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A playwright of the early Edo period, born in Echizen Province (present-day Fukui Prefecture). He moved to Kyoto in his youth and served noble and samurai households before turning to playwriting. He wrote for both ningyo jōruri (puppet theater) and kabuki, producing masterworks in collaboration with the chanter Takemoto Gidayu. His 1703 work Sonezaki Shinjū (The Love Suicides at Sonezaki), based on a real double suicide, was a major hit in the domestic drama (sewamono) genre; its michiyuki scene—the journey to death—is considered one of the pinnacles of Japanese literature and drama. Kokusenya Kassen (The Battles of Coxinga, 1715) was a masterpiece of the historical drama (jidaimono) genre and ran for a record seventeen months. In his later years he was active in the Dōtonbori district of Osaka, celebrated as "Bashō of the east, Chikamatsu of the west." His artistic theory of kyojitsu himaku no ron—that art exists at the border between the fictive and the real—remains a classic of theatrical theory today. He died at 72.

A writer of keen insight into the conflict between human passion and social duty. He empathized deeply with the joys and sorrows of ordinary people, using the shinjū (double suicide) genre to explore the universal themes of life and death, love and obligation. While possessing a theoretical view of art, he was equally skilled at moving audiences emotionally.

Hailed as "the Shakespeare of Japan," he established the literary status of jōruri and kabuki. Works such as Sonezaki Shinjū and Meido no Hikyaku (The Courier for Hell) continue to be performed today, and he laid the foundation for ningyo jōruri bunraku, a UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage.