Osamu Dazai's No Longer Human, this leading postwar Japanese writer's second novel, tells the poignant and fascinating story of a young man who is caught between the breakup of the traditions of a northern Japanese aristocratic family and the impact of Western ideas. In consequence, he feels himself "disqualified from being human" (a literal translation of the Japanese title).
Donald Keene, who translated this and Dazai's first novel, The Setting Sun, has said of the author's work: "His world … suggests Chekhov or possibly postwar France, … but there is a Japanese sensibility in the choice and presentation of the material. A Dazai novel is at once immediately intelligible in Western terms and quite unlike any Western book." His writing is in some ways reminiscent of Rimbaud, while he himself has often been called a forerunner of Yukio Mishima.
The character in this book sees himself as disconnected from "human beings," alienated and unable to connect. Today, we might call him someone "on the spectrum." But perhaps not, given that this was published in 1948, soon after the bomb. The rumination on "human beings" felt similar to Holden Caufield at certain points (though, much less whiny!)
This book got me thinking a lot about how recent interest in the nonhuman might be related to alienation and capitalism. This is just a half-formed thought and probably not very interesting (and maybe obvious to others), but I'm noting it here just to record it.
This was a weird one for me, mostly because I read Junji Ito's adaptation earlier this year which oddly was more detailed. This felt truncated in weird places, and I'm not sure if it was just from reading the adaptation or whether it's a common feeling but the pacing was probably my biggest issue. It's a short book about a man's thirty-ish years of life, with a lot of detail in some places but also a lot of stuff that just gets glossed over.
Still, although I'd probably recommend the manga over this for most people, I think Dazai captures his themes more precisely than Ito does (which makes sense, as Ito adapted it into a horror). Throughout there is a feeling that Yozo is struggling with normal problems, but because of his upbringing and the influences he finds in his life he never seems to find a way to …
This was a weird one for me, mostly because I read Junji Ito's adaptation earlier this year which oddly was more detailed. This felt truncated in weird places, and I'm not sure if it was just from reading the adaptation or whether it's a common feeling but the pacing was probably my biggest issue. It's a short book about a man's thirty-ish years of life, with a lot of detail in some places but also a lot of stuff that just gets glossed over.
Still, although I'd probably recommend the manga over this for most people, I think Dazai captures his themes more precisely than Ito does (which makes sense, as Ito adapted it into a horror). Throughout there is a feeling that Yozo is struggling with normal problems, but because of his upbringing and the influences he finds in his life he never seems to find a way to cope with them. He quickly dismisses himself as not being human, as it seems to him that most people fit into society more naturally than he does, yet his questions on how people behave are questions we all ask ourselves. It is obvious, from the start, that Yozo is perfectly human and not nearly as horrid as he thinks of himself.
As time goes on and life wears on him, he becomes worse. His alcoholism, his stealing, his cheating, it all piles up on both him and the reader. At what point does this man, who struggled to see himself as a person, become a bad man? At what point does his abused upbringing stop working to mitigate the awful things he does? Does he, at some point, stop being human? Yozo always has his answer ready, and as a reader it becomes a more thoughtful process to refute him, even if it was the obvious thing to do at first. Eventually I found myself feeling for the people around him more than the man himself, and the idea that I had also given up on Yozo was a sad realization.
The role of women in this book is interesting. Yozo doesn't see himself as human, and his interactions with men often reinforce that, but when he interacts with women he seems to change. He does human things, even when they're often bad, and he's treated like a human in return. He blames women for all his woes, but more often than not they're the ones who reach out and see him as a person with his own desires. Very often the men in his life, even when they're treating him well, force expectations on him as if he doesn't need his own agency. The dichotomy in both the treatment of each gender and their views in Yozo's eyes are probably each worth an essay on their own.
I think that if you want a good story, the manga adaptation does a better job. In Dazai's telling of the story there are a lot of awkward gaps and pacing oddities, and the whole thing leaves off in a somewhat awkward state. If you want a powerful piece of fiction with a lot to dig into, however, this is a great pick.
