Jump to Content

Collection Guide
Collection Title:
Collection Number:
Get Items:
Inventory to the Masa Uehara Collection, 1966-1981
D-366  
View entire collection guide What's This?
Search this collection
Collection Details
 
Table of contents What's This?
  • Descriptive Summary
  • Administrative Information
  • Biography
  • Scope and Content of Collection
  • Related collection
  • Indexing Terms

  • Descriptive Summary

    Title: Masa Uehara Collection,
    Date (inclusive): 1966-1981
    Collection number: D-366
    Collector: Uehara, Masa
    Creator: Snyder, Gary--1930-
    Extent: 0.40 linear feet
    Repository: University of California, Davis. General Library. Dept. of Special Collections.
    100 North West Quad
    Davis, California, 95616-5292
    Abstract: Masa Uehara was married to the poet Gary Snyder from 1967-1989. The collection consists of 111 letters she received from Gary Snyder over the course of their courtship and married life.
    Physical location: Researchers should contact Special Collections to request collections, as many are stored offsite.
    Language: English.

    Administrative Information

    Access

    Collection is open for research.

    Publication Rights

    Copyright is protected by the copyright law, chapter 17 of the U.S. Code. All requests for permission to publish or quote from manuscripts must be submitted in writing to the Head of Special Collections. Permission for publication is given on behalf of Special Collections, General Library, University of California, Davis as the owner of the physical items and is not intended to include or imply permission of the copyright holder, which must also be obtained by the researcher.

    Preferred Citation

    [Identification of item], Masa Uehara Collection, D-366, Department of Special Collections, University of California Library, Davis, California.

    Acquisition Information

    Acquired in 2001.

    Biography

    Biographical Narrative

    Masa Uehara, daughter of Tokusei and Mitsu, was raised in Japan. She and Gary Snyder were introduced in 1966 at a dinner party hosted by Hisao Kanaseki, one of her university professors and a friend of Snyder's. At the time of their introduction Uehara had recently graduated from Kobe University and was planning to pursue graduate studies at Ochanomizu Women's University.
    Uehara and Snyder married on August 6, 1967 in a ceremony which took place on the rim of an active volcano on Suwa-no-se, a small island north of Okinawa. In April 1968, their first son, Kai, was born in Kyoto. The family left Japan in December 1968 to make their home in California. A second son, Gen, was born in 1969. In 1970, Snyder and Uehara and their two young sons took up residence on San Juan Ridge, in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada Mountains, near Nevada City, California.
    Uehara studied ballet, Japanese classical dance, and Bharat Natyam in Japan and the United States. She was a member of the Balasaraswati dance troupe in Berkeley and performed in Japan, India, and many parts of the United States. She later undertook graduate study in Graphic Design/Visual Communications at California State University, Chico and started her own free-lance design business.
    Uehara and Snyder divorced in 1989.
    Source: Yamazato, Katsunori. "Seeking a fulcrum: Gary Snyder and Japan (1956-1975)" Ph.D. dissertation, University of California, Davis, 1987.

    Scope and Content of Collection

    The Masa Uehara Collection consists of 111 letters she received from Gary Snyder over the course of their courtship and married life from 1966-1981.
    During the fifteen year period of the correspondence, Snyder traveled extensively, giving readings and lectures at colleges, universities, and other forums all over the United States and abroad. This required him to leave his young family behind for significant portions of every year. In his letters home Snyder kept his wife closely informed about his building network of friends and colleagues, his developing environmental ethics and poetics, and his thoughts about the places he visited.
    This collection is arranged in one series, Correspondence. The series is arranged chronologically.

    Related collection

    D-050, Gary Snyder Papers

    Indexing Terms

    The following terms have been used to index the description of this collection in the library's online public access catalog.

    Subjects

    Uehara, Masa
    Snyder, Gary--1930-
    Poets, American--20th century
    American poetry--20th century
    Authors, American--20th century
    American literature--20th century