Watanabe, Junzo

Born September 1894. Japanese poet.

Watanabe writes in the tanka genre. He began to publish in 1922. He is considered a disciple of the democratic poet Ishikawa Takuboku. In the 1920’s, he joined the movement for “proletarian literature” in Japan, which was influenced by Soviet literature. Watanabe initiated the use of the traditional lyric tanka genre in democratic literature. After World War II, he led a group of democratic poets who strove to bring poetry closer to life. Watanabe’s best works are the collections Songs of the Poor (1924), I Sing Life (1927), New Day (1946), and Map of Japan (1954). He has published several works on Ishikawa Takuboku and on contemporary Japanese poetry.