Jun Etō

Jun Etō (江藤淳) (25 December 1932 – 21 July 1999) was a Japanese literary critic, active in the Showa and early Heisei period Japan.

Early life
Etō was born in the Shinjuku district of Tokyo; his father was a banker, and his grandfather (originally from Saga in Kyūshū was an admiral in the Imperial Japanese Navy. His mother died when he was four years old, and always sickly as a child, he was mostly educated at home. He had an interest in literature from an early age, ranging from the heavy works of Jun'ichirō Tanizaki and Fyodor Dostoevsky, to the comics of Suihō Tagawa. In 1942, he was sent to boarding school in Kamakura, Kanagawa prefecture. While in Kamakura, his family's house in Tokyo was destroyed during the American air raids.

In the immediate postwar era, he went to high school in Fujisawa, Kanagawa prefecture, where he developed a friendship with future Tokyo governor Shintaro Ishihara, who was one year ahead of him. He later returned to Tokyo, and eventually graduated from Keio University with a degree in English literature.

Literary career
Although hired as a professor at the Tokyo Institute of Technology, Etō devoted most of his time and efforts into literature, and published his first work, Natsume Sōseki ron (1955), a critique of the famous Japanese writer Natsume Sōseki. He followed this with Dorei no shisō wo haisu (1958) and Sakka ha kōdō suru (1959), in which he argued that a writer's style was directly related to his personal behavior and background.

In 1962, he published Kobayashi Hideo ronshū, in which he dared to write a critique on the famous literary critic Kobayashi Hideo. Shortly afterwards, he departed for the United States for two years, for advanced studies at Princeton University.

Other works include Ichizoku saikai (1967–1972) in which he attempted to trace his family roots and at the same time, the roots of the Japanese people.

Etō was a very prolific author, and his books and essays ranged from literary criticism and to postwar political commentary; through taking controversial viewpoints, he also established himself as one of foremost public intellectuals in the print and television. Etō especially drew controversy during the mid-1960s when he produced a series of essays after his return from Princeton, which indicated a shift to the far right end of the political spectrum.

On 21 July 1999, Etō committed suicide at his home in Kamakura by cutting his left wrist. He had been depressed by the death of his wife the previous year, and by a stroke which he had suffered, which made writing difficult.

Published works

 * Tansman, Alan and Dennis Washburn. (1997). Studies in Modern Japanese Literature: Essays and Translations in Honor of Edwin McClellan. Ann Arbor: Center for Japanese Studies, University of Michigan. ISBN 0-9395-1284-X (cloth)