Akutagawa Ryunosuke. Rashomon and Other Stories (1959)

     Akutagawa Ryunosuke. Rashomon and Other Stories (1959) Specially translated for the Bantam Classics series, this is a good introduction to Akutagawa’s work. The introductory essay reprises his life, and places him in the Japanese tradition. It appears that Japanese writers often lifted stories from old books; their skill lies in the reworking of the story to suit both the reader’s tastes and their own preoccupations and weltanschauung. In this, Japanese literature resembles that of Europe before the Renascence, after which authorial originality became an admirable feature rather than a defect. It’s no accident, I think, that the shift towards the personal in art and literature coincides with the shift towards new discoveries in the sciences and technologies. I gather from reading the occasional review that Japanese literature is becoming “modern” in the same way. These stories not only offer a few hours entertainment but also insight into a different view of the world. **½ (2010)