was a novelist and playwright active during the Shōwa period

Showa period

The , or Shōwa era, is the period of Japanese history corresponding to the reign of the Shōwa Emperor, Hirohito, from December 25, 1926 through January 7, 1989.The Shōwa period was longer than the reign of any previous Japanese emperor...

 in Japan

Japan

Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...

.

Biography

Nagayo was born in Tokyo

Tokyo

, ; officially , is one of the 47 prefectures of Japan. Tokyo is the capital of Japan, the center of the Greater Tokyo Area, and the largest metropolitan area of Japan. It is the seat of the Japanese government and the Imperial Palace, and the home of the Japanese Imperial Family...

, as the 5th son of the famous doctor, Nagayo Sensai

Nagayo Sensai

Baron was a medical doctor and statesman in Meiji period Japan.- Biography :Nagayo was born to a family of traditional physicians in Ōmura Domain, Hizen Province , and studied rangaku under Ogata Kōan in Osaka...

. He attended the Gakushūin

Gakushuin

The or Peers School is an educational institution founded in Tokyo in 1877, during the Meiji period, for the education of the children of the Japanese aristocracy, though it eventually also opened its doors to the offspring of extremely wealthy commoners...

 Peers' School, and went on to graduate from Tokyo Imperial University. Through his school connections, he made the acquaintance of Mushanokoji Saneatsu

Mushanokoji Saneatsu

was the pen name of a Japanese novelist, playwright, poet, artist and philosopher active during the late Taishō and Shōwa periods of Japan. He was also sometimes known as Mushakōji Saneatsu, other pen-names included Musha and Futo-o.-Early life:...

 and Shiga Naoya

Shiga Naoya

was a Japanese novelist and short story writer active during the Taishō and Showa periods of Japan.-Early life:Shiga was born in Ishinomaki city, Miyagi prefecture. His father, the son of a samurai, was a banker. The family moved to Tokyo when Shiga was three, to live with his grandparents, who...

, and he contributed works to the Shirakaba ("White Birch") literary journal. He is considered a typical spokesman for the humanistic philosophy

Humanism

Humanism is an approach in study, philosophy, world view or practice that focuses on human values and concerns. In philosophy and social science, humanism is a perspective which affirms some notion of human nature, and is contrasted with anti-humanism....

 of the Shirakaba school.

Publication of Shirakaba was suspended in 1923 after the Great Kantō Earthquake

1923 Great Kanto earthquake

The struck the Kantō plain on the Japanese main island of Honshū at 11:58:44 am JST on September 1, 1923. Varied accounts hold that the duration of the earthquake was between 4 and 10 minutes...

, but Nagayo and Mushanokoji collaborated to bring out a new literary magazine, Fuji, the same year. As a literary critic for Fuji, Nagayo railed against the proletarian literature movement of the pre-war period.

His major works include the plays Kou to Ryuho (1916–1917), Indara no ko ("Child of Indra", 1921), and the historical novel

Historical novel

According to Encyclopædia Britannica, a historical novel is-Development:An early example of historical prose fiction is Luó Guànzhōng's 14th century Romance of the Three Kingdoms, which covers one of the most important periods of Chinese history and left a lasting impact on Chinese culture.The...

 Takezawa sensei to iu hito (1924–25).

He is best known in the West for his screenplay

Screenplay

A screenplay or script is a written work that is made especially for a film or television program. Screenplays can be original works or adaptations from existing pieces of writing. In them, the movement, actions, expression, and dialogues of the characters are also narrated...

 Seido no Kirisuto ("Christ in Bronze"), a story about religious persecution

Religious persecution

Religious persecution is the systematic mistreatment of an individual or group of individuals as a response to their religious beliefs or affiliations or lack thereof....

 in Edo period

Edo period

The , or , is a division of Japanese history which was ruled by the shoguns of the Tokugawa family, running from 1603 to 1868. The political entity of this period was the Tokugawa shogunate....

 Japan, which was one of the entries in competition at the 1956 Cannes Film Festival

Cannes Film Festival

The Cannes International Film Festival , is an annual film festival held in Cannes, France, which previews new films of all genres including documentaries from around the world. Founded in 1946, it is among the world's most prestigious and publicized film festivals...

.

See also

• Japanese literature
  Japanese literature
  Early works of Japanese literature were heavily influenced by cultural contact with China and Chinese literature, often written in Classical Chinese. Indian literature also had an influence through the diffusion of Buddhism in Japan...
  
  
• List of Japanese authors