Byakuren Yanagiwara (October 15, 1885 – February 22, 1967, real name Akiko) was a Japanese poet and novelist. In 1894, she was adopted by a distant relative, Viscount Yorimitsu Kitakōji. She entered the Kazoku Girls' School in 1898. In 1900, she was married to the eldest son of the Kitakōji family, Suketake, at the age of 15, after which she dropped out of school due to her pregnancy. She gave birth to her eldest son, Isamitsu, but in 1905 she divorced, leaving Isamitsu to the Kitakōji family, and returned to her parents' house.
Due to the rigid customs of the time, a divorced daughter was disgraced and could not enter the Yanagiwara family's main residence. In 1908, she transferred to Tōyō Eiwa Girls' School, a Canadian mission school in Azabu, Tokyo, as a boarder to resume her studies, which she had given up due to her marriage and childbirth. There she met Hanako Muraoka, a girl eight years younger than her, who became her "confidante."
