Hinatsu Kōnosuke
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
 Hinatsu Kōnosuke |
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| Born: | 22 February 1890 Iida, Nagano Japan |
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| Died: | 13 June 1971 Iida, Nagano Japan |
| Occupation: | Writer, University Professor |
| Genres: | poetry, literary criticism |
- This is a Japanese name; the family name is Hinatsu.
Hinatsu Kōnosuke (日夏耿之介 Hinatsu Kōnosuke?); (22 February 1890 - 13 June 1971) was the pen-name of a Japanese poet known for his romantic and gothic poetry patterned after English literature. His real name was Higuchi Kunito.
A native of what is now part of Iida city in Nagano prefecture, Hinatsu graduated from Waseda University, and was later a professor of English literature at Waseda. He was influenced by the works of Oscar Wilde and Edgar Allen Poe, and the Japanese writers Mishima Yukio and Shibusawa Tatsuhiko. His specialty was the translation of romantic and gothic poetry from English into Japanese. Always in poor health, and a fervent Roman Catholic, he always had an icon of the Virgin Mary in his room.
In 1915 he founded the magazine Shijin (Poets) with Horiguchi Daigaku and Saijo Yaso.
In 1917, he published the first anthology of his own works, Tenshin no sho, which combined elements from both genre into what he described as “gothic romanticism”. Using complex symbolism, his works were a distinct contrast from the realistic poetry then in vogue.
His critical study, Meiji Taisho shi shi (1929) was the first scholarly history of modern Japanese poetry, and was awarded the 1st Yomiuri Prize in 1949.
He suffered from a cerebral hemorrhage in 1956, and returned to his native Iida. However, in 1961, he accepted a post as professor of English literature at Aoyama Gakuin University, and returned to Tokyo, where he lived until 1971.
In 1986, the Hinatsu Kōnosuke Memorial Museum was opened in his honor in Iida, Nagano.
