She was Japan's first professional woman writer of modern literature, specializing in short stories and poetry, and was also an extensive diarist.

[4] Her parents were from a peasant community in nearby Yamanashi Prefecture,[6] but her father had managed to procure samurai status in 1867.

[13] Her fiancé Saburō Shibuya [ja] (who later became a prosecutor, a judge, and the governor of Akita Prefecture) soon broke off their engagement.

[12] At the proposal of her teacher, she moved into the Haginoya as an apprentice, but left after a few months due to being unhappy with what she saw as an inordinate amount of household duties.

[14] Together with her mother and younger sister Kuniko, she moved to Hongō district, where the women earned their income by sewing and laundry work.

"Bush warbler in the grove", 1888) and received abundant royalties, Higuchi decided to become a novelist to support her family.

[18] In March 1892, she gave her literary debut with the story Yamizakura (Flowers at Dusk), published in the first issue of the magazine Musashino, under her pen name Higuchi Ichiyō.

The plots were thin, there was little development of character, and they were loaded down by excessive sentiment, especially when compared to what she was writing concurrently in her diary.

It was published in the prestigious journal Miyako no hana in November and December 1892,[22] only nine months after she had started writing in earnest.

[23] In 1893, Higuchi, her mother, and her sister abandoned their middle-class house and moved to a poor neighborhood where they opened a stationery store that failed.

To this period belong Ōtsugomori (On the Last Day of the Year), Nigorie (Troubled Waters), Jūsan'ya (The Thirteenth Night), Takekurabe, and Wakaremichi (Separate Ways).

At the time of her death, Higuchi left behind 21 short stories, nearly 4,000 poems (which are regarded being of lesser quality than her prose), numerous essays and a multivolume diary.

Her stories Ōtsugomori, Nigorie, Jūsan'ya and Takekurabe have been repeatedly adapted for film and television, notably An Inlet of Muddy Water (1953, dir.