Peter MacMillan — The Founder — True Japan Initiative

Poet & Translator

Peter MacMillan, poet and translator

ピーター・J・マクミラン

His translations of the Hyakunin Isshu (One Hundred Poets, One Poem Each) and The Tales of Ise have won translation prizes in both Japan and the United States, and he is now at work on the first complete English translation of the Man’yōshū and its some 4,500 poems. As poet, translator and printmaker, he has made it his life’s work to pass the heart of Japanese culture — beyond language — to the world.

The essence of Japan, he believes, lives in the quiet space between words, between people and things. That conviction, reached through translating waka and walking the country’s shrines and temples, became the starting point of True Japan Initiative.

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“Peter MacMillan is the premier translator of his generation.”
── Donald Keene, scholar of Japanese literature

Biography

Peter MacMillan grew up in the Irish countryside. He graduated first in his class from University College Dublin (National University of Ireland), took an M.A. in philosophy, and later earned a Ph.D. in English literature. He served as a Visiting Fellow at Princeton, Columbia and Oxford.

A dual citizen of Ireland and Britain, he has lived in Japan for more than twenty years. Based in Saga, Kyoto, he is a part-time lecturer at the University of Tokyo and Musashino University, the representative of the translation and production company The Moon is a Boat Co., Ltd. (Tsuki no Fune), and a member of PEN America and the Japan PEN Club.

Translating waka and other classics, and walking the country’s shrines, temples and poetic places, he came to see that the beauty of Japan lives in the quiet space between words, between people and things. To carry that quiet heart into the next thousand years, he founded the general incorporated association True Japan Initiative in 2025.

Selected Works

One Hundred Poets, One Poem Each — translation of the Hyakunin Isshu

2008　|　With a foreword by Donald Keene; later published as a Penguin Classic. Winner of translation prizes in Japan and the U.S.
The Tales of Ise — translation of the Ise Monogatari

2016　|　Penguin Classics. Nominated for the PEN Award for Poetry in Translation.
WHACK A WAKA — English Hyakunin Isshu karuta

2019　|　The world’s first English edition of the karuta, with tournaments held in Japan and abroad.
Admiring Fields — a collection of poems

2011　|　Published in Italy.
英語で味わう万葉集 / 日本の古典を英語で読む — books in Japanese

Books in Japanese that open the Man’yōshū and the classics to readers through both English and Japanese.
松尾芭蕉を旅する — a recent book in Japanese

Tracing the journeys and verse of Matsuo Bashō.

Awards

2008	For his translation of the Hyakunin Isshu, One Hundred Poets, One Poem Each: the Japan–U.S. Friendship Commission Prize for the Translation of Japanese Literature (Donald Keene Center Special Prize).
2008	The 44th Special Cultural Translation Prize of the Japan Society of Translators.
──	The Tales of Ise (Penguin Classics) was nominated for the PEN Award for Poetry in Translation.

Activities & Media

Printmaking	Creates woodblock prints under the artist name “Seisai”.
Columns	Asahi Shimbun, “Hoshi no hayashi ni” (2019–2024); Kyoto Shimbun, “Enjoying the Classics”.
Television	Host of NHK World’s “Magical Japanese”; appearances on NHK E-Tele programmes including “NHK Tanka” and “100 Minutes de Meicho”.