Yasunari Kawabata was a Japanese novelist and short story writer whose spare, lyrical, subtly-shaded prose works won him the 1968 Nobel Prize in Literature, the first Japanese author to receive the award. His works have enjoyed broad international appeal and are still widely read. The Nobel Prize in Literature 1968, announced October 17, 1968. Yasunari Kawabata, “for his narrative mastery, which with great sensibility expresses the essence of the Japanese mind”. Yasunari Kawabata: born 1899, Osaka, Japan. Wiki link Data: the Nobel Foundation (CC0).