Ryūnosuke Akutagawa > Quotes

“A man sometimes devotes his life to a desire which he is not sure will ever be fulfilled. Those who laugh at this folly are, after all, no more than mere spectators of life.”
― Ryunosuke Akutagawa, Rashomon and Other Stories

“I could wish for nothing more than to die for a childish dream in which I truly believed.”
― Ryunosuke Akutagawa, Mandarins: Stories

“I don't have the strength to keep writing this. To go on living with this feeling is painful beyond description. Isn't there someone kind enough to strangle me in my sleep?”
― Ryunosuke Akutagawa, Rashōmon and Seventeen Other Stories

“It is unfortunate for the gods that, unlike us, they cannot commit suicide.”
― Ryūnosuke Akutagawa, Rashōmon and Seventeen Other Stories

“He wanted to live life so intensely that he could die at any moment without regrets.”
― Ryūnosuke Akutagawa, The Life of a Stupid Man

“Yes -- or rather, it's not so much that I want to die as that I'm tired of living.”
― Ryūnosuke Akutagawa, Rashōmon and Seventeen Other Stories

“What is the life of a human being—a drop of dew, a flash of lightning? This is so sad, so sad.”
― Ryūnosuke Akutagawa, The Life of a Stupid Man

“It's not so much that I want to die as that I'm tired of living.”
― Ryūnosuke Akutagawa, The Life of a Stupid Man

“When I kill a man, I do it with my sword, but people like you don't use swords. You gentlemen kill with your power, with your money, and sometimes just with your words: you tell people you're doing them a favor. True, no blood flows, the man is still alive, but you've killed him all the same. I don't know whose sin is greater - yours or mine.”
― Ryūnosuke Akutagawa

“Isn't there someone kind enough to come strangle me in my sleep?”
― Ryunosuke Akutagawa

“I have no conscience at all -- least of all an artistic conscience. All I have is nerves.”
― Ryūnosuke Akutagawa, Rashōmon and Seventeen Other Stories

“Life is not worth a single line of Baudelaire.”
― Ryūnosuke Akutagawa, The Life of a Stupid Man

“..he understood far more deeply than anyone else the loneliness that lurked beneath his jaunty mask.”
― Ryūnosuke Akutagawa

“I could have sworn that the man's eyes were no longer watching his daughter dying in agony, that instead the gorgeous colors of flames and the sight of a woman suffering in them were giving him joy beyond measure.”
― Ryūnosuke Akutagawa, Hell Screen

“As you can imagine, those who had fallen this far had been so worn down by their tortures in the seven other hells that they no longer had the strength to cry out.”
― Ryūnosuke Akutagawa, The Spider's Thread

“As he thought about his life, he felt both tears and mockery welling up inside him. All that lay before him was madness or suicide. He walked down the darkening street alone, determined now to wait for the destiny that would come to annihilate him.”
― Ryūnosuke Akutagawa, The Life of a Stupid Man

“17. Butterfly

A butterfly fluttered its wings in a wind thick with the smell of seaweed. His dry lips felt the touch of the butterfly for the briefest instant, yet the wisp of wing dust still shone on his lips years later.”
― Ryūnosuke Akutagawa

“The human heart harbors two conflicting sentiments. Everyone of course sympathizes with people who suffer misfortunes. Yet when those people manage to overcome their misfortunes, we feel a certain disappointment. We may even feel (to overstate the case somewhat) a desire to plunge them back into those misfortunes. And before we know it, we come (if only passively) to harbor some degree of hostility toward them.”
― Ryūnosuke Akutagawa, Rashōmon and Seventeen Other Stories

“I may wear the skin of an urbane sophisticate, but in this manuscript I invite you to strip it off and laugh at my stupidity.”
― Ryūnosuke Akutagawa, The Life of a Stupid Man

“Life is more hellish than hell itself.”
― Ryūnosuke Akutagawa, Rashōmon and Seventeen Other Stories

“He disliked his own lies as much as his parents', but still he continued to lie -- boldly and cunningly. He did this primarily out of need, but also for the pathological pleasure of killing a god.”
― Ryūnosuke Akutagawa, Rashōmon and Seventeen Other Stories

“I have heard unsavory rumors about you and the umbrella-maker's daughter”
― Ryunosuke Akutagawa, Rashōmon and Seventeen Other Stories

“A shimmering of heat—
Outside the grave
Alone I dwell.”
― Ryūnosuke Akutagawa, The Life of a Stupid Man

“But he knew well enough what was wrong with him: he was ashamed of himself and afraid of them – afraid of the society he so despised.”
― Ryūnosuke Akutagawa, The Life of a Stupid Man

“It’s scary what greed can do to people, don’t you think?”
― Ryūnosuke Akutagawa, The Life of a Stupid Man

“Everyone is the same under the skin.”
― Ryūnosuke Akutagawa, Rashōmon and Seventeen Other Stories

“It is important-even necessary-for us to become acutely aware of the fact that we can't trust ourselves. The only ones you can trust to some extent are people who really know that. We had better get this straight.”
― Akutagawa Ryūnosuke

“But surely the will to create was a form of the will to live...?”
― Ryūnosuke Akutagawa, Akutagawa Ryunosuke Short Story Selection vol.1 [mikan +1]

“Do I still love this woman? he asked himself. He was in the habit of observing himself so closely that the answer came as a surprise to him: I do.”
― Ryūnosuke Akutagawa, The Life of a Stupid Man

“Why did this one have to be born – to come into the world like all the others, this world so full of suffering? Why did this one have to bear the destiny of having a father like me? This was the first son his wife bore him.”
― Ryūnosuke Akutagawa, The Life of a Stupid Man