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3.5 

No Longer Human

By Osamu Dazai & Donald Keene
No Longer Human by Osamu Dazai & Donald Keene digital book - Fable

Publisher Description

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.

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.

Portraying himself as a failure, the protagonist of Osamu Dazai’s No Longer Human narrates a seemingly normal life even while he feels himself incapable of understanding human beings. His attempts to reconcile himself to the world around him begin in early childhood, continue through high school, where he becomes a “clown” to mask his alienation, and eventually lead to a failed suicide attempt as an adult. Without sentimentality, he records the casual cruelties of life and its fleeting moments of human connection and tenderness.

Still one of the ten bestselling books in Japan, No Longer Human is an important and unforgettable modern classic: “The struggle of the individual to fit into a normalizing society remains just as relevant today as it was at the time of writing.” (The Japan Times)

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7946 Reviews

3.5
Rolling on the Floor Laughing Face“No Longer Human was the first Osamu Dazai's book which I have read. I loved the first half of the book, but then at the time after he first commited a double su!c!de with that woman, it felt a little distant or maybe I couldn't get the part, but I don't know. After Yozo left Flatfish's place, it took the interest it had on me back to it. And then it didn't left me till the end of the book, I stopped the book 2 times because I was getting bored in the mid-way as I said because of Flatfish maybe. But the ending was in my opinion, really good. I cannot really explain what I felt when I completed it, it felt empty but I enjoyed it?”
Thinking Face“what a horribly sad and uninspired character. i wish i didn’t take so many breaks reading this so i can have a more firm grasp on what exactly is going on. his bleak existence and overly philosophical/cynical view on life at time made it unbearable to read, but also i found myself relating in very small ways to the more depressive moments in his life. i understand why this author is renowned and why this is considered a classic, however i don’t think i would return to this book for any reason other than to ponder life”

About Osamu Dazai

Osamu Dazai was born in 1909 into a powerful landowning family of northern Japan. A brilliant student, he entered the French department of Tokyo University in 1930, but later boasted that in the five years before he left without a degree, he had never attended a lecture. Dazai was famous for confronting head-on the social and moral crises of postwar Japan before he committed suicide by throwing himself into Tokyo’s Tamagawa Aqueduct. His body was found on what would have been his 39th birthday.

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