文庫BunkoJapanese classics, made readable with AI
Cover of 人間椅子 (Ningenisu)

Upper intermediate · JLPT N2

人間椅子Ningenisu — The Man Inside the Chair

by Edogawa Ranpo (江戸川乱歩, 1894–1965)

  • JLPT N2
  • 14,835 characters
  • 10 parts
  • about 124 minutes

人間椅子 is a short tale of psychological horror by Edogawa Ranpo, first published in 1925. Most of it takes the form of a letter. One morning Yoshiko, a famous woman writer, opens a thick envelope from an unknown admirer. Inside is a long confession. The writer is a poor, ugly craftsman of fine chairs, and he reveals, step by step, the secret life he has been leading inside one of his own creations. The story is unsettling but contains no gore. Its effect comes from closeness, touch and slow realisation, and it builds toward a twist that readers still argue about. For learners, the main challenge is the letter's voice. The chair-maker writes in elaborate, self-abasing epistolary keigo (ございます, 申し上げます, お許し下さいませ), with older kanji spellings and many onomatopoeic words. The reward is a chance to see formal written Japanese used to create character and suspense. The writer's politeness grows more disturbing as his story goes on. The short third-person frame around the letter is plain and easy to follow, so you can settle in before the harder voice begins.

Start reading →

Contents

  1. A Strange Manuscript Arrives for YoshikoEach morning, after her husband leaves for the ministry, the famous writer Yoshiko shuts herself in her study and reads letters from admirers before she starts work. Among them is a bulky package that looks like a manuscript but turns out to be a letter addressed to her as 'Madam'. The unknown writer begs her forgiveness and says he will confess a strange crime he has committed while living hidden from the world for several months.
  2. An Ugly Craftsman's Secret DreamsThe letter-writer confesses that he was born hideously ugly and poor, yet burned inside with passionate dreams of luxury and love. He earns his living as a skilled chairmaker, entrusted with the finest commissions. Each time he finishes a chair, he sits in it and imagines the splendid room it will grace, picturing himself as a noble young lord whispering endearments to a beautiful sweetheart.
  3. The Masterpiece ArmchairThe chair-maker describes how his sweet daydreams are always shattered by ugly reality, and how each finished chair leaves him dreary enough to think of dying, and then of some other, more terrible way out. At that time he is commissioned to make a large leather armchair for a foreign-run hotel in Y City. He pours his soul into it, and when he sits in it he is overwhelmed by its comfort and by fantasies so vivid he fears he is going mad.
  4. Building a Hiding Place Inside the ChairThe letter-writer, unwilling to part with his finest chair, is seized by a strange and terrible idea: to hide inside it himself. He rebuilds the armchair with a hollow space, air holes, a shelf for food and water, and other contrivances so that he can live inside it for days. Then he crawls in, and the furniture company's men load the chair onto their cart, unaware of their hidden passenger.
  5. A Hermit Crab in the Hotel LoungeThe armchair holding the letter-writer is set down in a busy hotel lounge, and he begins slipping out at quiet moments to steal from the guests. He compares himself to a hermit crab and admits that theft soon gave way to a far stranger pleasure, which he says is the true subject of his letter. He then describes the first time a large foreign man sat down on the chair, pressing against him through a single layer of leather.
  6. Strangers Sitting on a Hidden LapHidden inside the chair in the hotel lounge, the letter-writer is first paralysed with fear, then fascinated as one guest after another sits on him without suspecting anything. In the dark he learns to tell people apart by touch alone. When a young foreign woman throws herself into the chair, laughing and singing on his lap, he feels a violent attraction to her body.
  7. A Lover Hidden in the DarkThe chair-maker says that after his astonishing discovery, theft became secondary to the strange world of touch inside the chair, where he could be close to beautiful women he could never approach in the bright world. He stays hidden in the hotel for months, cramped and half-crippled, unable to abandon this world. As guests come and go, he remembers his many unwitting 'lovers' by the shapes of their bodies rather than by their faces.
  8. Ambassador, Dancer, and the AuctionInside the chair, the hidden man feels the body of a famous European ambassador-poet and secretly imagines how easily he could stab him and shake the world. He also worships the flawless body of a celebrated foreign dancer. When the hotel is sold to a Japanese company and his chair is put up for auction, he decides to stay inside, hoping it will be bought by a Japanese household where he might find true love.
  9. Sold Into the Home of a LadyThe chair is sold at auction to a Japanese government official and placed in the study of his house. The study is used mostly by his young, beautiful wife, who sits in the chair almost all day while she works on a piece of writing. The man inside falls truly in love for the first time and tries to make the chair as comfortable and lifelike as he can, hoping she will come to love it.
  10. The Letter's Confession and Final TwistThe letter-writer confesses that the woman he loves is Yoshiko herself. He begs her to signal with a handkerchief so that he can visit her as an ordinary caller. Horrified, Yoshiko flees the study. Then a second letter arrives in the same handwriting. Its writer says he is a devoted reader of her works and has sent her a manuscript of his own under separate cover, which he would like to title "The Human Chair." This implies that the first letter was that story.

Before you read

  • Expect two registers. The frame (Parts 1 and 10) is plain written narration ending in 〜た and 〜であった. The letter is humble keigo: learn ございます, 申し上げます, 存じます, 〜でございましょう and お〜下さいませ early, and you will move through it much faster.
  • Watch for older spellings that stand in for familiar words: 了う = しまう (as in 〜て了う), 此様 = このよう, 丈け = だけ, 拘らず = かかわらず, 知れない = しれない. Once you recognise them, many 'unknown' kanji turn out to be words you already know.
  • The letter-writer's obsessive voice relies on a few patterns that express certainty, compulsion and minimisation: 〜に相違ない, 〜ないではいられない, 〜に過ぎない, 〜ねばならぬ, and the causative AをしてBさせる. Concessive 〜ながら and 〜にも拘らず often mark his contradictions, such as being ugly yet dreaming of beauty.
  • Learn the core vocabulary of the chair and the senses before you start: 椅子, 肘掛椅子, 革, 詰め物, 触覚, 膝, 肉体, 感触. Much of the middle section describes sensations felt through leather in the dark.
  • Read the onomatopoeia for sound and texture rather than looking up each one. Ranpo uses words like ぐったり and ふっくら to make the hidden man's experience physical, and their general feel usually matters more than an exact translation.

Words to know

The most useful words from the notes across the story.

WordMeaningJLPT
予感よかんto have a presentiment, sense in advanceN1
無躾ぶしつけrude, impertinentUsually written 不躾 today; common in apologies such as ぶしつけなお願い.—
味気なさあじけないdreariness, joylessnessdictionary form: 味気ないAlso read あじきない in older texts; さ turns the adjective into a noun.—
妄想もうそうfancy, daydream, delusionA key word of the story: his private fantasies.—
奇怪きっかいbizarre, grotesqueAlso read きかい. 奇怪極まる means 'utterly bizarre'.—
愛着あいちゃくattachment, fondnessAlso used for objects; here a strong, obsessive attraction.—
競売きょうばいauction—
遠慮えんりょholding back, refraining out of reserveHere he did not even dare look women in the face.N4
書斎しょさいstudy (room for reading and writing)N3
註文ちゅうもんorder, commission; demanddictionary form: 注文Old spelling of 注文.N3
刺戟しげきstimulation, thrillOlder spelling of modern 刺激.N3
合図あいずsignal, signN3
原稿げんこうmanuscript原稿用紙 is squared manuscript paper.N2
苦心くしんpains, painstaking effortN2
拵えたりこしらえるto make, to fashiondictionary form: 拵えるSomewhat old-fashioned or colloquial word for 作る.N2

Plot summary

Show the full summary (contains spoilers)

Yoshiko, a celebrated writer married to a Foreign Ministry official, receives a letter from a stranger. He is a skilled but ugly and poor chair-maker. He made a luxurious armchair for a foreign-run hotel in Y City, built a hollow space inside it, and hid there. At first he crept out to steal. Soon he became obsessed with the guests who sat on him, and he came to know them only by touch. When the hotel was sold, the chair went to auction and was bought by a Japanese official. It was placed in the study used by the official's young wife, and the hidden man fell in love with her. He reveals that she is Yoshiko and asks her for a sign so that he can visit her. Horrified, she flees the study. A second letter then arrives in the same handwriting. It explains that the first was a manuscript the writer hopes to title "The Human Chair."

About the author

His pen name is a Japanese rendering of the name of Edgar Allan Poe, whom he admired. He began with detective stories such as 二銭銅貨 and went on to create the detective Akechi Kogorō. He also wrote many tales of the grotesque and the perverse, of which 人間椅子 is a famous example. Later he wrote the popular Boy Detectives series for young readers and promoted the mystery genre as an editor and critic. Japan's Edogawa Rampo Prize for mystery fiction is named after him.

More stories by Edogawa Ranpo →