Onoto Watanna

The Old Jinrikisha (Esprios Classics) Onoto Watanna

Winnifred Eaton was a Canadian author and screenwriter. Although she was of Chinese-British ancestry, she published under the Japanese pseudonym Onoto Watanna and under the name Winifred Reeve. Eaton was only 14 when one of her stories was accepted for publication by a Montreal newspaper. Before long she also had articles published in several popular magazines in the United States, notably the Ladies' Home Journal. Under this pseudonym Onoto Watanna, she published romance novels and short stories that were widely read throughout the United States. In 1900, Eaton moved to New York City, where her second major novel, A Japanese Nightingale, was published. It proved extremely successful, being translated into several languages and eventually adapted both as a Broadway play and then, in 1918, as a motion picture.