内容紹介
No Longer Human (Ningen Shikkaku) is the story of a young man caught between the disintegration of the traditions of his aristocratic provincial family and the impact of modern Western ideas. Largely autobiographical, No Longer Human explores Dazai’s feeling of being “disqualified from being human” (the literal translation of the original title) - a sense of loss and anomie that remains strong in Japan even today among those who struggle to reconcile their attachments to tradition with the necessities of living in a global economy.
著者について
Osamu Dazai is the pen name of Shuji Tsushima (1909-1948), the scion of a wealthy land owing family in Aomori. He began writing short stories while attending Tokyo Imperial University, where he studied French literature before dropping out to write full-time.
A leading light of the Japanese avant-garde, he gained wide recognition after the war for his pessimistic novels, which skewered the social establishment, while exploring the possibility of redemption for the misplaced people with whom he so closely identified. After numerous attempts over a span of twenty years, Dazai died, in a double suicide, shortly after the completion of No Longer Human.
