Chapter 2 General Guide

This set of works consists of thirteen volumes, and this number is taken from the number thirteen of the steps of the probation frame in ancient Europe.This number often appears in mystery novels or series of books in Europe, America and Japan. Ranpo Edogawa has been a writer for more than forty years, with a wide range of creations. The proportion of mystery novels in his works is quite high. In order to let readers understand the whole picture of Edogawa Rampo's works, juvenile reasoning and comments are also included in the income. .However, there are about ten long-form or serial works in cooperation with other writers, which are considered random and incomplete works, regardless of income.

The collected works are divided into four categories: pre-war mystery novels, post-war mystery novels, juvenile mystery novels and essays, research, and reviews.Pre-war mystery novels are further divided into short stories and extremely short stories. There are a total of thirty-nine stories, all of which are collected and divided into three volumes according to their genre.There are only four chapters in the middle part, which are combined into one volume.There are twenty-nine novels, seven of which are selected and divided into five volumes, two of which are combined into one volume. There are not many post-war mystery novels, only two novels and seven short stories. Choose one novel, and five short stories will be combined into one volume. There are 34 full-length mystery novels for juveniles, and two selected novels will be divided into two volumes.There are countless essays, studies, reviews, etc., from which thirty-nine articles are selected as one volume.

The above is the theme of all thirteen volumes.In addition to the main text, each volume has three appendices. Each volume contains several precious portraits or family photos from different eras at the beginning of each volume, and a commentary or research paper on Ranpo is selected at the end of the volume.It has been more than 40 years since the death of Ranpo. During this period, there have been hundreds of comments, studies, and reviews published by critics, researchers, and people outside the speculative literary world.The thirteen essays included in this collection are masterpieces selected from these essays.In addition, in order to let readers fully understand the answers to the mysteries of each story, a "problem solving" written by the author is attached at the end of the volume.This kind of editing policy is the mode of editing the "Complete Works of Writers" in Japan. The purpose is to let readers understand the writer and works from different angles, which can be said to be one of the services of the publishing house to readers.

The detailed content of "Edogawa Ranpo Works Collection" consists of thirteen volumes: 1.: Including the debut novel published in April 1923, and the original and quasi-script reasoning short stories and very short stories published between September 1925, a total of 16 articles.Including debut, "A Receipt" and "Fatal Mistake", "The Two Wastes", "Twins", "Red Room", "Diary", "Abacus Story", "The Robbery", "Day Day" "Dream", "Death of a Sleepwalker", "Actor with a Hundred Faces", "One Person with Two Roles", "Doubt", in addition to the work "Arquebus" before debut.

2.: Contains eight short stories by Akechi Kogoro, the only famous detective written by Edogawa Ranpo.Including, "Psychological Test", "Mafia", "Ghost", "Walker on the Ceiling", "Who", "Murder Weapon", "The Moon and the Glove". 3.: Collection of 15 short stories of original and declension reasoning published between October 1925 and April 1931, including "Kiss", "The Dancing One-Inch Mage", "Poisonous Weed", "Masked Dancer", "Flying Ashes", "Mars Canal", "Monogram", "Ashi Debuts", "Inhuman Love", "Mirror Hell", "Smoke Bug", "With The Man Who Travels with Stickers", "The Unbelievable Crime of Dr. Muluo".

4.: Collects four novels of declension reasoning published between 1928 and 1934.Including, "worm",,. 5.: Contains two short and long articles published in 1926.Including "The Lakeside Pavilion Incident". 6.: The original text is about 220,000 words long, written between 1929 and 1930. 7.: The original text is about 210,000 words long, written between 1929 and 1930. 8.: The original text is about 190,000 words long, written between 1930 and 1931. 9.: Include two shorter novels.Including "Landscape of Hell" published from 1931 to 1932 and published in 1934.

10.: Contains five short stories and one long story published from 1950 to 1960.Including, "To the Chief of Horikoshi's Investigation Section 1", "Air Raid Shelter", "The Man Abandoned by His Wife". 11.: The first juvenile reasoning novel, the original text is about 130,000 words, written in 1936. 12.: The second juvenile reasoning novel, the original text is about 120,000 words, written in 1937. 13.: Contains thirty-nine non-fiction masterpieces, divided into three parts, sixteen self-reports, eleven reviews, and twelve researches.The title of this book has quite a history. Edogawa Ranpo once claimed to be the lord of the Phantom City during his lifetime.

Edogawa Rampo is the father of Japanese reasoning literature, a veritable master of reasoning literature, and a national writer whose works are still loved by readers of all ages. Why can Edogawa Ranpo gather so many honors in one body?The answer is the result of "the times create heroes, and heroes recreate the times".Let's start from the beginning. After the Meiji Restoration in 1868, when Japanese culture was fully westernized, in terms of literature, it first started by translating or rewriting European and American works. It took about twenty years before writers imitating Western creative forms appeared. Only then did they gradually understand the essence, creative ideas, and writing principles of European and American literature, and it was not until the Taisho period (1912-1926) that modernized Japanese literature was established.

During this period, although the popular books of the common people in the Edo period (1603-1867) before the Meiji Restoration were gradually improved after the Meiji Restoration, the traditional writing form and content were basically retained.It was not until the Taisho period that it synchronized with pure literature and showed a new appearance of popular literature, and its status was gradually established. The starting point of modern Japanese popular literature was in 1922, when Nakazato Kazan published Taiga’s novel “The Great Bodhisattva Card”.At that time, there was no literary term "popular literature", and it was called "popular literature and art", "reading material literature and art", "popular reading material", "popular reading material" and so on.

The term "popular literature" or "popular literature" has been widely used since the publication of the magazine "Popular Literature" in January 1926, and after "Complete Works of Modern Popular Literature" was published by Pingfanshe in 1927. thing. The original popular literature refers to novels with a romantic and entertaining character set before the Meiji Restoration as the background, also known as period novels (chivalrous popular novels).However, later, romantic "modern novels" and "detective novels" were also classified as popular literature (popular novels in a broad sense) with the contemporary background as the story background.Since then, contemporary novels, modern novels, and detective novels have emerged.

Detective novels "before Qing Zhang (1956)" include fantasy novels and science fiction novels. Although the three stand together, they are closely related, collectively called "entertainment novels", and detective novels "after Qing Zhang" Renamed as a mystery novel, and now both are used together. Having said that, mystery novels are imported literature to Japan, but mystery novels were introduced from Europe and America very early. In 1877, ten years after the Meiji Restoration, Kohei Kanda translated Dutch writer Christie Meyer's "Yang Tooth Prison, ten years before Conan Doyle published "The Detective Sherlock Holmes". After that, in the thirty-fifth year of the Meiji era, there were not many translated works, but the "reversal (rewriting) mystery novels" headed by Kuriyan Leixiang became the mainstream of popular reading.In addition, some writers tried to create reasoning novels, but except for Hei Yanleixiang's "No Miserable" which has a literary level, they did not gain much. It can be said that the period of reasoning creation is still immature. Entering the Taisho period, the period gradually matured, and several publishing houses planned to publish series of European and American mystery novels, and there were about ten kinds of them. Also due to the establishment of modern literature, writers such as Tanizaki Junichiro, Akutagawa Ryunosuke, and Sato Haruo, who emerged in the Taisho period, have a wider range of materials than previous writers, and some of their works have a strong meaning of reasoning.In addition, in 1917, the playwright Kido Okamoto began to write the "Half Seven Catching Tent Series" that imitated Sherlock Holmes's investigations, with a total of 68 episodes, based on Edo (now Tokyo) before the Meiji Restoration. The background of the story, the reasoning novels of the era, which emphasizes reasoning, human feelings and customs, were not regarded as mystery novels at that time, but were classified as period novels. As for January 1920, Hakubunkan, one of the two major publishing houses of the Meiji period and the Taisho period, launched the monthly comprehensive magazine "New Youth", which mainly published articles encouraging Japanese youth to develop overseas. European and American reasoning short stories that have begun to be accepted by readers.At the same time, a call for essays on the creation of mystery novels was held. Although the first award-winning works were published in April, their quality is still far from that of European and American works. The biggest reason is that the number of entries is limited to 4,000 words, and the works have not been fully developed. room for. Although "New Youth" is not a special magazine for mystery novels, it is the only magazine that focuses on mystery novels. In August of the following year, the editor-in-chief Morishita Umura edited and published the supplementary issue of "Special Series of Mystery Fiction", which was well received. (Afterwards, the second to fourth issue of Mystery Fiction Supplement will be published regularly every year, with European and American mysteries as the main axis.) Under such a big environment, the time was ripe. In April 1922, "New Youth" published Edogawa Ranpo's story, which became a milestone in the history of Japanese mystery novels. Ranpo Edogawa, whose real name is Hirai Taro, also has the pseudonym Komatsu Ryunosuke.The pen name Edogawa Ranpo Wuzi is expressed in Chinese characters from the Japanese pronunciation of Edgar Allan Poe, the father of mystery novels in the world.Ranpo was born in Nabari Town, Naga County, Mie Prefecture on October 21, 1894. His father, Shigeo Hirai, was the secretary of the Naga County Office. His mother, Kiku Hirai, moved to Nagoya City when he was three years old when his father was transferred to another job. . He entered Baichuan Common Primary School at the age of seven, and after he learned to read, he read Iwatani Xiaobo's "World Story Collection".At the age of eleven, he entered the Municipal No. 3 Higher Primary School. In the second grade, he began to read martial arts novels by Harunami Oshikawa and detective novels by Heiyan Leixiang.At the age of thirteen, he entered Aichi County No. 5 Middle School. Because he hated running and mechanical gymnastics, he often missed classes.Luanbu's dream of a reasoning writer sprouted at this time. He is not interested in the joy of the real world, and prefers to stay alone in a dark room, dreaming about the illusory world quietly. In 1907, my father opened Hirai Store to do business.In 1912, the Hirai store went bankrupt, and Ranpo, who had graduated from middle school, gave up the opportunity to study in a high school. In June, he moved to North Korea with his family. In August, he went to Beijing alone, and worked as a letterpress typesetter at Unzando in Tenjin Town, Yushima, Hongo. intern.Afterwards, I was admitted to the preparatory class of Waseda University, but for the sake of living, I seldom went to class. During this period, I worked as a copyist, political magazine editor, library renter, and English tutor, etc., but all for a short period of time. In the spring of 1913, my grandmother rented a house in Ushigome Kikuimachi, and moved to live with her at random, so she didn't have to work part-time and could concentrate on school.Graduated from the preparatory course in August and entered the Department of Political Economy. In the spring of the second year, he and his classmates founded the review-style magazine "White Rainbow", obsessed with Edgar Allan Poe and Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes, and Ranpo firmly believed in pure reasoning novels. Write in short form.Later, he implemented this creative idea in his own works.In order to study European and American mystery novels, Ranpo also went to Ueno, Hibiya, Ohashi and other libraries to read in addition to the university library. In the same year, he bound his reading notes into a book and called it "Strange Tan". In 1915, his father returned from North Korea and settled in Ushigome, and Ranpo moved in with him. The short mystery story "Matchlock Gun" written in this year was Ranpo's debut mystery novel.After graduating from university in the second year, he planned to go to the United States to write mystery novels to make money, but lacked travel expenses, so he had to stay in Japan to find a job.This year, he went to work at Kato Yoko, a trading company in Osaka, and resigned in May of the next year. After that, he wandered around hot springs for several months.After returning, he worked in the electrical department of Toba Shipyard in Mie Prefecture, and then changed to the company's magazine "Hiyori" as an editor.In the following five years, he changed jobs more than ten times at random, such as traveling storyteller, running a second-hand bookstore, magazine editor, city office clerk, news reporter, secretary general of the workers' club, lawyer's office clerk, newspaper advertising department clerk, etc. In 1923, Ranpo wrote two reasoning short stories and "A Receipt", and first sent them to Ma Chang Gucho, a literary critic who had published reasoning literature reviews, asking him to criticize and recommend publication in magazines, but there was no Responded, Ranbu asked back and re-submitted to "New Youth". After the editor-in-chief Morishita Umura read it, it was suspected that it was a reversal of the European and American works. Please ask Kosai Fuki, a medical doctor who wrote forensic medical records in "New Youth" at the time (later also wrote mystery novels) for identification . Thus, in April 1923, the recommendation article by Kosai Fuki was published at the same time, and received good reviews. In July, "A Receipt" was also published. Since then, Ranpo's life has been smooth sailing. The appearance of Ranpo proves that the Japanese are also capable of writing mystery novels comparable to those in Europe and the United States.As a result, challengers or followers who want to try come out one after another.In less than a few years, based on "New Youth", detective novels have established a place in the popular literary world, standing on a tripod with contemporary novels and modern novels. However, the reasoning novels published in "New Youth" are classified according to the current standard. There are not many works of original reasoning. The common feature is that the stories are danmei, legendary, abnormal, fictional, and romantic. Speaking of Edogawa Ranpo, in 1924 due to busy work, he only published two short stories in "New Youth". Seventeen short stories and six essays were published, which was the most fruitful year for Ranpo, and also the year when Ranpo established a stable position in the popular literary world. After that, the main axis of Ranpo's writing gradually shifted from short stories to novels, and in 1936 he created a full-length mystery novel for teenagers.From 1940 to 1945, the Japanese government completely banned the creation of mystery novels, and Ranpo only published three adventure novels that were in line with national policy. After the war, Ranpo's writing volume decreased sharply, and his main activities gradually shifted to organizing reasoning writers, cultivating new writers, and promoting reasoning literature, building the post-war Japanese reasoning literary world. For example, after World War II ended, writers who were evacuated to the countryside after the war returned to Beijing one after another. In the second year, on Saturday, June 15, 1946, Ranpo hosted a "Symposium for Reasoning Writers in Beijing", He told the two-hour "Recent Status of American Mystery Fiction" to the writers present.Introduced the new trend of American mystery novels, and encouraged everyone to contribute to the prosperity of Japanese mystery novels after the war. After this gathering, it was decided to hold a regular gathering on the second Saturday of each month, called "Tuyaokai" (Saturday is called Tuyaokai in Japan). A year later, the "Detective Writers Club" was established with Tuyokai as the team, and Ranpo Edogawa was appointed as the first president.In October 1954, the Detective Writers Club merged with the Kansai Detective Writers Club and was renamed the "Japan Detective Writers Club".In 1962, it was reorganized from an arbitrary group organization into a legal person (foundation), and renamed "Japan Mystery Writers Association". When the Detective Writers Club was established, the Detective Writers Club Award was established in order to reward outstanding works of the year. After the organization changed its name, the name of the award also changed accordingly. It is now called the Japan Mystery Writers Association Award. On October 30, 1954, at the celebration of Edogawa Ranpo's 60th birthday, in order to revitalize Japanese mystery novels, Ranpo provided 1 million yen to the Japanese Detective Writers Club as a fund, and established Edogawa Ranpo. The Togawa Ranpo Award, the first two awards were given to those who made contributions to the Japanese reasoning literary world, and from the third year onwards, it was changed to the Long Mystery Novel Essay Award to encourage new writers' reasoning creation. In addition to promoting these organizational activities, Ranpo also actively wrote theoretical and research articles introducing European and American mystery writers and their masterpieces, as well as mystery novels.The former is compiled as "Overseas Detective Writers and Works", and the representative work of the latter is "Continuation·Phantom City".In recognition of Edogawa Ranpo's contribution to the Japanese reasoning literary world, the Japanese government awarded him the "Purple Ribbon Medal" in November 1961. On July 28, 1965, Ranpo died of cerebral hemorrhage at the age of 71.The Japanese government once again awarded the "Five Honors and Third Class Ruibao Medal" to commemorate his contributions.