In the following essay, Napier examines how the early works of Ōe and Mishima Yukio—particularly Ōe's “Prize Stock” and Pluck the Buds, Shoot the Kids and Yukio's Sound of Waves—represent a rejection of traditional Japanese narratives by focusing heavily on pastoral and dream-like themes.

[Wilson is a critic and educator specializing in Japanese and comparative literature. In the following essay, she analyzes Ōe's variations on his most recurrent themes in five of his works and elucidates its relation to the genres of satire and "grotesque realism" as defined by structuralist theory.]

In the following essay, Tachibana analyzes thematic aspects of Ōe's “Prize Stock,” perceiving the story to be a study of power in a Japanese village community.

In the essay below, Napier analyzes the contrasting roles that the Japanese Emperor plays in the works of Ōe and Yukio Mishima. While Ōe is severely critical of the imperial system, Mishima, who came of age during the 1930s, supports the Emperor for patriotic reasons.

In the excerpt below, Wilson studies the narrative structure—especially the function of repetition—in "Father, Where Are You Going?," "Teach Us to Outgrow Our Madness, " and "The Day He Himself Shall Wipe My Tears Away. "

In the following essay, Ōe discusses his attitude toward and utilization of the “I-novel” form and reviews significant influences on his life and work.

In this essay, Nemoto compares Ōe's "The Day He Himself Shall Wipe My Tears Away" to Günter Grass's The Tin Drum, arguing that the two works use similar techniques to critique the actions of Imperial Japan and Nazi Germany in World War II.

In the following essay, Ryan identifies the deception and corruption of children by adults as the central theme of Nip the Buds, Shoot the Kids.

[In the following essay, Yoshida argues for the universality of Ōe's fiction, citing its strong affinities with the "grotesque realism" of the French Renaissance writer François Rabelais.]

In the following essay, Wilson argues that the narrative in The Football Game of the First Year of Manen is constructed as “an attempt to look simultaneously at the linear movement of historical events.”

In the following essay, Iwamoto offers a critical reading of the relationship between politics, power, and sex in Warera no jidai.

In the following essay, Yoshida traces Ōe's literary development and asserts that the author's major thematic concerns “are closely related to his own personal problems and emotions, but he successfully distills them into a more universal context to produce a significant literary representation that is firmly grounded in human existence.”

Yamanouchi is a Japanese educator and author. Here, the critic details various literary methods employed in the works of Abe Köbö and Ōe and explores thematic parallels between the two authors, including alienation, isolation, and the search for identity.

In the following essay, Wilson discusses Ōe's preoccupation with sexual “submission and liberation” in Our Times, noting that most Japanese critics responded negatively to the work's avant-garde subject matter.

In the following interview, which was conducted in 1986, Ōe discusses such topics as the literary and cultural forces that have influenced him and the style and techniques of his fiction.

In the following essay, Swain investigates the major influences on Ōe's fiction and nonfiction, particularly the impact of the birth of his mentally and physically handicapped son.

[In the following interview, which was conducted in 1986, Ōe discusses such topics as his literary and cultural influences and the style and techniques of his fiction.]

In the following transcript of Ōe's Nobel Lecture, originally delivered on December 8, 1994, the author outlines the dilemmas confronting post-war Japan and discusses the influence of his mentally-challenged son, Hikari, on his life and work.

[In the following essay, Sakurai discusses the major influences on Ōe's early literary career, such as Japan's military defeat in 1945 and the works of such authors as Jean-Paul Sartre and traditional Haiku poets.]

In the following essay, Wilson considers the major themes in Ōe's short stories and novels, primarily focusing on Ōe's works which revolve around father-son relationships.

In the following interview, Ōe discusses his relationship with his readers, translations of his works, and his intention of creating a new form of literary expression.

In the following essay, Richter examines the role of shame in the short story "Sheep. "

In the following review, Wood underscores the importance that Ōe places on the atomic bombing of Hiroshima in Nip the Buds, Shoot the Kids, A Personal Matter, and Hiroshima Notes.

In the following interview, Ōe discusses his background as an existentialist and recounts the controversy surrounding his acceptance of the 1994 Nobel Prize for Literature.

In the following review, Dalglish asserts that An Echo of Heaven can be viewed as a wholly original novel within the context of modern Japanese literature, labelling it as “a work riven with postmodern uncertainty.”

In the following review, Harris praises Ōe's unique narrative style and vivid use of detail in Nip the Buds, Shoot the Kids.

[In the following article, Sterngold reports on the Swedish Academy's decision to award Ōe the 1994 Nobel Prize in Literature.]

In the following review, Allen contends that although Somersault is replete with beautiful images and compelling ideas, the novel is both “alienating and boring.”

In the following review, Maristed argues that Somersault is an “extraordinarily dense novel,” noting that Ōe's detached authorial voice distinguishes the work from his previous novels.

[A Japanese-born English novelist and critic, Ishiguro received widespread critical acclaim for The Remains of the Day, which was awarded the 1989 Booker Prize for Fiction. In the following excerpt from an interview originally published in 1991, Ōe discusses the Western view of Japanese culture and his role as an international figure.]

[In the following essay, Sterngold discusses Ōe's decision to reject Japan's Imperial Order of Culture—its highest cultural honor—and examines the Japanese public's reaction, which ranged from apathy to harsh opprobrium.]

In the following review, Eder discusses the recurring themes of anger and shame in Ōe's early novellas Seventeen and J.

In the following review, Ward asserts that, despite Ōe's dense narrative style, Rouse Up, O Young Men of the New Age is ultimately a rewarding novel.

In the following review, Loughman offers an overview of the major thematic concerns in Seventeen and J.

In the following review, Lovell complains that the narrative in Somersault is too formulaic and flat, asserting that Haruki Murakami's Underground offers a much more compelling portrayal of Japanese cults.

In the following review, Rubin praises Ōe's multi-layered portrayal of Marie Kuraki, the protagonist of An Echo of Heaven.

In the following review, King criticizes Ōe's “disturbing” fictionalization of events from his personal life in A Quiet Life.

In the following essay, Rubin notes that, although Ōe's writing explores uniquely Japanese issues and themes, the virtuosity of Ōe's prose has allowed his works to take “their place in the global pantheon.”

In the following review, L'Heureux notes the influence of Flannery O'Connor on An Echo of Heaven.

In the following review, Loughman offers a mixed assessment of Nip the Buds, Shoot the Kids but commends the novel's “sharpness of focus, narrative simplicity, and spontaneity.”

On the surface it is paradoxical that Ōe Kenzaburō …, a spokesman for the Japanese New Left, admirer of Mao, and student of Sartrean Existentialism, should give thematic treatment to anything quite so traditional as the notion of "shame," a complex emotional response to a variety of situations in Japanese society. Although very much the modern writer and liberated from many of the complexes that burdened older literary figures such as Tanizaki Jun'ichirō and ...

Ōe has been accused, with some justice, of writing Japanese that reads like a translation from a Western language. His long and complex sentences have neither elegant simplicity nor effortless flow, but are knotty challenges for the mind to unravel. Crammed with adjectives and similes, they consciously—occasionally almost self-consciously—prod the reader along, constantly forcing him to make unexpected associations, or emphasizing the author's analytical self-awareness. In a sens...

In the following review, Iwamoto commends Ōe's sensitive and poignant exploration of his relationship with his mentally and physically handicapped son, Hiraki, in A Healing Family.

[In the following review, Yoshida commends Ōe's Chiryō-tō as an imaginative and beautifully composed piece of science fiction.]

In the following review, King faults Rouse Up, O Young Men of the New Age as a “narrow and self-referential” work.

In the following positive review, Ryan finds parallels between Ōe's narrative voice in An Echo of Heaven and the Nō theater of Japan.

In the following review, Iwamoto commends Ōe's compassionate reflections on the Hiroshima tragedy and its impact on his own life in Hiroshima Notes but argues that the author's polemic tone becomes overbearing at times.

[In the following review of the English publication of Teach Us to Outgrow Our Madness, Sakurai hails Ōe as a major international talent.]

In the following positive review of Japan, the Ambiguous, and Myself, Goff comments that all four lectures in the collection “reflect Ōe's abiding concern for the role of the writer in society and the place of Japan in the modern world.”

In the following review, Yoshida lauds Ōe's insights into the complexities of Japanese culture in Japan, the Ambiguous, and Myself, calling the collection “a valuable glimpse into the soul of Japan's greatest contemporary writer.”

In the following review, Picone lauds Ōe's “disquieting” world view in Somersault and argues that the novel broadens “the scope and form that the author's future fiction might take.”

In the following review, Havel offers a positive assessment of Rouse Up, O Young Men of the New Age, praising the author's “gift for the portrayal of the inevitable emotional blunders of human beings.”

[In the following review, Yoshida hails Natsukashii toshi e no tegami as a technically daring "milestone in Ōe's career."]

Kenzaburō Ōe [is] the most talented writer to emerge in Japan after World War II. Like his previous publications (A Personal Matter, 1968,… and The Silent Cry, 1975), [Teach Us to Outgrow Our Madness] is certain to surprise some Western readers who have come to expect delicate prose and exquisite imagery from a Japanese novelist. Having learned his craft from postwar American authors such as Norman Mailer and French existentialists such as Jean-Paul Sartre, rather than from The Tale of ...

Teach Us to Outgrow Our Madness is the best of [Ōe's] novels. Among those who will highly value it are parents, especially parents of retarded or autistic children. For doctors and other health-care personnel, it is prescribed as part of continuing education. The I-Thou experience, and beyond it the feeling for what Philip Berrigan calls Equal Jeopardy … are here exquisitely clear. As the courtroom scene in Wilder's Heaven's My Destination is a classic short comedy, the op...