KANEKO Tohta was born in 1919 in Chichibu, the mountainous area of Saitama Prefecture and began writing haiku when he was 18 years old.

Attracted to haiku through the works of TAKESHITA Shizunojo, KATOH Shuuson and NAKAMURA Kusatao. First submitted to KATOH Shuuson's "Kanrai" in 1941. Graduated Tokyo University in 1943 and started working for the Bank of Japan. Posted to Truck Lagoon as a Naval pay officer in 1944 and repatriated in 1946. After the war he emerged as a flag-bearer for avant-garde haiku and started the haiku group "Kaitei" (Distance to the Sea) in 1962 at the age of 43. "Kaitei" changed from a coterie magazine to a hierarchical structure in 1985.

From before the War until 1955 he stressed the importance of "plasticism" and "sociality" in haiku. His second phase was from the mid sixties to 1975 when he studied classical haiku in depth as a result of heated debate between the conservative and avant-garde factions within the group. The present phase is his third and it is characterized by the popularization of haiku as "poetry for the masses" grounded in the works of such poets as Issa and Santohka and blending the traditional and avant-garde in the melting pot termed "Modern Haiku".

To "practise the modern in the grandeur of the old" is his current catch phrase. He has published over 50 books starting with his anthology "Shounen" (A Youth). Now Honorary President of the Modern Haiku Society and selector for the Asahi Haiku Column.