Pathway to Japanese Literature

Discover Japan's stories—across time, across language.

Horse-Drawn Carriages of MoscowAuthor: Miyamoto Yuriko

Original Title	モスクワの辻馬車
Author	宮本百合子
Genre	Modern Short Fiction
Author Type	Female Author
Summary	In 1930s Moscow, a Japanese woman navigates the frostbitten streets in a horse-drawn carriage, racing against time to complete urgent errands on her final night in the Soviet capital. With a frayed coat and a bulging briefcase, she bargains tersely with a surly driver over fares, her Russian tinged with foreign inflection. Shadows swallow lamplit boulevards as she delivers mysterious parcels—loosening invisible ties to a city she’s called home for years. The clatter of cleated horseshoes echoes past Pushkin’s statue and bustling theaters, while drivers grumble about vanishing oats and collectivization’s toll. Determined yet weary, she confronts escalating disputes over rubles, her resolve hardening like the icy cobblestones. Between honey jars for Siberian colds and crumpled residence permits, fragments of her Moscow life surface—clattering typewriters, strawberry jam farewells, and the grit of clinging to principle in a shifting world. As midnight nears, one stubborn standoff at a vanished police station threatens to unravel her meticulously planned exit.