Innocence and the Other World: The Tales of Miyazawa KenjiTakao Hagiwara

Excerpt

Miyazawa Kenji 宮沢賢治, 1896-1933, was an exceptionally energetic and creative figure. Throughout his short life he engaged in a diverse range of activities and occupations. Along with his career as a poet and ‘children’s story’ writer,’ he was also a soil scientist, religious thinker, teacher, farmer, social reformer, and engineer-salesman. In many of these roles he was not merely active, but outstanding, demonstrating great originality of thought and expression. Certainly, if we consider only Kenji’s literary career, it can be argued that he is unique in the tradition of Japanese literature. His exuberant style, based upon a highly idiosyncratic cosmology, seems to place him in a category of his own.

Although Kenji received little recognition as a writer during his lifetime, his literary fame grew rapidly after his death. To date, seven different editions of his collected works and innumerable books, periodicals, and articles related to Kenji studies have been published. In the postwar period, few primary or secondary school students graduate without having read one or two of Kenji’s poems or tales. Even in the non-academic world, Kenji has recently become popular. Comic books and animated movies based on or adapted from his tales have been published commercially, while in Hanamaki, his birthplace, various public works commemorate him.