Naoko Higashi
JapanAbout
Naoko Higashi is an award-winning Japanese poet, novelist, children’s author, and screenwriter. She is particularly known for her work in tanka, a traditional Japanese poetic form consisting of 31 syllables. Her writing often explores human relationships, memory, the natural world, and the emotional connections that shape everyday life. Higashi’s literary career spans poetry and fiction, with works that appeal to both adult and younger readers. Her novel The House in the Forest of Threads received the 31st Tsubota Joji Literature Award and was subsequently adapted into a television drama. Her novel The Soul Catchers (Toritsukushima), originally published in Japan in 2007, explores the possibility of the dead remaining connected to their loved ones through ordinary objects. Its distinctive premise and reflections on grief and remembrance have also inspired a film adaptation. Through her imaginative storytelling and lyrical sensibility, Higashi brings a gentle, contemporary perspective to Japanese literary traditions and the enduring human desire to remain connected to those we have lost.
