Fumiko Hayashi (author)

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Fumiko Hayashi
Fumiko Hayashi.jpg
Native name
林 芙美子
Born(1903-12-31)December 31, 1903
Shimonoseki, Yamaguchi, Japan
DiedJune 28, 1951(1951-06-28) (aged 47)
Tokyo, Japan
OccupationNovelist and poet
LanguageJapanese
NationalityJapanese

Fumiko Hayashi (林 芙美子, Hayashi Fumiko, December 31, 1903 or 1904[a] – June 28, 1951) was a Japanese novelist and poet.

Life and career[]

The daughter of an itinerant peddlar, Hayashi was born in Shimonoseki, Japan and raised in abject poverty.[1] When Hayashi was seven, her mother ran away with a manager of her common-law husband's store, and afterwards the three worked in Kyūshū as itinerant merchants. After graduating from high school in 1922, Hayashi moved to Tokyo with a lover and lived with several men before settling into marriage with the painter Rokubin Tezuka (手塚 緑敏) in 1926, barely managing to support herself with a variety of menial jobs.[1]

Hayashi's work is notable for its feminist themes. Many of her works revolve around free spirited women and troubled relationships. One of her best-known works is (放浪記, 1927; translated into English as Vagabond's Song or Diary of a Vagabond), which was adapted into the anime . Another is her late novel Ukigumo (Floating Clouds, 1951), which was made into a film of the same name by Mikio Naruse in 1955. Naruse adapted several of her works, and also directed a biographical film about her in 1962, Horoki (A Wanderer's Notebook).

In 1941, Hayashi joined a group of women writers who went to Manchuria in occupied China, from where she reported positively on the Japanese administration. In 1942–43, again as part of a larger group of women writers, including Ineko Sata, she travelled to Southeast Asia, where she spent eight months in the Andaman Islands, Singapore, Java and Borneo. In later years, Hayashi faced criticism for collaborating with state-sponsored wartime propaganda, but never apologised or rationalised her behaviour.[2]

Joan E. Ericson's (1997) translations and analysis of the immensely popular Hōrōki and Suisen (Narcissus) suggest that Hayashi's appeal is rooted in the clarity with which she conveys the humanity not just of women, but also others on the underside of Japanese society.[2]

Selected works[]

Yasunari Kawabata and other close friends at Hayashi's funeral, 1951
  • 1930: Horoki (Diary of a Vagabond) – autobiographical novel; source for Naruse's 1962 film A Wanderer's Notebook[3]
  • 1931: Fukin to uo no machi ("The Accordion and the Fish Town") – short story
  • 1933: Seihin no sho (A record of Honorable Poverty) – autobiographical novel
  • 1934: Nakimushi Kozo (Cry Baby) – novel – source for Shirō Toyoda's 1938 film
  • 1936: Inazuma (Lightning) – novel; source for Naruse's 1952 film Lightning[3]
  • 1947: Uzushio (Swirling Currents) – novel
  • 1948: Bangiku (Late Chrysanthemum) – short story; winner of the Women's Literary Award; one of the sources for Naruse's 1954 film Late Chrysanthemums;[3] translated twice by John Bester (Japan Quarterly) and Lane Dunlop (ISBN 978-0865472297)
  • 1949: Shirosagi – short story; one of the sources for Naruse's 1954 film Late Chrysanthemums[3]
  • 1949: Suissen – short story; one of the sources for Naruse's 1954 film Late Chrysanthemums[3]
  • 1950: Chairo no me – novel; source for Naruse's 1953 film Wife[3]
  • 1951: Ukigumo (Floating Clouds) – novel; source for Naruse's 1955 film Floating Clouds. Translated by Lane Dunlop (ISBN 978-0231136297)
  • 1951: Meshi (Repast) – novel; source for Naruse's 1951 film Repast[3]
  • 1957: Rinraku (Downfall) – short story. Translated by J.D. Wisgo (ISBN 978-1737318200)

See also[]

Notes[]

  1. ^ Japanese sources disagree on the birth year.

References[]

  1. ^ Jump up to: a b Lagassé, Paul (January 2000). Fumiko Hayashi. ISBN 9780787650155.
  2. ^ Jump up to: a b Ericson, Joan E. (1997). Be a Woman: Hayashi Fumiko and Modern Japanese Women's Literature. Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press. ISBN 9780824818845.
  3. ^ Jump up to: a b c d e f g Goble, A., ed. (1999). The Complete Index to Literary Sources in Film. Walter de Gruyter. p. 212. ISBN 9783110951943.

Bibliography[]

External links[]

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