Ryūnosuke Akutagawa

Ryūnosuke Akutagawa was born in the Kyōbashi district of Tokyo, the third child and only son of father Toshizō Nīhara and mother Fuku Akutagawa. His mother experienced a mental illness shortly after his birth, so he was adopted and raised by his maternal uncle, Dōshō Akutagawa, from whom he received the Akutagawa family name. He was interested in classical Chinese literature from an early age, as well as in the works of Mori Ōgai and Natsume Sōseki.

In 1914, Akutagawa and his former high school friends revived the literary journal *Shinshichō* ("New Currents of Thought"), publishing translations of William Butler Yeats and Anatole France along with their own works. Akutagawa published his second short story *Rashōmon* the following year in the literary magazine *Teikoku Bungaku* ("Imperial Literature"), while still a student. The story, based on a twelfth-century tale, was not well received by Akutagawa's friends, who criticized it extensively. Nonetheless, Akutagawa gathered the courage to visit his idol, Natsume Sōseki, in December 1915 for Sōseki's weekly literary circles. In November, he published his short story Rashomon on *Teikoku Mongaku*, a literary magazine. In early 1916 he published *Hana* ("The Nose", 1916), which attracted a letter of praise from Sōseki and secured Akutagawa his first taste of fame.

It was also at this time that he started writing haiku under the *haigo* (or pen-name) *Gaki*. Akutagawa followed with a series of short stories set in Heian period, Edo period or early Meiji period Japan. These stories reinterpreted classical works and historical incidents. Examples of these stories include: *Gesaku zanmai* ("A Life Devoted to Gesaku", 1917) and *Kareno-shō* ("Gleanings from a Withered Field", 1918), *Jigoku hen* ("Hell Screen", 1918); *Hōkyōnin no shi* ("The Death of a Christian", 1918), and *Butōkai* ("The Ball", 1920). Akutagawa was a strong opponent of naturalism. He published *Mikan* ("Mandarin Oranges", 1919) and *Aki* ("Autumn", 1920) which have more modern settings.

In 1921, Akutagawa interrupted his writing career to spend four months in China, as a reporter for the *Osaka Mainichi Shinbun*. The trip was stressful and he suffered from various illnesses, from which his health would never recover. Shortly after his return he published *Yabu no naka* ("In a Grove", 1922). During the trip, Akutagawa visited numerous cities of southeastern China including Nanjing, Shanghai, Hangzhou and Suzhou. Before his travel, he wrote a short story "The Christ of Nanjing [ja]"; concerning the Chinese Christian community; according to his own imagination of Nanjing influenced by Classical Chinese literature.

He is regarded as the "father of the Japanese short story", and Japan's premier literary award, the Akutagawa Prize, is named after him.

Towards the end of his life, Akutagawa began suffering from visual hallucinations and anxiety over the fear that he had inherited his mother's mental disorder. In 1927 he survived a suicide attempt, together with a friend of his wife.

He committed suicide at the age of 35 through an overdose of barbital.

***Cadabra Releases:***

In A Grove

***Bibliography:***

## Selected works in translation

* *Tales of Grotesque and Curious*. Trans. Glenn W. Shaw. Tokyo: Hokuseido Press, 1930.

* "The Christ of Nanking" (*Nankyo no Kirisuto*). Trans. Ivan Morris. In *The Columbia Anthology of Modern Japanese Literature, Volume 1: From Restoration to Occupation, 1868-1945.* New York: Columbia University Press (2005).
* *Fool's Life*. Trans. Will Peterson Grossman (1970). ISBN 0-670-32350-0
* *Kappa*. Trans. Geoffrey Bownas. Peter Owen Publishers (2006) ISBN 0-7206-1200-4
* *Hell Screen*. Trans. H W Norman. Greenwood Press. (1970) ISBN 0-8371-3017-4
* *Mandarins*. Trans. Charles De Wolf. Archipelago Books (2007) ISBN 0-9778576-0-3
* *Rashomon and Seventeen Other Stories*. Trans. Jay Rubin. Penguin Classics (2004). ISBN 0-14-303984-9
* *Travels in China* (*Shina yuki*). Trans. Joshua Fogel. *Chinese Studies in History* 30, no. 4 (1997).
* *TuTze-Chun*. Kodansha International (1965). ASIN B0006BMQ7I
* *La fille au chapeau rouge*. Trans. Lalloz ed. Picquier (1980). in ISBN 978-2-87730-200-5 (French edition)