Third Thursday Lecture: Writing poetry in 1930s Hokkaido: nature, ethnography and resistance

Incorporated into Japan’s national territory in 1869, Hokkaido rapidly became a site of major economic and cultural transformation. Japanese settlers migrated to the island to assist development, which also disrupted the traditional world of the indigenous Ainu people. The lecture recounts the experience of poet, school- teacher and farmer Sarashina Genzo, a second-generation settler born in the town of Teshikaga in 1904, and his interaction with the Ainu in the 1920s and 30s. It introduces Kotan Chronicles, a collection of his poems translated into English for the first time. With a powerful and distinctive voice, the poetry probes this extraordinary cultural encounter in Japan’s far north, depicting both the beauty of the Hokkaido landscape and the back-breaking work required to survive there in an era of economic hardship. It shows how literature acted not only as a subtle witness to changing times, but also a means of political resistance. The translation of Sarashina’s poems results from the collaboration between a historian and a poet, who will contribute to the lecture from the perspective of their respective fields.

 

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