Shunrō Oshikawa was a Japanese author, journalist, and editor born as Masa'ari Oshikawa in Matsuyama, Japan on March 21, 1876. He died in Tokyo on November 16, 1914. Oshikawa is recognized as a pioneer of science fiction in Japan and is remembered alongside figures like Jūza Unno as one of the fathers of Japanese science fiction. While studying law at Tōkyō Senmon Gakkō, which is now Waseda University, he wrote his most famous work, Kaitei Gunkan (The Undersea Warship). He was influenced by the technological adventure novels of Jules Verne, particularly Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Seas, which shaped his speculative fiction style.

His signature work, Kaitei Gunkan, was first published in 1900 under the full title Kaitō Bōken Kitan: Kaitei Gunkan. The novel told the story of an armored submarine with a drill-shaped bow, called the Denkōtei or Lightning Ship, and its inventor Captain Sakuragi. The story reflected the imperialist ambitions of Meiji-era Japan and foreshadowed the Russo-Japanese War. This novel became the first in a popular six-volume series that included Bukyō no Nippon (1902), Shinzō Gunkan (1904), Bukyō Kantai (1904), Shin Nippontō (1906), and Tōyō Bukyō Dan (1907). Beyond this series, Oshikawa also contributed to the development of Japanese detective fiction, incorporating mystery and crime elements into his adventure stories.

Oshikawa worked as a lead reporter for the magazine Shajitsu Gahō, which covered the Russo-Japanese War, and later became co-editor of the publication Bōken Sekai. Following a dispute with his publisher Hakubunkan, he founded his own magazine, Bukyō Sekai, in 1911, which he edited until his death. He was also a sports enthusiast who played baseball at Waseda University and was part of the first Japanese university baseball team to travel to the United States in 1905.

The 1995 anime original video animation Super Atragon, known in Japan as Shin Kaitei Gunkan, is directly based on Oshikawa’s original novel. The OVA was produced by Phoenix Entertainment and ran for two episodes. The story follows a special United Nations task force sent to investigate unusual phenomena in Antarctica, where they encounter a mysterious black cylinder and are saved by the reappearance of a secret Japanese submarine that had been lost since World War II.

Oshikawa’s creative identity is strongly marked by themes of Japanese nationalism, martial valor, and imperial ambition. His writing often featured aristocratic heroes, plucky inventors, and speculative machinery, and was steeped in a sense of Japan's manifest destiny. A recurring focus in his work is the concept of Bukyo, or warrior morality, which served as a central theme in his Kaitei Gunkan series. His grasp of actual science was sometimes weak, with his inventions often resembling ornithopters more than scientifically rigorous spacecraft, but his focus was on adventure and nationalistic futurism rather than technical accuracy.

The industry significance of Oshikawa lies in his foundational role in Japanese popular culture. He was instrumental in developing adventure tales into an independent genre of children's fiction in Japan. Although his original literary works were never widely translated into Western languages, the loose film and anime adaptations of his books beginning in the 1960s gained considerable international audiences. The 1963 Toho film Atragon, directed by Ishirō Honda, and the 1995 OVA Super Atragon brought his core concepts to new generations, even though these adaptations often dropped much of his original fervent patriotism and added fantasy elements like lost continents and giant monsters. A biography of his life, Kaidanji: Oshikawa Shunrō by Junya Yokota and Shingo Aizu, won the Nihon SF Taisho Award in 1988, further cementing his posthumous recognition in the science fiction field.