Top 280 Osamu Dazai Quotes (2025 Update)
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251. “There was in his nature a tendency to display a taste for fairness and justice – not the “fairness and justice” that politicians are forever carrying on about, but fairness and justice in the true, original sense of the words. As a consequence, the people of Mishima regarded him as a troublemaker and kept their distance.”

— Osamu Dazai

252. “You takes things too seriously. It seems you’re not satisfied unless you always make yourself the protagonist in some tragedy.”

— Osamu Dazai

253. “Without mutual respect, there can be no true nuptial bond.”

— Osamu Dazai

254. “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.”

— Osamu Dazai

255. “Extending discipline for the minority to everyone else at the same time seems particularly cruel. As I grow older, I have begun to understand more and more how ethics taught in school and public mores are two different things. Those who insist on keeping ethics in school look like fools. People think they’re eccentric. They’ll never succeed, they’ll always be penniless.”

— Osamu Dazai

256. “My unhappiness was the unhappiness of a person who could not say no.”

— Osamu Dazai

257. “Please. Fire can’t burn underwater.” “Think before you speak, young master. Water contains oxygen, doesn’t it? Where there’s oxygen, there’s no reason you can’t have fire.”

— Osamu Dazai

258. “What superficiality – and what stupidity – there is in trying to depict in a pretty manner things which one has thought pretty. The masters through their subjective perceptions created beauty out of trivialities. They did not hide their interest even in things which were nauseatingly ugly, but soaked themselves in the pleasure of depicting them. In other words, they seemed not to rely in the least on the misconceptions of others.”

— Osamu Dazai

259. “It seems, regrettably, that not even genius can overcome the debilitating effects of a mild fever.”

— Osamu Dazai

260. “Inside every woman is a merciless bunny, and inside every man a virtuous tanuki who’s forever floundering as he tries to keep his head above water.”

— Osamu Dazai

261. “Young people never say anything straight. You can tell they’re being honest if they hide behind a laugh.”

— Osamu Dazai

262. “He would never say something in the shadows that he cannot say directly to a person. If there is something he wants to say, he will always tell the person to their face. He was like that at the university, and he is like that now. That is why he is always losing out.”

— Osamu Dazai

263. “Once you’ve given in to that whim, your destiny is decided. There’s no such thing as ‘seeing what happens’ in this life. To do something just to see what happens is exactly the same as just plain doing it.”

— Osamu Dazai

264. “The clash between rich and poor is a hackneyed enough subject, but I am now convinced that it really is one of the eternal themes of drama.”

— Osamu Dazai

265. “He looks happy. Away from home like this, he seems a different person.”

— Osamu Dazai

266. “Across from me four or five salarymen who all looked about the same age were just sitting there. They must have been around 30. I didn’t like any of them. Their eyes were empty and dull. They had no vigor. But now, if I so much as grinned at them, I could very well be dragged off by one of these men, falling into the chasm of compulsory marriage. A mere smile can determine a woman’s fate. It is frightening. Fascinatingly so. I have to be careful.”

— Osamu Dazai

267. “If my life could be of some use, I would offer it to anyone.”

— Osamu Dazai

268. “That’s all right. I’ll eat it cold. No need to warm it up.” Ojii-san shrinks guiltily into himself as he sits down. He’s dying to tell his wife about all the marvelous things that happened last night, but in the stern and austere atmosphere of her presence he finds the words sticking in his throat. He eats with head bowed, feeling perfectly wretched.”

— Osamu Dazai

269. “It’s a faculty absolutely unique to man – having secrets.”

— Osamu Dazai

270. “No less than myself, though in a different way, he was entirely removed from the activities of the human beings of the world. We were of one species if only in that we were both disoriented.”

— Osamu Dazai

271. “What do you think the path of your predecessors was, but the path of adventure?”

— Osamu Dazai

272. “Ojii-san’s wen has been his only confidant, and he’s conscious of a certain loneliness without it.”

— Osamu Dazai

273. “Valuing physical sensations above moral considerations is evidence of either mental deficiency or demonic evil.”

— Osamu Dazai

274. “It was only natural for Yozo to vacillate when asked about the reason behind his suicide – it was everything to him.”

— Osamu Dazai

275. “We have a pearl disposal problem down here, you see. After all, if you think about it, they’re just oyster poop.”

— Osamu Dazai

276. “It may be true that in any society defective types with low vitality like myself are doomed to perish, not because of what they think or anything else, but because of themselves. I have, however, some slight excuse to offer. I feel the overwhelming pressure of circumstances which make it extremely difficult for me to live.”

— Osamu Dazai

277. “But there is no limit to a proud and beautiful maiden’s capacity for cruelty.”

— Osamu Dazai

278. “No matter how often I tried, she never once complimented me.”

— Osamu Dazai

279. “The Venerable’ – isn’t that what you call yourself? Trying to find comfort in dreams of a past that will never come again, rather than hope for the future.”

— Osamu Dazai

280. “I’ve been subjected to ridicule and derision every day of my life. In spite of which, did I not take courage and boldly present myself at that examination? Yes! Only to fail miserably... In a world like this, where the brazen, the shameless, the evil-hearted alone prosper, a weak and penniless scholar like myself is destined forever to be a failure and a laughingstock.”

— Osamu Dazai

281. “Something hard about her gives you the impression less of a beautiful woman than of a handsome young man.”

— Osamu Dazai