Inoue was born in 1926 While Inoue asserted that he was born in
Lüshun, China, other sources name
Kurume in
Fukuoka Prefecture as the actual place of birth. After his mother had left the family, he and his sister were raised by their grandmother. Inoue's writings deal extensively with social and political issues, such as the living conditions of mining workers,
Koreans in Japan and the
Burakumin, the
Korean War, and the effect of the
atomic bomb. In the
Kenzaburō Ōe edited anthology
The Crazy Iris and Other Stories of the Atomic Aftermath, Inoue was attested to "capture the tension of post-war Japan in a unique and distinguished style". In 1970, he established and edited the quarterly literary magazine
Henkyō ("Frontier"). Russian, Czech and Serbian language anthologies, in particular his short story
The House of Hands about a group of survivors of the
atomic bombing of Nagasaki. Inoue died of cancer in 1992. His last years living with his illness were documented in
Kazuo Hara's film
A Dedicated Life (
Zenshin shosetsuka), which revealed that many details about his life were his own inventions. His eldest daughter is the novelist and translator Areno Inoue. ==Selected works==