更新日：2010年7月5日

Ozaki Kihachi

The poet Ozaki Kihachi was born in Tokyo in 1892. While attending the Keika Shogyo (Commercial) School, he showed an aptitude for the English language and familiarized himself with English poetry anthologies. In 1911, he came to the notice of poet and sculptor, Takamura Kotaro, and this ignited his interest in the arts. While working as a company employee, Ozaki also undertook translations and wrote his own verse, and he wrote stories for the literary magazine, Shirakaba (White Birch). In 1922, he published his first collection of poems, "Sora to Jumoku" (Sky and Trees). As a member of the Shirakaba coterie became close friends with Mushanokoji Saneatsu and Senge Motomaro, and he tried to follow the idyllic life of tilling the fields and composing verse. He was also fond of travelling and mountaineering, and these interests provided the ideal setting for a close fusion of nature and literary pursuits. Besides English, Ozaki taught himself French and German, and was greatly influenced by writers such as Romain Rolland and Herman Hesse, and Chino Shosho’s translation of Rilke’s verse. In works such as "Takamura Shisho" (Takamura Anthology) and "Hana Sakeru Kodoku" (Flowering Loneliness), he was able reach new depths of poetry by distancing himself from realistic society and achieving a union of nature and the inner self. Ozaki also published "Yama no Ehon" (Mountain Picture Book) a collection of miscellaneous thoughts, and prolific translations of Romain Rolland, Herman Hesse and Georges Duhamel. Ozaki died in 1974 at the age of 82.

Ozaki moved to Kamakura in 1966 and spent the last years of his life in Yamanouchi, near the Meigetsu-in Temple. His ashes rest at this temple.