Shiro Maeda

Shiro Maeda

Maeda was born in Gotanda, Tokyo, and graduated from Wako University. He formed the Gotandadan theater company in 1997 at the age of nineteen. The charm of his work lies in its naturally laid-back and amusing humor within a theatrical space. His plays Iya, mushiro wasurete-gusa (More a Forget-Me than a Forget-Me-Not), Kyabetsu no tagui (A Type of Cabbage), and Sayonara boku no chiisana meisei (Farewell, My Moment of Fame) were short-listed for the 49th, 50th, and 51st Kishida Drama Awards respectively. In 2007, he won the Kishida Drama Award for Ikiterumono wa inainoka (No One Alive Here?) This is a lyrical and humorous piece depicting death that grew out of a workshop involving the 17 actors who were selected from auditions, and for reasons never explained, all the characters die. It has been acclaimed as strict yet fresh theater of the absurd. Many of his short stories have been published in literary magazines, and several of his novels have been nominated for major literary awards, including Ai demo nai, seishun demo nai, tabi datanai (Not Really Love, Nor Youth, Nor a Trip) for the 27th Noma New Literary Writers Prize, Renai no kaitai to Kita-ku no metsubo (Splitting Up, and the Collapse of Kita Ward) for the 28th Noma New Literary Writers Prize and the 19th Mishima Prize, and Gureto seikatsu adobencha (The Great Life Adventure) for the 137th Akutagawa Prize.