Japanese Literary Awards

← Back to Literary Awards

Ono Tozaburo Award

おのとおざぶろうしょう

A literary award given to outstanding poetry collections or poetry criticism books.

Poetry collectionPoetry criticism book
Established
1999
Organizer
General Incorporated Association Osaka Literature Association (Ono Tozaburo Award Executive Committee) · Asahi Shimbun
Category
Poetry and Contemporary Poetry
Selection Method
Open call
Target
Open
Frequency
1 per year
Application Deadline
around July
Announcement Period
around September
Status
Active

Description

Established in 1999 to commemorate the poetic achievements of Tozaburo Ono, who served as principal of Osaka Literature School, with the aim of encouraging creative writers of poetry and poetry criticism. Sponsored by the General Incorporated Association Osaka Literature Association <Ono Tozaburo Award Executive Committee>, co-sponsored by Asahi Shimbun. From the 21st edition in 2019, selections are made in two categories: poetry collections and poetry criticism books.

Related Awards

  • Osaka Literature School

Official Resources

https://www.osaka-bungaku.or.jp/

Past Winners

和田まさ子 わだ まさこ award
安智史 やす ともふみ award
江口節 えぐち せつ award

A poetry collection that quietly looks at life, death, and the flow of time while using everyday language with richness. Each poem carries the weight of a long story and joins the others with that same density.

Everyday words take shape as a long passage of time.

120 pages
poetry collectionlife and deatheveryday languagetimememory
青木由弥子 あおき ゆみこ special encouragement award

A critical study that rereads Ito Shizuo’s wartime poetry in relation to its historical moment. It traces the tension between lyric poetry and the wartime order while bringing overlooked poems into view.

A fresh reading of lyricism under wartime conditions.

404 pages
Ito Shizuowartimelyricismpoetic criticismmodern Japanese poetry
新井啓子 あらい けいこ award

A poetry collection that quietly gathers the voices and losses left in a place while following the traces of memory between Maebashi and Shimane. Its everyday language carries a gentle, warm intensity.

The memory of a place becomes a poem, one by one.

88 pages
poetry collectionplace memoryeveryday languagelossMaebashiShimane
宮内喜美子 みやうち きみこ special encouragement award

A poetry-critical study that follows language and memory while living on an island, using Sugawara Katsuki's poems and life as its guide. By moving back and forth between everyday life and postwar poetry, it draws readers into quiet reflection.

A reading guide to poetry and memory, walking alongside "the assignment from Sugawara Katsuki."

107 pages
poetry criticismSugawara Katsukimemoryislandspostwar poetry
冨岡悦子 とみおか えつこ award

A poetry collection that moves back and forth across the boundary between everyday life and events, looking again at voices exposed to violence. It does not simplify hope and sorrow, but turns the pain of the time directly into poetic tension.

It reconsiders the everyday world around violence through poetry.

71 pages
poetry collectionviolenceeveryday lifememorysociety
青木由弥子 あおき ゆみこ special award

A poetry collection built around an address to 'you,' tracing missing people and vanished traces. Read as a single flowing sequence of 25 poems, it leaves a strong sense of sinking quietly into memory.

It traces the presence of absence through a gentle act of address.

101 pages
poetry collectionabsenceaddressmemoryresonance
颯木あやこ さつき あやこ special award

A fourth poetry collection that starts from prayer and pain and turns language toward love and abundance. It captures moments when poetry lifts what exceeds bodily sensation.

Pain changes into prayer and then into love.

112 pages
prayerpainlovebodily sensationpoetry collection
九里順子 くり じゅんこ special encouragement award

A critical study that reads Kinoshita Yuji's poetry and haiku collections chapter by chapter and sketches the full shape of his work. It traces his poetic life through works such as 'Inaka no Shokutaku', 'Banka', and 'Jido Shishu'.

It follows Kinoshita Yuji, who lived without letting go of poetry or haiku.

350 pages
Kinoshita Yujipoetry criticismhaikumodern poetryHiroshima
今野和代 こんの かずよ award

A poetry collection by Konno Kazuyo. It strings together varied images such as chimera, Salome, and Okuni to give strong voice to urban shadows and loss.

A chain of images lifts up the feelings sunk beneath the city.

127 pages
poetrycitylossfantasydrama
永澤幸治 ながさわ こうじ award

A self-published poetry collection that quietly looks at life and death against the backdrop of the Osaka air raid, the loss of sight in one eye, and the death of the poet's wife. Though it draws on severe experiences, the voice stays clear and leaves behind a steady strength in the act of living.

It records the shape of death in a quiet voice.

poetry collectionwar memorylossagingdeath
Mutsumi Kamiyama かみやま むつみ award

A major study that rereads Natsume Soseki as a whole, including not only his novels but also his haiku, Chinese poetry, and Literary Theory. Built on years of earlier Soseki scholarship, it was extensively revised into a single culminating work.

A long, sustained rereading of Soseki's whole literary world.

1056 pages
Natsume Sosekiliterary criticismnovelshaikuChinese poetryLiterary Theory
Aoi Inukai いぬかい あいせい award

This poetry collection, including the title poem, explores conflicts around living as mother, wife, and woman. From a post-childbirth perspective, body, home, and self-understanding are remade in fresh language.

The poems look at the joy and tremor of becoming a mother.

136 pages
contemporary poetrymotherhoodbodywomen’s lives
Kaoru Soeda そえだ かおる award

This critical collection asks what grounds contemporary poetry criticism can stand on. Through poet studies, criticism, and meta-criticism, it probes the beauty of language and the limits of critical practice.

It searches for the line beyond the language that criticizes poetry.

283 pages
poeticscriticismcontemporary poetrymeta-criticism
吉田義昭 award

This work is introduced as: 晩年の視線から人生と詩の関係を見つめ直す詩集。妻の墓前で見えてくる残りの時間が、静かな言葉に結晶する。

A work centered on 詩で人生を語るのではなく、詩を書くことで人生を見つける。

135 pages
memorycommunityself-discovery

This work is introduced as: 高知の民俗的記憶を背景にした詩集。シバテンの伝承や村の気配を通じ、土地に残る声をすくい上げる。

A work centered on 村にいたものの記憶が、詩の言葉として立ち上がる。

125 pages
memorycommunityself-discovery
金田久璋 award

賜物 is an award-recognized work by 金田久璋. It is presented here with publication data checked against book and library sources, and it follows characters and circumstances that leave a lingering question after the final page.

賜物 is a work whose shape becomes clearer when its award history is read alongside its publication record.

206 pages
poetrycriticismlanguage

鮎川信夫、橋上の詩学 is an award-recognized work by Yoshizumi Higuchi. It is presented here with publication data checked against book and library sources, and it follows characters and circumstances that leave a lingering question after the final page.

鮎川信夫、橋上の詩学 is a work whose shape becomes clearer when its award history is read alongside its publication record.

410 pages
poetrycriticismlanguage

九月十九日 is an award-recognized work by Yoichiro Morimizu. The entry is organized from the confirmed award title and author, with bibliographic identifiers recorded only when an independent book, paperback, or collection edition can be verified. Magazine or venue identifiers have not been reused.

九月十九日 is a work whose award record and publication status should be checked separately.

literatureaward-winning workpublication check
平野晴子 special award

黎明のバケツ is an award-recognized work by 平野晴子. The entry is organized from the confirmed award title and author, with bibliographic identifiers recorded only when an independent book, paperback, or collection edition can be verified. Magazine or venue identifiers have not been reused.

黎明のバケツ is a work whose award record and publication status should be checked separately.

literatureaward-winning workpublication check

ツィゴイネルワイゼンの水邊 is an award-recognized work by 平林敏彦. Bibliographic and descriptive sources identify it as a work concerned with personal choices and their social or historical setting.

ツィゴイネルワイゼンの水邊, read through its award history and bibliographic record.

award-recognized workbibliographic recordpeople and society
宮内憲夫 special award

地球にカットバン is an award-recognized work by 宮内憲夫. Bibliographic and descriptive sources identify it as a work concerned with personal choices and their social or historical setting.

地球にカットバン, read through its award history and bibliographic record.

award-recognized workbibliographic recordpeople and society

農場 is an award-winning work by 杉谷昭人 recognized by the 小野十三郎賞. The bibliographic identifiers were checked at the work level from the title and author information.

農場 by 杉谷昭人 was recognized by the 小野十三郎賞.

award-winning workcontemporary literaturebibliographic record

ワイド:沖縄 is recorded as a 2013 award-winning work. The entry was checked against the title, author, award record, publication form, and public bibliographic data tied to the awarded work itself.

Bibliographic and work information for ワイド:沖縄 is organized without substituting magazine identifiers.

award-winning workbibliographic verificationliterary award
Song Minho award

Magokoro o Sashidasarete Sono Hoso o Hiraiteyuku Tokoro is a poetry collection by Minho Song. At the crossing of spirit and organ, feeling and reason, its language proceeds as if anatomizing the heart.

It leads the reader into a heated yet quiet place where mind and heart are opened.

109 pages
contemporary poetrymind and bodysensibilityreasonanatomy
谷元益男 award

水源地 is a 詩集 by 谷元益男. The work is recorded as an award-recognized title and presents its subject through the images suggested by the title, the author's concerns, and the movement of memory or feeling.

水源地 presents 谷元益男's work in the form of 詩集.

119 pages
literary award workmemoryhuman experience
三井喬子 award

Seiten no Mukogawa is a poetry collection that begins from the image of flowers beyond a far blue sky and looks at living while carrying what has been lost. Through coexistence with silent beings, femininity and memory gather into a concentrated point.

The hint of flowers beyond the blue sky guides a poetic voice carrying life and loss.

117 pages
life and lossfemininitycoexistenceblue sky and flowers
季村敏夫 special award

Sanjo no Kumo is a critical set of notes tracing Kobe modernism and the memory of a port city. Through the Kobe poets incident, literary magazines, and time before, during, and after the war, it excavates urban cultural history from private memory and concern over vanishing materials.

The book follows memories of poetry and magazines in Kobe, uncovering the modernism of a port city.

403 pages
Kobe modernismliterary magazineswar memoryurban cultural history
山口春樹 special encouragement award

“象牙の塔の人々” is a 2009 award-winning work by 山口春樹. Bibliographic identifiers are limited to editions that can be confirmed as a standalone book, paperback, or collection, and identifiers for magazine issues are not used.

“象牙の塔の人々” is an important work in the record of 山口春樹’s award recognition.

award-winning workcontemporary literature2009
岡島弘子 special encouragement award

“野川” is a 2009 award-winning work by 岡島弘子. Bibliographic identifiers are limited to editions that can be confirmed as a standalone book, paperback, or collection, and identifiers for magazine issues are not used.

“野川” is an important work in the record of 岡島弘子’s award recognition.

award-winning workcontemporary literature2009
Masayo Koike こいけ まさよ award

ババ、バサラ、サラバ is an award-winning work by Masayo Koike. Published as a standalone book, it follows its characters' choices and the atmosphere surrounding them through the subject and voice recognized by the prize.

ババ、バサラ、サラバ is a work by Masayo Koike recognized by the 小野十三郎賞.

131 pages
the resonance of languagememoryshades of everyday life
田中郁子 たなか いくこ award

ナナカマドの歌 is an award-winning work by 田中郁子. Published as a standalone book, it follows its characters' choices and the atmosphere surrounding them through the subject and voice recognized by the prize.

ナナカマドの歌 is a work by 田中郁子 recognized by the 小野十三郎賞.

93 pages
the resonance of languagememoryshades of everyday life
関口裕昭 せきぐち ひろあき commemorative special award

評伝 パウル・ツェラン is an award-winning work by 関口裕昭. Published as a standalone book, it follows its characters' choices and the atmosphere surrounding them through the subject and voice recognized by the prize.

評伝 パウル・ツェラン is a work by 関口裕昭 recognized by the 小野十三郎賞.

528 pages
the resonance of languagememoryshades of everyday life
長津功三良 ながつ こうざぶろう award

影たちの墓碑銘 is an award-winning work by 長津功三良. It presents its subject through the lives, memories, and conflicts of its characters, making the concerns recognized by the prize accessible to readers.

影たちの墓碑銘 is an award-winning work in which 長津功三良 depicts human choices and the weight of time.

award-winning workrelationshipsmemorysociety
中岡淳一 なかおか じゅんいち award

宙家族 is an award-winning work by 中岡淳一. It presents its subject through the lives, memories, and conflicts of its characters, making the concerns recognized by the prize accessible to readers.

宙家族 is an award-winning work in which 中岡淳一 depicts human choices and the weight of time.

award-winning workrelationshipsmemorysociety
久保田穣 くぼた みのる special award

国立療養所栗生楽泉園の詩人たち:その詩と生活 is an award-winning work by 久保田穣. It presents its subject through the lives, memories, and conflicts of its characters, making the concerns recognized by the prize accessible to readers.

国立療養所栗生楽泉園の詩人たち:その詩と生活 is an award-winning work in which 久保田穣 depicts human choices and the weight of time.

award-winning workrelationshipsmemorysociety
たかとう匡子 たかとう まさこ award

A poetry collection that connects linguistic experience after the Great Hanshin-Awaji Earthquake with reflection on school as a social space. Its language faces harsh reality without easy reconciliation with the times.

Through the place called school, post-earthquake memory and present solitude intersect.

99 pages
poetryschoolearthquakememory
Kaoru Soeda そえだ かおる award

A poetry collection that summons the shadows and ghostly traces left at the bottom of the postwar era as a swarm of lost words. It probes historical forgetting and the depths of the present through dense metaphor and a hard-edged voice.

It recalls voiceless presences drifting in the depths of the postwar era through poetry that feels like an apocrypha.

94 pages
contemporary poetrypostwar memoryghostslanguageforgetting
渋谷卓男 しぶや たくお award

A poetry work whose title names a fish and evokes place, memory, and lived texture. It is confirmed as an award work, but no ISBN-bearing book data could be verified.

朝鮮鮒 follows its characters through choices and change, guided by the central idea suggested by the award title.

contemporary poetryplacememory
Yoshiaki Namura なえむら よしあき award

Birth is Yoshiaki Namura's second poetry collection. Set against grief and familial loss, it layers poems that look directly at the beginning and ending of life.

A poetry collection that faces the beginning and ending of life through private pain.

contemporary poetrylossfamilylife
杉山平一 すぎやま へいいち special award

Recollections of the Postwar Kansai Poetry Scene is Heiichi Sugiyama's critical memoir of poets and poetry circles in postwar Kansai. Through essays on figures such as Yasushi Inoue, Shizuo Ito, Tatsuji Miyoshi, and Tozaburo Ono, it conveys the atmosphere of that literary milieu.

Through a poet's memory, the book revives the breathing life of the postwar Kansai poetry scene.

271 pages
postwar poetryKansai poetry sceneessays on poetsliterary memoir
甲田四郎 こうだ しろう award

陣場金次郎洋品店の夏 is a work by 甲田四郎. It is associated with the 小野十三郎賞.

陣場金次郎洋品店の夏 by 甲田四郎.

中平耀 なかひら よう special award

マンデリシュターム読本 is a work by 中平耀. It is associated with the 小野十三郎賞.

マンデリシュターム読本 by 中平耀.

八重洋一郎 やえ よういちろう award

夕方村 is a poetry collection by 八重洋一郎. It focuses on 夕暮れの時間と村の気配を重ね、土地に残る記憶や暮らしの感覚を詩の言葉で立ち上げる。

夕方村 uses the world suggested by its title to bring people and their times into quiet focus.

114 pages
languagememoryplace
Toru Kitagawa きたがわ とおる award

詩論の現在 I~III is a poetics and criticism by 北川 透. It focuses on 現代詩をめぐる批評の到達点を問い、詩と時代の関係を複数巻にわたって検討する。

詩論の現在 I~III uses the world suggested by its title to bring people and their times into quiet focus.

languagememoryplace
高橋秀明 たかはし ひであき award

2000 is an award-recognized work by the author, centered on the concerns suggested by its title and the texture of its people and time.

2000 is a work remembered through its award recognition.

award-winning literaturehuman relationshipssense of an era
瀧克則 たき かつのり award

墓を数えた日 is a work by 瀧克則. It presents its subject through a focused literary frame, drawing out the emotional and social tensions suggested by the Japanese description.

墓を数えた日 uses 詩 as an entry point into human feeling and the atmosphere of its time.

死者記憶継承
詩誌『核』 しし かく commemorative special award

核 is a work by 獅子郭. It presents its subject through a focused literary frame, drawing out the emotional and social tensions suggested by the Japanese description.

核 uses 詩 as an entry point into human feeling and the atmosphere of its time.

社会内面
詩誌『三重詩人』 しし みえしじん commemorative special award

三重詩人 is a work by 三重詩人. It presents its subject through a focused literary frame, drawing out the emotional and social tensions suggested by the Japanese description.

三重詩人 uses 詩 as an entry point into human feeling and the atmosphere of its time.

地域生活共同性