Background
Sakyo Komatsu is pseudonym of Minoru Komatsu. He was born on January 28, 1938, in Osaka, Japan.
Kyoto, Japan
Kyoto University
(A mysterious virus wipes out all of humanity, save for re...)
A mysterious virus wipes out all of humanity, save for researchers in the frigid Antarctic. To save what is left of the world from nuclear destruction, the scientists must find a way to return to America. Reads L to R (Western Style). In this classic of Japanese SF from 1964, American astronauts on a space mission discover a strange virus and bring it to Earth, where rogue scientists transform it into a fatal version of the flu. After the virulent virus is released, nearly all human life on Earth is wiped out save for fewer than one thousand men and a handful of women living in research stations in Antarctica. Then one of the researchers realizes that a major earthquake in the now-depopulated United States may lead to nuclear Armageddon…
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1421549328/?tag=2022091-20
("A chillingly realistic work of science fiction." ― The N...)
"A chillingly realistic work of science fiction." ― The New York Times. After dropping anchor for the night near a small island to the south of Japan, a crew of fishermen awaken to find that the island has vanished without a trace. An investigating scientist theorizes that the tiny island has succumbed to the same force that divided the Japanese archipelago from the mainland ― and that the disastrous shifting of a fault in the Japan Trench has placed the entire country in danger of being swallowed by the sea. Based on rigorous scientific speculation, Japan Sinks recounts a completely credible series of geological events. The story unfolds from multiple points of view, offering fascinating perspectives on the catastrophe's political, social, and psychological effects. Winner of the Mystery Writers of Japan Award and the Seiun Award, this prescient 1973 science-fiction novel foreshadowed the consequences of the 1995 Osaka-Kobe earthquake and the 2011 Tohoku earthquake and tsunami.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0486802922/?tag=2022091-20
journalist novelist publicist screenwriter writer
Sakyo Komatsu is pseudonym of Minoru Komatsu. He was born on January 28, 1938, in Osaka, Japan.
Komatsu graduated from Kyoto University with a degree in Italian Literature.
In 1949 Komatsu wrote the manga by the name Minoru Mori. His career as a writer began in the 1960s.
In 1961 he wrote his first fantastic story 'Peace on Earth' for the Scientific-fiction Contest of SF Magazine. It was the story about a world in which World War II does not end in August 1945 and a young man prepares to defend Japan against the Allied invasion. Komatsu received an Honorable Mention and 5000 yen for it. The next year, he wrote the story 'Memoirs of an Eccentric Time Traveler'. Sakyo Komatsu soon became one of the most popular science fiction writers in Japan.
His first novel 'The Japanese Apache' was published in 1964. In the same year, he published 'Day of Resurrection', which was later made into a successful movie.
In 1966 he wrote one of his most important novel 'At the End of an Endless Stream'. Komatsu’s most famous novel was 'Japan Sinks', in which the shifting of the tectonic plates resulted in earthquakes across the entire nation and causes all of Japan to crumble into the sea. A second edition appeared in the US in the aftermath of the 1995 Kobe Earthquake with a new opening statement by the author.
In 1982 he published a novel 'Sayonara Jupiter'. Komatsu adapted the story into the script for the 1984 film with the same name, directed by Koji Hashimoto.
Komatsu was involved in organizing the Japan World Exposition in Osaka Prefecture in 1970. In 1984 he worked as a technical consultant for a live concert in Linz, Austria by Japanese electronic composer Isao Tomita.
(A mysterious virus wipes out all of humanity, save for re...)
("A chillingly realistic work of science fiction." ― The N...)
Komatsu was haunted by memories from his teenage years of the devastation caused by the atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
He was inspired to write thinking of what would happen if the nationalistic Japanese lost their land, and ironically prefigured the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami that triggered a nuclear plant disaster decades later on March 11, 2011.
Quotations:
"In a world suffused by nationalism and ethnicity I began to think how people in Japan would live if they lost their land. I sometimes wonder if our intolerant territoriality is really justifiable on this planet, where continents are constantly drifting."
"I had thought I wouldn’t mind dying any day. But now I’m feeling like living a little bit longer and seeing how Japan will go on hereafter."