The comic and the fantastic in “The Nose”, by Akutagawa

Abstract

In this work, we analyze the short story “The nose”, by the Japanese writer Ryûnosuke Akutagawa (1892-1927), seeking to examine how comic and fantastic are combined in the narrative. Akutagawa is best known for the authorship of “Rashômon”, a short story that served as inspiration for the eponymous film by Akira Kurosawa (1910-1998) - although most of the film’s plot is based on the narrative titled “In a grove”, also by Akutagawa. The short story “The nose”, adapted from Konjaku Monogatari, a collection of folk tales from the Heian period (794-1185), was also influenced by the famous work of the same name by Nicolai Gógol (1809-1852), as noted by the Korean critic Beongcheon Yu (1976). For David Roas (2014), “The nose”, by Gógol, is an example of the grotesque, because, in this story, humor would nullify the fantastic effect. This is because, for the Spanish theorist, the fantastic is built from an event within the narrative that leads the reader to question his own conception of reality. So, for the fantastic effect to take place, a good deal of realism in the narrative is needed, evidently combined with something supernatural. But, in view of the completely absurd events reported in the story of Gógol, the characteristic anxiety of the fantastic would lose its strength, yielding to humor. This combination of the supernatural and humor is considered by Roas to be grotesque. It is worth investigating, therefore, if something similar also happens in Akutagawa's “The nose”.