15 Facts About Ango Sakaguchi

Ango Sakaguchi was a Japanese writer, who wrote short stories and novels and was an essayist.

Ango Sakaguchi was associated with the Buraiha or "Decadent School", which designated a group of dissolute writers who expressed their perceived aimlessness and identity crisis of post-World War II Japan.

Ango Sakaguchi was born in 1906 and was the 12th child of 13.

Ango Sakaguchi was born in the middle of a Japan perpetually at war.

Ango Sakaguchi's father was the president of the Niigata Shimbun newspaper, a politician, and a poet.

Ango Sakaguchi moved to Tokyo at 17, after hitting a teacher who caught him truanting.

Ango Sakaguchi's father died from brain cancer the following year, leaving his family in massive debt.

At 20, Ango Sakaguchi taught for a year as a substitute teacher following secondary school.

Ango Sakaguchi became heavily involved in Buddhism and attended Toyo University to study Indian philosophy, graduating at the age of 25.

Ango Sakaguchi wrote various works of literature after graduating, receiving praise from writers such as Makino Shin'ichi.

Ango Sakaguchi's mother died when he was 37, in the middle of World War II.

Ango Sakaguchi struggled for recognition as a writer for years before finally finding it with "A Personal View of Japanese Culture" in 1942, and again with "On Decadence" in 1946.

In 1947, Ango Sakaguchi wrote an ironical murder mystery, Furenzoku satsujin jiken, for which he received the Mystery Writers of Japan Award in 1948.

Ango Sakaguchi had a child at 42 with his wife, Michiyo Kaji.

Ango Sakaguchi later died from a brain aneurysm at age 48 in 1955, in Kiryu, Gunma.