This was one of the most bizarre and surprising collection of stories I’ve ever read. This one was slightly better than his companion collection, and the novel, Dark Room. That being said, I read all three books in one day. If only there were more...
Junnosuke chooses for his theme the same category of entertainment as Ngai Kafu. But where Kafu’s language is flowery, Junnosuke’s is blunt and like climbing a jagged precipice that takes your breath away. The stories are varied in structure and tone, but the obsessions are present in all of them. The most disturbing and beautiful and strange one was the one where the main character runs over a cat with his car. I will never forget that story. Many of the other stories had the same atmospheric homeliness of Kazuo Ozaki’s collection Rosy Glasses and Other Stories. I have both of these volumes on my shelf now. Whereas I find many of Kafu’s characters tiresome, Junnosuke’s narrators possess the same shamelessness as Tanizaki’s. Though his consistency isn’t quite up to par with Tanizaki, Junnosuke is easily one of the best Japanese writers ever. The only problem was he did not appear to be masterful enough to compete with Kawabata, Soseki and Tanizaki. Not a lot of his work has been translated, and he’s very rarely mentioned. This book is another reason that I have to consider the vague and daunting possibility of learning to read Japanese. A good recommendation if you like Akutagawa. His narration is haunting, evocative, and endlessly readable. He makes the rhythm his own and doesn’t care a whit about what the reader might be thinking behind all of the smirks and grimaces. ( )