更新日：2010年7月5日

Ishizuka Tomoji

Ishizuka Tomoji, haiku poet and novelist, was born in 1906 in Niigata Prefecture. He went up to Tokyo in 1924 and got a job at the Tokyo-Do bookstore. On the introduction of his friend Naka Kohei, he began to study under the novelist Yokomitsu Riichi, with the aim of creating his own novels. In order to compose haiku, he joined the Kareno coterie of Hasegawa Reiyoshi, but in 1933 he started to contribute haiku verses to the Ashibi magazine, run by Mizuhara Shuoshi. From this time, he started working for Tenbosha Books and engaged in the editing of an essay magazine, Buntai (Style). He also joined the coterie headed by Hotaka Tokuzo that published the magazine, Literary Quarterly.

In 1935, he began the Sara bookstore and published works by Yokomitsu Riichi and Kawabata Yasunari, and the haiku anthologies of Nakamura Kusatao and Ishida Hakyo. With the latter, he founded the haiku magazine, Tsuru (Crane) in 1937. In 1940, the publication of the anthology, "Hosun Kyojitsu," brought him into the limelight of the haiku world. After the death of Ishida Hakyo in 1969, he took over the responsibility for Tsuru. His other anthologies of haiku include "Iso Kaze" (Beach wind), "Kojin" (Light dust) and "Tamanawa-sho." In 1942, he made his first mark in the world of fiction writing with the novel, "Matsukaze," which was carried in the magazine Bungakukai (Literary world). Other novels included "Seishun" (Youth) and "Hashi-mori" (Bridge guard). He died in 1986 at the age of 79.

Ishizuka Tomoji lived in Kamakura from 1945 until his death, first at Inamuragasaki, then Ueki and Tamanawa. In Kamakura, he was a member of the Nanboku (North-South) coterie and contributed to the "Kamakura" magazine. A memorial stone bearing his haiku can be found in the precincts of Kenchoji Temple.