Osamu Dazai Quotes - Page 2

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Desire Feelings Liars Suffering Waiting

Any man who criticizes my suicide and passes judgment on me with an expression of superiority, declaring (without offering the least help) that I should have gone on living my full complement of days, is assuredly a prodigy among men quite capable of tranquilly urging the Emperor to open a fruit shop.

Osamu Dazai

Suicide, Men, Offering

Osamu Dazai (1968). “The Setting Sun”, p.159, New Directions Publishing

24 Copy quote
All I feel are the assaults of apprehension and terror at the thought that I am the only one who is entirely unlike the rest. It is almost impossible for me to converse with other people. What should I talk about, how should I say it? - I don't know.

Osamu Dazai

People, Impossible, Should

Osamu Dazai (1973). “No Longer Human”, p.26, New Directions Publishing

64 Copy quote
Then what's a synonym for woman?" "Entrails." "You're not very poetic, are you? Well, then, what's the antonym for entrails?" "Milk.

Osamu Dazai

Milk, Poetic, Wells

Osamu Dazai (1973). “No Longer Human”, p.143, New Directions Publishing

20 Copy quote
Scoundrels [...] simply don't die. The ones who die are always the gentle, sweet, and beautiful people. [...] Scoundrels live a long time. The beautiful die young.

Osamu Dazai

Beautiful, Sweet, Long

Osamu Dazai (1968). “The Setting Sun”, p.10, New Directions Publishing

30 Copy quote
I have no desire for others to take it on themselves to analyze my thoughts. I am without thoughts. I have never, not even once, acted on the basis of any doctrine or philosophy.I am convinced that those people whom the world considers good and respects are all liars and fakes. I do not trust the world.

Osamu Dazai

Liars, Philosophy, People

Osamu Dazai (1968). “The Setting Sun”, p.97, New Directions Publishing

42 Copy quote
Victims. Victims of a transitional period of morality. That is what we both certainly are.

Osamu Dazai

Morality, Victim, Periods

Osamu Dazai (1968). “The Setting Sun”, p.173, New Directions Publishing

77 Copy quote
I am convinced that human life is filled with many pure, happy, serene examples of insincerity, truly splendid of their kind-of people deceiving one another without (strangely enough) any wounds being inflicted, of people who seem unaware even that they are deceiving one another.

Osamu Dazai

People, Deception, Example

Osamu Dazai (1973). “No Longer Human”, p.37, New Directions Publishing

100 Copy quote
The world, after all, was still a place of bottomless horror. It was by no means a place of childlike simplicity where everything could be settled by a simple then-and-there decision.

Osamu Dazai

Mean, Simple, Simplicity

28 Copy quote
Labeled a delinquent. That's the only kind of label I want to be crucified under.

Osamu Dazai

Labels, Want, Kind

34 Copy quote
At times everything grows misty and dark before my eyes, and I feel that the strength of my whole body is oozing away through my finger tips.

Osamu Dazai

Eye, Dark, Body

Osamu Dazai (1968). “The Setting Sun”, p.53, New Directions Publishing

23 Copy quote
What frightened me was the logic of the world; in it lay the foretaste of something incalculably powerful. Its mechanism was incomprehensible, and I could not possibly remain closeted in that windowless, bone-chilling room. Though outside lay the sea of irrationality, it was far more agreeable to swim in its waters until presently I drowned.

Osamu Dazai

Powerful, Sea, Water

Osamu Dazai (1973). “No Longer Human”, p.67, New Directions Publishing

40 Copy quote
I drink out of desperation. Life is too dreary to endure. The misery, loneliness, crampedness - they're heartbreaking.[...] What feelings do you suppose a man has when he realizes that he will never know happiness or glory as long as he lives? Hard work. All that amounts to is food for the wild beasts of hunger.

Osamu Dazai

Loneliness, Hard Work, Men

Osamu Dazai (1968). “The Setting Sun”, p.150, New Directions Publishing

59 Copy quote
Unhappiness. There are all kinds of unhappy people in the world. I suppose it would be no exaggeration to say that the world is composed entirely of unhappy people. But those people can fight their unhappiness with society fairly and squarly, and society for its part easily understands and sympathizes with such struggles. My unhappiness stemmed entirely from my own vices, and I had no way of fighting anybody.

Osamu Dazai

Struggle, Fighting, People

Osamu Dazai (1973). “No Longer Human”, p.157, New Directions Publishing

39 Copy quote
Is it not true that no two human beings understand anything whatsoever about each other, that those who consider themselves bosom friends may be utterly mistaken about their fellow and, failing to realize this sad truth throughout a lifetime, weep when they read in the newspapers about his death?

Osamu Dazai

Two, May, Realizing

"No Longer Human". Book by Osamu Dazai, 1948.

28 Copy quote
What is society but an individual? [] The ocean is not society; it is individuals. This was how I managed to gain a modicum of freedom from my terror at the illusion of the ocean called the world.

Osamu Dazai

Ocean, World, Gains

Osamu Dazai (1973). “No Longer Human”, p.125, New Directions Publishing

18 Copy quote
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.

Osamu Dazai

Love, Lying, Fall

Osamu Dazai (1973). “No Longer Human”, p.47, New Directions Publishing

72 Copy quote
To be a friend of the weak-that is the artist's point of departure as well as his ultimate goal.

Osamu Dazai

Artist, Goal, Departure

29 Copy quote
To wait. In our lives we know joy, anger, sorrow, and a hundred other emotions, but these emotions all together occupy a bare one percent of our time. The remaining ninety-nine percent is just living in waiting. I wait in momentary expectation, feeling as though my breasts are being crushed, for the sound in the corridor of the footsteps of happiness. Empty. Oh, life is too painful, the reality that confirms the universal belief that it is best not to be born.

Osamu Dazai

Reality, Ninety Nine, Expectations

21 Copy quote
In my case such an expression as 'to be fallen for' or even 'to be loved' is not in the least appropriate; perhaps it describes the situation more accurately to say that I was 'looked after.

Osamu Dazai

Expression, Cases, Fallen

Osamu Dazai (1973). “No Longer Human”, p.49, New Directions Publishing

14 Copy quote
It would seem that the more irresponsible and crafty one is, the more likely one is to have a talent for storytelling.

Osamu Dazai

Talent, Storytelling, Irresponsible

Osamu Dazai (2013). “Blue Bamboo: Tales by Dazai Osamu”, p.169, BookBaby

18 Copy quote
Mother, recently I have discovered the one way in which human beings differ completely from other animals. Man has, I know, language, knowledge, principles, and social order, but don't all the other animals have them too, granted the difference of degree? Perhaps the animals even have religions. Man boasts of being the lord of all creation, but it would seem as if essentially he does not differ in the least from other animals. But, Mother, there was one way I thought of. Perhaps you won't understand. It's a faculty absolutely unique to man - having secrets. Can you see what I mean?

Osamu Dazai

Mother, Mean, Men

45 Copy quote
Not long ago I learned from a certain person in considerable detail about the worthlessness of your character. All the same, it is you who have given me strength, you who have put the rainbow of revolution in my breast. It is you who have given an object to my life.

Osamu Dazai

Character, Long Ago, Rainbow

Osamu Dazai (1968). “The Setting Sun”, p.174, New Directions Publishing

14 Copy quote
I am convinced that those people whom the world considers good and respects are all liars and fakes. I do not trust the world. My only ally is the tagged dissolute. The tagged dissolute. That is the only cross on which I wish to be crucified. Though ten thousand people criticize me, I can throw in their teeth my challenge: Are you not all the more dangerous for being without tags?

Osamu Dazai

Liars, People, Fake

"The Setting Sun".

15 Copy quote
And I was incapable of living all by myself in those lodgings where I didn't know a soul. It terrified me to sit by myself quietly in my room. I felt frightened, as if I might be set upon or struck by someone at any moment.

Osamu Dazai

Soul, Might, Rooms

Osamu Dazai (1973). “No Longer Human”, p.72, New Directions Publishing

10 Copy quote
I have often felt that I would find it more complicated, troublesome and unpleasant to ascertain the feelings by which a woman lives than to plumb the innermost thoughts of an earthworm.

Osamu Dazai

Women, Feelings, Complicated

Phyllis I. Lyons, Osamu Dazai (1975). “The Osamu saga: the autobiographical fiction of Dazai Osamu”

16 Copy quote

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Born: June 19, 1909
Died: June 13, 1948
Occupation: Author
Cite this Page: Citation

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