Kenzaburo Oe
Kenzaburo Oe
Kenzaburō Ōeis a Japanese writer and a major figure in contemporary Japanese literature. His novels, short stories and essays were strongly influenced by French and American literature and literary theory. They deal with political, social and philosophical issues including nuclear weapons, nuclear power, social non-conformism, and existentialism...
NationalityJapanese
ProfessionWriter
Date of Birth31 January 1935
CountryJapan
hangover agony suffering
If any suffering was fruitless it was the agony of a hangover; what he suffered now could not expiate suffering of any other kind.
europe light soul
The destination of the soul: this is what I, led on by Nils Holgersson, came to seek in the literature of Western Europe. I fervently hope that my pursuit, as a Japanese, of literature and culture will, in some small measure, repay Western Europe for the light it has shed upon the human condition.
men imagination enough
To be upright and to have an imagination: that is enough to be a very good young man.
war taken opportunity
In Japan itself there have all along been attempts by some to obliterate the article about renunciation of war from the Constitution and for this purpose they have taken every opportunity to make use of pressures from abroad.
understanding lifestyle phony
Understanding comes hard to persons of high rank who are accustomed to phony lifestyles that involve no daily work.
stills
The dead can survive as part of the lives of those that still live.
jesus men effort
There could be joy in destruction, too, couldn't there? Isn't Jesus Christ's Second Coming supposed to occur only after a lot of unmitigated destruction? But again, human history is fraught with tragedies in which man spared no effort to destroy with millenarian joy, only to learn that no messiah appeared afterwards.
believe writing son
I think, we can only write very personal matters through our experience. When I named my first novel about my son A Personal Matter, I believe I knew the most important thing: there is not any personal matter; we must find the link between ourselves, our personal matter, and society.
jobs firsts literature
It is the second job of literature to create myth. But its first job is to destroy it.
reading reading-experience written
There's no better reading experience than going to the place where a text was written.