Factbook

A Dynamic Compendium of Interesting Japanese Literary and Publishing Facts
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    Japanese literature and novels littered with cats[UPDATED: 9-18-2020]

    There is a long tradition of cats within Japanese literature, folk stories and art. Many ‘cat books’ feature amongst the ranks of Japan’s bestselling titles.

    Natsume Soseki (1867-1916) wrote a highly regarded satirical account of the Meiji Era in Japan titled: I am a Cat, for example, in 1905. Junichiro Tanazaki (1886-1965) who is held in similar regard wrote the novella A Cat, A Man and Two Women in 1936 when he was in the process of adapting The Tale of Genji into modern Japanese.

    Another example is the highly successful series initially published in 1978 Calico Cat Holmes Series by the mystery writer Jiro Akagawa, which now consists of more than 30 novels and 14 collections of short stories.

    The first winner of the Agatha Christie Award, The Black Cat Takes a Stroll by Akimaro Mori, yet another example, very successfully uses the feline form to describe its professor protagonist. 

    The publication of books about cats or with cats as a narrative motif is a continuing trend. Analysis shows that the number of books with the word cat in their title has been steadily increasing in Japan since the 1990s and the rate of publication continues to rise.
    Japanese literature and novels littered with cats Posted by Richard Nathan
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    Only one author, Yoriko Shono, has won Japan’s Triple Crown of literary prizes to date[UPDATED: 4-17-2019]

    The so-called Triple Crown of Japanese literary prizes for new authors consists of the Akutagawa Prize, the Yukio Mishima Prize and the Noma Prize.

    Yoriko Shono, author of Time Slip Kombinat, who describes her style of writing as ‘avant-pop’, is the only author to-date to have achieved the Triple Crown by being awarded all three prizes. 

    A common theme of her work is ‘cyborg-identity’ a narrative that alongside more traditional robot fiction has a long history in Japan and has been used in cyborg feminists novels, and subversive fiction to, for example, ridicule and question society.
    Only one author, Yoriko Shono, has won Japan’s Triple Crown of literary prizes to date Posted by Richard Nathan
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    Japan’s most prolific male and female authors have written 1,000 books[UPDATED: 12-27-2018]

    Jiro Akagawa and Kaoru Kurimoto are Japan’s most prolific authors and have written around 1,000 titles between them. 

    Akagawa has written more than 530 books and sold millions of copies. His first published short story in 1976 Yūrei Ressha, Ghost Train, which was awarded the All Yomimono Mystery Prize for New Writers, helped launch his career.  

    Akagawa’s two major series are: the Mike-Neko Holmes, Holmes, the Tortoiseshell Cat, series, which contains 35 novels and 14 collections of short-stories and the series; Three Sisters Investigates, which includes 23 novels. He has won and been nominated for many important literary prizes and had his books adapted for film and made into video games. At pixel time he continues to write. 

    Kaoru Kurimoto (1953-2009) wrote more than 400 books, but also had a second pen name Azusa Nakajima. When books published under both names are added together she probably wrote approximately 500 titles. Her most famous series is a 130-volume series called Guin Saga. The series has sold in the millions.

    Like many other famous Japanese authors, she studied literature at Wasada University. She wrote across different genres and won several literary prizes including the Edogawa Rampo Prize and the Gunzo Prize for New Writers. 

    Another prolific Japanese author from a much earlier period is Kyokutei Bakin (1767-1848) who wrote 470 books with titles such as: Strange Tales of the Crescent Moon and The Chronicles of the Eight Dog Heroes of the Satomi Clan of Nanos, which took almost three decades to compete and consists of 106 volumes. This work by Bakin has been highly influential and adapted many times. Yukio Mishima (1925-1970), for example, one of Japan’s most internationally famous authors, adapted it for kabuki, and it has been adapted for anime as well. 

    In comparison, the British author Barbara Cartland (1901-2000) published 722 books, an estimated one book every 40 days during her career. Agatha Christie (1890-1979), another British author, who is often cited as the World’s most published and translated author, wrote 19 plays and 69 books. 

    Christie is reported to have sold 4 billion books, four times the number of books distributed in Japan each year. Cartland and Christie are both listed in the Guinness Book of Records.

    Corin Telledo (1927-2009) is also listed and is considered the most read author in the Spanish language and successful author in terms of the number of Spanish language books written and sold. She published thousands of novellas during her career, mostly romances.  
    Japan’s most prolific male and female authors have written 1,000 books Posted by Richard Nathan
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    The translation of the play R.U.R. (Rossum’s Universal Robots) in 1923 led to a robot literature boom in Japan[UPDATED: 3-5-2018]

    The play R.U.R. (Rossum’s Universal Robots) by Karel Čapek (1890–1938), written in 1920 and first performed in Prague in 1921, had a major impact in Japan in the 1920s and 30s after its arrival in translation. 

    The play not only popularised the word robot worldwide, but also triggered a flurry of robot stories in Japan; sometimes described by academics as “Early Showa Robot Literature”. Jinzo Ningen (Artificial Human) by Hatsunosuke Hirabayashi (1892-1932) is often cited as a classic example of this genre. 

    The Robot and the Weight of The Bed by Sunjugo Naoki (1891-1934), who the Naoki Literary Prize – one of Japan’s most important literary awards – is named after, is another example. This story written in 1931 is about a dying man’s plan to leave a robot to look after his wife after he has departed this world. It is set in the future when Japan has electrically controlled cars (not dissimilar to the electronic and autonomous cars being developed today) that automatically avoid accidents. The story is about a robot designed to make sure a wife remains faithful to her husband after his death. Other stories from this period feature enhanced or modified humans as well as robots and dolls. 

    The rapid industrialization Japan was experiencing at the time and the arrival of new developing technologies generated creative angst as well as concerns amongst the general population. 

    Robots were not considered by these authors as merely tools to serve humans; they were also seen as potential threats to human and biological life. Japanese authors developed narratives reflecting the growing concerns about mechanization; similar to the fears often articulated in the media today, about Artificial Intelligence (AI) and the current generation of robots (actual not imagined), and the prospect of so-called technological singularity, artificial super-intelligence that leads to runaway technological growth, changing our society beyond recognition, perhaps in an uncontrollable unforeseen way.
    The translation of the play R.U.R. (Rossum’s Universal Robots) in 1923 led to a robot literature boom in Japan Posted by Richard Nathan
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    In 1964 after Junichiro Tanizaki was nominated and shortlisted for the Nobel Prize in Literature, AFP announced in error that he had won[UPDATED: 2-28-2018]

    In 1964 four Japanese authors were amongst the 76 candidates nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature; Junichiro Tanizaki (1886-1965), Yasunari Kawabata (1899-1972), Yukio Mishima (1925-1970) and Junzaburo Nishiwaki (1894-1982). 

    That year there were 19 new candidates for the prize including two nominated for the first time who went on to win in subsequent years: the Guatemalan author Miguel Angel Asturias (1899-1974) and the Spanish writer Camilla José Cela (1916-2002). They won in 1967 and 1987 respectively. 

    Junichiro Tanizaki was one of six candidates that the Nobel Committee for Literature “considered most relevant” to win in 1964, including the winner that year – the French author Jean-Paul Sartre (1905-1980).

    In the media frenzy leading up to the official announcement by the Nobel Committee the French news agency L’Agence-France-Presse (AFP) announced in error that Junichiro Tanizaki had won. 

    The Japanese media flocked to Tanizaki’s house to document and report his reaction. It was all, in fact a mistake; he never actually won the prize, and tragically died in July the following year. The prize, which is generally announced in October, is only awarded to living authors. Sartre, however, having won famously refused to accept the prize saying that the Writer should “refuse to let himself be transformed into an institution”. 

    Four years later in 1968 Yasunari Kawabata won, becoming the first Japanese author to win the prize and the first Asian author to win it since Rabindranath Tagore (1861-1941) in 1913, who was the first Non-European to win the prize.
    In 1964 after Junichiro Tanizaki was nominated and shortlisted for the Nobel Prize in Literature, AFP announced in error that he had won Posted by Richard Nathan
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    Japan has around 500 different literary prizes[UPDATED: 2-27-2018]

    Japan has around 500 different literary prizes. Some literary prizes target new writers, others specific genres such as the Seiun Award for the best science fiction, awarded by the Federation of Science Fiction Fan Groups of Japan (FSFFGJ). Two of the most coveted awards are the Akutagawa and the Naoki prizes.
    Japan has around 500 different literary prizes Posted by Richard Nathan
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    At least one Japanese literary prize rewards its judging panel and prize-winners equally[UPDATED: 2-27-2018]

    The Akutagawa Prize, one of Japan’s most prestigious literary prizes founded in 1935 in honour of Ryunosuke Akutagawa (1892-1927), reportedly pays each of its nine judges an annual retainer of 1 million yen to select the winner twice a year. In contrast, the prize awarded twice a year (for the best published literary fiction by a new or rising author) is worth the same amount – 1 million yen, about US$10,000. Winners of the prize also receive a high-end pocket watch. 

    Judges have no fixed term. Some of the longest serving judges have remained as judges for decades. The haiku poet Kosaku Takii (1894-1984), for example was an Akutagawa Prize judge for 47 years, between 1935 and 1982. The judges select from a shortlist of 5-7 nominees presented to them by Bungeishinju editors, whose founder set up the prize. 

    In contrast, the Man Booker Prize, a prestigious British literary prize sponsored by a hedge fund, has 5 judges who read more than a hundred novels each from which they select the longlist of 12-13 novels, from these they select a shortlist generally 6, announced about 3 months after the longest, and then finally the winner.

    The judges are generally appointed to only judge the prize once by the prize’s advisory committee and are paid about half that of the Akutagawa Prize judges. Occasionally a judge may be on the panel for two years, but that is the exception not the rule. The Man Booker Prize is awarded once a year, not twice like the Akutagawa, in October after the shortlist is announced normally a month before. The Prize is worth more than 15 times the amount its judges are paid.
    At least one Japanese literary prize rewards its judging panel and prize-winners equally Posted by Richard Nathan
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    The Akutagawa Prize has had some major controversies[UPDATED: 2-27-2018]

    The Akutagawa Prize founded in 1935 may be one of Japan’s most prestigious literary prizes, but it hasn’t escaped serious criticism or indeed controversy. It and its prize-winners have been accused of many things over the years including anti-Semitism, plagiarism and collusion. 

    An expose of it and other Japanese literary prizes was published in 2004, under the title Bungakusho Mettagiri. It criticized amongst other things the selection process and its transparency. One award winner from the 1970s was accused of plagiarism; this being Akio Miyahara’s Derek ga sawatta, Someone touched it, the winner in 1972. 

    A decade later in 1987, Shusaku Endo (1923-1996), one of Japan’s most famous authors, and a member of the judging panel for the prize, felt obliged to write to the New York Times after Passover, by Fumiko Kometani, a book deemed by critics to be anti-Semitic, won the prize in 1986. 

    Endo wrote stating that there was no head of the judging panel and that he had not in fact voted for the prize-winning novel, which was a story about an unhappy Jewish-Japanese marriage. Endo wrote in his letter to the newspaper: “There is no head among the jury of the Akutagawa Prize. As one member of the selection committee, I objected to selecting ”Passover.” That I did not place a high value on this novel is clear from my comments on selection”. 

    The Akutagawa Prize was set-up in the 1930s by Kan Kikuchi (1888-1948), while he was editor of Bungeishinju, one of Japan’s leading literary magazines in honor of Ryunosuke Akutagawa (1892-1927). The prize is awarded twice a year (for the best published literary fiction by a new or rising author) and is worth – 1 million yen, about US$10,000. 

    Kikuchi has had a major impact on the Japanese literary scene. Not only did he found Bungeishinju in 1923, he also founded the Naoki Prize in 1935. The Akutagawa and Naoki prizes are sponsored by the publisher of Bungeishinju, which also organizes the Kikuchi Prize, named after Kan Kikuchi, the Matsumoto Seicho Prize and the Oya Soichi Non-Fiction Prize.
    The Akutagawa Prize has had some major controversies Posted by Richard Nathan