MOTOORI NORINAGA (1730–1801), regarded as the preeminent scholar of the Kokugaku ("national learning") school of premodern Japan. Born Ozu Yoshisada to a merchant-class family in Matsuzaka, Norinaga became interested in literature as a young man. Following the death of his brother-in-law in 1751, Norinaga's mother skillfully juggled the family finances in order to send her son to the capital, Kyoto, to continue his education. In 1752 he became the student of Hori Keizan, a Confucian scholar, with whom he studied Chinese literature. That same year he also discovered a book on Japanese poetry written by the Shingon monk Keichu, the first Kokugaku scholar (kokugakusha). This experience moved Norinaga to undertake the study of the earliest Japanese documents, an occupation that he complemented with the study of practical medicine. As a result of his reading, which inculcated in him a growing awareness of, and sensitivity to, Japan's long cultural and...