An information recording apparatus comprises a recording medium, a swing arm driven by an actuation unit, the swing arm swinging over a surface of the medium in response to driving by the actuation unit, a recording head carried by the swing arm and scanning over the surface of the medium with a swinging motion of the swing arm by the actuation unit, the recording head recording information to the medium, a head retracting mechanism retracting the recording head out of the medium in a state where no recording is to be made on the medium, an optical injection unit injecting a light into the recording head, the recording head including an optical irradiation part irradiating the light injected to the recording head upon the medium when recording information to the medium. The optical injection unit is integrated with the head retracting mechanism to form a unitary optical-injection and head-retraction mechanism.