Oguri Mushitarō: Life and Major Works

Born in 1901 in a cadet branch of a sake-wholesaling family in Hatagochō, Kanda, Tokyo City (now Sotokanda, Chiyoda Ward); his real name was Eijirō. After graduating from Keika Middle School he ran a printing shop while immersing himself in detective fiction, and made his full-fledged debut in 1933 with "Kanzen Hanzai" ("The Perfect Crime"), published in the magazine "Shinseinen." That same year he published "Goryū Satsujin Jiken" ("The Ax Murder Case"), introducing for the first time his great detective Norimizu Rintarō, and drew attention for his erudite style, which overflowed with wide-ranging knowledge spanning theology, medicine, the occult, and cryptography. His 1934 serial novel in "Shinseinen," "Kokushikan Satsujin Jiken" ("The Case of the Black Death Mansion"), was, for its arcane yet ornate prose, counted among the "three great strange books" of Japanese detective fiction alongside Yumeno Kyūsaku's "Dogura Magura" and Nakai Hideo's "Kyomu e no Kumotsu" ("Offering to Nothingness"), and stood as the pinnacle of "unorthodox" detective fiction. During the Pacific War he served with the Army as a war correspondent in Malaya. After the war his interests shifted to historical fiction, but he died suddenly on February 10, 1946, of a cerebral hemorrhage, at the age of 45.