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May 10, 1937 – September 6, 2014 was a Japanese lyricist and novelist. In 1985, Yamaguchi won the Naoki Prize for her novels, Enka no Mushi ("Japanese Ballad Lover") and Robai ("Old Japanese Plum").
When she was 20 years old, Yamaguchi met then-yakuza boss Noboru Ando. She became his mistress, known to members of his crime family, the 安藤組, as "Hime" ("princess"). When Ando was on the run from the police in 1958 for having a hitman shoot businessman Hideki Yokoi, Yamaguchi hid him in her apartment in Yoyogi.
On August 5, 1959, she opened an upscale bar in the Ginza district of Tokyo, which she named "Hime". Yamaguchi wrote song lyrics during the slow times while managing her bar, leading to a series of successful songs during the 1970s. In 1971, Yamaguchi's song "Yokohama Tasogare" ("Yokohama Twilight Time"), performed by Hiroshi Itsuki, became a major hit within the enka genre. Yamaguchi penned another hit with "Brandy Glass", performed by actor and singer, Yujiro Ishihara. She began writing novels during the 1980s.
Yamaguchi died from respiratory failure on September 6, 2014, at the age of 77.
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