family to Europe to complete her literary studies. They traveled to Paris, London, Berlin, and (leaving their son behind) toured around the United States, returning to Japan in 1932.
After returning home, Okamoto continued her researches into Buddhism, but also found time to a
novelette called ("The Dying Crane"), describing the last days of writer
Ryūnosuke Akutagawa
, art name , was a Japanese writer active in the Taishō period in Japan. He is regarded as the "father of the Japanese short story", and Japan's premier literary award, the Akutagawa Prize, is named after him. He committed suicide at the age of ...
, while staying at an inn near
Kamakura Station
is a railway station on the Yokosuka Line in Kamakura, Kanagawa, Japan, operated by East Japan Railway Company (JR East).
Lines
Kamakura Station is served by the Yokosuka Line and Shōnan-Shinjuku Line. It is located from the junction at ...
in the summer of 1923. Published in the magazine in 1936, it marked the start of her activity with prose fiction.
After that, she published many more works in quick succession, including ("The Relationship between Mother and Child"), ("
A Riot of Goldfish
A, or a, is the first letter and the first vowel of the Latin alphabet, used in the modern English alphabet, the alphabets of other western European languages and others worldwide. Its name in English is ''a'' (pronounced ), plural ''aes ...
"), and ("Portrait of an Old Geisha"). A recurring theme in her work is the effect of a person's familial ancestral
karma
Karma (; sa, कर्म}, ; pi, kamma, italic=yes) in Sanskrit means an action, work, or deed, and its effect or consequences. In Indian religions, the term more specifically refers to a principle of cause and effect, often descriptivel ...
on their present-day lives. While praised for the richness of her use of language, some critics have felt that she tended towards excessive passion and unnecessary literary flourishes.
She died of a
brain hemorrhage
Intracerebral hemorrhage (ICH), also known as cerebral bleed, intraparenchymal bleed, and hemorrhagic stroke, or haemorrhagic stroke, is a sudden bleeding into the tissues of the brain, into its ventricles, or into both. It is one kind of bleed ...
in 1939. She was 49 years old. Her grave is at the
Tama Cemetery
in Tokyo is the largest municipal cemetery in Japan. It is split between the cities of Fuchu and Koganei within the Tokyo Metropolis. First established in April 1923 as , it was redesignated Tama Cemetery in 1935. It is one of the largest green a ...
in
Fuchu, Tokyo.
Because she did not begin writing actively until her later years, most of her works were published posthumously.
Kanoko Okamoto has always wanted to become a novelist, but only began publishing ‘secular’ fiction until the end of her life. Her reputation as a fiction writer was assured with the publication of her novella Boshi Jojo (A Mother’s Love.) Boshi Jojo is published in 1937, and is a daring look at the erotic side of maternal feeling.
Okamoto Kanoko dedicated herself to presenting straightforward images of strong, mysterious, even shamanic female characters. The combination of power and female beauty is represented in many of her works including ‘A Mother’s Love,’ ‘
A Riot of Goldfish
A, or a, is the first letter and the first vowel of the Latin alphabet, used in the modern English alphabet, the alphabets of other western European languages and others worldwide. Its name in English is ''a'' (pronounced ), plural ''aes ...
,’ and
The Record of Old Geisha’ Her works like ‘Kakoze’ also explore themes like homoerotic aestheticism and the
female gaze
The female gaze is a feminist theory term referring to the gaze of the female spectator, character or director of an artistic work, but more than the gender it is an issue of representing women as subjects having agency. As such all genders can cre ...
.
Selected works
* (The Dying Crane) (1936)
* (A Midsummer Night's Dream) (1937)
* (The Relationship between Mother and Child) (1937)
* (
A Riot of Goldfish
A, or a, is the first letter and the first vowel of the Latin alphabet, used in the modern English alphabet, the alphabets of other western European languages and others worldwide. Its name in English is ''a'' (pronounced ), plural ''aes ...
) (1937)
* (Portrait of an Old Geisha) (1938)
* (Stream of Light) (1938)
* (Story of Inside the Grass Circle) (1939)
* (Lively Ebb and Flow) (1940)
* (The Opening of the Female Body) (1943)
English translations
* ''A Riot of Goldfish'' (). Translated by J. Keith Vincent. London, Hesperus Press (2010). (Also includes "The Food Demon" [])
See also
* Japanese literature
* List of Japanese authors
References
*Sugisaki, Kazuko. 'A Writer's Life: A Biographical Sketch'. In ''The House Spirit'' by Okamoto, Kanoko translated by Sugisaki, Kazuko. Capra Press (1995).
*Copeland, Rebecca. ''The Modern Murasaki: Writing by Women of Meiji Japan''. Columbia University Press (2007).
External links
Kamakura's Literary Figureson
Aozora Bunko
Aozora Bunko (, literally the "Blue Sky Library", also known as the "Open Air Library") is a Japanese digital library. This online collection encompasses several thousands of works of Japanese-language fiction and non-fiction. These include out-o ...
*
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Okamoto, Kanoko
1889 births
1939 deaths
Writers from Tokyo
Japanese women novelists
Japanese women poets
20th-century Japanese poets
20th-century Japanese novelists
20th-century Japanese women writers
Pseudonymous women writers
20th-century pseudonymous writers