Gōzō Yoshimasu (吉増 剛造|Yoshimasu Gōzō) (born 1939, Tokyo) is a prolific Japanese poet, photographer, artist and filmmaker active since the 1960s. He has received a number of literary and cultural awards, including the Takami Jun Prize (1971), the Rekitei Prize, the Purple Ribbon Medal in 2003 (given by the Government of Japan),[1] the 50th Mainichi Art Award for Poetry (2009),[2] and the Order of the Rising Sun, Gold Rays in 2013.[3]
Reading at the Daiwa Foundation (London), 5 July 2013
Major influences include Shinobu Orikuchi, Paul Klee, Vincent van Gogh, Paul Cézanne, William Blake, John Cage, Patrick Chamoiseau.[1] Many of his poems are multilingual, blending elements of French, English, Chinese, Korean, Gaelic, and more, and feature cross-linguistic and typographic wordplay. His poems rely on intimate experiences with geography and history, layering encounters in the present with a keen awareness of the past. Drawing on multiple translators whose detailed notes appear opposite the translations, helping to elucidate them, Alice Iris Red Horse: Selected Poems of Yoshimasu Gozo, a Book in and on Translation is the most extensive and adventurous attempt at an English translation of Yoshimasu's complex poetry. Yoshimasu's performances often include film, the display of fetish objects, chanting, ritual procedures, and the collaboration of musicians and other artists.[4]
In a 2014 interview by Aki Onda on the MoMA blog "Post," Yoshimasu described the relationship of his poetry to performance by remarking, "My quest is to reclaim the poetry that lies at the root of performing arts."[5]
His visual art has been gaining increased recognition, with the Japan Art Academy awarding him the Imperial Prize and the Japan Art Academy Prize in 2015.[6]
Publications
Poetry anthologies
Departure (出発, Shin-geijutsusha, 1964)
Anthology of Golden Age Poetry (黄金詩篇, Shichōsha, 1970)
Tower of the Mind (頭脳の塔, Aochisha, 1971)
Kingdom (王國, Kawade Shobō Shinsha, 1973)
Exorcising My Demons (わが悪魔祓い, Seidosha, 1974)
River Written in Cursive (草書で書かれた、川, Shichōsha, 1977)
Hot Wind: a thousand steps (熱風 a thousand steps, Chuō Kōronsha, 1979)
Blue Sky (青空, Kawade Shobō Shinsha, 1979)
Letter to the Tree Towering next to the Big Hospital (大病院脇に聳えたつ一本の巨樹への手紙, Chuō Kōronsha, 1983)
Osiris, God of Stone (オシリス、石ノ神, Shichōsha, 1984)
Helix Songs (螺旋歌, Kawade Shobō Shinsha, 1990)
At the Entrance to the House of Fireworks (花火の家の入口で, Seidosha, 1995)
“The Island of Snow,” or “The Ghost of Emily” (「雪の島」あるいは「エミリーの幽霊」, Shūeisha, 1998)
Snake of Heaven, Bloom of Violet (天上ノ蛇、紫のハナ, Shūeisha, 2005)
Nowhere Tree (何処にもない木, Shironsha, 2006)
Naked Memo (裸のメモ, Shoshi Yamada, 2011)
Dear Monster (怪物君, Misuzu Shobō, 2016)
Voix (Shichōsha, 2021)
Exclusive anthologies
A number of major poetry publishers in Japan have published books and issues of journals (such as Gendai-shi Techō) anthologizing Yoshimasu's works. These include:
Across the Naked Common: Japanese and American Poets' Response to Emerson with Forrest Gander and Masaki Horiuchi (裸のcommonを横切って―エマソンへの日米の詩人の応答, Takanashi Shobō, 2019)
Interviews/Dialogues
Yoshimasu has often had dialogues with creators from Japan and around the world. These include:
Ocean in a Boardgame, Cosmos in a Poem (盤上の海、詩の宇宙, Kawade Shobō Shinsha, 1997) Conversations with Yoshiharu Habu (ISBN4309263194)
At the Edge of this Era (この時代の縁で, with Hiromasa Ichimura, Heibonsha, 1998) (ISBN4582829236)
On the Shores of "Asia" (「アジア」の渚で, (Fujiwara Shoten, 2005) Dialogue with / co-authored by Korean poet Ko Un (ISBN4894344521)
To the World as Archipelago (アーキペラゴ - 群島としての世界へ, Iwanami Shoten, 2006) Dialogue / epistolary exchange with Ryūta Imafuku, Professor of Anthropology and Communication at Tokyo University of Foreign Studies (ISBN4000220314)
Translations into French
Osiris: dieu de pierre. Tr. Claude Mouchard and Makiko Ueda. Circé, May 1999. [1]
Antique observatoire, translated by Claude Mouchard and Masatsugu Ono, illustrations by Daniel Pommereulle, Collection R / Avant post, 2001.
Ex-Voto, a thousand steps and more, translated by Ryoko Sekiguchi, Éditions Les petits matins October 2009.
Translations into English
Devil’s Wind: A Thousand Steps or More. Ed./trans. Brenda Barrows, Thomas Fitzsimmons. Oakland University Press, 1980.
Osiris: The God of Stone. Tr. Hiroaki Satō. St. Andrew's Press, 1989.
"at the side (côtés) of poetry." Tr. Jeffrey Angles. Guernica, 5 Nov. 2012.[7]
"火・Fire: To Adonis...". Tr. Jordan A. Yamaji Smith. Poetry Review, Vol. 103. No. 2 (Summer 2013), pp. 60–61.
ed. Forrest Gander. Alice, Iris, Red Horse: Selected Poems of Gozo Yoshimasu: a Book in and on Translation. Translated by Hiroaki Sato, Jeffrey Angles, Sawako Nakayasu, Jordan A. Yamaji Smith, Richard Arno, Auston Stewart, Eric Selland, Sayuri Okamoto & Derek Gromadzki. New Directions, 2016. [2]
Location One: Poetic Spectrum: Images, Objects and Words of Gozo Yoshimasu [7]
The Columbia Anthology of Modern Japanese Literature: Volume 2 (eds. J. Thomas Rimer, Van C. Gessel). New York: Columbia, 2007. pp. 742–4.
Havens, Thomas R. H.Radicals and Realists in the Japanese Nonverbal Arts: The Avant Garde Rejection of Modernism. Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press, 2006. pp. 73, 132, 148.
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