Retired Hokkaido farmer describes rural plight in novels

Novelist Hiroshi Tamai, a 79-year-old self-described “peasant writer,” is proud that he persisted with his craft through the toughest years as a cattle farmer in Betsukai, eastern Hokkaido.

In the mid-1950s, the Japanese government sought young people to join a pilot project to cultivate the wild Konsen plateau and increase food output as Japan recovered from war.