was a famous Japanese journalist and writer for Yomiuri Shinbun.

Career

Iiboshi was an alumnus of Kyoto University

Kyoto University

, or is a national university located in Kyoto, Japan. It is the second oldest Japanese university, and formerly one of Japan's Imperial Universities.- History :...

. He was the vice copy chief of the social news division of the national Japanese newspaper Yomiuri Shimbun

Yomiuri Shimbun

The is a Japanese newspaper published in Tokyo, Osaka, Fukuoka, and other major Japanese cities. It is one of the five national newspapers in Japan; the other four are the Asahi Shimbun, the Mainichi Shimbun, Nihon Keizai Shimbun, and the Sankei Shimbun...

.

When President Shigeru Okada of Tōei

Toei Company

is a Japanese film, television production, and distribution corporation. Based in Tokyo, Toei owns and operates thirty-four movie theaters across Japan, a modest vertically-integrated studio system by the standards of the 1930s United States; operates studios at Tokyo and Kyoto; and is a...

 Film Studio got a manuscript from the yakuza

Yakuza

, also known as , are members of traditional organized crime syndicates in Japan. The Japanese police, and media by request of the police, call them bōryokudan , literally "violence group", while the yakuza call themselves "ninkyō dantai" , "chivalrous organizations". The yakuza are notoriously...

 Kōzō Minō , he asked Iiboshi to rewrite it as a novel. After that, Iiboshi made a lot of novel series about yakuza conflicts and the dark side of the Japanese politics.

Main works

• "Jingi naki Tatakai" (Battles Without Honor and Humanity) series
• "Nippon no Don" (Tycoon in Japan) series

Criticism

Iiboshi's works are termed "documentary" and are based on detailed research by his original resources. However, the model persons of his novels, the yakuza Kōzō Minō and Kazuo Taoka

Kazuo Taoka

was one of the most prominent yakuza Godfathers.Known as the "Godfather of Godfathers", Taoka was third kumicho of the Yamaguchi-gumi, Japan's largest yakuza organization, from 1946 to 1981....

 say that it is only entertaining fiction.

A recent book about yakuza film, Chris D.

Chris D.

Chris D., real name Chris Desjardins, is a punk poet, rock critic, singer, writer, actor and filmmaker. Chris D. is best known as the lead singer and founder of the early Los Angeles punk/deathrock band The Flesh Eaters. Desjardins was a feature writer at Slash magazine in 1977, when he formed a...

's Outlaw Masters of Japanese Film, quotes Kinji Fukasaku

Kinji Fukasaku

was a Japanese film actor, screenwriter, and best known as a celebrated and innovative filmmaker. He was born in Mito, Ibaraki, Japan, and died in Tokyo, from prostate cancer...

 as saying that Iiboshi had been a yakuza before becoming a writer; but this claim is quite wrong.

Resources

Asahi

Asahi Shimbun

The is the second most circulated out of the five national newspapers in Japan. Its circulation, which was 7.96 million for its morning edition and 3.1 million for its evening edition as of June 2010, was second behind that of Yomiuri Shimbun...

Newspaper. Gendai Nihon Jinbutsu Jiten (Who's Who Today). 1990. ISBN 978-4023400511.