Hirabayashi Taiko

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Hirabayashi Taiko
Born (1905-10-03)3 October 1905
Suwa City, Nagano Prefecture, Japan
Died 17 February 1972(1972-02-17)
Occupation Writer
In this Japanese name, the family name is "Hirabayashi".

Hirabayashi Taiko (平林 たい子 Hirabayashi Taiko, 3 October 1905 - 17 February 1972) was the pen-name of a Japanese author. Her real name was Hirabayashi Tai.

Biography

Hirabayashi resolved at the age of 12 to become a writer and also developed an interest in socialism at a young age. After graduating from the Suwa Women’s Higher School in 1922, she moved to Tokyo and began living with the anarchist Yamamoto Toshio. They went to Korea together but returned after only one month. They were both arrested in the confusion and clampdowns following the 1923 Great Kantō earthquake and released on condition of leaving Tokyo. She eventually moved to Manchuria and was to give birth in a hospital in Dalian but the child lived for only twenty-four days, dying of malnutrition. Based on this personal experience, she wrote the short story In the Charity Hospital, which established her as a writer of proletarian literature.

Hirabayashi Taiko married the novelist and critic Kobori Jinji in 1927 but divorced in 1955 after discovering that he had an illegitimate child. In 1946 she won the inaugural Women's Literature Prize with Kou iu onna.

After the war, she can be seen as a writer of Tenko Literature (literature based on one's own political apostasy) and showed conservative, anti-communist tendencies. She was also known to be a member of the Democratic Socialist Party.

Her writings were often modelled on her own life or contemporary authors but she also produced various social commentaries and essays. During the war, after receiving help from a gambler named Ishiguro Seiichi (石黒政一), she became interested in the world of the yakuza and also wrote novels with a chivalrous spirit such as Kokusatsu (黒札)、Chitei no Uta (地底の歌) and Nagurareru Aitsu(殴られるあいつ). In 1967 she won the 7th Women's Literature Prize with Himitsu.

She was posthumously awarded the Nihon geijutsuin shou (日本芸術院賞) and the Hirabayashi Taiko Prize was created in her honour.

There is a Hirabayashi Taiko Memorial Museum in Suwa City, Fukushima prefecture.

Literary works

  • Azakeru (嘲る, 1927) - Self-Mockery
  • Seryoushitsu ni te (施療室にて, 1928) - In the Charity Hospital
  • Shussen ni te (1946) - Diary of the End of the War
  • Hitori yuku (一人行く, 1946) - I Walk Alone
  • Mou chugoku hei (1946) - Blind Chinese Soldiers
  • Kishi mojin (1946) - The Goddess of Children
  • Kau iu onna (かういふ女, 1946) - This Kind of Woman
  • Watashi ha ikiru (私は生きる, 1947) - I Mean to Live
  • Kokusatsu (黒札) - Black Notes
  • Chitei no uta (地底の歌, 1948) - Song from the Underworld
  • Jinsei jikken (1948) - A Life Experiment
  • Hito no inochi (1950) - A Man's Life
  • Nagurareru aitsu (殴られるあいつ) - The Beaten Man
  • Onigo bojin (鬼子母神) -
  • Sabaku no hana (砂漠の花, 1957) - Flowers in a Desert
  • Sono hito to tsuma (その人と妻) - The Man and His Wife
  • Erudorado Akarushi (エルドラド明るし)
  • Fumou (1962) - Sterility
  • Kuroi Nenrei (1963) - The Black Age
  • Himitsu (秘密, 1967) - Secrets

See also

References

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