14 Facts About Kitamura Tokoku

Kitamura Tokoku was the pen name of Kitamura Montaro, a Japanese poet and essayist.

Kitamura Tokoku was one of the founders of the modern Japanese romantic literary movement.

From a samurai-class family of Ashigarashimo District, Kanagawa, Kitamura was interested in liberal politics at an early age, and played a minor role in the Freedom and People's Rights Movement.

Kitamura Tokoku attended the Tokyo Senmon Gakko, but was expelled due to his radical political views.

Kitamura Tokoku self-published the long verse Soshu no shi in 1888, which was the longest Japanese poem written in free verse up until that time.

Kitamura Tokoku followed this with the poetic drama Horai kyoku.

Kitamura Tokoku claimed to be influenced by the works of Byron, Emerson and Carlyle.

Kitamura Tokoku turned from poetry to essays, and wrote works extolling the "life-espousing views" of the West, over the "life-denying view" of Buddhism and traditional Japanese Shinto thought.

Kitamura Tokoku was drawn to the Quaker movement, and founded a pacifist society, the Japan Peace Association, in 1889.

Kitamura Tokoku was hired as an English teacher at the Friends Girls School in 1890.

Kitamura Tokoku submitted literary criticism to the magazine Bungakukai, which he helped launch with Shimazaki Toson in 1893.

Kitamura Tokoku authored the Bungakukai article The Evils of Blind Faith, in which he ridiculed, among other things, the kokugaku movement, which by the time of its near-extinction in the late 19th century had evolved into a form of Shinto fundamentalism.

Kitamura Tokoku was a close associate of Shimazaki Toson, whom he strongly influenced towards the romantic literary movement and whose father Shimazaki Masaki is noted for his involvement in kokugaku circles.

Kitamura Tokoku's grave is at the temple of Zuisho-ji in Shirokane, Tokyo.