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Article: Endo Shusaku: death and rebirth in Deep River.(Critical Essay)
- Article from:
- Christianity and Literature
- Article date:
- January 1, 2002
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2002 Conference on Christianity and Literature. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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Mention the name of Endo Shusaku (1923-96) in literary circles, and chances are that the cliched portrayals of him as "Japanese Christian author," or even as the "Japanese Graham Greene," will not be long in surfacing. On one level it is hard to argue with the depiction. Endo was, after all, a Japanese national (albeit raised in occupied Chinese Manchuria) who identified with the Catholic tradition through baptism at the age of twelve (albeit, by his own admission, more under duress from his devout mother than from any deeply held conviction) and who devoted his entire adult life to an increasingly "successful" literary career. As with all expedient labels, however, these ...