The shishosetsu is a Japanese form of autobiographical fiction that flourished during the first two decades of this century. Focusing on the works of Chikamatsu Shuko, Shiga Naoya, and Kasai Zenzo, Edward Fowler explores the complex and paradoxical nature of shishosetsu, and discusses its linguistic, literary and cultural contexts.

Edward Fowler teaches in the Department of East Asian Languages and Literatures at the University of California, Irvine.

"The most thoroughgoing and sophisticated narratological study of modern Japanese literature to date, and I fully expect that it will significantly advance the level of critical discourse in the field."—Marvin Marcus, Modern Fiction Studies

"Carefully and widely researched, with sympathetic and informed textual readings and a wealth of background information. . . . A singular study."—Mary N. Layoun, Journal of Asian Studies

"Fowler's study is the fruit of a thoughtful and penetrating engagement with an important modern Japanese literary form, and the only one to shed a brilliant light on the phenomenon of narrative discourse in the shishosetsu."—Janet A. Walker, Journal of Japanese Studies

Winner of the Hiromi Arisawa Memorial Award, 1990
The Lilienthal Prize for the work of a junior scholar, The Center for Chinese Studies and the Center for Japanese Studies, UC Berkeley