, born Mitsuyoshi Tōge, was a Japanese poet, activist, and survivor of the

atomic bombing of Hiroshima On 6 and 9 August 1945, the United States detonated two atomic bombs over the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, respectively, during World War II. The aerial bombings killed between 150,000 and 246,000 people, most of whom were civil ...

. He is best known for his collection of poems ''Genbaku Shishu'' ("Poems of the Atomic Bomb"), published in 1951.

Early life and education

Mitsuyoshi Tōge, later known as Sankichi Tōge, was born on 19 February 1917 in

Osaka is a Cities designated by government ordinance of Japan, designated city in the Kansai region of Honshu in Japan. It is the capital of and most populous city in Osaka Prefecture, and the List of cities in Japan, third-most populous city in J ...

, the youngest son of Ki'ichi Tōge, a successful manufacturer of bricks. From the start Tōge was a sickly child, suffering from

asthma Asthma is a common long-term inflammatory disease of the airways of the lungs. It is characterized by variable and recurring symptoms, reversible airflow obstruction, and easily triggered bronchospasms. Symptoms include episodes of wh ...

and periodic vomiting. His family was politically radical, with two siblings official members of the Communist Party and all of the children having been arrested at least once; however, Tōge did not become involved in politics at this time. He graduated from Hiroshima Prefecture's School of Commerce in 1935 and started working for the Hiroshima Gas Company.

Poetry and activism

Tōge started composing poems in the second year of middle school. Early influences included

Tolstoy Count Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy Tolstoy pronounced his first name as , which corresponds to the romanization ''Lyov''. () (; ,Throughout Tolstoy's whole life, his name was written as using pre-reform Russian orthography. ; ), usually referr ...

Heine Heine is both a surname and a given name of German origin. People with that name include: People with the surname * Albert Heine (1867–1949), German actor * Alice Heine (1858–1925), American-born princess of Monaco * Armand Heine (1818–1883) ...

Tōson Shimazaki was the pen-name of Haruki Shimazaki, a Japanese writer active in the Meiji, Taishō and early Shōwa periods of Japan. He began his career as a Romantic poet, but went on to establish himself as a major proponent of Japanese Naturalism. The ...

, and Haruo Sato. By 1945 he had composed three thousand

tanka is a genre of classical Japanese poetry and one of the major genres of Japanese literature. Etymology Originally, in the time of the influential poetry anthology (latter half of the eighth century AD), the term ''tanka'' was used to disti ...

and even more

haiku is a type of short form poetry that originated in Japan. Traditional Japanese haiku consist of three phrases composed of 17 Mora (linguistics), morae (called ''On (Japanese prosody), on'' in Japanese) in a 5, 7, 5 pattern; that include a ''kire ...

. They were mostly lyric poems. Tōge was 28 in Midori-machi, from the

hypocenter A hypocenter or hypocentre (), also called ground zero or surface zero, is the point on the Earth's surface directly below a nuclear explosion, meteor air burst, or other mid-air explosion. In seismology, the hypocenter of an earthquake is its ...

of the bomb dropped by the Americans on Hiroshima to end World War II in 1945. After this, his activism included the publication of several books advocating peace and opposing the use of nuclear weapons. Among other groups and movements, he became involved in and took up some leadership positions in the Hiroshima Poets Society (Hiroshima shijin kyōkai), the New Japan Literature Association (Shin Nihon bungaku kai), the Our Poetry Association (Warera no shi no kai), and the Communist-sponsored Culture Circle (Bunka sākuru) in Hiroshima. He also became involved in

workers' rights Labor rights or workers' rights are both legal rights and human rights relating to labor relations between workers and employers. These rights are codified in national and international labor and employment law. In general, ...

and

trade union A trade union (British English) or labor union (American English), often simply referred to as a union, is an organization of workers whose purpose is to maintain or improve the conditions of their employment, such as attaining better wages ...

s. Because of this activism, he gained a higher profile than two other prominent poets who also wrote about the bomb, Hara Tamiki and Ōta Yōko. In 1946, he submitted an essay entitled "Hiroshima in 1965", containing ideas for the revival of the city, to a competition held by ''

Chugoku Shimbun The is a Japanese local daily newspaper based in Hiroshima. It serves the Chūgoku region of Japan with a market share in Hiroshima, Yamaguchi, Shimane, Okayama and Tottori Prefectures. The newspaper publishes morning and evening editions. The ...

'' newspaper, winning first prize. The essay, which some later said had been written by his elder brother, was published in ''Chugoku Shimbun''. In 1949 he joined the

Japanese Communist Party The is a communist party in Japan. Founded in 1922, it is the oldest political party in the country. It has 250,000 members as of January 2024, making it one of the largest non-governing communist parties in the world. The party is chaired ...

. By 1951 he was writing poetry very different from his earlier efforts, as he became more politicised. His first collection of the atomic bomb works, ''Genbaku Shishu'' ("Poems of the Atomic Bomb") was published in 1951. In the same year, it was sent to the World Youth Peace Festival in

Berlin Berlin ( ; ) is the Capital of Germany, capital and largest city of Germany, by both area and List of cities in Germany by population, population. With 3.7 million inhabitants, it has the List of cities in the European Union by population withi ...

, where it garnered international acclaim. His work includes references to the political environment of the time, especially of Japan occupied by the Allied Forces, and he expresses anger at the United States, while not mentioning the country by name.

Personal life and death

In 1938 Tōge was diagnosed, wrongly, with

tuberculosis Tuberculosis (TB), also known colloquially as the "white death", or historically as consumption, is a contagious disease usually caused by ''Mycobacterium tuberculosis'' (MTB) bacteria. Tuberculosis generally affects the lungs, but it can al ...

. Believing himself to have only a few years to live, he spent most of his time as an invalid. In December 1942, he was baptized into the

Catholic Church The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the List of Christian denominations by number of members, largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwid ...

, and did not denounce religion after joining the Communist Party. In 1948 Tōge learned that his earlier diagnosis was wrong; he had

bronchiectasis Bronchiectasis is a disease in which there is permanent enlargement of parts of the bronchi, airways of the lung. Symptoms typically include a chronic cough with sputum, mucus production. Other symptoms include shortness of breath, hemoptysis, co ...

, an enlargement of the bronchial tube. During his illness and hospitalisation, his supporters raised funds to pay the fees for his medical expenses. Tōge died on 10 March 1953 at the age of 36 at the National Hiroshima Sanatorium.

Legacy

Tōge's poetry, especially that containing the vivid imagery describing the pain caused by the bomb, has been translated into many languages, and he is regarded as "the leading poet of atomic bomb". A monument to Tōge was erected at on 6 August 1963, which bears his most well known poem, ''Genbaku Shishu''. In 2013 the Association of Preservation Data on Hiroshima Literature received around 20 previously unpublished manuscripts from the nephew of Tōge, which included the draft of a plan to reconstruct Hiroshima. As it had accompanied the prizewinning essay mentioned above, there was still some uncertainty regarding its authorship. ''Midnight in Broad Daylight'' (2016), by American historian Pamela Rotner Sakamoto, takes its title from a poem by Tōge.

''Genbaku Shishu'' (Poems of the Atomic Bomb)

References

External links

''Hiroshima Piano'' (2020 Film) (Official Website)''Hiroshima: In four poems: August 6''
translated by Karen Thornber {{DEFAULTSORT:Toge, Sankichi Hibakusha 1917 births 1953 deaths 20th-century Japanese poets Japanese communists