Favorite quote?
This is rather difficult for someone as well read as I am. Even so, I suppose my favorite quote would rest within the pages of my favorite novel. Ever since I was younger, I have held a high respect and admiration for the prose of Dazai Osamu, a very prolific Japanese writer. His novel No Longer Human is, to me, one of the finest pieces of literature ever written, and reading it will never fail to stir up something within me.
If I had to choose just one quote from within those pages, it would be the one I have taken the liberty of translating below:
“Whenever I was asked what I wanted, my first impulse was to answer “Nothing.” The thought went through my mind that it didn’t make any difference, that nothing was going to make me happy. At the same time I was congenitally unable to refuse anything offered to me by another person, no matter how little it might suit my tastes. When I hated something, I could not pronounce the words, “I don’t like it.” When I liked something I tasted it hesitantly, furtively, as though it were extremely bitter. In either case I was torn by unspeakable fear. In other words, I hadn’t the strength even to choose between two alternatives.”