Masahiko Shimada (島田 雅彦) is a Japanese writer. He has won the Noma Literary New Face Prize, the Izumi Kyōka Prize for Literature, the Itō Sei Literature Prize, and the Mainichi Publishing Culture Award. His work has been translated into English.

Biography

While studying Russian at Tokyo University of Foreign Studies, Shimada published a story called The Cassation for the Soft Left-wingers that was nominated for the Akutagawa Prize. The next year he won the 6th Noma Literary New Face Prize for his novel Music for the Kingdom of Somnambulism (夢遊王国のための音楽). Dream Messenger (夢使い) was published in Japan in 1989, with an English translation by Philip Gabriel following in 1992. In her review for The New York Times, Julia Just praised Dream Messenger as "proof that the Japanese novel is taking some fantastic turns in the hands of a new generation of writers." A 2017 retrospective review by Stephen Mansfield of The Japan Times described Dream Messenger as "existential novel that manages to remain firmly grounded within the parameters of a compelling narrative." The same year that Dream Messenger was published in English, Shimada won the 20th Izumi Kyōka Prize for Literature for Higan Sensei (彼岸先生), a parody of Natsume Sōseki's novel Kokoro. Shimada wrote the libretto for Shigeaki Saegusa's opera Chūshingura, which Werner Herzog directed in its 1997 Tokyo debut. Shimada directed and performed in his own play Yurariumu (Ulalium) in 1990. His Japanese translation of Steve Erickson's Rubicon Beach appeared in 1991. In 2016 Shimada won the 70th Mainichi Publishing Culture Award for his novel Kyojin no hoshi (虚人の星).

Recognition