was a
Japanese playwright. She was born in
Hiroshima
is the capital of Hiroshima Prefecture in Japan. , the city had an estimated population of 1,199,391. The gross domestic product (GDP) in Greater Hiroshima, Hiroshima Urban Employment Area, was US$61.3 billion as of 2010. Kazumi Matsui has b ...
, but was not in the city on the day of the
atomic bombings. She lost many friends in the bombing, and her profound sense of guilt led her to devote most of her life to producing plays connected with the Hiroshima bombings.
She felt a strong affinity with the architect
Jan Letzel
Jan Letzel (9 April 1880 – 26 December 1925) was a Czech architect who was active in early 20th century Japan. He is most famous for designing the Hiroshima Products Exhibition Hall that was partially destroyed in the atomic bombing of the cit ...
, who had designed the Hiroshima Prefectural Commercial Exhibition building, which — by a stroke of luck — somehow survived the atomic bomb's blast, and thereby became the famous
A-bomb dome. Letzel was Czech, and Murai decided to study in
Prague
Prague ( ; ) is the capital and List of cities and towns in the Czech Republic, largest city of the Czech Republic and the historical capital of Bohemia. Prague, located on the Vltava River, has a population of about 1.4 million, while its P ...
. She translated various works between Czech and Japanese, including the first Japanese renditions of plays by
Josef Topol,
Václav Havel
Václav Havel (; 5 October 193618 December 2011) was a Czech statesman, author, poet, playwright, and dissident. Havel served as the last List of presidents of Czechoslovakia, president of Czechoslovakia from 1989 until 1992, prior to the dissol ...
and
Milan Kundera
Milan Kundera ( ; ; 1 April 1929 – 11 July 2023) was a Czech and French novelist. Kundera went into exile in France in 1975, acquiring citizenship in 1981. His Czechoslovak citizenship was revoked in 1979, but he was granted Czech citizenship ...
, and opera by
Smetana and
Janáček. For this work she won the 1968
Kinokuniya
Kinokuniya (紀ノ国屋) a high-end Japanese supermarket chain headquartered in Shinjuku Ward, Tokyo. Kinokuniya Co., Ltd. became a wholly owned subsidiary of East Japan Railway Company on April 1, 2010.
There is no relationship with retailer a ...
Theatre Award.
Later her own plays were performed and won awards throughout Japan, as well as in
Maui
Maui (; Hawaiian language, Hawaiian: ) is the second largest island in the Hawaiian archipelago, at 727.2 square miles (1,883 km2). It is the List of islands of the United States by area, 17th-largest in the United States. Maui is one of ...
(Hawaii), the
Avignon
Avignon (, , ; or , ; ) is the Prefectures in France, prefecture of the Vaucluse department in the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region of southeastern France. Located on the left bank of the river Rhône, the Communes of France, commune had a ...
Festival and the
Edinburgh Fringe
The Edinburgh Festival Fringe (also referred to as the Edinburgh Fringe, the Fringe or the Edinburgh Fringe Festival) is the world's largest performance arts festival, which in 2024 spanned 25 days, sold more than 2.6 million tickets and featur ...
, starring actresses such as
Mahō Shibuki (ex
Takarazuka),
Takajō Miki (ex SKD=
Shochiku
is a Japanese entertainment company. Founded in 1895, it initially managed '' kabuki'' theaters in Kyoto; in 1914, it also acquired ownership of the Kabuki-za theater in Tokyo. In 1920, Shochiku entered the film production industry and establis ...
Kageki Dan) and Kurihara Chieko
JMDB.
She was married to
Kuzui Kinshirō (
:ja:葛井欣士郎), a film producer and manager of the alternativ
Art Theatre Shinjuku Bunkaduring the 1960s and early 1970s.
She died on 9 May 2018, at her home in Shinjuku.
Footnotes
See also
*
Japanese literature
Japanese literature throughout most of its history has been influenced by cultural contact with neighboring Asian literatures, most notably China and its literature. Early texts were often written in pure Classical Chinese or , a Chinese-Japa ...
*
List of Japanese authors
This is an alphabetical list of writers who are Japanese, or are famous for having written in the Japanese language.
Writers are listed by the native order of Japanese names—family name followed by given name—to ensure consistency, although ...
External links
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Murai, Shimako
1928 births
2018 deaths
Japanese dramatists and playwrights
Japanese women writers
Japanese women dramatists and playwrights
Writers from Hiroshima
Translators from Czech
Translators to Japanese
20th-century Japanese translators