HIGASHIKAWA KOHEI – GO TO EXIST

His purpose as a writer is clear:

“To confront the world by confessing the contradictions of my own existence.”

Through psychological depth and metaphor, he captures the contradictions and pain of a world where individuals voluntarily commodify themselves. His writing exposes the emergence of “self-regulated humans” and resonates with themes found in Kafka’s alienation and Karl Ove Knausgård’s introspective prose. His work does not exclude any reader; instead, it forces them to unknowingly confront their own existence within a totalitarian system.

At the same time, Higashikawa embraces absurd comedy. For him, comedy is both a promotional tool for his ideas and a form of critique. His performances are not merely about making people laugh—they serve as a mirror reflecting societal contradictions and cultural distortions.

Born and raised in a small city in western Japan, Higashikawa grew up without financial hardship and remained largely unaware of how society truly functioned. However, his perspective changed dramatically after graduating high school and experiencing a “blank year” before university.

The moment he lost the label of “student,” the way people treated him changed overnight. Adults and friends alike began to act as if he had somehow become a lesser person. It was then that he realized:

“A person’s very existence is shaken by the structures and evaluations imposed by society.”

He later moved to Tokyo for university, only to witness the same phenomenon on a much larger scale. Job hunting exposed him to the cold reality of societal expectations, making him painfully aware of his inability to conform. Unable to adapt, he left Tokyo and drifted west, seeking a fresh start.

But just as he was about to begin a new chapter, he found himself trapped in an invisible prison—chronic pain. When ordinary life became impossible, he turned to writing as a means of proving his existence. His novel, Go To Exist, was not only a work of fiction but also a philosophical reckoning with himself.

This work introduces his own concept: Coexistential Orientation—the idea that even when our thoughts are infiltrated by the politics hidden within society, culture, and daily life, we are naturally inclined to struggle with how to recognize and engage with the existence of the person before us. In that moment, the world is stripped of its preconceptions, allowing us to truly see one another.

Society often reduces people to labels—“hikikomori,” “unemployed,” “dropout”—but Coexistential Orientation transcends reason and judgment. It is “the ability to actualize each other’s presence in the same space”—a fundamental human inclination that enables us to affirm our own existence without fear of scrutiny or evaluation.

A Back Cover from GO TO EXIST

Once, he had high hopes for anime and manga. But as he grew older, the constraints on free expression and the harsh realities of the entertainment industry turned his anticipation into disillusionment. Yet, the urge to tell stories never faded. Instead, it evolved into his present-day writing.

The greatest influence on his creative journey was chronic pain. It was only when he realized he could no longer live “normally” that writing became inseparable from his existence.