Cogwheels and Other Stories

In 1914, Akutagawa published his short story Rashomon, which won him considerable praise and he followed that up with another highly acclaimed short story, The Nose. His reputation as one of the first great Japanese modernists in literature was already established during his lifetime. In 1950, a great Japanese film director, inspired by the work of Akutagawa, released his classic film 'Rashomon'. Akutagawa was an avid reader of ghost stories, Chinese and Japanese classics as well as Poe, de Maupassant, Anatole France, Kipling and other masters of the short story. His works probe psychological themes such as decadence, obsession and the grotesque, all combined in a highly dramatic narrative style. This book is a collection of his work.