Who is Kenzaburo Oe?
Kenzaburo Oe is a Japanese author who won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1994. Kenzaburo Oe is well known for his haunting works that challenge readers to think critically about their lives. Born only six years before the outbreak of the Second World War, Kenzaburo Oe was greatly moved by the events of the war and his childhood, spent steeped in Japanese military culture. Much of his fiction integrates the small community he grew up in, the clash between city and countryside, a mystical cosmology, and unique mythology. It also challenges many traditional Japanese values. Kenzaburo Oe was born in the forests of Shikoku in 1935, to a family that had traditionally lived a small village life for hundreds of years. In an era when many young Japanese began to leave their homes for Tokyo, Oe’s family continued to live an uninterrupted rural life. Oe’s family contained many storytellers, who told the young boy fantastical legends about Japan, many of which were incorporated into Kenzaburo O
