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KOTORI WEEKLY
Rashomon
Ryunosuke Akutagawa
Beneath a ruined gate, a servant is forced to choose how he will survive.
Human weakness and terror are compressed into a short, sharp story.
Its tension is immediate, making it an approachable first Akutagawa story.
Why read it now
Its sharpness is immediate, and it opens naturally onto Akutagawa's other short fiction.
Before reading
Akutagawa drew on a classical tale while giving its moral uncertainty a distinctly modern psychological form.
Read next
Related authors
- Ryunosuke Akutagawa
- Kan Kikuchi
- Ogai Mori
Read this work in Kotori’s focused vertical reader.