Japanese Literature

Japan is one of the most developed and progressive nations of the world today. The Japanese economy has emerged as one of the strongest world economies. The nation has a rich heritage of culture, tradition and literature. Asiarooms.com gives you an insight to the great Japanese literature that has caught the fascination of millions across the world. Read on to know more about Japanese literature.

The literature of Japan owes much to the Chinese literature, as the former was highly influenced by the latter during its early days. But gradually, literature of Japan developed a uniqueness of its own. Diplomatic ties with the western countries during the 19th century opened the door for setting up trade relations with them. This had an effect on the Japanese literature, as it was heavily influenced by the western literature and western authors.

History

Japanese literature can be categorized as ancient literature, medieval literature and modern literature.

Ancient Literature: The eight century roughly belonged to the ancient literature. Without the presence of a native writing system, classical Chinese was the only literary language. Japan adopted Chinese characters (Kanji) to initiate the Japanese syllabic writing (Kana). The Nara Period saw some of the ancient Japanese literary works, such as Kojiki, Nihonshoki and Manyoshu.

The classical period prevailed from ninth to twelfth century. This period, or the Heian period is considered to be the golden era of Japanese literature. Some of the masterpieces of this period include Murasaki Shikibu's The Tale of Genji and The Pillow Book, Kokin Wakashu, Sei Shonagon etc.

Medieval Literature: This era carries the influence of Zen Buddhism. The stories and tales written in this period mainly deal with war stories, simple lifestyles and salvation through killing. Some of the notable works of this period are The Tale of the Heike, Hojoki by Kamo no Ch?mei and Tsurezuregusa by Yoshida Kenko. The authors of this period made a unique mixture of Kanji and Kana, which prevails even today.

The period from 17th century to the mid parts of 19th century saw the rise of the working middle class, thus multiplying the literacy rate among the public. The early-modern literature had some of the gems of Japan's literary works like Oku no Hosomichi, 36 Views of Mount Fuji, Nanso Satomi Hakkenden and so on.

The post- World War 2 literature in Japan got international recognition, when in 1964, Oe Kenzaburo won the Nobel in Literature for A Personal Matter, his best-known work. In the eighties, detective and science fictions, fictions, non-fictions as well as children's literature started to rule the Japan literature.

Japan's literature is gaining in popularity in the international arena. For more information on Japan, visit Asiarooms.com.

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