Ironically enough, after his return to Japan, Eroshenko did become associated with the socialist movement. He met and made friends with Takatu Seido (1893-1974) who, soon after, helped to found the Communist Party of Japan. Takatu introduced Eroshenko to other young Japanese socialists, one of whom, Kamitika Itiko (1888-1980) helped the young Russian a great deal. Itiko was a journalist who later became an influential member of the Japanese Socialist party, and, although neither of them knew it at the time, she laid the foundation for Eroshenko's later friendship with the Chinese novelist, Lusin. (I'll have more to say about that in my next article.)
Although Eroshenko was able to earn some money by teaching Esperanto and working as a masseur he needed more. (He does not seem to have been able to derive any income from his musical talents, which I find rather strange.) And so, helped by Kamitika Itiko, (and by other Japanese friends too), Eroshenko began to write stories, which he called "fables" in the Japanese language and to sell them to various journals. These stories had a certain quality which really appealed to Japanese readers. I'm not sure exactly what it was, but they certainly also had a lyrical quality to them and that resulted in Eroshenko being known as the "Blind Poet." In fact, with one exception, Eroshenko does not seem to have written any poems in any language during his time in Japan. The only poem which is known is "Antaudiro de la Ciganino" (The Gypsy's Prophecy), which he recited at the Japanese Esperanto Conference in 1920. On that occasion, his dramatist friend Akita Uzyaku translated the poem into Japanese and read out that version to the audience.
But it was as a writer of prose that Eroshenko became known as in Japan and in 1920 his portrait was painted by a short-lived but well-known painter of the modern school, Nakamura Tune (1888-1924). And as we will see, later his stories also had a strong appeal to the Chinese temperament.
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