Disclaimer: machine translated by DeepL which may contain errors.
Celebrating writer Arata Iyohara, a graduate of the Department of Earth and Planetary Science, on winning the Naoki Prize.
Shogo Tachibana, Professor, UTokyo Organization for Planetary and Space Science
Writer Arata Iyohara ((Photo by Shinchosha))
Mr. Arata Iyohara, a graduate of the Department of Earth and Planetary Science of the Graduate School, has received the 172nd Naoki Sanjo Award. D. in the Department of Earth and Planetary Science, and made his debut as a writer while working as an Assistant Professor in the Faculty of Science at the University of Toyama. In his prize-winning work, "The Sea that Inherits Indigo," he depicts people's thoughts and connections in five short stories about sea turtles, Hagiyaki clay, Japanese wolves, atomic bombs, and meteorites. In the other stories, he weaves the stories of people with gentle strokes. Science is woven into these stories in a natural way, and the natural phenomena of various spatio-temporal scales, which are the subject of science, are in harmony with our human activities, either in the background of the stories or accompanying them. The people involved in science are also depicted, and to those of you in this Graduate School, these characters may seem like yourselves. I think you will also realize that science is an activity to place human beings in nature and to enrich their minds.
When we invited him to our Homecoming Day talk event in October 2024, he showed us a photograph of himself as a young man going out for field research and confronting nature. In the photographs he introduced to us when we invited him to a talk event at our Homecoming Day in October 2024, we saw many images of the young Mr. Iyohara going out for field research and confronting nature. I imagine that during the time he spent facing nature, he developed a scientist's viewpoint to look at objects objectively and calmly, while at the same time cultivating an artist's eye to portray people warmly.
As a fan, I look forward to the day when I will be able to encounter his next work. Congratulations!