The Essential Akutagawa

"The stories of Akutagawa - like those of his peer and contemporary Franz Kafka - are intricate explorations of peculiar junctures of modern cosmopolitan subjectivity. Yet Kafka, though clearly positioned on the borders of dominant Western culture, still writes from within it. Akutagawa's singular difference lies in a set of confrontations that can be said to be truly alien. Eastern and Western, Ancient and Modern, Masculine and Feminine collapse in his extraordinarily innovative and lucid prose."--BOOK JACKET.