Osamu DAZAI (native name: 太宰治, real name Shūji Tsushima) was a Japanese author who is considered one of the foremost fiction writers of 20th-century Japan. A number of his most popular works, such as Shayō (The Setting Sun) and Ningen Shikkaku (No Longer Human), are considered modern-day classics in Japan. With a semi-autobiographical style and transparency into his personal life, Dazai’s stories have intrigued the minds of many readers. His books also bring about awareness to a number of important topics such as human nature, mental illness, social relationships, and postwar Japan.
Schoolgirl by Osamu Dazai. 5 stars. Oh, I would like to give it 5 lilies. It's a lovely short story but made me all sappy and sobby. I've always been under the impression that Dazai is a very sensitive and sentimental person. Otherwise he wouldn't have written No Longer Human, The Setting Sun or「ヴィヨンの妻」(Villon's Wife, has not been translated into English yet). He assumed the role of a wife, a mother, and in this book, a schoolgirl and a typical day in her mundane life. I wish I had read this book sooner. It was recommended to me by a Chinese teacher from high school. Props to her:D
The entire story is contained within the events of one day. Most of the prose is inside the mind of the protagonist in the style of stream of consciousness. What else could define the world of an individual more than the fears, anxieties and episodes of the past that help shape one's character? The amount of self-loathing and hopes contained inside the narrator's mind paints the larger world around her. The very mundane ramblings and little episodes tell of the socio-cultural wind, the status of women, of work, of the strange place of teenagers in society, the desire for authenticity, etc. The work is written pre-WW2 but the narrator is very contemporary. She is hardly out of place in the world today.
I didn't know it was a collection of short stories. But I enjoyed it nonetheless. I can't believe I let this book sit on the shelf for nearly two years(maybe three because I don't remember how long I have had it). This is one of the few books I brought to America, and I'm glad that past me made that decision. <33