SAKAGUCHI ANGO

   Sakaguchi Ango, given name Heigo, was a novelist and essayist from Niigata Prefecture. An aspiring writer in his teenage years, Sakaguchi made a name for himself only after World War II when he published his popular essay, “Darakuron” (On Decadence, 1946). He attended college at Toyo University and graduated in ethics and Indian philosophy. He wrote historical and detective novels and literary criticism, including the essay “Nihon bunka shikan” (1942; tr. A Personal View of Japanese Culture, 2005) and the novel Hakuchi (1946; tr. The Idiot, 1961), but is most renowned for Darakuron. Sakaguchi died of a brain aneurism at the age of 50. In 2005, the city of Niigata established the Sakaguchi Ango Award in his honor.

   See also POSTWAR LITERATURE.