Japanese literature release: “A Brute’s Love” by Edogawa Rampo (bilingual reader)

Edogawa Rampo（江戸川乱歩） is an author who took influence from Western culture and went on to make a huge impact in classic Japanese literature, especially in the genres of mystery and thriller fiction. 

Back in 2021 I published The Masquerade Ball (覆面の舞踏者), a story by Rampo about a mysterious party that is, considering the spectrum of this author’s works, a bit on the tame side. After seeing some reader interest in this story I did a search through some of his other stories and discovered A Brute’s Love (人でなしの恋), a story with darker overtones about a woman who suspects her husband is cheating on her. According to one source, this was actually one of Rampo’s favorite works.

So I decided to translate this work, and as with most of my books I included both English-only and parallel English/Japanese versions as reading practice for studying Japanese. I also put in a handful of translation notes in areas I felt needed a bit more context.

Originally published in 1926, this nearly century-old story does contain some words that are not too common in modern Japanese. However, I think anyone with a good foundation in grammar and the willingness to look up some words will be able to get through it, and you can use the English text as a reference to see if your interpretation was roughly on the mark.

I’d like to thank Priya Singh for helping proofread. Also, thanks to Kaimai Mizuhiro (開米瑞浩) for helping confirm the meanings in a handful of places.

You can find it now on Amazon here for only $0.99 USD (or equivalent), or see the two-book series here.