Arishima Museum

Central Hokkaido Area Niseko Town

This museum features the life and works of Takeo Arishima (1878 – 1923), a novelist of the Taisho era known for works that include Kain no Matsuei (Descendants of Cain), Umareizuru Nayami (The Agony of Being Born), and Aru Onna (A Certain Woman). It also introduces the history of the farm he owned.

museum Facility information

Address: Arishima 57, Niseko-cho, Abuta-gun, Hokkaido
Phone: 0136-44-3245
Hours: 9:00 – 17:00 (last admission: 16:30)
Closed: Mondays and the year-end and New Year’s holidays
Admission: Individuals: Adults: ¥500; High school students: ¥100; Junior high school students or younger and seniors 65+ living in Niseko: Free
Groups of 10 or more: Adults: ¥400
Annual passes: Adults ¥800; High school students: ¥200
Parking: Available
Official website: https://www.town.niseko.lg.jp/arishima_museum/

Wheelchair accessibility

Parking	Accessible restroom	Slopes	Nursing room	Wheelchairs available upon request
Unavailable	Available	Available	Unavailable	Available

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About Takeo Arishima

Takeo Arishima was born in 1878 in Tokyo. After graduating from Gakushuin Secondary School, he entered Sapporo Agricultural College and went to the United States to pursue his studies in 1903. In 1906 he joined his younger brother and painter Ikuma Arishima, who had studied in Italy, and continued his studies in Europe. In the following year, he returned to Japan and joined the faculty of the Agricultural College of Tohoku Imperial University, the successor to Sapporo Agricultural College. Around this time, Takeo Arishima joined Saneatsu Mushanokoji, Naoya Shiga, Ton Satomi (Takeo’s younger brother and a writer), and other like-minded people in publishing Shirakaba magazine, and he began to publish his works. In 1916, he lost his wife and his father one after the other, and in the following year, he left the agricultural college. From that time onward, he published Kain no Matsuei (Descendants of Cain), Chiisaki Mono He (To My Little Ones), Umareizuru Nayami (The Agony of Being Born), Aru Onna (A Certain Woman), Hitofusa no Budo (A Bunch of Grapes), and other works, establishing himself as a novelist in Japan's literary world. He was a prolific writer, publishing not only novels, but also children’s stories, plays, social criticism, art criticism, and more. In 1922, to live true to his beliefs, he liberated the Arishima Farm he owned (as an absentee landlord) in Kaributo Village (today’s Niseko Town), Hokkaido, on the condition that the farmland be shared by the tenant farmers. He passed away in 1923.