Quotes by Japanese Authors - Page 21

It seems to me that very sad things always contain an element of the comical
Haruki Murakami
If people can't stand being alone, they have no choice but to die
Natsuo Kirino
Just tell me what's so irritating."(katsu)That's none of your damn business!"(kyok)Maybe not. But I'm curious."(
Natsuki Takaya
We're on the border of this world, speaking a common language. That's all.
Haruki Murakami
Life is a tiring business indeed.Soy sauce runs out. Milk runs out. Dishwashing detergent runs out. Lancôme lipsticks—I thought I had stockpiled several years' worth—run out. Dust underneath the dining table becomes dust balls. Newspapers and magazines pile up, and so does laundry. E-mail and junk mail keep coming. When occasion demands, I make myself presentable and I present myself. I listen to my sister's same old complaints on the phone. I withdraw money for my elderly mother, whose tongue works fine but whose body is a mess. I contact her caseworker. And now I have reached a stage in life when my own health is prone to betray me.
Minae Mizumura
And yet, as you all know, joining humanity is never a simple matter. By beginning to live the same temporality as Westerners, the Japanese now had to live two temporalities simultaneously. On the one hand, there was Time with a capital "T," which flows in the West. On the other hand, there was time with a small "t," which flows in Japan. Moreover, from that point on, the latter could exist only in relation to the former. It could no longer exist independently, yet it could not be the same as the other, either. If I, as a Japanese, find this new historical situation a bit tragic, it's not because Japanese people now had a live in two temporalities. It's rather because as a result of having to do so, they had no choice but to enter the asymmetrical relationship that had marked and continues to mark the modern world—the asymmetrical relationship between the West and the non-West, which is tantamount, however abstractly, to the asymmetrical relationship between what is universal and all the rest that is merely particular.
Minae Mizumura
Language is very tough, though, a tenacity that is backed up by a long history. However it is treated, its autonomy cannot be lost or seriously damaged, even if that treatment is rather rough. It is the inherent right of all writers to experiment with the possibilities of language in every way they can imagine—without that adventurous spirit, nothing new can ever be born.
Haruki Murakami
Finally, I would like to point out that now in the age of English, choosing a language policy is not the exclusive concern of non-English-speaking nations. It is also a concern for English-speaking nations, where, to realize the world’s diversity and gain the humility that is proper to any human being, people need to learn a foreign language as a matter of course. Acquiring a foreign language should be a universal requirement of compulsory education. Furthermore, English expressions used in international conferences should be regulated and standardized to some extent. Native English speakers need to know that to foreigners, Latinate vocabulary is easier to understand than what to the native speakers is easy, child-friendly language. At international conferences, telling jokes that none but native speakers can comprehend is inappropriate, even if fun. If native speakers of English – those who enjoy the privilege of having their mother tongue as the universal language – would not wait for others to protest but would take steps to regulate themselves, what respect they would earn from the rest of the world! If that is too much to ask, the rest of the world would appreciate it if they would at least be aware of their privileged position – and more important, be aware that the privilege is unwarranted. In this age of global communication, some language or other was bound to be come a universal language used in every corner of the world English became that language not because it is intrinsically more universal than other languages, but because through a series of historical coincidences it came to circulate ever more widely until it reached the tipping point. That’s all there is to it. English is an accidental universal language.If more English native speakers walked through the doors of other languages, they would discover undreamed-of landscapes. Perhaps some of them might then begin to think that the truly blessed are not they themselves, but those who are eternally condemned to reflect on language, eternally condemned to marvel at the richness of the world.
Minae Mizumura
Those who live only in the universal temporality can make their voices heard by the world. Those who simultaneously live in the universal and particular temporalities may hear voices from the other side, but they cannot make their own voices heard.
Minae Mizumura
Otaku (おた) is also a formal way of saying "you". た means "house", and with the honorific お, it literally means "your honorable house", implying that you are less of a person and more of a place, fixed in space and contained under a roof. Makes sense that the stereotype of the modern otaku is a shut-in, an obsessed loner and social isolate who rarely leaves his house.
Ruth Ozeki
One's identity derives not from one's nation or blood but from the language one uses.
Minae Mizumura
Daisuke was of course equipped with conversation that, even if they went further, would allow him to retreat as if nothing had happened. He had always wondered at the conversations recorded in Western novels, for to him they were too bald, too self indulgent, and moreover, too unsubtly rich. However they read in the original, he thought they reflected a taste that could not be translated into Japanese. Therefore, he had not the slightest intention of using imported phrases to develop his relationship with Michiyo. Between the two of them at least, ordinary words sufficed perfectly well. But the danger was of slipping from point A to point B without realizing it. Daisuke managed to stand his ground only by a hair's breadth. When he left, Michiyo saw him to the entranceway and said, "Do come again, please? It's so lonely.
Sōseki Natsume
In science fiction, telepaths often communicate across language barriers, since thoughts are considered to be universal. However, this might not be true. Emotions and feelings may well be nonverbal and universal, so that one could telepathically send them to anyone, but rational thinking is so closely tied to language that it is very unlikely that complex thoughts could be sent across language barriers. Words will still be sent telepathically in their original language.
Michio Kaku
It is cognition that is the fantasy.... Everything I tell you now is mere words. Arrange them and rearrange them as I might, I will never be able to explain to you the form of Will... My explanation would only show the correlation between myself and that Will by means of a correlation on the verbal level. The negation of cognition thus correlates to the negation of language. For when those two pillars of Western humanism, individual cognition and evolutionary continuity, lose their meaning, language loses meaning. Existence ceases for the individuum as we know it, and all becomes chaos. You cease to be a unique entity unto yourself, but exist simply as chaos. And not just the chaos that is you; your chaos is also my chaos. To wit, existence is communication, and communication, existence.
Haruki Murakami
Something whose connection with human experience we cannot grasp is bound to be frightening.
Kōbō Abe
Those who are attached only to the result of their effort will not have any chance to appreciate it, because the result will never come.
Shunryu Suzuki
The power to concentrate was the most important thing. Living without this power would be like opening one’s eyes without seeing anything.
Haruki Murakami
Welcome to thee,O sword of eternity!Through BuddhaAnd through Daruma alikeThou hast cleft thy way.
Kakuzō Okakura
Talentless and incompetent as I am, there are two things I can do, and two things only: walk, with my own two feet; compose, composing my poems.
Santōka Taneda
The color of the flower has faded, while I lost myself in idle thought in this long rain / 花の色は うつりにけりな いたづらに わが身世にふる ながめせし間に
Ono no Komachi
Would the mountain cherry blossoms return my affection for there is no one else out here. /もろともに あはれと思へ 山桜 花よりほかに 知る人もなし
Former Chief Abbot Gyoson
May I live to see the day when I long for the agony I feel now. /ながらへば またこのごろや しのばれむ 憂しと見し世ぞ いまは恋しき
Fujiwara no Kiyosuke
Swift waters parted by the jagged rocks are joined at river's end. / 瀬をはやみ 岩にせかるる 滝川の われても末に あはむとぞ思ふ
Emperor Sutoku
With people you can never tell, Will they have changed when next we meet? But here in my dear old home at least, The plums still smell as sweet. / 人はいさ 心も知らず ふるさとは 花ぞ昔の 香ににほひける
Fujiwara no Okikaze
Oh, you cherry petals, On this calm and balmy day, Why are you so restless, So keen to fly away? / ひさかたの 光のどけき 春の日に しづ心なく 花の散るらむ
Ki no Tomonori
Impassionate gods have never seen the red that is the Tatsuta River. /ちはやぶる 神代も聞かず 竜田川 からくれなゐに 水くくるとは
Ariwara no Narihira
Do I, then, belong to the heavens?Why, if not so, should the heavensFix me thus with their ceaseless blue stare,Luring me on, and my mind, higherEver higher, up into the sky,Drawing me ceaselessly upTo heights far, far above the human?Why, when balance has been strictly studiedAnd flight calculated with the best of reasonTill no aberrant element should, by rights, remain-Why, still, should the lust for ascensionSeem, in itself, so close to madness?Nothing is that can satify me;Earthly novelty is too soon dulled;I am drawn higher and higher, more unstable,Closer and closer to the sun's effulgence.Why do these rays of reason destroy me?Villages below and meandering streamsGrow tolerable as our distance grows.Why do they plead, approve, lure meWith promise that I may love the humanIf only it is seen, thus, from afar-Although the goal could never have been love, Nor, had it been, could I ever haveBelonged to the heavens?I have not envied the bird its freedomNor have I longed for the ease of Nature,Driven by naught save this strange yearningFor the higher, and the closer, to plunge myselfInto the deep sky's blue, so contraryTo all organic joys, so farFrom pleasures of superiority But higher, and higher,Dazzled, perhaps, by the dizzy incandescenceOf waxen wings.Or do I then Belong, after all, to the earth?Why, if not so, should the earthShow such swiftness to encompass my fall?Granting no space to think or feel,Why did the soft, indolent earth thusGreet me with the shock of steel plate?Did the soft earth thus turn to steelOnly to show me my own softness?That Nature might bring home to meThat to fall, not to fly, is in the order of things,More natural by far than that improbable passion?Is the blue of the sky then a dream?Was it devised by the earth, to which I belonged,On account of the fleeting, white-hot intoxicationAchieved for a moment by waxen wings?And did the heavens abet the plan to punish me?To punish me for not believing in myself Or for believing too much;Too earger to know where lay my allegianceOr vainly assuming that already I knew all;For wanting to fly offTo the unknownOr the known:Both of them a single, blue speck of an idea?
Yukio Mishima
You sit at the edge of the world,I am in a crater that's no more.Words without lettersStanding in the shadow of the door.The moon shines down on a sleeping lizard,Little fish rain from the sky.Outside the window there are soldiers,steeling themselves to die.(Refrain)Kafka sits in a chair by the shore,Thinking for the pendulum that moves the world, it seems.When your heart is closed,The shadow of the unmoving Sphinx,Becomes a knife that pierces your dreams.The drowning girl's fingersSearch for the entrance stone, and more.Lifting the hem of her azure dress,She gazes --at Kafka on the shore
Haruki Murakami
A samurai was essentially a man of action.
Inazo Nitobe
In the world of old memories, there's room for visitors
Nobuhiro Watsuki
In the world of old memories, there's no room for visitors
Nobuhiro Watsuki
He had always been a middle-of-the-road sort. He had never submitted word for word to anyone's command, but neither had he passionately rebelled against anyone's advice. Depending upon the interpretation, this was the posture of a schemer or the strategy of a born vacillator. If he himself had been confronted with either of these charges, he could not have avoided wondering if they might not be true. But in large part, this was to be attributed neither to artifice nor to vacillation but rather to the flexibility of his vision, which allowed him to look in both directions at once. To this day, it was precisely this capacity that had always dampened his determination to advance singlemindedly toward a particular goal. It was not unusual for him to stand paralyzed in the midst of a situation. His posture of upholding the status quo was not the result of poverty of thought, but the product of lucid judgment; but he had never understood this truth about himself until he acted upon his beliefs with inviolable courage. The situation with Michiyo was precisely a case in point.
Sōseki Natsume
There's a need, too, for a special name in order to distinguish between this present world and the former world in which the police carried old-fashioned revolvers. ... 1Q84 - that's what I'll call this new world. Q is for 'question mark'. A world that bears a question.
Haruki Murakami
When you become big enough to wear this, they'll come for you. You'll probably be 17. It will be spring. Get on the ship. There, your ability will be needed. Then you'll be... free from solitude.
Shirō Yuiga
Being tough isn’t in and of itself a bad thing. Looking back on it, though, I can see I was too used to being strong, and never tried to understand those who were weak. I was too used to being fortunate, and didn’t try to understand those less fortunate. Too used to being healthy, and didn’t try to understand the pain of those who weren’t. Whenever I saw a person in trouble, somebody paralyzed by events, I decided it was entirely his fault––he just wasn’t trying hard enough. People who complained were just plain lazy. My outlook on life was unshakable, and practical, but lacked any human warmth. And not a single person around me pointed this out.’” - Miu
Haruki Murakami
It's not as if our lives are simply divided into light and dark. There's a shadowy middle ground. Recognizing and understanding the shadows is what a healthy intelligence does.
Haruki Murakami
Still, the time I spent with her was more precious than anything. She helped me forget the undertone of loneliness in my life. She expanded the outer edges of my world, helped me draw a deep, soothing breath. Only Sumire could do that for me.
Haruki Murakami
[I]t's not enough to be right. I think you have to be generous. It's not enough to be logical. You have to be virtuous...[Y]our demeanor will carry your message, perhaps, even further than your words will...[P]eople don't just disagree with us. Many of them genuinely think that we are evil, and when people think you're evil, I don't think they listen very carefully to your words. They search your manner. They look for the slightest excuse to ignore all your impregnable arguments, all of your carefully-marshaled facts, and that's why we must never be mean-spirited or angry or petulant, or dismissive of the interest of others. I believe rudeness and arrogance, they would drive people away, that would only confirm their own prejudices. It's the excuse they're desperate for to walk away smug and happy and say 'these people are just small-minded angry bigots.' Our opponents don't recognize our good faith, but -and this is a hard thing- I think we must try our best to recognize their good faith...You can't expect them to recognize our good intentions unless we are willing to recognize theirs.
Jared Taylor
I really had no idea you'd be this stupid but then again you were the only person that really got me
Novala Takemoto
As I say, I have never in all these years thought of the matter in quite this way; but then it is perhaps in the nature of coming away on a trip such as this that one is prompted towards such surprising new perspectives on topics one imagined one had long ago thought throughly.
Kazuo Ishiguro
This isn't the kind of story where understanding makes you smart, or not understanding makes you dumb.
CLAMP
If you can't understand it without an explanation, you can't understand it with an explanation.
Haruki Murakami
Every time he studied this instrument, with its slender, gleaming steel rod that tapered down to such needle-like sharpness, he wondered why it was necessary to have things like this in the world. If it were truly only for chopping ice, you'd think a completely different design might do. The people who produce and sell things like this don't understand, he thought. They don't realize that some of us break out in a cold sweat at just a glimpse of that shiny, pointed tip.
Ryū Murakami
What I saw there was my own death.
Otsuichi
I'm not gonna die alone, no way! He will never allow it!
Otsuichi
I want to have her hands..!Morino's hands...
Otsuichi
There are people who kill, and people who get killed.
Otsuichi
Being insulted by a smart-mouthed little punk like you.. really pisses me off!
Sui Ishida
I'll tell you right now, a ghoul's hunger is true hell.
Sui Ishida
There's only one way to satisfy a ghoul's hunger.
Sui Ishida
There's no place for someone who can't decide between being one or the other.
Sui Ishida
I'm not the protagonist of a novel or anything...I'm just a normal college student who likes to read...But...If I were to write a book with me as the main character...It would be......A tragedy.
Sui Ishida
Your heart is burning strong with righteous indignation... That flame is scattering sparks that may set fire elsewhere. That fire of yours will one day spread to others seeking a just world. The point is whether you have a torch in your heart or not. To light a fire to others.
Sui Ishida
Tormented by an unworldly hunger, yet not knowing how to satisfy it.
Sui Ishida
We can't crush evil with morals. We are justice. We are morality.
Sui Ishida
Humans are thought to be at the top of the food chain...But there are beings who hunt them as food.These monsters who feed on the dead flesh of humans.They are called......Ghouls.
Sui Ishida
What's wrong with wanting to live...? We may be different but we were still given life. Given a chance. If we can only eat humans, then that's what we'll do. How else are we supposed to live with these bodies of ours?!
Sui Ishida
This world is wrong. We have to correct it.
Sui Ishida
Please... Don't make me a murderer.
Sui Ishida
Even if it's a life in shackles, if you have somebody who accepts you for what you really are, how reassuring would that be?
Sui Ishida