Born in
Kyoto, Yamazaki grew up in
Manchuria during
World War II. He studied philosophy with a concentration in aesthetics and art history at
Kyoto University. After his studies in Kyoto, he studied at
Yale University from 1965 to 1967, where he would also teach. Upon his return to
Japan, he taught at
Kansai University and, until his retirement, at
Osaka University. In 1972, alongside
Minoru Betsuyaku, he co-founded the
Te no Kai theatre company, where he wrote the plays
Fune wa Hosen yo and
Mokuzō Haritsuke. Yamazaki's most well-known play,
Zeami, was dedicated to the founder of the
Noh genre of theatre,
Zeami Motokiyo. For this play, he won the
Kishida Prize for Drama in 1963. In 1975, he won the
Mainichi Shuppan Bunka Shō for
Yamiagari no Amerika. In 1984, he was awarded
Yomiuri Prize for
Oedipus shōten and the Yoshino-Sakuzō Prize for
Yawarakai kojinshugi no tanjō. In 2006, he was named as a
Person of Cultural Merit, and in 2011, he received the Prize of the Japanese Academy of Arts. Yamazaki died in the
Hyōgo Prefecture on 19 August 2020 at the age of 86. ==References==