地狱变 (1918)

《地狱变》（日语：地狱変／じごくへん，罗马化：Jigokuhen），是芥川龙之介于1918年（大正7年）发表的短篇小说代表作。是根据日本名著《今昔物语》第28卷中的一个故事及《宇治拾遗物语》中一段相似的故事（“絵仏师良秀”），进行改写。

故事内容

小说内容讲述了一个日本平安时代的故事，自负的画师良秀人缘极差，主家甚至将所养的猴子取名为“良秀”以嘲弄他。画师非常重视艺术，但不善于描画未曾亲历过的事情，只能画亲眼所见之物。为精进画艺，他曾在路边若无其事的素描尸体，也曾纵毒蛇攻击自己的弟子，以便素描。但他除了美术外，最操心的就是自己在堀川大公别墅中担任宫女的女儿，他画了许多画想把女儿赎回来，却得不到堀川的许可。

骄奢淫逸的堀川命良秀画一扇“地狱变”屏风，但是良秀苦于画不出一位嫔妃陷于烈焰中的痛苦神情，因此请堀川大公提供一辆“被大火所点燃的槟榔毛牛车”的真实情景。最后堀川答应了，还打算在车内以锁链捆绑一个女人使其活活被烧死，但是他焚烧的车，车内锁链捆绑的女主角，是良秀的女儿。猴子良秀跃入车中与之共死，但画师良秀在目睹女儿惨遭火刑惊心动魄的一幕后，脸上的神情竟由惊怕转为狂喜，完全以画师的观点取代父亲的立场观看这场惨剧。“地狱变”屏风最后如期完成，众人皆为屏风的技艺高妙所慑服。但是第二天晚上，失去爱女的良秀在屋子里悬梁自尽了。

改编作品

2009年日本动画青色文学系列中将这篇小说改编成动画，篇幅一集（系列第十二集），由Madhouse制作。

电子游戏Limbus Company中出现以这篇小说主角为原型的角色良秀

Hell Screen (地獄変, Jigokuhen) is a short story written by Japanese writer Ryūnosuke Akutagawa. It was a reworking of Uji Shūi Monogatari and originally published in 1918 as a serialization in two newspapers. It was later published in a collection of Akutagawa short stories, Akutagawa Ryūnosuke zenshū.

Translation

"Hell Screen" was first translated into English by W.H.H. Norman in 1948, in his collection of Akutagawa short stories Hell Screen and Other Stories. Numerous variant translations have followed, including the most recent one translated by Jay Rubin and published by Penguin Group.

Plot overview

"Hell Screen" is narrated by a mostly uninvolved servant who witnesses or hears of the events. The plot of "Hell Screen" centers on the artist Yoshihide. Yoshihide is considered “the greatest painter in the land”, and is often commissioned to create works for the Lord of Horikawa, who also employs Yoshihide's daughter in his mansion, and is rumoured to be taking her as his mistress. When Yoshihide is instructed to create a folding screen depicting the Buddhist hell, he proceeds to inflict tortures upon his apprentices, so he can see what he is trying to paint. Supernatural forces seem to be present; one time, Yoshihide speaks in a devilish voice. Throughout the story Yoshihide seeks to get his daughter back from his employer, but is refused. One night the servant is dragged by a monkey into a room where he finds the daughter recovering from what appears to be an attempted rape. The monkey thanks him for saving her with a servile gesture. She refuses to name her abuser. The story climaxes when Yoshihide asks the lord to burn a beautiful lady in a carriage so he can finish the screen, as he claims he can only paint what he has seen. The lord concedes, but, in a macabre twist, Yoshihide must watch as his daughter and her monkey who rushes to be with her are the ones who burn. The story ends with the magnificently horrible screen completed, and Yoshihide's suicide by hanging.

Themes

The work follows one of Akutagawa's major styles: the updating of ancient tales to reflect modern psychology. One major psychological theme is artistic obsession, as Makoto Ueda puts it: “For Akutagawa the dilemma was insoluble: if the artist chooses to place his art ahead of his life, in the end he must suffer the destruction of his life”. The story is also an examination of Akutagawa's own devotion to his work.

Another theme is the objectivity of truth, as the narrator, a servant of the Lord of Horikawa, repeatedly ignores the physical attraction the Lord has for Yoshihide's daughter, despite overwhelming evidence. The servant even refuses to believe his own eyes when he witnesses the Lord forcing himself on Yoshihide's daughter. At the story's end, the servant proclaims:

Word soon spread that His Lordship had burned the carriage that night in the Palace of the Melting Snows, and there seem to have been many who were highly critical of the event. First of all came the question of Yoshihide’s daughter: why had his Lordship chosen to burn her alive? The rumor most often heard was that he had done it out of spite for her rejection of his love. I am certain, however, that he did it to punish the twisted personality of an artist who would go so far as to burn a carriage and kill a human being to complete the painting of a screen. In fact, I overheard His Lordship saying as much himself.

Adaptations

Multiple media productions and kabuki based on "Hell Screen" have been produced, including:

Jigoku-hen, a 1953 Kabuki dramatized by Yukio Mishima.

Portrait of Hell, a 1969 movie produced by Toho

A 1962 NHK broadcast television adaptation

Ukrainian composer Victoria Poleva wrote the 1994 ballet Gagaku, based on Akutagawa's "Hell Screen"

Episode 12 of Aoi Bungaku, a 2009 animated series directed by Atsuko Ishizuka

Episode 7 of Bungou to Alchemist: Shinpan no Haguruma, a 2020 animated series directed by Odahiro Watanabe