- Ikezawa Natsuki
Ikezawa Natsuki (池澤夏樹, born
July 7 ,1945 [ [http://www.impala.jp/english_website/ikezawaprofileE.html ikezawa profile,english ] ] ) is a Japanese poet, novelist, essayist and translator.He draws upon the relationship between civilization and nature in his writing, among other themes. Ikezawa translates a wide variety of writing, from contemporary Greek poetry to contemporary novels, and translates American literature to Japanese.
Life
Ikezawa was born in the summer of 1945 to
Fukunaga Takehiko and Harajo Akiko (the pen name forYamashita Sumi ) inObihiro, Hokkaido , which his parents fled inWorld War II . His parents were members of the literary society Matinée Poétique. In 1950, his parents divorced, and he moved to Tokyo with his mother the following year. Ikezawa did not find out about his father until his high-school years .Fact|date=February 2007In 1963, Ikezawa enrolled at
Saitama University to studyphysics , but dropped out in February 1968. In 1975, he moved toGreece , where he lived for 3 years. His daughter, Haruna, was born during his sojourn there.After returning to Japan, via north Africa, Ikezawa published his first collection of poems, "The Way of Salt" ("Shio No Michi", 塩の道) in Eureka . He was also commissioned to write essays.Specify|date=January 2007 After writing the Japanese subtitles of the
Theo Angelopoulos film, "The Travelling Players" ("O Thiassos", 旅芸人の記録) in 1979, Angelopoulos commissioned him to continue writing subtitles for the director's films.Fact|date=February 2007 He gave up writing poetry after publishing "The Considering with The Longest River" ("Mottomo Nagai Kawa Ni Kansuru Kosatsu", もっとも長い河に関する考察, 1982) and began writing prose, beginning with the short story "The Stratosphere on a Summer Morning" (Natsu No Asa No Seisoken, 夏の朝の成層圏). For his short story, "Still Lives" (Stiru Raifu, スティル・ライフ), he received two Rookie-of-the-Year awards: the TyuoKoron Prize and theAkutagawa Prize . This story established him as a novelist, and he has since become a prolific writer.In 1993, Ikezawa moved to Okinawa, Japan, and later to Fontainebleau, France.
Awards
Ikezawa's works have been awarded several prizes such as the Tanizaki-Junichiro Prize for "The Fall of Macias Guili" ("Masiasu Giri No Shikkyaku", マシアス・ギリの失脚), the
Mainichi Prize for "A Burden of Flowers" ("Hana Wo Hakobu Imoto", 花を運ぶ妹), and theYomiuri Prize for "Ending with Happiness" ("Tanoshi Shumatsu", 楽しい終末).Bibliography
* "Still Lives" (tr.
Dennis Keene , Tokyo:Kodansha International, 1997)
* "A burden of flowers" (tr.Alfred Birnbaum , Tokyo: Kodansha International, 2001)
* "On a Small Bridge in Iraq" (tr. Alfred Birnbaum, Okinawa: Impala, 2003)References
External links
* [http://www.impala.jp/english_website/indexE.html Impala] - Official web site
* [http://www.wordswithoutborders.org/article.php?lab=ATeam The A Team] (Words Without Borders, tr. Alfred Birnbaum, from Ikezawa Natsuki. ‘Asteroid no Kansokutai (アステロイドの観測隊)’, "Switch" Vol. 11, No. 3, Tokyo: Switch Publishing, 1993.7)
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