was a Japanese actress and singer. Born as Masako Kobayashi in Matsushiro, Nagano,

Nagano Prefecture is a Landlocked country, landlocked Prefectures of Japan, prefecture of Japan located in the Chūbu region of Honshu. Nagano Prefecture has a population of 2,007,682 () and has a geographic area of . Nagano Prefecture borders Niigata Prefecture ...

as the fifth daughter and last of nine children of Tohta Kobayashi, she was adopted by the Hasegawa family in Ueda at the age of six and in 1900 graduated Ueda school. She had to return to her birth family after her adopted father died, however in the year of her return, her natural father also died. At the age of 17 she moved to Tokyo. She married in 1903 at the arrangement of relatives but divorced within a year. In 1908 she married Seisuke Maezawa from the same country village and in 1909 joined Shoyo Tsubouchi's newly established theatre group only to divorce Maezawa the following October 1910. Matsui first became famous in 1911 for her portrayal of Nora in ''

A Doll's House ''A Doll's House'' (Danish language, Danish and ; also translated as ''A Doll House'') is a three-act Play (theatre), play written by Norwegian playwright Henrik Ibsen. It premiered at the Royal Danish Theatre in Copenhagen, Denmark, on 21 De ...

''. In 1913 after establishing the Geijutsu-za theatre troupe with the

shingeki was a leading form of theatre in Japan that was based on modern realism. Born in the early years of the 20th century, it sought to be similar to modern Western theatre, putting on the works of the ancient Greek classics, William Shakespeare, Moli ...

director Hogetsu Shimamura, she became an acclaimed actress thanks to her performance in the role of Katusha in Tolstoy's ''

Resurrection Resurrection or anastasis is the concept of coming back to life after death. Reincarnation is a similar process hypothesized by other religions involving the same person or deity returning to another body. The disappearance of a body is anothe ...

'' (translated by Shimamura). " Katyusha's song", written by

Shinpei Nakayama was a Japanese songwriter famous for his many children's songs ('' warabe uta)'' and popular songs (''ryūkōka'') that have become deeply embedded in Japanese popular culture. Early life Nakayama was born in 1887 in Nakano City, Nagano Prefe ...

, which she sang in the film, became a huge hit selling over 20,000 copies at the time. This was said to be the first ''

ryūkōka is a Japanese music genre, musical genre. The term originally denoted any kind of "popular music" in Japanese, and is the East Asian cultural sphere, sinic reading of ''hayariuta'', used for commercial music of Edo period, Edo Period. Therefore, ...

'' song. After Shimamura died of the

Spanish flu The 1918–1920 flu pandemic, also known as the Great Influenza epidemic or by the common misnomer Spanish flu, was an exceptionally deadly global influenza pandemic caused by the H1N1 subtype of the influenza A virus. The earliest docum ...

on November 5, 1918, she committed suicide by

hanging Hanging is killing a person by suspending them from the neck with a noose or ligature strangulation, ligature. Hanging has been a standard method of capital punishment since the Middle Ages, and has been the primary execution method in numerou ...

on January 5, 1919. It was Matsui's wish to be buried alongside Shimamura, with whom she had been having an affair. However, her wish was not to be granted and her grave lies with her family in her hometown of Matsushiro. Remains are also buried in the Tamon Temple in Shinjuku, Tokyo. The movie '' The Love of Sumako the Actress'' was produced in 1947 based on her life.

References

4. ^ (Japanese) “People of the Shinshu region”. Shinano Mainichi Newspaper. 1966 5. “Modern Girls, Shining Stars, the Skies of Tokyo – 5 Japanese women”, Phyllis Birnbaum, 1999

External links

* 1886 births 1919 suicides 20th-century Japanese actresses Japanese stage actresses Singers from Nagano Prefecture Suicides by hanging in Japan 20th-century Japanese women singers 20th-century Japanese singers 1919 deaths {{Japan-singer-stub