Oscar Nakasato

Oscar Nakasato is Brazilian, grandson of Japanese immigrants. He is a writer and college professor. Master in Literary Theory and Comparative Literature and Ph.D. in Brazilian Literature, he published his thesis entitled IMAGES OF INTEGRATION AND DUALITY: JAPANESE-BRAZILIAN CHARACTERS IN FICTION by Blücher in 2010. For years, he wrote critical reviews of Japanese literature for daily Folha de S. Paulo. He won literary awards with the tales HELLO, PERI’S EYES and BOY ON THE TREE.
NIHONJIN won the Benvirá Prize for Literature and the Bunkyo Prize for Literature in 2011, and the Jabuti Award in 2012. His second novel, TWO, was published in Brazil by Tordesilhas in 2017, and the third one, OJIICHAN, will be published by Fósforo in November 2024 by Fósforo, that also bought NIHONJIN to be re-released in a new edition in 2025.
OJIICHAN
OJIICHAN (grandfather in Japanese) is a novel about old age. The narrative is about themes common to people after their 60’s such as loneliness, degenerative diseases, and social indifference, but the characters of this novel show that each person lives the experience of aging in their own, many times surprising, ways. Satoshi is a high-school teacher living with his daughter and wife, who has Alzheimer’s disease. When he turns 70, he is compulsorily retired by the school system, huge loss for him, who loved the contact with students and colleagues more than anything. He returns to gateball training with his best friend Hiroshi, very fond of this sport popular among the Japanese community in Brazil, but he is suffering for the gradual loss of his motor skills.
For an unexpected circumstance, Satoshi is forced to move with his wife from his house to a small apartment, where he cannot take his dog, Peri. In the condominium, he makes friends with a neighbor, Estela, a widow who keeps a shocking secret, and Altair, an obsessive reader of a Brazilian classic novel, who has a strange lesson for Satoshi. Unable to fully deal with the difficulties of his wife, Satoshi hires a caregiver, and the three of them develop an unusual relationship. An honest and moving vision of aging and maturity that enthralls the reader by offering a deep understanding of what it means to get old.

Publication/Status: To be published by Fósforo (Brazil) in November 2024.
NIHONJIN
This contemporary classic novel is a fictional memoir: the protagonist’s grandson narrates the story of a family of Japanese immigrants along eight decades of the 20th century. Hideo Inabata arrives to Brazil with his wife and faces hard work on the coffee plantations, the difficulty of adaptation to the new country, discrimination, and restrictions on individual freedom during the Second World War. The Brazilianization and political-ideological positions of his son and the interracial marriage of his daughter are two major conflicts that move the plot.
Winner of Benvirá Prize for Literature (2011) and Jabuti Award for best novel in 2012), NIHONJIN is always considered among the ten best works of Brazilian literature in this century. It is also among the 20 best narratives of the last 20 years according to a poll conducted by the newspaper Cândido, in 2014. Meu avô é um Nihonjin (My Grandpa Is A Nihonjin), the Animation Feature film based on the novel, produced by Pinguim Content, and directed by Celia and Rita Catunda, is a finalist to Mianima 2022-2023, a program from MIA Association (Mujeres en la Industria de la Animación), in Madrid, focused on projects by women from Spain and Latin America.

Publication/Status: Originally published by Benvirá (Brazil) in 2011, to be republished in a new edition by Fósforo (Brazil) in 2025. Also published by Textofilia (Mexico) in 2021 and by Suiseisha (Japan) in 2022. Sold to Ediciones Zero (Chile). Animation Feature Film from Pinguim Content to be released in 2025. [176 pages]
TWO (DOIS)
Two distinct voices narrate this novel. Two elderly brothers tell their lives each from a different angle, with a different focus, revealing their peculiar identities. The oldest, Zé Paulo, is conservative and methodical. The youngest, Zé Eduardo, is restless and unstable. While Zé Paulo’s language is colloquial, as he is talking to his grandson, Zé Eduardo’s narrative is formal, he is writing his diary. They have two other siblings: Zé Carlos, a policeman, and Maria Luisa, who abdicates her personal life and devotes herself to their family. Zé Paulo lives all his life in Maringá, a provincial town; there, he gets married and has three children.
Zé Eduardo leaves to São Paulo, where he integrates an urban guerrilla during the military dictatorship and, as a result, is exiled. When he returns to Brazil, he is back in touch with his older brother, but their relationship is never to be warm. Ana Paula, Zé Paulo’s teenage daughter, is rejected by her father and finds refuge in her uncle’s words and arms. Then a tragedy ends the fraternal relationship for good.

Publication/Status: by Tordesilhas (Brazil) in November 2017.
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