name: Miyoko Matsutani
birth_date: 1926-02-15 00:00:00
death_date: 2015-02-28 00:00:00
genres: Children's Books
avg_rating: 4.2
ratings_count: 522
about: jap. 松谷みよ子 Born in 1926, Kanda, Tokyo. Graduated from Toyo High School in 1942. Requisitioned by the Naval Hydrographic Department in 1944, when she started writing stories for children.Evacuating to Nagano in May 1945 to escape the war, she met Joji Tsubota, a famous writer for the young readers who was also there under the war evacuation, and showed him her works, asking for his advice. After her return to Tokyo in 1948, Tsubota's recommendation enabled her Kaininatta Kodomo no Hanashi (A Story of a Child turned into a Shell) to appear in the magazine Dowa Kyoshitsu (A Classroom of Children's Stories). Later, the story was published by Akane Publishing Co. as collected short stories entitled Kaininatta Kodomo (A Child turned into a Shell, jap. 松谷みよ子 Born in 1926, Kanda, Tokyo. Graduated from Toyo High School in 1942. Requisitioned by the Naval Hydrographic Department in 1944, when she started writing stories for children.Evacuating to Nagano in May 1945 to escape the war, she met Joji Tsubota, a famous writer for the young readers who was also there under the war evacuation, and showed him her works, asking for his advice. After her return to Tokyo in 1948, Tsubota's recommendation enabled her Kaininatta Kodomo no Hanashi (A Story of a Child turned into a Shell) to appear in the magazine Dowa Kyoshitsu (A Classroom of Children's Stories). Later, the story was published by Akane Publishing Co. as collected short stories entitled Kaininatta Kodomo (A Child turned into a Shell, 1951). The work won the first Japan Juvenile Literature Association Award for New Writers.Married to Takuo Segawa, a folktale historian, with whom she establishment Taro Za, a puppet theater company, which broadened her social perspectives in her writingstyle. With her husband she energetically collected oral stories and folktales through the interviews with the rural people in the Shinshu region, which inspired her to create a story Tatsunoko Taro (Taro the Dragon Boy, 1960) in her unprecedented literary style. Matsutani describes the story as a "collaboration of ancestors and myself." Interspersed with classical children's rhymes, her narrative style flows with a beautiful rhythm exquisitely resonant with the inherent power of story-telling. With its highly appreciated originality both in contents and form of expression that opened a new way in children's books, the work received the first Kodansha Award for Newcomers, the Sankei Juvenile Literature Publishing Culture Award, and the Hans Christian Andersen Award-Honour List (current IBBY Honour List) in 1962.Along with her enthusiasm in creating children's fictions based on folktales, the autobiographical narrative in her Chisai Momo-chan (Little Momo-chan, 1964) brought a fresh air to the genre. The lively tone in the depiction of a child's daily life with her working mother captured readers' hearts. The work won the Noma Prize for Juvenile Literature and the NHK Juvenile Literature Encouragement Prize. Subsequently, she worked on the series of Momo-stories following the girl's growth,such as Momo-chan to Pooh (Momo-chan and Poo, 1970), Momo-chan to Akane-chan (Momo-chan and Akane-chan, 1974), Chisai Akane-chan (Little Akane-chan, 1978) and Akane-chan to Okyaku-san no Papa (Akane-chan and Daddy as Guest, 1983). Particularly, Chisai Akane-chan made a big challenge in dealing with a topic on a parent's divorce, a conventional taboo in the realm of children's literature, by putting the serious subject into focus in a touch of fairytale style.Matsutani has also been intent upon writing such fictions termed as so-called protest literature, including Futari-no Ida (Another Little Girl Called Ida, 1969), Shinokunikara-no Baton (From the Past World, 1976), and Watashino Anne Frank (Letters to Anne Frank, 1979). Her war-stories for younger children such as Machinto (A Little more, 1978) and Oide-Oide (Come here, 1984), for example, are written for those children in the next generation who do not have any experience of real war. The scope of her activities has been extended to record and compile the modern folktales in a series such as Gendaiminwako (Collection of Folktales in Modern times, 5 volumes, 1985).pageup ...more