AKUTAGAWA RYUNOSUKE PRIZE

   The Akutagawa Ryunosuke Prize (Akutagawa Ryunosuke sho) is Japan’s most prestigious literary award. Established by Kikuchi Kan in 1935 in memory of writer Akutagawa Ryunosuke, it is sponsored by the Association for the Promotion of Japanese Literature and is awarded semiannually to the best story of a purely literary nature published in a newspaper or magazine by a new or rising author. The judges include contemporary writers, literary critics, and former winners of the prize. Winners receive a pocket watch, cash sum of one million yen, and considerable media attention and often go on to fill the ranks of the bundan (writer’s guilds). Notable prize recipients include Ishikawa Jun, who received it for Fugen (1936, tr. The Bodhisattva, or, Samantabhadra, 1990) and Inoue Yasushi for Togyu (The Bullfight, 1949). The list of prizewinners forms a veritable “who’s who” among modern writers.