Ranpo has sometimes been called the Edgar Allan Poe of Japan, and his nom de plume, being a phonetic rendering of the American author’s name in Chinese characters, certainly invites the comparison. Ranpo was fond of wordplay and ‘liked Poe so much [he] could break into a dance,’ but there is a deeper meaning in his choice of pen name than a simple literary game or acknowledgment of influence. Throughout his numerous works of detective fiction, and especially in his early pieces, Ranpo continually asserts the right of his creations to be judged and considered on the same terms as those of prominent Western authors. His chosen name, in combination with his frequent allusions to works on crime and detection by mostly Western authors, demands that the reader or critic compare Ranpo’s work with that of the famous Western writers he references and to consider them all as belonging to the same category.… But the name of Poe - and the association with the tradition of Western detective authors it evokes - is not the only message incorporated into Ranpo’s nom de plume. ‘Edogawa Ranpo’ is not a double but a triple entendre. ‘Edogawa’ refers to the Edo River, which borders present day Tokyo to the south… In Ranpo’s day, it was a place where traditional Japanese merchant culture mingled and collided with emerging twentieth-century modernity. … The name ‘Ranpo’ comprises to Chinese ideograms, the first meaning ‘unrest,’ ‘disorder,’ or ‘disturbance’ and the second ‘walk.’ The name has been variously rendered in English as ‘rambler,’ as ‘staggering drunkenly,’ as ‘chaotic rambling,’ and as ‘staggering,’ suggestive of roguishness and menace. All of these conceptions share the idea of erratic, aimless motion. This wayward movement is embodied in the aimless youths living in the less well-to-do district of the capital who people much of Ranpo’s detective fiction.… They are poor students, struggling authors, and recent graduates with no set course in life. These unsettled young men are part of ordinary society but detached just enough from its quotidian routines to provide an outsider’s perspective on events.
- William Varteresian, the introduction to The Early Cases of Akechi Kogorō by Edogawa Ranpo
