The thesis is focused on a literary theoretical debate between two outstanding Japanese writers: Akutagawa Ryunosuke and Tanizaki Junichiro. As a reaction to this debate, Akutagawa wrote a literary critical essay Bungeitekina, amarini bungeitekina (Literary, All Too Literary) which contains Akutagawa's considerations on literature and which is analyzed in this thesis. I have also devoted my thesis to other literary theoretical essays written by Akutagawa. The goal of this thesis is to follow the influence of Akutagawa's literary considerations of his works and also to set his work into the wider context of Japanese literature. Hermeneutics is the methodology chosen for this work. To achieve the set-out goal, biographies on Akutagawa and other literary studies focused on Akutagawa were studied.