The Human Chair

by Edogawa Rampo

A short story about a chair that holds a dark secret.

Genres: Horror, Short Stories, Japanese Literature, Fiction, Classics, Japan, Mystery

20 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1925

About the author

Hirai Tarō (平井 太郎), better known by the pseudonym Rampo Edogawa ( 江戸川 乱歩), sometimes romanized as "Ranpo Edogawa", was a Japanese author and critic who played a major role in the development of Japanese mystery fiction.

Reviews

[Alekzander]

I am now afraid of chairs.

[Tobi ﾄﾋﾞ]

edogawa why the hell would you write this

[Ed Erwin]

I may never sit down again!

[Rami Hamze]

A M A S T E R P I E C E !

completely blown away.

creepy, emotional, dark. The best short story in a long time.

[Jane Dominique]

from now on i'll be stabbing my chair aggressively before sitting down, thank you very much.

[Sarah ♡ (let’s interact!)]

Loneliness can apparently be enough to drive a man to confine himself within a chair. Just so he can feel close to other human beings, especially women. Is this real or all mere fantasy?

Read this after Junji Ito’s illustrated re-imagining of this short story. I like how the author’s pen name is a reference to Edgar Allen Poe. You can see his influence within his own work.

[Daniel Warriner]

"The Human Chair" (人間椅子, 1925) by Edogawa Rampo isn't so much a scary tale as it is a deviant's disturbing fantasy come to life. An ugly furniture maker crafts a chair into which he can slip to sit unbeknownst to those (mostly women) sitting atop him. You can hear the wheels turning in Rampo's head as you read this; everything you might want to know about holing up in a chair is covered here. It's a fun story written in a serious tone. It also has that typically Japanese form of horror that's rooted half in the quotidian and half in the frightfully bizarre. Put another way, Eugene Thacker, writing for The Japan Times, described it as "exemplary of a particular trope in Japanese horror where an innocuous, everyday event sends a character chasing a single idea — methodically, bit by bit — to its logical and terrifying conclusion."

[daph pink ♡]

This short story's junji Ito manga adaptation left me completely baffled as I read it. The original story is even greater; everything that happens is so horrifying that, for a split second, believing it to be true, it may cause lifelong trauma.

[Cassi]

A fun little story that leaves your skin crawling. Great writing, entertaining plot, not much else to say about it. It's a good story for when you're sitting in your favorite armchair.

[Semi Murderous ^_^]

Cute story about a man who wasn't getting laid so he turned himself into a chair so people can sit on his face. 10/10 [Must read]
you might get creeped out and feel very uncomfortable at times but the story is exceptional. Def, worth a read.

[Amin]

صندلی انسانی یکی از جالبترین و هیجان انگیزترین داستانهای کوتاهی بود که خوندم و خلاقیت نویسنده ستودنیه واقعا

[Mili Chamberlain]

Oh fuck! No more sitting methinks.

[Dylan]

Think about your favorite chair; it's like a broken-in pair of jeans, really comfortable, or a well-worn leather jacket-a second skin, a comfy bed…Well imagine if someone was living in that chair, right underneath you, as you enjoy your most intimate moments relaxing while you are completely unaware someone is sitting right there. Is that the ultimate violation? Or is it something much worse?

You have got to be kidding me, right? A person living in a chair?! That seemed completely ridiculous. I get that you have to have some disbelief in reality for a horror story to be scary, but that’s stretching it.

I initially gave this 2 stars, but shortly after I read it, it stuck with me. It was creepy, and the narrator—the dude living in the chair—was very creepy. It deserves 4 stars, it’s really short and I recommend it.

- Beware, this was originally in Japanese, and some of the translated versions are wacky- hard to understand, especially the Kindle version.

[onthebooksel]

This short story was so fucking creepy. I made the mistake of reading this at night before class on my HOLLOWED OUT COUCH and let me tell you that was a mistake. Edogawa Rampo really wrote this, and I remember class discussion being really fun this day and so I’m super thankful to Dr. Yi for making me read this.

[QHuong(BookSpy)]

Mấy truyện trinh thám tâm lý khá là sợ ấy, còn vài truyện mang yếu tố siêu nhiên cũng dị dị nhưng mình thấy sợ mấy truyện tâm lý hơn, đặc biệt là truyện "Sâu bướm" vừa đọc vừa hình dung đã thấy rùng mình rồi.

[ryan ❦]

he was a real life chairman…

[Tiffany]

i will now be inspecting every chair i ever sit in

[Jovana Autumn]

Welcome to my project of reading *weird* fiction in 2023

➥ What begins as an almost tedious story about an accomplished female author going through her fan letters, quickly turns into a psychological terror ending in one of the aptest culmination that I have come across in short fiction.

Rampo composes his story with elegance: He swiftly places the reader as a bystander in the story, reading the letter alongside his protagonist.

¶ There is a dual nature of terror in this story – the first is the fear of being unknowingly observed and the second fear lies in the ambiguity of the ending: was the writer of the letter lying in the first letter or in the second?
If he was lying in the first, that would lead to the surfacing of a new voice in writing that could replace the old one (the addressee replacing the addresant).
If the second letter is untrue, there is an imminent threat to deal with immediately. Both cases are anxiety-inducing and unfortunate for the protagonist.

Regardless of which end is true, the story is a satisfying piece as far as the average reader goes and Rampo is a writer worth inspecting.

[Lily]

Creo que ahora tengo miedo de las sillas.

[natura]

Muy buen relato de terror en el que vas descubriendo, a la vez que la protagonista, el descabellado caso de una “butaca humana”. La inquietud que te va invadiendo según avanzas en la historia la remata Rampo de forma genial haciendo que descubras el fantástico desenlace a la vez que Yoshiko. El revés de los últimos párrafos casi es una concesión a los “finales felices” occidentales, y se sale un poco de la historia, a un pelo de resultar moñas tipo “final de Los Serrano”. Se lo perdonaremos porque el resto es una pasada.

[Jimena]

Inquietante, siniestro y fascinante.

Qué hijo de puta este Edogawa.

[Margo Oka]

This was so funny

[Sima Khairullah]

“Though I am ugly, my heart burns with strong desire. I dream of beauty, of rich and wonderful things. I imagine a world far beyond my true life.”

When humans let their intrusive thoughts win, they craft something extraordinary, something strange and haunting, something infinitely disturbing, and they pour it all into their writing. This was superb!!!

But like… team letter or manuscript? 😭

[Mihaela Oprea]

Foarte stranie povestire. Cert este faptul că e una din puținele cărți din literatura japoneză care mi-a plăcut, dar și că mă voi gândi de două ori data viitoare când voi vrea să iau loc într-un fotoliu.

[Atlantisli]

it was very creepy... short but an impressive story.

AaaaA okurken içim bi tuhaf oldu sürekli kafamda canlandırmaya çalıştım. çok kısa ama etkileyici bir hikayeydi.

[Esmé]

gross! grossest of all was that the narrator has no idea how to write women. what do you mean her "deep sense of feminine consideration" brother?? anyway this was a fun and ooky read. i wish it didnt have the second letter at the end. gets bonus points for the junji ito adaptation

[Zuzia]

wtf???

[Alien Bookreader]

"After all, who could imagine such a ridiculous thing as a person hiding inside of a chair?"

"Have you ever been to the shore and seen a type of crab called the hermit crab? Its appearance is like a giant spider, and when people are nowhere around it struts about the shore as if it were king of its kind."

An interesting little tale, yet somehow I was expecting more to happen. It sounds almost like the beginning of a good story, which ends before the real story starts.

It reminds me of a claustrophobic version of the Phantom of the Opera. An ugly pariah yearns to be part of noble society. He was born into bad circumstances, he isn't charming or good looking, yet he possesses a special skill: making fancy chairs. And he uses this special skill to his advantage.

[Suha]

A piece of delicious dark chocolate; this short story is well written, enjoyable, creepy and imaginative. Loved it 😊

[True Blue]

Truyện ngắn kinh dị mà không cần máu me , chủ yếu khai thác tâm lí con người, dark và biến thái