Edogawa Rampo (1894–1965)

There are a lot of authors that are claimed as Edgar Allan Poe's successor. There is only one Poe and many second rate imitators. Rampo however, is an author that clearly understands Poe, that can channel Poe styling and put his own voice in the work. This story about a creepy creator of a bizarre chair that on its surface is not a scary concept, but Rampo twists this initial seed of a story into a very unnerving tale of obsession and extreme voyeurism. It's got all the Poe hallmarks: a show more grotesque protagonist, a dark, cold, but plush atmosphere, a broken psyche, and a truly shocking twist. These are pretty standard in most inspired works. What Rampo gets about Poe that many authors fail at is the rhythm of the story. There's a slow build up of the stories heart beat. Something that crescendos, when the story reaches a high point it drops you off a cliff. It's in the sudden change that the impact of the story is felt, not necessarily how creepy the twist is or how dark the story is. There's no limit to the depravity of the human mind. Darkness is not what makes a story unnerving, Rampo clearly understands this and like Poe is great at manipulating our emotions to break our spirit. I can't wait to consume more of Rampo's work. show less

With this superb collection, the father of the Japanese modern mystery story has become a new favourite of mine. Fast, fluent and eschewing clever prose for pure, imaginative storytelling, Rampo's stories are utterly gripping and wonderfully translated by James Harris.

This collection covers a mixture of everyday horror and psychological crimes and includes a story of a man becoming a chair and a variety of stories of criminals inventing seemingly unsolvable murders; many of these have twists show more at the end to keep the reader from seeing too far beyond the veil of truth. In what feels like a probably trademark for him, he also reuses a few ideas and themes throughout too including names, mirrors, altered perceptions and the damaging effects of the war on the mind and body - but all used differently as instruments to tell a unique story in itself.

With everything set in early 20thC Japan, Rampo uses the culture and architecure of the time heighten the atmosphere - bringing a mystical and slightly exotic feel to anyone more attuned to westerns tropes and stylisms. Lovers of Poe will find much to enjoy in Rampo's equally imaginative tales and whilst he is very much inspired by his greater namesake, deserves just as much recognition from western readers in my opinion.

A superb and highly recommended set of tales that almost demands to be read in a single sitting. show less

So disturbing…

Our narrator is a writer of crime fiction. He meets a beautiful woman at the museum, Shizuko. It turns out she is a fan of his works, so that they can meet and exchange letters without it being ”unseemly” (she is married). The narrator is immediately smitten, though. Then Shizuko comes to him for advice – she is being stalked and threatened, by one Ōe Shundei, the author of gory, lurid crime stories.

”Fool that I am, I wanted to continue for as long as possible the show more pleasure of talking alone with her about a secret that not even her husband knew.”

The writing is excellent, extremely creepy. It has a cloying quality. The whole thing feels like a nightmare you cannot wake up from, with unsettling, perverse details. There are many twists, which I saw coming. (I think I’ve read too many classic mysteries!) It didn’t matter, though, because the “how” was so well done.

Since this was published in 1928, some things felt very dated, but it didn’t stop the flow of the narrative for me. This was a fascinating example of a classic Japanese mystery, so I recommend it as such. show less

3.5? Maybe higher, I'm terrible at rating anthologies. The best story here is absolutely the first, The Chair, about a guy who lives in a chair and the incredibly described erotic, intimate feelings he gets when people sit on him, unknowingly. It's really unique and fascinating and weird. The way he "reciprocates" by adjusting his chair-body to better suit the person sitting on him... It's repulsive and sexual, it's great.

There's another story focusing on a similar combination of emotions show more about a woman and her severely disabled husband who had a quadruple amputation after a war injury and also can't talk/hear. I had pretty mixed feelings because it's both grossly ableist in terms of focusing on how weird and gross he is now... But also again there's the same focus on how the wife finds this incredibly erotic and hot and loves getting to "play" with him in his present state. The combination of eroticism and repulsion is unpleasant to read and the whole story is pretty horrible in those ways but it's still a really interesting work to read.

The other stories are a combination of weird tales, horror and stuff more in a mystery vein. The worst story here features his incredibly popular series detective solving a murder that we see from the perspective of the murderer but it's incredibly weak - the "gotcha" type way the detective catches the murderer would be so easy to get out of by just saying "oh I must have misremembered". Really disappointing given how popular his mysteries were!

The other stories don't reach the fascination the first two I mentioned do but all of them are effectively creepy and uncomfortable and leave you a little unsettled in the end. Definitely an entertaining read. show less