The Spider's Thread

by Ryūnosuke Akutagawa

"The Spider's Thread" (Kumo no Ito) is a 1918 short story by Ryunosuke Akutagawa, first published in the children's magazine Akai Tori.


The Buddha Shakyamuni is meandering around Paradise one morning, when he stops at a lotus-filled pond. Between the lilies, he can see, through the crystal-clear waters, the depths of Hell. His eyes come to rest on one sinner in particular, by the name of Kandata. Kandata was a cold-hearted criminal, but had one good deed to his while walking through the forest one day, he decided not to kill a spider he was about to crush with his foot. Moved by this single act of compassion, the Buddha takes the silvery thread of a spider in Paradise and lowers it down into Hell.

Tested with iPhone app only now (7/16/2009)

Genres: Japanese Literature, Short Stories, Fiction, Classics, Japan, Fantasy, Literature

28 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1918

About the author

Akutagawa Ryūnosuke (芥川 龍之介) was one of the first prewar Japanese writers to achieve a wide foreign readership, partly because of his technical virtuosity, partly because his work seemed to represent imaginative fiction as opposed to the mundane accounts of the I-novelists of the time, partly because of his brilliant joining of traditional material to a modern sensibility, and partly because of film director Kurosawa Akira's masterful adaptation of two of his short stories for the screen.

Akutagawa was born in the Kyōbashi district Tokyo as the eldest son of a dairy operator named Shinbara Toshizō and his wife Fuku. He was named "Ryūnosuke" ("Dragon Offshoot") because he was born in the Year of the Dragon, in the Month of the Dragon, on the Day of the Dragon, and at the Hour of the Dragon (8 a.m.). Seven months after Akutagawa's birth, his mother went insane and he was adopted by her older brother, taking the Akutagawa family name. Despite the shadow this experience cast over Akutagawa's life, he benefited from the traditional literary atmosphere of his uncle's home, located in what had been the "downtown" section of Edo.

At school Akutagawa was an outstanding student, excelling in the Chinese classics. He entered the First High School in 1910, striking up relationships with such classmates as Kikuchi Kan, Kume Masao, Yamamoto Yūzō, and Tsuchiya Bunmei. Immersing himself in Western literature, he increasingly came to look for meaning in art rather than in life. In 1913, he entered Tokyo Imperial University, majoring in English literature. The next year, Akutagawa and his former high school friends revived the journal Shinshichō (New Currents of Thought), publishing translations of William Butler Yeats and Anatole France along with original works of their own. Akutagawa published the story Rashōmon in the magazine Teikoku bungaku (Imperial Literature) in 1915. The story, which went largely unnoticed, grew out of the egoism Akutagawa confronted after experiencing disappointment in love. The same year, Akutagawa started going to the meetings held every Thursday at the house of Natsume Sōseki, and thereafter considered himself Sōseki's disciple.

The lapsed Shinshichō was revived yet again in 1916, and Sōseki lavished praise on Akutagawa's story Hana (The Nose) when it appeared in the first issue of that magazine. After graduating from Tokyo University, Akutagawa earned a reputation as a highly skilled stylist whose stories reinterpreted classical works and historical incidents from a distinctly modern standpoint. His overriding themes became the ugliness of human egoism and the value of art, themes that received expression in a number of brilliant, tightly organized short stories conventionally categorized as Edo-mono (stories set in the Edo period), ōchō-mono (stories set in the Heian period), Kirishitan-mono (stories dealing with premodern Christians in Japan), and kaika-mono (stories of the early Meiji period). The Edo-mono include Gesaku zanmai (A Life Devoted to Gesaku, 1917) and Kareno-shō (Gleanings from a Withered Field, 1918); the ōchō-mono are perhaps best represented by Jigoku hen (Hell Screen, 1918); the Kirishitan-mono include Hokōnin no shi (The Death of a Christian, 1918), and kaika-mono include Butōkai(The Ball, 1920).

Akutagawa married Tsukamoto Fumiko in 1918 and the following year left his post as English instructor at the naval academy in Yokosuka, becoming an employee of the Mainichi Shinbun. This period was a productive one, as has already been noted, and the success of stories like Mikan (Mandarin Oranges, 1919) and Aki (Autumn, 1920) prompted him to turn his attention increasingly to modern materials. This, along with the introspection occasioned by growing health and nervous problems, resulted in a series of autobiographically-based stories known as Yasukichi-mono, after the name of the main character. Works such as Daidōji Shinsuke no hansei(The Early Life of

Reviews

[Flo · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Buddha saw there, in the depths of Hell, a single man writhing along with the other sinners. This man was named Kandata, and he had been a notorious thief who had performed murder and arson and other acts of evil. In his past, however, he had performed just one good deed: one day, when walking through the deep forest, he saw a spider crawling along the road. At first he raised his foot to crush it, but suddenly he changed his mind and stopped, saying, “No, small though it may be, a spider, too, has life. It would be a pity to meaninglessly end it,” and so did not kill it.

Jan 06, 17

[Roya · Rating 3 out of 5]

داستان کوتاهی بود اما دستم اومد که فضای داستان‌های آکوتاگاوا چجوریه و حس می‌کنم داره ازش خوشم میاد =)))

[Mohammed Samih · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Spider's Thread is such a fine masterpiece, one of the greatest short stories if not the greatest one that was ever introduced to the world of literature I may not know a lot about Ryūnosuke Akutagawa which is too sad because most of his works if not all are not translated to Arabic, maybe because it's mostly short stories that were scattered here and there, so translators will most often overlook him, just as they do with Osamu Dazai, I have watched the Akira Kurosawa fascinating slice of Cinema " Rashômon " which's been written by Ryūnosuke but mostly 80% of the credit goes to the directing of Akira.
This story was overlooked by me, I heard about it three years ago and I just didn't care to spend the time reading it with my broken, crippled English, but it absolutely nailed it, it deserved ever second I spent on it.
such a masterpiece

[Rica · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Spider's Thread teaches a lesson about selfishness. The Buddha Shakyamuni finds a man named Kandata in the underworld. He was a sinner. But, one day, he did not crush a spider with his foot. Because of this, the Buddha lowered a spider thread into the Hell to send Kandata to Heaven. When Kandata started to climb the thread, other sinners were starting to climb too. He shouted that it was only for him. As a result, the weight of sinners made it to fall apart. All the sinners ended up in the depths of Hell.

[P.H. Wilson · Rating 4 out of 5]

Real rating: 7.9//10
The retelling of a fable is done with ease and childlike innocence in Akutagawa's story. There is no heavy handed judgement or syrupy moralism only a simple tale that is for children but should be read by adults every so often as a reminder.
The prose is decent with a poetic essence to it which makes this tiny read a pleasure to reread like a favourite poem.

[Larrry G]

well I don't have that supreme Being being able ability to see all view so it was a bit murky maybe they all should have landed on the mountain instead but that is 2oth century movie over-the-top-ness that would never-the-less have tied in how the lake is filled

how many stars to give this
are there stars above the heavens
there is a sun in this one
In the old west (America) high noon
has its own significance

p.s. every good escape artist knows to pull the rope up behind you

[Ẓḭ Ẓḭ · Rating 4 out of 5]

A story about selfishness in a simple language for children. I come to know it by watching the anime Aoi Bungaku and ever since I have wanted to read it because of its moral lesson. I like its simplicity and its main idea but it's too short and not having a previous knowledge of Japanese culture and religion I couldn't relate to some of its ideas about heaven and hell.

[Ami Iida · Rating 4 out of 5]

It's one of thebest shortJapanese story.

[Camille Joyce L · Rating 5 out of 5]

Buddha was included in the story. The narrator (as what I've read) describes Buddha seeing different people from Paradise and Hell. He was in Paradise, one morning, with the calming environment and peaceful mind. Then he suddenly saw the flower with a vision in the Hell showing Kandata, a great robber and a sinner who was doing a good thing. Before his death, he was in a deep forest and one thing he has done ever in his whole life was; trampling a spider to death.

As Buddha looked down to Hell, he remembered how Kandata had spared the spider's life. And because of that, he was planning to get him out of the Hell. But, he saw the spider in the Paradise spinning a silvery thread and he put it in the lotus flower with a vision and it was gone to Hell.

Kandata was rising and sinking with other sinners, and everywhere, you could just see a dark sight and you could hear the shouts and cries of tortures in the Needle Mountain. By this time, he was starving to death and was choking blood, and all he could do is nothing. Then, he lifted his head above the Pool of Blood and he saw the thread. When he saw this, he clapped for joy. In the thread, he was clinging and going up to as far as it could go with all his might.

He climbed up while shouting "Success!", when he saw the countless sinners climbing up eagerly like a procession of ants. When he saw this, he was just shocked. He shouted, "Hey! This spider's thread is mine! Get down!"

At that moment, the thread broke. He shot down and fell headlong into the darkness. Glittering and shimmering, the spider of the Paradise was hanging in the moon and starless sky.

Buddha had watched it all, and he began to troll again with a sad face. It was noon.

[Ana Lacuesta · Rating 5 out of 5]

Terminado: El Hilo de la Araña de Ryūnosuke Akutagawa

Es un cuentito cortito y súper interesante, un buen primer acercamiento al escritor que en 4 hojas deja una moraleja al final de su historia, tras mostrar como Buda intenta salvar a un pecador de su padecimiento en el infierno.

[Anna Jalipa · Rating 5 out of 5]

A good book for sophomores.

[Rahul · Rating 4 out of 5]

Striking similar to the parable of the onion from The Grand Inquisitor presented in The Karamazov Brothers by Dostoevsky. Buddhism at its finest.

[Oğuz · Rating 5 out of 5]

The best.

[Bella Azam · Rating 4 out of 5]

Dragon: The Old Potter's Tale (1919)
- Similar to The Nose, this story also points out on appearance and religion where the Buddhist monk named E'in had a giant nose and this caused him to be the centre of jokes by many. In order to divert the attsntion from his looks, he concot a a revenge by putting a signboard saying that a dragon will ascend to heaven on the third month. The words spread around like wildfire, even if people had doubts, majority believed the news and soon anticipates the event. Eventually, the day came and thousand people gathers to see the dragon but does this dragon even exist?
The theme of religion and physical appearance were themes that Akutagawa explored most in his work and this one sparks more interest in the question of whether the prank could actually be true. Jay Rubin mentioned "Dragon toys with the likelihood that religion is nothing more than mass hysteria, a force so powerful that even the fabricator of an object of veneration can be taken in by it." 
The question whether the dragon does ascend remains vague as we are unsure whether ir exist or the people in thr midst of waiting fir hours toi invested in thr notion of wanting and believing the dragin, cinjure uo the image of dragin. Its fascinatung but as always tye ending remains inconclusive.

The Spider Thread (1918)
Its a very short story but concise in conveying the message. Talked about sinner's and how oe act of compassion leads to a help from the lord above but a greed will cause the downfall. Kandata, a vicious murderer was punished in the lowest of Hells but his action of letting a spider live ultimately gave him a help to climb to heaven by the spider thread. There are depiction of gruesome hell and its a terrifying scene. For someone as selfish as Kandata who won't share his help from above with othets eventually leads to his eternal damnation in Hell
An interesting twist of fate is that I was surprised that an anime Erased I just finished watching had a connection with this story I read yesterday. The anime talked about this short story and it was so twisted in the mind of a person and I was pleasantly surprised by the coincidence.

It was published for children based on Taisho fairy tales

[Stef · Rating 3 out of 5]

Selesai baca ya ku dapatkan, dari kebaikan sedikit, jika kita terlalu serakah dan dengki pada akhirnya balik lagi kebawah kan.

[koshpica]

najbezblamnije ubacivanje na gr

[cey · Rating 5 out of 5]

rereading akutagawa is a form of therapy at this point

[Aurora · Rating 4 out of 5]

I actually found a spider in my room later in the day, and killed it. Am I cooked? 💀

(I actually felt extra guilty)

[Yohan · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm going to start counting children's books on here if I read them in Japanese. The translation I found online was two pages long but it took me four hours to parse it all in Japanese.

[Yumeko (blushes) · Rating 2 out of 5]

Uncommon setting, common sentiment, which can work if the execution is interesting. It is not.

[Abdullah · Rating 5 out of 5]

In the Buddha-land of Purity, there was a pond with a lot of lotus flowers. They were all as white as snow. Their golden stamens were continuously giving off sweet fragrance. One day in the morning, the Buddha was alone strolling around the lotus pond.
When the Buddha was staying still by the pond, he happened to look down between the lotus leaves and flowers at the darken world of Hell---it was far beneath the pond. He could clearly see the Styx, a bloody-pond and a pin-hill through the clear water of the lotus pond.
The Buddha noticed a man called Kandata squirming around with other sinners. This man used to be a thief who had committed one misdeed after another, such as killing people and setting fires to houses, such a bad man was he. But he had carried out a good deed: it was many years ago when he was walking along in the deep woods, he found a small spider crawling across the path. He tried to stamp it down to death, but he changed his thought, "It is merely a small insect, but it is sorrowful to take its life thoughtlessly." After all, he didn't kill the spider.
Looking down at him, the Buddha thought of saving him out of Hell as he remembered Kandata's only good deed he had done in his life. Just the right time, the Buddha saw a spider spinning a beautiful silver thread between leaves of lotuses. He gently picked it up and hung it down into the water between the white lotuses, as if it was aiming at Hell. It became longer and longer and went down far, far from the lotus pond to Hell.
2
In the meantime, the sinners were floating up and down in the bloody-pond in Hell. It was completely dark out there. The only things that could be seen dimly were pins on the dreadful pin-hill. It was also dumb silent. The only sounds that could be heard were the sighs they sometimes gave off. Since they were down there, they were suffering the torments of Hell and had no more energy to speak with each other. Kandata was also choked with blood in the pond and did nothing but writhed in agony like a dying frog.
In the soundless darkness that day, Kandata happened to look up at the sky above him. He saw a silver thread hanging down toward him from far above the sky. Looking at it, he unconsciously clapped his hands with joy.
"If I hold that thread tightly and climb it up, I could escape from Hell." He thought, "If luck could have it, I might climb up to Buddha land of Purity. In that case, they'd never drive me away onto the pin-hill nor make me sink into the bloody pond."
Just then the thread reached him on his nose; he at once held the spider's thread with his both hands tightly and began to climb up hurriedly. He was good at doing so, as he used to be a thief. He kept climbing the thread up, up, up. But however hard he did, it was not easy to get to the goal which was far away from Hell. On the way he felt too tired to climb up any more and stopped climbing to take a rest. He looked down; the bloody pond and the pin-hill were far below him. He thought he'd reach the goal sooner or later. He chuckled to himself with a voice of "well, well" for the first time in many years. He, however, noticed a huge number of sinners climbing up his thread like ants. He was flabbergasted and said to himself,
"I don't think my spider's thread can bear such heavy weight. If it snapped off, all the people on the thread would fall down headfirst into Hell, including me, who have climbed up all the way." In fact, hundreds of thousands of sinners were crawling up the thread in a line.
"I have to do something to stop them, otherwise the thread must snap off halfway and I'll fall down back into the bloody-pond."
He yelled at them at the top of his lungs,
"Hey, you! This spider's thread belongs only to me. From whom the Hell did you get the permission to climb up the thread? Climb down quickly!"
All of the sudden the thread, which had kept bearing the weight, snapped just where Kandata was holding with both hands. He fell down headlong into the bloody pond spinning like a top in no time.
The shining but shortened thread was still hanging down from the sky. It was still dark---no moon or stars in the sky.
3
The Buddha was staying still by the lotus pond and watching what had happened from beginning to end. After seeing Kandata sinking in the bottom of the bloody-pond like a stone, the Buddha resumed strolling as if nothing had happened, but he looked so sad. It seemed like the man's merciless behavior made the Buddha sad: trying to escape from Hell only by himself turned out to get him the equivalent punishment.
The lotuses in the pond had nothing to do with this affair. The white flowers were quietly swaying and giving off sweet fragrance from their golden stamens.
It had been nearly noon in Buddha land of Purity. (2009/05/01 With Itaya) The original by Akutagawa Ryunosuke

[Adam · Rating 2 out of 5]

Curious little short story. My interpretation is that if he tried to help the others climbing with him, the web/rope would not have snapped. It was a final test to see if he could be a good person. The metaphor of heaven and hell seems to be used to show that we are constantly balancing between doing good things and doing bad things. Even though I am an atheist, I can still appreciate that there is an element of moral judgement differing good things from bad things. Humans naturally should try and help each other, empathy is part of our nature.

As the author says, “the instant that he says this, it snapped”. It only snapped because the protagonist chose the selfish option instead of putting others before himself.

The Buddha was in full control, and would have allowed the spider’s web/rope to have been strong enough to carry all of them if he chose to be selfless and prove his worth to be in paradise. However, I do not like that the lives of all the others had to be put into the protagonists hands. It’s not their fault that the main character was selfish, and they may have chosen the ‘moral’ option instead.

In reality though, I would have done the same thing as logically the web would have snapped with other people on it, and the protagonist had no way of knowing that it wouldn’t and that it was a test. As such, I offer a slightly different perspective as well:

The protagonist could easily have told the other ‘sinners’ to go back down, then wait for him to get to paradise. Once he had gotten off the rope, the others could follow 1 by 1 so that the rope doesn’t snap. In this scenario, the story is a critique if the Buddha (or God). The Buddha had set an arbitrary version of morality and because the protagonist didn’t follow it exactly he is sent to burn in hell forever. The main character was never even told by the Buddha what he expected or wanted from him. In fact, the Buddha had no real intention of saving all the people, as we can see for 2 reasons. 1. He doesn’t send a rope down for each of the others to try and get up. 2. He snaps the rope even though the protagonist didn’t actually make an immoral decision. Firstly, he was looking after himself first and making sure he survived which is human nature. No one can be judged or condemned for this. And once he was safe, we have no reason to believe that he wouldn’t have instructed the others to climb and join him 1 by 1.

From this perspective, the story can be seen as a critique of the absurdity and the immorality of the Buddha/God and the arbitrary rules that religion imposes on people. This view concludes with 2 things as an argument against the Buddha’s character. It is human nature and justified for a person to save themselves before someone else. This is common knowledge and what is taught these days in evacuations. Save yourself before saving others. It is only after we are safe ourselves that our level of morality and empathy can be judged. To help the others climb would not have risked the man’s life once he was safe, and therefore it would actually have been a question of to have empathy and help others or want to enjoy paradise by himself. Neither would affect him and the choice was literally whether to be nice or not. This is the only time we can expect or demand empathy and morality from anyone, when there own life is first and foremost safe. To argue anything else is against our instincts, against our logic and unreasonable. I am not prepared to risk my life for someone else’s, except in very rare circumstances.

As such, in my view, the author could be offering one of these 2 interpretations. If it is the first one, I think it is an absurd moral once you dig deep into it and question it. On the surface though, yeah I guess it’s a nice message that you always have a choice to decide to be kind. But I would strongly disagree with the foundations of moral judgement on the character, the same way I do with nearly all moral judgements found in religions, if this is what the author intended.

If the author intended the 2nd message, I applaud him. However, I think it is more likely that he meant the first one. If I was to rewrite it though, I would change it to mean the 2nd because I think it is a much fairer, reasonable and accepting view on when we have the right do judge someone morally.

Even though it seems this story was about Buddhism, the whole sense of judgement and hell makes it sound very much like the language of evangelical Christians. I am always turned off by the idea of judgement and damnation, and this story was no different. It has a holier than though attitude, and very few people would do anything different to what the character did.

[Jolina · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the greatest short story ever made. I read this story years back for my literature class, I was in my second year of high school then. I remember how everyone in my class thought of it as something they have to read for class recitation. As for me, it was life changing. Up to this day, I still think about the dread, disgust, pity and all the other emotions that this story made me feel. I may forget all other authors out there because of my bad memory, but Ryunosuke Akutagawa is definitely one of the writers I'll never forget.

[Panda · Rating 4 out of 5]

Although unfamiliar with the author, spider's thread is a story I heard long ago and thought it an ancient Japanese fable.

Perhaps it's the translation but the language is very simplistic and seemed to be aimed at children. The prose poetic and sweet.

It's a shame that that not many of the author's works got translated because although short this is a story that sticks to the mind once heard.

[Jacklynn Ray · Rating 4 out of 5]

Its very short, but I really enjoyed the moral of the story. It's really a less then 10 minute read, but I am going to read more by this author. I think I will enjoy his work just based on reading this.

[Pet · Rating 2 out of 5]

hơi thất vọng vì đã đọc "rashomon" và "trong rừng trúc" nên kỳ vọng dành cho tất cả những thứ viết bởi akutagawa đều ở mức ngất ngưởng.

giống như "đỗ tử xuân", "sợi tơ nhện" có tính giáo lý quá nhiều và đập thẳng vào mặt người đọc luôn nên đọc xong thì không còn gì để chiêm nghiệm.

[Claudia Marcela · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is really, really memorable. It's a book that makes you think. Is short, so is good for read at anytime.

[Diab · Rating 4 out of 5]

An entertaining short story about death, afterlife, selfishness, mercy and irony.

[Erica]

i want to read

[Emily · Rating 2 out of 5]

2.5 stars.