Home > Work > No Longer Human
21 " [...] I was afraid to board a streetcar because of the conductor; I was afraid to enter the Kabuki Theater for fear of the usherettes standing along the sides of the red-carpeted staircase at the main entrance; I was afraid to go into a restaurant because I was intimidated by the waiters furtively hovering behind me waiting for my plate to be emptied. "
― Osamu Dazai , No Longer Human
22 " Show me what you've written," I said, although I wanted desperately to avoid looking at it. "
23 " Comprender los sentimientos de cualquier mujer es más complicado y desagradable que estudiar las emociones de una lombriz. Según mi experiencia, que viene de cuando era niño, cuando una mujer se pone a llorar de repente, lo mejor es ofrecerle algún dulce y enseguida mejora su humor. "
24 " It is only too obvious that favoritism inevitably exists: it would have been useless to complain to human beings. So I said nothing of the truth. "
25 " Jusque-là dans ma vie, le désir d'être tué m'était venu plus d'une fois, mais l'idée de tuer quelqu'un ne m'avait pas effleuré ; lorsque je me trouvais devant un adversaire terrible je ne pensais, au contraire, qu'à le rendre heureux. "
26 " To fall for," "to be fallen for"--I feel in these words something unspeakably vulgar, farcical, and at the same time extraordinarily complacent. Once these expressions put in an appearance, no matter how solemn the place, the silent cathedrals of melancholy crumble, leaving nothing but an impression of fatuousness. It is curious, but the cathedrals of melancholy are not necessarily demolished if one can replace the vulgar "What a messy business it is to be fallen for" by the more literary "What uneasiness lies in being loved. "
27 " When I lay next to her my body was enveloped in her current, which mingled with my own harsher current of gloom like a “ withered leaf settling to rest on the stones at the bottom of a pool.” I had freed myself from fear and uneasiness. "
28 " Existe la palabra «marginados», que denota a los infelices, a los fracasados y a los descarriados en la sociedad humana; pero yo creo que lo soy desde el momento en que nací. Por eso, cuando me cruzo con alguien calificado de «marginado», de inmediato siento afecto por él. Un afecto que llena todo mi cuerpo de un arrobamiento de ternura. "
29 " Incapace com'ero di nutrire un briciolo di fiducia nella mia facoltà di parlare e d'agire come un essere umano, custodivo rinchiuse nel petto le mie angosce solitarie. Tenevo nascoste l'agitazione e la malinconia, preoccupandomi d'evitare che avesse a trapelarne qualche traccia. "
30 " Purchè ne sia capace, è probabile che gli esseri umani non badino troppo se rimango estraneo alle loro vite. L'unica cosa che debbo evitare, è di riuscir molesto ai loro occhi; sarò nulla, sarò vento, il cielo. "
31 " Now I have neither happiness nor unhappiness.Everything passes.That is the one and only thing that I have thought resembled a truth in the society of human beings where I have dwelled up to now as in a burning hell.Everything passes. "
32 " The weak fear happiness itself. They can harm themselves on cotton wool. Sometimes they are wounded even by happiness "
33 " Whenever I was asked what I wanted my first impulse was to answer "Nothing." The thought went through my mind that it didn't make any difference, that nothing was going to make me happy. "
34 " I thought, “I want to die. I want to die more than ever before. There’s no chance now of a recovery. No matter what sort of thing I do, no matter what I do, it’s sure to be a failure, just a final coating applied to my shame. That dream of going on bicycles to see a waterfall framed in summer leaves—it was not for the likes of me. All that can happen now is that one foul, humiliating sin will be piled on another, and my sufferings will become only the more acute. I want to die. I must die. Living itself is the source of sin. "
35 " People talk of “social outcasts.” The words apparently denote the miserable losers of the world, the vicious ones, but I feel as though I have been a “social outcast” from the moment I was born. If ever I meet someone society has designated as an outcast, I invariably feel affection for him, an emotion which carries me away in melting tenderness. "
36 " As long as I can make them laugh, it doesn’t matter how, I’ll be alright. If I succeed in that, the human beings probably won’t mind it too much if I remain outside their lives. The one thing I must avoid is becoming offensive in their eyes: I shall be nothing, the wind, the sky. "
37 " Mine has been a life of much shame. I can't even guess myself what it must be to live the life of a human being. "
38 " I have always shook with fright before human beings. Unable as I was to feel the least particle of confidence in my ability to speak and act like a human being, I kept my solitary agonies locked in my breast. I kept my melancholy and my agitation hidden, careful lest any trace should be left exposed. I feigned an innocent optimism; I gradually perfected myself in the role of the farcical eccentric. "
39 " What did he mean by "society"? The plural of human beings? "
40 " Living itself is the source of sin. "