This collection includes historical stories and short stories (including the legendary "In more often") that brought Akutagawa world fame and automatically associated with his name. which served as the basis for the script of the immortal film "Rashomon" Kurosawa) and less known to the Western reader, but venerated in the author's homeland even higher stories, the action of which takes place against the background of the modern author of the reality of Japan at the beginning of the 20th century , Still retaining many features of national identity, but greedily and rapidly "Europeanizing" . Special mention should be made of the reminiscences constantly arising in Akutagawa’s work with classical Russian literature, which he admired endlessly and in which, along with his native history, he found an inexhaustible source of inspiration.