Information About

Edogawa Rampo




Rampo Edogawa (江戸川 乱歩 ''Edogawa Ranpo''), born '''Tarō Hirai''' (平井 太郎 ''Hirai Tarō'', October 21 , 1894 - July 28 , 1965 ) was a Japanese Author and Critic . He wrote many works of Detective Fiction . Kogoro Akechi was the primary detective of these novels.

Rampo was a great admirer of western Mystery writers, and especially of Edgar Allan Poe . The pseudonym "Edogawa Rampo" is actually a Japanese rendering of Poe's name. Other authors who were special influences on him were Maurice Leblanc and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle .


BIOGRAPHICAL INFORMATION


Tarō Hirai was born in Mie Prefecture in 1894. He grew up in Nagoya and studied economics at Waseda University starting in 1912. After graduating in 1916 he worked a series of odd jobs, including newspaper editing and selling Soba Noodles as a street vendor.

In 1923 he wrote his first mystery story, " The Two-Sen Copper Coin ." (Nisen Dõka, 二銭銅貨). The story was soon published under the nom de plume "Edogawa Rampo" by the magaizine " Shin Seinen ," which had also published stories by Edgar Allan Poe , Arthur Conan Doyle , and GK Chesterton . Although there is a history of crime literature in Japan, this is generally acknowledged to be the first original modern-style Japanese Mystery story.

He later went on to found and head the Japan Mystery Writers' Club .

Rampo could understand spoken English, but could not speak or read well. He and his translator, James B. Harris, collaborated for five years on the first English translation of some of his stories.


THEMATIC ELEMENTS


  • Many of Rampo's characters are preoccupied with planning and executing a "perfect crime."

  • Mirrors , Lenses , and other Optical Devices appear in many of Rampo's stories and as symbols of distorted or heightened reality.

  • Many of Rampo's stories include characters who were wounded or disfigured during World War I .



MAJOR WORKS



"Kogoro Akechi" stories
























Others


  • ''Hakuchū-mu'' (July 1925, 白昼夢)




  • ''Kohan-tei Jiken'' (1926, 湖畔亭事件)




  • ''Kotō no Oni'' (1929, 孤島の鬼)


  • ''Hakuhatsu-ki'' (1931, 白髪鬼)


  • ''Yōchū'' (1933, 妖虫)

  • ''Ryokui no Oni'' (1936, 緑衣の鬼)

  • ''Yūrei-tō'' (1937, 幽霊塔); translation from novel ''A Woman in Grey'' of Alice Muriel Williamson , adaptation by Kuroiwa Ruiko (黒岩涙香).

  • ''Yūki no Tō'' (1939, 幽鬼の塔)


  • ''Jūjiro'' (1955, 十字路)



TRIVIA

  • In the Manga and subsequent Anime '' Case Closed '' (''Meitantei Conan'', or ''Detective Conan'' in Japan ), the protagonist Jimmy Kudo (Kudō Shin'ichi), chooses the Pseudonym "Conan Edogawa" after Arthur Conan Doyle and Edogawa.

  • Another, less famous manga, CLAMP's '' Man Of Many Faces '' (''20 Mensō ni Onegai!!'') is primarily inspired by the Kogoro Akechi series – in particular the villainous "20 Faces" character.



SEE ALSO



EXTERNAL LINKS

  • Kurodahan Press A publisher planning to release English translations of Rampo's stories.

  • Edogawa Rampo's World A fansite in English and Japanese.

  • Rampo, Edogawa, "Japanese Tales of Mystery and Imagination," translated to English by James B. Harris. 1956, Charles E. Tuttle Company.