Description
This study offers both a chronological description of the literary career of Kasai Zenz? (1887-1928), as well as an historical examination of shi-sh?setsu (a Japanese autobiographical/confessional literary genre) during and after his lifetime. Zenz? was one of the most important shi-sh?setsu authors, living in the Taish? Period (1912-1926) in which this genre was in the height of its ascendancy. In shi-sh?setsu , the I novel, the author recounts details of his or her personal life with only a thin veneer of fiction. This genre was believed to be an ideal form of prose writing and an expression of individual depth, created without the fabrications normally found in conventional fiction, making it one of the most striking features of modern Japanese literature. Kasai, living his entire life in poverty, turned to Zen Buddhism for spiritual solace and became both a major architect of the Taish? shi-sh?setsu and its defining author.
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