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Taiwanese writer Li Qinfeng wins prestigious Japanese arts award for novel

  • Date:2021-03-04
Taiwanese writer Li Qinfeng wins prestigious Japanese arts award for novel

Taiwanese writer Li Qinfeng (李琴峰) is among the winners of this year's Geijutsu Sensho Shinjin Award (芸術選奨文部大臣新人賞) for her Japanese-language novel "Porarisu ga furisosogu yoru (北極星灑落之夜 )."

Born in Taiwan, Li Qinfeng began to learn Japanese at the age of 15. At the same time, she started writing novels in Chinese. She later graduated from National Taiwan University (NTU) with a double major in Japanese and Chinese. In 2013, she left for Japan to study, later earning a master's degree at Waseda University.

In 2017, Li Qinfeng received the 60th Gunzō New Writers' Award (群像新人文学賞) for Excellence with her Japanese novel "Hitorimai (獨舞)."

In 2019, she was shortlisted for the Japanese literary award Akutagawa Prize (芥川龍之介賞), for her novel "Count to Five and the Crescent Moon (倒數五秒月牙)."

The approval that Li has gained once again for "Porarisu ga furisosogu yoru" reflects her creative capacity.

Sponsored by Japan's Agency for Cultural Affairs (文化庁), the Geijutsu Sensho Shinjin Award mainly recognizes artists and creators with outstanding achievements.

This year's winners also include Koyoharu Gotouge (吾峠呼世晴) , author of the Japanese anime series "Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba (鬼滅の刃)," musician Yonezu Kenshi (米津玄師), and performer Anne Suzuki (鈴木杏), in the media arts, popular arts and performing arts sections respectively.

The panel of judges for the Geijutsu Sensho Shinjin Award pointed out that Li has used the bar "Polaris" at Shinjuku Ni-chōme in Tokyo as the scene for her novel. Through employing a wide array of writing styles, she was able to depict the profundity of love among the people within the bar.

"We still tend to categorize the so-called sexual minorities from the notion of what constitutes 'normal' or 'abnormal' nowadays." "'Porarisu ga furisosogu yoru' details the lives of young people who have suffered from such differentiation. Though marked by sadness, the story is filled with a hope for change," the panel said.

"Through a gift for narrating, the Taiwanese author brings a fresh wind to a Japanese literary scene that happens to be more reserved in this gem of a novel, thus worthy of an award," the panel added.

Unitas Publishing Co., which published the Chinese translation of Li's novel "Count to Five and the Crescent Moon" in January 2021, noted that this was the first time a non-Japanese native has won this award, thus setting a record.