KOKORO

NATSUME SŌSEKI (1867-1916), one of Japan’s most influential modern writers, is widely considered the foremost novelist of the Meiji era (1868-1912). Born Natsume Kinnosuke in Tokyo, he graduated from Tokyo University in 1893 and then taught high school English. He went to England on a Japanese government scholarship, and when he returned to Japan, he lectured on English literature at Tokyo University and began his writing career with the novel I Am a Cat. In 1908 he gave up teaching and became a full-time writer. He wrote fourteen novels, including Botchan and Kusamakura, as well as haiku, poems in the Chinese style, academic papers on literary theory, essays, and autobiographical sketches. His work enjoyed wide popularity in his lifetime and secured him a permanent place in Japanese literature.

 

MEREDITH McKINNEY holds a Ph.D. in medieval Japanese literature from the Australian National University in Canberra, where she teaches at the Japan Centre. She taught in Japan for twenty years and now lives near Braidwood, New South Wales. Her other translations include Ravine and Other Stories by Furui Yoshikichi, The Tale of Saigyo, and, for Penguin Classics, The Pillow Book of Sei Shōnagon and Natsume Sōseki’s Kusamakura.