The life of a stupid man is an autobiography that leads to the death of Akutagawa, told in 51 short verses. His writing is one that I loved. It is daunting, sorrowful and mostly, it shows the thoughts of a man that feels empty inside. Stories like this, when a person whom has not experienced this feeling once in their life, would not be able to relate to the story. It was depressing and dark, but for me, it gave me a sense of comfort in his writing.

In a bamboo grove is a story where it is told in different perspectives from a murder of man. Its interesting how Akutagawa had arranged the story in such a way that there is a perspective from the sprit of the man himself. It was entertaining at best, mysterious, and until the end, you wouldn't know who to believe and what to expect. At school Akutagawa was an outstanding student, excelling in the Chinese classics. He entered the First High School in 1910, striking up relationships with such classmates as Kikuchi Kan, Kume Masao, Yamamoto Yūzō, and Tsuchiya Bunmei. Immersing himself in Western literature, he increasingly came to look for meaning in art rather than in life. In 1913, he entered Tokyo Imperial University, majoring in English literature. The next year, Akutagawa and his former high school friends revived the journal Shinshichō (New Currents of Thought), publishing translations of William Butler Yeats and Anatole France along with original works of their own. Akutagawa published the story Rashōmon in the magazine Teikoku bungaku (Imperial Literature) in 1915. The story, which went largely unnoticed, grew out of the egoism Akutagawa confronted after experiencing disappointment in love. The same year, Akutagawa started going to the meetings held every Thursday at the house of Natsume Sōseki, and thereafter considered himself Sōseki's disciple.

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In September 1926, Akutagawa had written a short piece entitled "Death Register" ("Tenkibo"), which made public for the first time his fears of having inherited his mother's madness. The piece ends at the family burial plot, where Akutagawa recalls a haiku:

Nothing like dipping into your favourite author’s works when you’re stressed no? I’m glad this was the last book I read before studying for my exams. In the early hours of July 24, as a light rain finally broke the heat, Akutagawa spoke with his wife for the last time. Then, shortly before dawn, he took a fatal dose of the barbiturate Veronal. He lay down on his futon and fell into a final sleep reading the Bible. By the following evening, his death was national news. Friends and reporters rushed to his house. At a crowded news conference, Kume read aloud from Akutagawa's suicide note: "I am now living in an icy clear world of morbid nerves ... Still, nature is for me more beautiful than ever. No doubt you will laugh at the contradiction of loving nature and yet contemplating suicide. But nature is beautiful because it comes to my eyes in their last extremity ..." Ryunosuke Akutagawa (1892-1927). Akutagawa's Rashomon and Seventeen Other Stories is also available in Penguin Classics. Read more Details Ah, what is the life of a human being - a drop of dew, a flash of lightning? This is so sad, so sad."

Summary

The Death Register is the thoughts of the author himself which told about the three people in his family and how they died. It was a recollection of his thoughts, on the people that somehow mattered to him, and also showing how he had felt at each individual's death at the time. It was sorrowful, and I had definitely loved the haku at the end of the story. I am living now in the unhappiest happiness imaginable. Yet, strangely I have no regrets. I just feel sorry for everyone and anyone unfortunate enough to have had a bad husband, a bad son, a bad father like me. So, goodbye then." He wrote on reflections on different parts of his life, and this short essays of his was given to his good friend Kume Masao, and published as it is. Its one thing to read about someone's life, its also another thing to read on suicidal thoughts that eventually lead to death. One thing's for sure, Akutagawa's love for literature and reading is something that is commendable. He reads a lot, even before he took his own life. He tried to find meaning in life but in such a way that at one point, he just felt empty. And your point is what exactly? This book made me feel stupid. I just couldn’t grasp what the author was getting at for most of it. Well, all of it really. I don’t mind obscurity in literature. Sometimes I crave it. Sometimes it’s nice not to know what something means. You ponder it perpetually. As I’ve done with Kafka’s Trial and more recently the phenomenal Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner. I couldn’t tell you what either of those books is about. Nobody can, but arguments can be made. Interpretations can be made. There are ways of reading of them even if each and every way isn’t definitive. For books life those answers will never be had, and because if this they have an undying legacy and an unshakable place in the literary cannon. Apartado de esas historias feudales que lo caracterizan, nos encontramos con dos obras autobiográficas, por un lado los “engranajes” y por el otro “vida de un loco”, en los que trae una y otra vez su sentimiento de culpa, la depresión, y sus temores constantes de la enfermedad que ya atacara a su madre. Vida de un loco son relatos cortos, de un párrafo de duración en algunos casos, algunos sin sentido casi como un recuerdo que pasa, y otros que uniendo las piezas revelaban su vida privada.

This edition of Ryunosuke Akutagawa’s The Life of a Stupid Man includes two other short stories: In A Bamboo Grove and Death Register. This was my first time reading Akutagawa and I’m glad that I started with these three short stories because they are so moving and not at all trite. This dystopian and fantastical book stands in stark contrast to the impressionistic autobiographical material of Akutagawa's last year. Yet Kappa still begins and ends in madness. The tale is narrated in 17 short chapters by Patient No 23 in a lunatic asylum as he recounts his life among the Kappa; his gradual familiarisation with their civilisation and language, their manners and customs. It makes uncomfortable reading.Eighty years later, on the anniversary of his death, I leave an unlit cigarette on Akutagawa's grave. There are flowers here too, other cigarettes, coffee and sake. A pale girl sits by the grave, writing in a notebook. Crows scream in the trees, mosquitoes bite into her skin. Yards away, the corpse of a cat is being eaten by maggots and flies. But here Akutagawa is no longer alone and, thanks to his last words, neither are we.