Born Hiratsuka Haru in Tokyo in 1886, the second daughter of a high ranking civil servant, and educated at Japan Women's University in 1903, Hiratsuka came to be influenced by contemporary currents of European philosophy, as well as Zen Buddhism, of which she would become a devoted practitioner. Of particular influence to her was turn-of-the-century Swedish feminist writerEllen Key, some of whose works she translated into Japanese, and the individualistic heroine of Henrik Ibsen's A Doll's House. In 1908 she attempted a double-suicide with Morita Sōhei, her teacher - a married writer - and a disciple of novelist Natsume Soseki, in the mountains of Nasushiobara, Tochigi. The pair were found alive on the mountain, but the attempted suicide by such a highly educated pair aroused widespread public criticism. Upon graduation from university, Hiratsuka entered the Narumi Women's English School where, in 1911, she founded Japan's first all-women literary magazine, Seitō. She began the first issue with the words, “In the beginning, woman was the sun” – a reference to the Shinto goddess Amaterasu, and to the spiritual independence which women had lost. Adopting the pen name “Raichō”, she began to call for a women’s spiritual revolution, and within its first few years the journal’s focus shifted from literature to women’s issues, including candid discussion of female sexuality, chastity and abortion. Contributors included renowned poet and women’s rights proponent Yosano Akiko, among others. Exaggerated stories of their love affairs and nonconformism, spread by Japan's mainstream press, turned public opinion against the magazine and prompted Raichō to publish several fierce defenses of her ideals. Her April 1913 essay "To the Women of the World" rejected the conventional role of women as ryōsai kenbo : "I wonder how many women have, for the sake of financial security in their lives, entered into loveless marriages to become one man’s lifelong servant and prostitute." This nonconformism pitted Seitō not only against the society but the state, contributing to the censorship of women's magazines that "disturbed public order" or introduced "Western ideas about women" incompatible with Japan. The journal folded in 1915, but not before establishing its founder as a leading light in Japan’s women's movement. Meanwhile, in 1914, Hiratsuka began living openly with her younger lover, artist Okumura Hiroshi, with whom she had two children out of wedlock and eventually married in 1941. In 1920, following an investigation into female workers' conditions in textile factories in Nagoya which further galvanized her political resolve, Hiratsuka founded the New Women's Association together with fellow women's rights activistIchikawa Fusae. It was largely through this group's efforts that the Article 5 of the Police Security Regulations—which, enacted in 1900, had barred women from joining political organizations and holding or attending political meetings—was overturned in 1922. Women's suffrage, however, remained elusive in Japan. A further and more controversial campaign attempted to ban men with venereal disease from marrying. This unsuccessful campaign remains a point of controversy surrounding Hiratsuka’s career in that it saw her aligned herself with the eugenics movement, asserting that the spread of V.D. was having a detrimental effect on the Japanese “race.” The next couple of decades saw Hiratsuka withdraw somewhat from the public eye, saddled with debts and her lover beset with health problems, although she would continue to write and lecture. In the postwar years, however, she emerged again as a public figure through the peace movement. In 1950, the day after the outbreak of the Korean War, she traveled to the United States together with writer and activist Nogami Yaeko and three other members of the Japan Women's Movement in order to present US Secretary of StateDean Acheson with a request that a system be created in which Japan could remain neutral and pacifist. Hiratsuka continued to champion women's rights in the postwar era, founding the New Japan Women's Association in 1963 together with Nogami and noted artist Iwasaki Chihiro, and continuing to write and lecture up until her death in 1971.
Legacy
While her career as a political activist covered many decades, Hiratsuka is primarily remembered for her stewardship of the Seitō group. As a leading light of the women's movement in early twentieth century Japan, she was a highly influential figure whose devotees ranged from pioneering Korean feminist author Na Hye-sok who was a student in Tokyo during Seitōs heyday to anarchist and social criticItō Noe whose membership in the Seitō organization generated some controversy. Her postwar organization, the New Japan Women's Organization, remains active to this day.
