Ryōko Sekiguchi Japan France

Ryoko Sekiguchi (Tokyo, 1970) is a poet, translator, and writer of both fiction and non-fiction. She studied French and comparative literature at Waseda University and the University of Tokyo, and art history at the Sorbonne. After a prize-winning literary debut, honoured with the prestigious Gendaishi Techo Award, she published her first poetry collection, Cassiopea peca, in 1993. She has been a writer-in-residence at the French Academy in Rome and was appointed Chevalière de l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres. Her Japanese translation of Patrick Chamoiseau’s Solibo magnifique received the Japanese Best Translation Award. Her essay 961 heures à Beyrouth (961 Hours in Beirut, 2022) was awarded an honourable mention at the Prix France Liban and won the Grand Prix SGDL de la Non-Fiction. Sekiguchi’s literary work is marked by a sharp ability to write about the self and about the processes of intercultural translation that underpin her own intellectual and creative journey. She lives in Paris, where she is actively involved in promoting Japanese culture and cuisine. Her book Nagori (2018) was translated into Italian by Giampiero Massano and published by Einaudi in 2022. In France, she has received the Coup de cœur du jury at the Prix Rungis des Gourmets and the Prix Mange, Livre. In 2024 she published L’Appel des odeurs with P.O.L., a celebration of the sense of smell, while her novel Venise, millefleurs, a journey into the vegetal soul of Venice, was released in 2026 in Italian translation by Wetlands.

© Aline Princet