Contents
Kenzaburō Ōe
Writing A Personal Matter and fiction confronting war, disability and responsibility.
A Personal Matter · Hiroshima Notes
- Born
- 31 January 1935
- Birthplace
- Uchiko, Japan
- Died
- 3 March 2023
More people
Kenzaburō Ōe
Kenzaburō Ōe was a Japanese novelist whose work connected intimate family experience with postwar moral questions.
Early life
Shikoku
Grew up in a village on Shikoku.
French literature
Studied at the University of Tokyo.
Career
- 1950s
Early fiction
Began publishing while a university student.
- 1960s
Changing concerns
Family experience and Hiroshima shaped new work.
- 1994
Nobel Prize
Received the Nobel Prize in Literature.
Selected work
A Personal Matter
Confronted a father’s response to his disabled child.
Hiroshima Notes
Collected reflections on the bomb’s human aftermath.
The Silent Cry
Set family conflict against a village’s history.
Beyond work
Family
His son Hikari became a composer.
Pacifism
Campaigned against nuclear weapons and nuclear power.
Sources & photo credit
Life, career and references ↗Nobel Prize biography and award ↗Photo: Thesupermat. CC BY-SA 3.0 · Original image. Cropped and displayed in monochrome.
