| Agawa Hiroyuki | |
| Native Name: | 阿川 弘之 |
| Native Name Lang: | ja |
| Birth Date: | 24 December 1920 |
| Language: | Japanese |
| Nationality: | Japanese |
| Genres: | --> |
| Subjects: | --> |
| Notablework: | --> |
| Spouses: | --> |
| Partners: | --> |
(December 24, 1920 – August 3, 2015) was a Japanese author. He was known for his fiction centered on World War II, as well as his biographies and essays.[1]
Agawa was born in Hiroshima, Japan. As a high school student Agawa was influenced by the Japanese author Naoya Shiga. He entered the Tokyo Imperial University to study Japanese literature. Upon graduation in 1942, Agawa was conscripted to serve in the Imperial Japanese Navy, where he worked as an intelligence officer breaking Chinese military codes until the end of the war. He returned to Hiroshima, where his parents had experienced the atomic bomb, in March 1946.
After World War II Agawa wrote his first short story Nennen Saisai (Years upon Years, 1946), which was a classic I Novel, or autobiographical novel, recounting the reunion with his parents. It follows the style of Naoya Shiga, who is said to have praised the work. August 6 as Agawa notes in a postscript, combines the stories of friends and acquaintances who experienced the bombing into the testimony of one family. Occupation censorship at the time was strict, but the story passed because, the author later observed, "it made no reference to the problems of after-effect and continued no overt criticism of the U.S." Agawa came to popular and critical attention with his Citadel in Spring (1952), which was awarded the Yomiuri Prize. (He later revisited the same theme of his experiences as a student soldier in Kurai hato (Dark waves, 1974)). Ma no isan (Devil's Heritage, 1953), a documentary novel, is an account of the bombing of Hiroshima through the eyes of a young Tokyo reporter, handling, among other topics, the death of his Hiroshima nephew and survivors' reactions to the Atomic bomb Casualty Commission, the U.S. agency that conducted research on atomic victims.
Agawa's four major biographical novels are Yamamoto Isoroku (山本五十六, 1965), Yonai Mitsumasa (米内光政, 1978), Inoue Seibi (井上成美, 1986), and Shiga Naoya (志賀直哉, 1994). His other major works include Kumo no bohyo (Grave markers in the clouds, 1955), and Gunkan Nagato no shogai (The life of the warship Nagato, 1975).
Agawa was awarded the Order of Culture (Bunka Kunsho) in 1999.
He is the father of Sawako Agawa, popular author and TV personality, and Naoyuki Agawa, professor of law at Keio University.
| Year | Japanese Title | English Title | Genre/Comments |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1946 | Nennen Saisai | From Age to Age in | I Novel
|
| 1952 | Haru no shiro | Citadel in Spring | Autobiographical novel
|
| 1953 | Ma no isan | Devil's heritage | Documentary novel; following the aftermath of the atomic bomb attack on Hiroshima, translation by John M. Maki, 1957. |
| 1955 | Kumo no bohyō | Burial in the Clouds | Documentary war novel; based on the diary of Iwao Yoshii,[2] a former Kamikaze pilot. Trans. by Teruyo Shimizu, 2006. Movie adaptation by Shochiku in 1957. |
| 1957 | Yoru no namioto | Short stories | |
| 1959 | California | I Novel | |
| 1960 | Saka no ooi machi | Short stories | |
| 1961 | Aoba no kageri | Short stories | |
| 1966 | Gentō | I Novel | |
| 1967 | Gunkan polka | Short stories | |
| 1968 | Mizu no ue no kaiwa | Short stories | |
| 1969 | Yamamoto Isoroku | The Reluctant Admiral: Yamamoto and the Imperial Navy | Biography
|
| 1973 | Kurai hatō | War novel (partly autobiographical) | |
| 1975 | Gunkan Nagato no shōgai | Documentary novel | |
| 1978 | Yonai Mitsumasa | Biography | |
| 1982 | Thames no mizu | Short stories | |
| 1986 | Inoue Seibi | Biography | |
| 1994 | Shiga Naoya | Biography | |
| 2004 | Naki haha ya | I Novel | |