Crime fiction is one of the most popular genres
in literature, and has been almost since its conception in the
late 19th century. Figures like Sherlock Holmes and Arsene Lupin
captivated our imagination for well over a hundred years at this
point. Asia is no exception: The Chinese and the Japanese love
and have loved stories of detection for a very long time in one
form or another.
But what about modern times? How did European crime fiction
influence Asian popular culture? The answer is obviously:
Profoundly.
This article will deal with the relationship of Edogawa Ranpo's
江戸川 乱歩 The
Fiend With Twenty Faces (怪人二十面相, Kaijin
ni-jū Mensō) and Maurice Leblanc's third novel
starring Arsene Lupin, The Hollow Needle (L'Aiguille
creuse).
(The article contains spoilers for the
two books!)
Edogawa Ranpo (Left) and Maurice Leblanc (Right)
was published in 1909 and contains the
third adventure of Arsene Lupin. In a sense, Leblanc was trying
to tie up some of the loose threads before changing his mind in
the last minute.
Plain and simple: The Hollow Needle's plot is about Arsene Lupin
trying to retire and escape into civilian life from being a
master thief, with a woman he loves. To this end, he leads the
police by their noses on a chase across France until they find
his secret lair in Normandy, allowing the French state to occupy
his secret fortress under a rock called "The Needle" in Étretat.
Of course, in the final moments of the climax the woman is
killed by a stray bullet and Lupin's fate is left uncertain.
Will he still escape into civilian life with his lover dead and
lair exposed or will he return to a life of grandiose crime?
Considering there's at least a dozen novels following this one,
the answer is probably the second option, but I digress.
Cover of the 1909 July–December issue
of "Je sais tout"
featuring Leblanc's story
Far more interesting than Lupin's struggles with love is the
other main character of the novel:
Isidore Beautrelet.
Beautrelet turns up at one of the scenes of Lupin's crimes just
as the police is conducting their investigation. He immediately
sets out to work, deducting the details of the crime with
relative ease while wearing a fake beard. Why the fake beard?
Because he's only a young student at one of France's many
Lyceums.
The curious detail in this is the fact that Leblanc creates a
teenage detective all the way back in 1909. High schoolers
solving crimes... Sounds like something out of an anime or a
manga, and we could brush this off as simply a mere coincidence,
thinking the Japanese arrived at the same premise without the
influence of Leblanc's writings, but we would be thoroughly
wrong if we did that! In essence, stuff like Detective Conan or
Akechi Goro's figure in Persona 5 have a lot to thank Maurice
Leblanc for, and all of this can be traced back to one man:
Edogawa Ranpo! (Sometimes written as "Rampo" in accordance with
old-style Hepburn.)
Edogawa Ranpo was a prolific author of crime fiction in the 20th
century, being at the forefront of developing a quality
tradition of crime fiction writing in Japan as the country was
modernizing during the Taisho and Showa periods. Ranpo's fiction
oftentimes carry on the Taisho spirit of writing in a liberal
manner, depicting
femme fatales, strange situations like
hiding in chairs or people with grotesque appearances and
deformities. He himself identified his writings as belonging to
the tradition of "Eroguro nansensu" or "Erotic and grotesque
nonsense".
Logical reasoning played an important role in Ranpo's early
stories such as
Murder on D-Hill. This he inherited
from Arthur Conan Doyle, and his most famous character, Akechi
Kogoro was indeed a Japanese attempt at trying to "domesticate"
the figure of the master detective from Britain. From his first
appearance in 1925, Akechi's figure was a constant feature of
Ranpo's works and his character slowly developed from a poor,
bookish university student wearing a kimono to being a
much-travelled, world famous sleuth with considerable flair. In
essence we could say that Ranpo's character modernizes alongside
Japan, and can be understood as a cross-cultural attempt at
grappling with all the new ideas, inventions, fashion and
technology flooding into the country, resulting in not only much
change but also an increase in the nation's competence and
confidence both at home and at abroad.
His 1936 novel
The Fiend with Twenty Faces is part of
his output targeting juvenile readers of the era. To this end
his iconic master detective gets a small assistant by the name
of
Kobayashi Yoshio. Of course viewed in literary
isolation using our general knowledge of Japan's contemporary
popular culture, this seems like a typically Japanese thing. But
just as with many things dubbed "stereotypically Japanese", the
roots lie abroad, even if buried deep underground by time.
Just like Beautrelet, Kobayashi is very autonomous. He's not
afraid to act even without permission. Akechi's tutelage is more
of a protective umbrella for when the situation turns too
serious. Essentially he's a higher power intervening, making
sure that harm doesn't get in the way of adventure for the
self-inserts of the young readers. (This is of course, also in
accordance with the demand of the times during a period when
authoritarianism was on the rise, demanding good role models for
young boys.)
Japanese edition of Ranpo's
Fiend with Twenty Faces
Kobayashi's character has been influenced by
that of Beautrelet, and while just their similar age and
attachment to detective work might not be the kind of proof
that would satisfy most people, the environment into which
Ranpo places his new character serves with definite proof of
where he drew his inspiration from.
First off, we have to look at who he faces off against.
Kobayashi's opponent in the book is called
Twenty Faces,
a thief who is a master of disguise. The influence of
Leblanc's Lupin is much more clearer on Twenty Faces, from
his occupation and methods down to the point where he spends
so much time in disguises that nobody is ever sure what his
face actually looks like, just like Lupin. He also sends a
calling card before stealing the treasures that caught his
eye.
Following getting injured by an unexpectedly laid down trap
during the first heist of the book, Twenty Faces finds
himself stuck in the garden of the Hashiba family. With all
exits closed off by policemen, the situation is not quite
unlike the one Lupin experiences in the first part of
The
Hollow Needle where he is injured during a botched
heist.
Then there's also the larger structure of the novel, where
both Beautrelet and Ranpo's protagonists are after their
respective thief's hideout. Of course the plot is not quiet
as serious and convoluted in Ranpo's book as in Leblanc's,
but the overall aim is the same: Find their central hideout
and put an end to their series of heists once and for all!
Though it is worth mentioning that in Ranpo's novel, Twenty
Faces is not seeking to retire, so his "failure" is not part
of some secret plan, he's simply foiled by Akechi and
Kobayashi.
This shows us that Ranpo wasn't just importing and
Japanizing character archetypes, he was also adapting
setpieces from Western crime fiction.
The final clue is Kobayashi's remark in the early parts of
the novel, where he tells the anxious Mr. Hashiba his plan
and also tells him that:
"Last year, in France, Mr. Akechi
gave the phantom thief Arsene Lupin a nasty shock using
this very method."
This is essentially Ranpo quite
literally telling the reader about his inspirations, but
it also is a stepping stone for elevating his setting.
In quality, in cleverness, Ranpo treats his characters
as equals of their western counterparts. Japan has grown
a lot. Grown up.
Ranpo's story is essentially a respectful handshake
between East and West. This is exactly why this 1936
novel is so fascinating to read when placed in the
proper literary context. He carries on not only the
character types and spirit of detective fiction, but
also the tradition of using and referring to other
authors' characters by whom he was inspired by or he
looks up to. (Such as with Leblanc initially penning his
Lupin stories with his character facing off against
Sherlock Holmes, before being forced to change it due to
copyright reasons.)
The Fiend with Twenty Faces remains a rather pleasant,
albeit short read, even as it's getting close to turning
90 years old. In 2017 it received an English
translation, making this classic piece of juvenile
detective fiction available to people outside Japan.
Even if you don't necessarily care about the convoluted
intertextual web relating it back to its European
forerunners, it's still worth a read just to see how
this seemingly obscure book might have influenced your
favourite anime or manga without you even knowing it!
The article was based on the following editions:
Maurice Leblanc (2021): Az Odvas Tű Titka, GABO,
Budapest. (In Hungarian, Translated by Gábor Bittner)
Edogawa Rampo (2017): The Fiend With Twenty Faces,
Kurodahan press. (In English, Translated by Dan Luffey)
