Makoto Oda

Oda Makoto (小田 実, Oda Makoto^?, June 2, 1932 — July 30, 2007) was a Japanese novelist, peace activist, academic and Time Asian Hero.

Oda was born in Osaka in 1932 and graduated from the University of Tokyo's Faculty of Letters program, majoring in classical Greek philosophy and literature. He won a Fulbright Scholarship to Harvard University in 1958.

His travels through Europe and Asia on a budget of a dollar a day formed the basis of his 1961 bestseller Nandemo Mite yaro ("I'll go and see everything"). His first book Assatte no Shuki ("The Notebook of the Day After Tomorrow") was published in 1951. It was based on experiences during World War II and the Korean War. His first full-length novel, "Amerika" ("America") was published in 1962.

Oda won the Lotus Prize in 1981 of the Afro-Asian Writers' Association for his book Hiroshima. This led to a 1990 English translation as well as translations in French, Arabic, Italian, Korean and Russian. It was written about the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki not only in Japan but on the Hopi Indians and Americans who lived near the testing sites.

He won the Kawabata Yasunari Prize for Aboji o Fumu ("Stomping Father"), published in 1998. Oda's novel The Breaking Jewel was published in English in 2003. It was about Japanese forces on a South Pacific island facing an American invasion at the end of World War II.

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