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Iwanami Shoten

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Iwanami Shoten
Founded1913; 111 years ago (1913)
FounderShigeo Iwanami
Country of originJapan
Headquarters locationTokyo
Key peopleMasanori Sakamoto [jp][1]
(President and CEO)
Publication typesBooks
Official websitewww.iwanami.co.jp

Iwanami Shoten, Publishers (株式会社かぶしきがいしゃ岩波書店いわなみしょてん, Kabushiki Gaisha Iwanami Shoten) is a Japanese publishing company based in Tokyo.[2]

Iwanami Shoten was founded in 1913 by Iwanami Shigeo. Its first major publication was Natsume Sōseki's novel Kokoro, which appeared as a book in 1914 after being serialized in the Asahi Shimbun. Iwanami has since become known for scholarly publications, editions of classical Japanese literature, dictionaries, and high-quality paperbacks. Since 1955, it has published the Kōjien, a single-volume dictionary of Japanese that is widely considered to be authoritative.

Iwanami's head office is at Hitotsubashi 2–5–5, Chiyoda, Tokyo.[3]

Company history

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Iwanami Shoten

Iwanami Shigeo founded the publishing firm Iwanami Shoten in the Kanda district of Tokyo in 1913. In its early years, the company published authors such as Natsume Sōseki, Kurata Hyakuzō and Abe Jiro. It also published academic and literary journals in the field of philosophy, including Shijo (1917) and Shicho (1921), science, including Kagaku (1931), and literature, such as Bungaku (1933). In 1927, it launched the Iwanami Bunko [ja] (Iwanami Library), a "major series of international works".[2]

During the Second Sino-Japanese War and the Second World War, the firm was repeatedly censored because of its positions against the war and the Emperor. Iwanami Shigeo was even sentenced to two months in prison for the publication of the banned works of Tsuda Sōkichi (a sentence which he did not serve, however). Shortly before his death in 1946, he founded the newspaper Sekai, which had a great influence in post-war Japanese intellectual circles.[4]

In 1955, the company released its Japanese language dictionary, Kōjien, which is highly regarded today and sold more than eleven million copies in 2007.[5] During the post-war decades, it continued to publish numerous foreign classics as well as encyclopedias. In 2010, around 20,000 titles were released by Iwanami Shoten.

Book series

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  • Iwanami Bunko (岩波いわなみ文庫ぶんこ) (English, "Iwanami Paperback Library") (1927)
  • Iwanami Gendai Bunko (岩波いわなみ現代げんだい文庫ぶんこ) (English, "Iwanami Modern Paperback Library") (2000)
  • Iwanami Gendai Zensho (岩波いわなみ現代げんだい全書ぜんしょ) (English, "Iwanami Modern Complete Books")
  • Iwanami Kōza Sekai Shichō (岩波いわなみ講座こうざ世界せかい思潮しちょう) (English, "Iwanami Lectures on Trends in World Thought") (1928)[6][7] - often referred to in short as Iwanami Koza (岩波いわなみ講座こうざ) (English, "Iwanami Lectures" or "Iwanami Courses")
  • Iwanami Shashin Bunko (岩波いわなみ写真しゃしん文庫ぶんこ), (English, "Iwanami Photo Library")
  • Iwanami Shinsho (岩波いわなみ新書しんしょ) (English, "Iwanami Trade Paperbacks")
  • Iwanami Sugaku Sosho (岩波いわなみ数学すうがく叢書そうしょ) (English, "Iwanami Mathematics Series")
  • Koza Nihon Eiga (講座こうざ・日本にっぽん映画えいが) (English, "A Course on Japanese Film" or "Lectures on Japanese Film") (1985)[8]
  • Nihon Koten Bungaku Taikei (日本にっぽん古典こてん文学ぶんがく大系たいけい) (English, "Japanese Classical Literature System") (1967)
  • Yūtopia Ryokō-ki Sōsho (ユートピア旅行りょこう記き叢書そうしょ) (English, "Utopia Travel Journal") (1996–2002)

References

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  1. ^ "【Company Information】Board of Management (as of 1st June, 2021)". Retrieved 2024-01-11.
  2. ^ a b Louis Frédéric, Japan Encyclopedia, Harvard University Press, 2005, p. 409.
  3. ^ "会社かいしゃ案内あんない Archived 2014-06-27 at the Wayback Machine." Iwanami Shoten. Retrieved on June 3, 2014. "【本ほん　 社しゃ】 〒101-8002　東京とうきょう都と千代田ちよだ区く一ツ橋ひとつばし2丁目ちょうめ5番ばん5号ごう" - Map in Japanese()
  4. ^ Joseph K. Yamagiwa (September 1955). "Literature and Politics in the Japanese Magazine, Sekai". Public Affairs. 28 (3): 254–268. JSTOR 3035405.
  5. ^ `Uzai'`ike-men' mo tōjō, Kōjien 10-nen-buri kaitei, Yomiuri Shimbun, 23 October 2007. Retrieved 15 June 2022.
  6. ^ Sandra Buckley, ed. The Encyclopedia of Contemporary Japanese Culture, London and New York: Routledge, 2002, "Iwanami publishing house" (entry), p. 225. Retrieved 21 October 2022.
  7. ^ Nathan Shockey, The Typographic Imagination: Reading and Writing in Japan’s Age of Modern, New York: Columbia University Press, 2020 (Studies in the Weatherhead East Asia Institute). Retrieved 22 October 2022.
  8. ^ Koza Nihon Eiga (Iwanami Shoten) - Book Series List, publishinghistory.com. Retrieved 17 June 2022.
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