Donald Keene

Donald Keene (1922-2019) was widely regarded as America’s foremost cultural ambassador to Japan. He was University Professor Emeritus and Shincho Professor of Japanese Literature Emeritus at Columbia University. The winner of numerous literary awards and prizes, including the Kikuchi Kan Prize; the Order of the Rising Sun, Third Class; the Yamagata Banto Prize; the Japan Foundation Prize; the Shincho Grand Prize; and the Ivan Sandrof Award for literary criticism, Professor Keene was elected to the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters in 1986; in 1990 he was elected as a foreign member of the Japan Academy, the equivalent academic body in Japan. He wrote or translated over fifty books, including Modern Japanese Literature, The Japanese Discovery of Europe, and The Battles of Coxinga.