Rashomon and Other Stories by Akutagawa

Rynosuke

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Original Title: Rashomon and Other Stories

ISBN: 0871401738
ISBN13: 9780871401731
Autor: Akutagawa Rynosuke/ / Takashi Kojima (Translator)
Rating: 4.3 of 5 stars (5819) counts
Original Format: Paperback, 96 pages
Download Format: PDF, FB2, MOBI, MP3.
Published: December 17th 1999 / by Liveright / (first published 1922)
Language: English
Genre(s):
Short Stories- 113 users
Fiction- 85 users
Cultural >Japan- 68 users
Asian Literature >Japanese Literature- 65 users
Classics- 46 users
Literature- 20 users
Cultural >Asia- 14 users
Historical Fiction- 10 users
Literature >Asian Literature- 10 users
Literary Fiction- 9 users

Description:

Writing at the beginning of the twentieth century, Ryunosuke Akutagawa created disturbing stories
out of Japan's cultural upheaval. Whether his fictions are set centuries past or close to the
present, Akutagawa was a modernist, writing in polished, superbly nuanced prose subtly exposing
human needs and flaws. "In a Grove," which was the basis for Kurosawa's classic film Rashomon
, tells the chilling story of the killing of a samurai through the testimony of witnesses, including the
spirit of the murdered man. The fable-like "Yam Gruel" is an account of desire and humiliation, but
one in which the reader's sympathy is thoroughly unsettled. And in "The Martyr," a beloved orphan
raised by Jesuit priests is exiled when he refuses to admit that he made a local girl pregnant. He
regains their love and respect only at the price of his life. All six tales in the collection show
Akutagawa as a master storyteller and an exciting voice of modern Japanese literature.

About Author:

Akutagawa Rynosuke () was one of the first prewar Japanese writers to achieve a wide foreign
readership, partly because of his technical virtuosity, partly because his work seemed to represent
imaginative fiction as opposed to the mundane accounts of the I-novelists of the time, partly
because of his brilliant joining of traditional material to a modern sensibility, and partly because of
film director Kurosawa Akira's masterful adaptation of two of his short stories for the screen.
Akutagawa was born in the Kybashi district Tokyo as the eldest son of a dairy operator named
Shinbara Toshiz and his wife Fuku. He was named "Rynosuke" ("Dragon Offshoot") because he
was born in the Year of the Dragon, in the Month of the Dragon, on the Day of the Dragon, and at
the Hour of the Dragon (8 a.m.). Seven months after Akutagawa's birth, his mother went insane
and he was adopted by her older brother, taking the Akutagawa family name. Despite the shadow
this experience cast over Akutagawa's life, he benefited from the traditional literary atmosphere of
his uncle's home, located in what had been the "downtown" section of Edo.
At school Akutagawa was an outstanding student, excelling in the Chinese classics. He entered
the First High School in 1910, striking up relationships with such classmates as Kikuchi Kan,
Kume Masao, Yamamoto Yz, and Tsuchiya Bunmei. Immersing himself in Western literature, he
increasingly came to look for meaning in art rather than in life. In 1913, he entered Tokyo Imperial
University, majoring in English literature. The next year, Akutagawa and his former high school
friends revived the journal Shinshich (New Currents of Thought), publishing translations of William
Butler Yeats and Anatole France along with original works of their own. Akutagawa published the
story Rashmon in the magazine Teikoku bungaku (Imperial Literature) in 1915. The story, which
went largely unnoticed, grew out of the egoism Akutagawa confronted after experiencing
disappointment in love. The same year, Akutagawa started going to the meetings held every
Thursday at the house of Natsume Sseki, and thereafter considered himself Sseki's disciple.
The lapsed Shinshich was revived yet again in 1916, and Sseki lavished praise on Akutagawa's
story Hana (The Nose) when it appeared in the first issue of that magazine. After graduating from
Tokyo University, Akutagawa earned a reputation as a highly skilled stylist whose stories
reinterpreted classical works and historical incidents from a distinctly modern standpoint. His
overriding themes became the ugliness of human egoism and the value of art, themes that
received expression in a number of brilliant, tightly organized short stories conventionally
categorized as Edo-mono (stories set in the Edo period), ch-mono (stories set in the Heian
period), Kirishitan-mono (stories dealing with premodern Christians in Japan), and kaika-mono
(stories of the early Meiji period). The Edo-mono include Gesaku zanmai (A Life Devoted to
Gesaku, 1917) and Kareno-sh (Gleanings from a Withered Field, 1918); the ch-mono are perhaps
best represented by Jigoku hen (Hell Screen, 1918); the Kirishitan-mono include Hoknin no shi
(The Death of a Christian, 1918), and kaika-mono include Butkai(The Ball, 1920).
Akutagawa married Tsukamoto Fumiko in 1918 and the following year left his post as English
instructor at the naval academy in Yokosuka, becoming an employee of the Mainichi Shinbun.
This period was a productive one, as has already been noted, and the success of stories like
Mikan (Mandarin Oranges, 1919) and Aki (Autumn, 1920) prompted him to turn his attention
increasingly to modern materials. This, along with the introspection occasioned by growing health
and nervous problems, resulted in a series of autobiographically-based stories known as
Yasukichi-mono, after the name of the main character. Works such as Daidji Shinsuke no
hansei(The Early Life of

Other Editions:
- Rashomon and Other Stories (Kindle Edition)

- Rashomon: And Other Stories (Paperback)

- Rashomon and Other Stories (Tuttle Classics)

- (Paperback)

- Rashomon and Other Stories (Paperback)

Books By Author:

- Rashomon and Seventeen other Stories

 - Kappa

- In a Grove

- Rashomon

- Hell Screen

Books In The Series:

Related Books On Our Site:

- And Then

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- Death in Midsummer and Other Stories

- Tales of Moonlight and Rain

- Modern Japanese Literature: From 1868 to the Present Day

- The Wild Geese

- The Dancing Girl of Izu and Other Stories

- Blue Bamboo: Japanese Tales of Fantasy

 - Toddler-Hunting & Other Stories

- The Oxford Book of Japanese Short Stories

- The Waiting Years

- The Sea and Poison

 - The Paper Door and Other Stories

- The Stones Cry Out

- The Best Japanese Science Fiction Stories

Rewiews:

May 11, 2015

Dan Schwent
Rated it: liked it
Shelves: i-hate-short-stories, 2015
In a Grove: A man is found stabbed to death in a grove. Some people of interest and the key
players give their accounts.
Yeah, I'm a fan of this. Lots of narrators with varying degrees of reliability. If the other stories are
this good, this collection is going to be stellar.
Rashomon: A samurai's servant sits under the Rashomon during a rain storm, pondering whether
he should become a thief or starve to death.
I didn't like this story as much as the first but it was still interesting. I never thou
In a Grove: A man is found stabbed to death in a grove. Some people of interest and the key
players give their accounts.
Yeah, I'm a fan of this. Lots of narrators with varying degrees of reliability. If the other stories are
this good, this collection is going to be stellar.
Rashomon: A samurai's servant sits under the Rashomon during a rain storm, pondering whether
he should become a thief or starve to death.
I didn't like this story as much as the first but it was still interesting. I never thought of making wigs
in that way.
Yam Gruel: Goi, a samurai who is the butt of everyone's jokes, has a life-long craving for Yam
Gruel. But what will he do when he's offered all he can ever eat?
This was an odd one, more like a fable than the previous two. I felt bad for Goi and really hoped
he'd go on a killing spree but, alas, it was not to be.
The Martyr: When the umbrella maker's daughter becomes pregnant, everyone suspects,
Lorenzo, the orphan raised by Jesuits.
Huh. This was an odd one about protecting the people you love at all costs.
Kesa and Morito: The tale of a love triangle from two of its participants. This was another story
with unreliable narrators. It was well written and fairly twisted.
The Dragon: An old man tells the story of a big nosed priest named Hanazo and the prank he
played on a village that backfired.
All in all, this was an enjoyable collection. By far, my favorite tales were In a Grove and Kesa and
Morito, the two unreliable narrator tales. The others were good to mediocre. 3.5 out of 5 stars.
46 likes
16 comments

2.
Kelly (and the Book Boar) wrote: "Good thing that I get most of my selections from the nice, clean,
public library . . . and that no one in KC ever po
Kelly (and the Book Boar) wrote: "Good thing that I get most of my selections from the nice, clean,
public library . . . and that no one in KC ever poops."
BBQ is a great constipater :)

May 07, 2015 10:56PM

Mike
Ran and Throne of Blood are as good as any western telling of those classics. If you ever watched
The Magnificent Seven, Seven Samurai is its source m
Ran and Throne of Blood are as good as any western telling of those classics. If you ever watched
The Magnificent Seven, Seven Samurai is its source material.
You gotta see more Kurosawa. Your books won't hate you for it! (Even his contemporary period
films are great.)

May 09, 2015 06:50AM