Etsuko Sugimoto, also known as Etsu Inagaki Sugimoto, was a Japanese autobiographer and novelist.
Background
She was born in Echigo Province in Japan, now part of Niigata Prefecture. Her father had once been a high-ranking samurai official in Nagaoka, but with the breakdown of the feudal system shortly before her birth, the economic situation of her family took a turn for the worse.
Career
Although originally destined to be a priestess, she became engaged, through an arranged marriage, to a Japanese merchant living in Cincinnati, Ohio. Etsu attended a Methodist school in Tokyo in preparation for her life in the United States of America, and became a Christian. Later she lived in New York City, where she turned to literature and taught Japanese language, culture and history at Columbia University.
She also wrote for newspapers and magazines.
She died in 1950.