Finished 走れメロス — is the friendship-trust theme as central as it felt, or am I over-reading it?

Question

Just finished 太宰治's 走れメロス. The whole story hinges on Melos racing back to keep his promise so his friend Selinuntius won't be executed in his place — it felt like the entire narrative is built around testing whether trust between two people can survive extreme pressure (exhaustion, despair, the temptation to just give up). Is that the standard reading, or is there a deeper political/historical angle I'm missing given when Dazai wrote it?

Accepted Answer

Your reading is the standard, widely-taught one — trust and friendship under extreme physical and psychological pressure really is the central theme, and it's usually read pretty straightforwardly rather than as coded political allegory (unlike some of Dazai's other, darker later work). Melos's internal doubt right before the climax — the moment he almost gives up and rationalizes abandoning his friend — is often highlighted as the emotional core, since it makes the eventual triumph of trust feel earned rather than easy or naive.