In Memoriam — Professor Ineko Kondo (1911–2008)
The obituary below appeared in the Girton College Annual Review (2009) and is reproduced with permission.
“KONDO. On 13 November 2008, Ine Rachel, known as Ineko (Sato), MLitt (1937). A graduate of Tohoku Imperial University, she came to Girton as a research student in English and completed an MLitt in 1939. Back in Japan, she became Assistant Professor at Tokyo Women’s Higher Normal School and later Professor at Tsuda Women’s College (1948–1980). She married physicist Masao Kondo in 1944 and received her doctorate in 1952 with a thesis on Jane Austen.”
Mrs Kondo was warmly known to many Camford members. With her gentle smile and quiet presence, she spoke easily with members of all ages. Few realised how deeply she influenced generations of Japanese women scholars.
Reminiscences by Professor Akiko Higuchi
One of her former students, Professor Akiko Higuchi (St Edmund’s, Cambridge, 1988), writes:
“As a junior at Tsuda College, I took Prof. Kondo’s course on A Passage to India and was immediately drawn to English novels. After completing an MA on Charlotte Brontë, marriage paused my academic path — but I continued to visit her, and she always encouraged me.
After returning from the United States, she often invited me to lectures at the British Council or the University of Tokyo. Her quiet support sustained my interest even when life was busy with raising children.”
“I later began teaching at Gakushuin Girls’ Junior and Senior High Schools and eventually at Gakushuin University. Prof. Kondo even introduced me to the President of the Thomas Hardy Society of Japan, through which I attended Hardy conferences in Dorchester throughout the 1980s and 1990s.”
“In 1986 she attended the conference, staying with another family; in 1988, we stayed together. In 1994 she asked me to photograph her with Professor M.C. Bradbrook, the Mistress of Girton, whom she deeply admired. I cycled from St Edmund’s with a melon and took their pictures.”
“When I earned my PhD in 2005, I visited Prof. Kondo in her nursing home to show her the diploma. She was very weak, and I am not sure she recognised it — but I wanted her to see it.
She had invited me to join the Camford Society after her retirement from it. Though work often prevented me attending, her encouragement stayed with me throughout my career.
Prof. Ineko Kondo was a pioneer among women scholars of English literature in Japan — I believe the first woman to earn a PhD in English literature here. She loved Girton deeply and admired Prof. Bradbrook. She was more than a researcher: she was a remarkable teacher whose students continue to contribute to the literary world.”
A Life Admired
Doreen Simmons concludes:
“An active, charming and inspiring member of the Cambridge & Oxford Society — and a friend to members of all ages — Ineko Kondo died on 13 November 2008, aged 97.”
— Doreen Simmons (Girton College, Cambridge, 1950)