Yone Noguchi

1875 –
1947
Read poems by this poet

Yone Noguchi, the first Japanese-born writer to publish poetry in English, was born in 1875 in Tsushima. While studying at Keio Gijuku, Noguchi decided to travel to the United States. After arriving in San Francisco in 1893, Noguchi worked as a journalist and as a domestic servant before deciding to pursue poetry. A few years later, Noguchi published his first poems in a small San Francisco magazine called The Lark. He went on to publish many articles and several books of poetry and prose. He returned to Japan in 1905 and continued to publish extensively in English, including Selected Poems of Yone Noguchi (The Four Seas Company, 1921), establishing himself as a cross-cultural and transnational writer. The father of Isamu Noguchi, one of the twentieth century's renowned sculptors, Noguchi died in Toyooka-mura on July 13, 1947.