A Shameful Life

by Osamu Dazai

  To me, prostitutes were neither human beings nor women but more like lunatics or idiots, and I could find solace in their embrace. I slept soundly when I was with them. They were so utterly lacking in anything like greed it was almost pitiable. Perhaps sensing a kindred spirit, they displayed a natural, though not oppressive, affection toward me. Theirs was an affection free from calculation, an affection devoid of ulterior motives, the affection you feel for a person you might never meet again. Some nights I actually saw the Madonna’s halo hovering over their heads, those idiots and lunatics.

  Yet, while I visited the brothels in search of some meager respite from my terror of humanity—if only for a night—and as I entertained myself with my kindred spirits, I started to undergo an unexpected change. An inauspicious aura began to coalesce about me, eddying and swirling. It was, I suppose, a kind of “gift” that prostitutes bestowed on a favored customer, though not one I had expected to receive. The contours of this gift gradually became visible and grew increasingly distinct so that, when Horiki finally pointed it out to me, I was both astonished and, I must admit, disgusted. To put it in objective though somewhat vulgar terms, the whores had been training me. They had been teaching me how to interact with women. Worse still, being prostitutes, they were relentless when it came to the study of this particular field, and their training had already effected quite a change in me. I’d become quite the adept. Already, it seemed, I’d acquired the scent of a “Don Juan” and women (not just whores) seemed to pick up on it instinctively, converging on me. This lascivious and disreputable air, it seems, was the “gift” they’d granted me, and that gift, more than my pursuit of respite, was starting to attract an uncomfortable amount of attention.

  Horiki probably intended the remark as a compliment, at least in part. Yet I couldn’t help but feel something disturbing and oppressive in it. For example, there was the naive, childish letter sent by a woman at a café. There was the general’s daughter of about twenty who lived next door to me in Sakuragi; each morning around the time I left for school, she would be loitering near her gate, wearing makeup, for no apparent reason. There was the time I went to a steakhouse and one of the maids—though I hadn’t so much as said a word to her . . . And when I bought cigarettes at the local tobacconist’s, inside the box she handed me . . . The woman sitting next to me at the Kabuki play . . . The night I got drunk and fell asleep on the train . . . When, completely out of the blue, I received a brooding letter from the daughter of a relative back home . . . Or when a girl—I have no idea who—left a handmade doll for me at my house when I was out. I am extraordinarily passive, so none of these incidents developed into anything more, they were mere fragments, yet it’s difficult to deny that some kind of aura seemed to linger about me, ensnaring women. I’m not joking or boasting of my romantic prowess—it is simply the truth. But that someone like Horiki should point it out to me caused a pain not unlike humiliation, and with that my desire to seek the company of prostitutes cooled markedly.

  One day, perhaps thinking to appear fashionably modern (being Horiki, it is difficult to imagine any other reason), Horiki took me to a secret gathering, a kind of communist reading group (I think they called it the “R-S” but my memory is vague). For Horiki, this kind of thing was no doubt nothing more than another stop on his “grand tour of Tokyo.” I was introduced to the “comrades,” forced to buy some pamphlets, and then subjected to a lecture on Marxist economics by the leader of the group, a young man with a profoundly ugly face. I couldn’t help but think that everything they said was nothing more than common sense. It was true enough, but there is more to the human soul than just that. There is also something incomprehensible, something terrifying. Desire is too weak a word for it, as is vanity. Even if we combine Eros and desire it’s still not quite enough. I’m not sure myself what it is, but I am certain that the foundation of human society is not economics. It’s something more, with the uncanny air of a strange and scary folk tale. Living in abject terror of that strange folk tale as I did, I was able to accept theories of materialism as easily as I accepted the fact that water runs downhill, but these theories did not liberate me from my dread of humans, they did not arouse in me a sense of joy or the hopefulness of a man whose eyes have been opened to the newly sprouted, green leaves of spring. Nevertheless, I attended every single meeting of the “R-S” (again, I think that was the name but I may be mistaken). It was all I could do not to burst out laughing at their debates. They were all so tense and grave as they became engrossed in their absurd, obvious attempts to demonstrate the theoretical equivalent of one and one making, in fact, two. I used my clowning to try to make the meetings a bit more relaxed, and, perhaps as a result, the atmosphere did grow a bit less stuffy. I was soon so popular I’d become an indispensable member of the group. These naive people must have taken me for one of their own, a naive youth like them. A happy-go-lucky, clowning “comrade.” If so, they were deceived from start to finish. I was not their comrade. Still, I attended every meeting without fail, entertaining all with my antics.

  I went because I liked it. Because I was fond of the people. That is not to say, however, that our intimacy was born out of our mutual devotion to Marxism.

  “Illicit.” It aroused a faint thrill in me. Or rather, I found the concept almost comforting. For it was the legitimate parts of the world that terrified me (I sensed in them something infinitely strong). Their workings mystified me, and I couldn’t endure sitting in that freezing, windowless room. Though the outside might be nothing but an ocean of lawlessness I thought it better by far to dive in and swim until I should die.

  There is a word: “pariah.” In human society this word is used to indicate those who have failed, the pathetic, the immoral. Ever since I was born, I felt I was a pariah, and whenever I met someone that society had also deemed worthy of being so branded I always felt a deep sense of compassion. So deep was my compassion that I sometimes caught myself in silent admiration of it.

  There is another phrase: “guilty conscience.” I’ve lived my whole life plagued by my conscience yet, at the same time, it has been a faithful companion—like a devoted wife standing by me through thick and thin as the two of us frolic in our gloom. There’s also the saying “to have skeletons in one’s closet.” For me, those skeletons appeared the moment I was born, and, instead of disappearing as I grew up, they became stronger and more solid until they weighed so heavily upon me that I suffered the torments of a million different hells each night. Even so (no doubt this will sound very odd), they gradually came to be more familiar to me than my own flesh and blood. Their weight, like the pain of an open wound, was like whispered protestations of love. To such a man as me, the mood of the underground political meetings I attended was thus strangely relaxing and oddly comfortable. In the end, it wasn’t the movement’s goals but its nature that attracted me. The only reason Horiki went was to mock them as a bunch of idiots, and, after the initial introduction, he never returned. Their mission might be to research production, he would say, but mine is to research consumption, and, with that lame jest, he never went back, henceforth inviting me only to participate in his research of consumption. Now that I think back on it, I see there were several different kinds of Marxists. Some were like Horiki, people who became self-proclaimed Marxists in a pique of vain modernity, and then there were those like me who, drawn by the scent of the illicit, merely settled themselves in their midst. Had the true believers among the Marxists ever guessed at our real natures I don’t doubt that their anger would have been as a raging inferno. They would have condemned us as contemptible traitors and expelled us on the spot. Yet neither I nor even Horiki were ever expelled. I, especially, felt more relaxed and was able to behave in a “healthier” manner in that illicit, underground world than I could among the gentlemen of polite society, and it wasn’t long before the others came to see me as a promising young “comrade,” entrusting me with all sorts of tasks, each enshrouded in such an absurd degree of secrecy that it wa
s difficult not to laugh. What’s more, I never refused any task, I accepted all with equanimity, I never got rattled or attracted the suspicion of the “dogs” (that’s what the comrades called the police). I never blundered or did anything that would get me taken in for questioning. Laughingly—and making everyone else laugh—I undertook all kinds of dangerous missions (members of the movement would grow terribly tense, as if they were attempting something of monumental importance. Like in a second-rate detective novel, they used such extreme caution in the execution of tasks so insignificant I could not help but feel a bit bewildered by it all. Nevertheless, when it came to making my errands sound perilous, they spared no effort), or so they called them, without flaw or mishap. At the time, the prospect of being arrested as a party member and imprisoned, even if it was for life, didn’t trouble me in the slightest. Compared to the terror I felt toward “real life” in human society and the hellish torments of my nightly insomnia, I sometimes thought that life in prison might be an improvement.

  Though Father and I lived in the same house, between his visitors and his going out it wasn’t unusual for us to go three or four days without seeing one another. Still, his was a formidable, terrifying presence and I contemplated moving out—perhaps to some sort of boarding house—but even as I tried to muster up the courage to discuss it, the old caretaker informed me that Father was planning to sell off the house.

  Father’s term of office was coming to an end and, no doubt having his own reasons for it, he’d decided not to stand for re-election. He’d drawn up plans to add a new wing to our estate at home as a retreat for his retirement and, not having any remaining ties to Tokyo, he must’ve thought it wasteful to maintain an entire house, complete with servants, for the sake of a mere student (Father’s mind, like the minds of everyone else in human society, was a mystery to me). So the house soon passed into the hands of another, and I moved into a gloomy room in a boarding house called “The Hermitage” in the nearby Hongō district, where I immediately found myself struggling to make ends meet.

  Before, I’d been receiving a monthly allowance from Father, and, even if I spent it all in two or three days, there were always cigarettes, liquor, cheese, fruit, and so on to be had around the house. When it came to things like stationery, books, and clothes I could go to any of the local shops and put them on my father’s account. If Horiki and I went out for noodles or a tempura rice bowl, I had only to go to one of the restaurants my father patronized. I could leave without paying and nobody said a word.

  Now, suddenly living on my own at the boarding house, I had to make do with the allowance alone. I was at a complete loss. Naturally, my money vanished in two or three days. I was horrified, and, growing so wretched that I thought I might go mad, I sent telegram after telegram to Father, to my brothers and my sisters in turn, begging them to send money, saying I would explain in a letter to follow (the circumstances I explained in those letters were, each and every one, mere empty clowning. I thought that if I was going to ask for something I should at least try to make them laugh). Under Horiki’s tutelage I diligently commuted to and from the pawnshops yet, even so, I was forever short of funds.

  In the end, I simply didn’t possess the ability to make it on my own, alone in a boarding house without any connections to help me. I was too frightened to simply stay at home. I would be overcome by the fear that a complete stranger might burst in at any moment and attack me, so, as though dodging a blow, I fled into the city, helping out in the movement or drinking at cheap bars with Horiki. I’d all but abandoned my studies and my painting and, in November of my second year of school, I became embroiled in a love suicide with an older, married woman, and my life changed forever.

  I skipped all my classes and never studied for any of my subjects, but I seemed to have an odd knack for exams so, one way or another, I was able to maintain the deception with my parents. However, unbeknownst to me, the school had contacted my parents directly, telling them that I would soon surpass the limit for absenteeism. Soon, at Father’s direction, my eldest brother started sending me long letters full of stern warnings. Yet, what really troubled me—far more than school—was my lack of funds and the fact that my work for the movement had gotten so demanding I could no longer treat it as a joke. I’d been promoted to the head of the Marxist Student Corps for the Central District or something like that. In any case, I was in charge of Hongō, Koishikawa, Shitaya, Kanda, and all the surrounding areas. People started talking about an armed uprising, so I bought a small pocketknife (thinking back on it, it was such a flimsy thing I doubt it would’ve served to sharpen a pencil) and took to carrying it about in the pocket of my raincoat as I ran about town making “contacts.” All I wanted to do was get drunk and sleep like the dead, but I didn’t have any money. And the “P” (that was our code word for the party. Or at least I think it was—I may be mistaken) kept sending me out on mission after mission, never giving me enough time to catch my breath. Given my delicate health it was highly unlikely I’d be able to keep it up for much longer. I’d only started in the movement because I was attracted to the “illicit,” so I couldn’t help feeling annoyed when it began to occupy so much of my time. Privately, I came to the conclusion they’d picked the wrong person for the job and should give it to one of their true believers instead. So I ran away. As you might expect, that didn’t make me feel very good, and I resolved to die.

  At the time, there were three women who were particularly fond of me. One was the boarding-house owner’s daughter. After I got home at night, bone-tired from my work for the movement, heading straight to bed without even bothering to eat, she would invariably come knocking at my door saying, “I’m sorry but my brother and sister are making so much noise downstairs that I can’t concentrate on this letter.” And with that she’d settle herself at my desk to write for an hour or more.

  It wouldn’t have been so bad if I could have just ignored her and gone to sleep but it was obvious she wanted me to talk to her, and, as usual, this sparked my passive need to please. Worn out as I was, I wasn’t interested in exchanging so much as a single word with her, yet, even so, I gathered up my remaining energy and, rolling over onto my stomach, lit a cigarette, saying, “I hear there’s a man who heats his bath with the love letters he gets.”

  “That’s horrid! Talking about yourself, I suppose?”

  “I did warm up some milk once.”

  “My, my, what an honor. Drink up, then.”

  I just wanted her to hurry up and leave. The whole pretense of the letter was a joke. I was certain she was just scribbling nonsense.

  “Show me,” I said, though I’d sooner die than read it. What? No! No, you mustn’t, she protested with obvious delight. It was so terribly pathetic that any interest I might’ve had quickly vanished. Then I got the idea of sending her on an errand.

  “Hey, I’m really sorry but can you do me a favor? There’s a pharmacy down on the avenue by the streetcars—can you pick up some Carmotine for me? I’m so exhausted I’m burning up, and I’m so tired I can’t even sleep. Would you mind? The money . . .”

  “Oh, don’t worry about the money,” she said, jumping happily to her feet. As I knew very well, women are delighted when a man asks them to do something for him, it is never a cause for distress.

  The second woman was one of my “comrades” who studied in the humanities at a women’s teacher’s college. Since we were both involved in the movement I saw her every day, whether I wanted to or not. Even after the meetings finished she would follow me around for hours on end and was always buying me all sorts of presents.

  “You can think of me as your elder sister.”

  Though this crude affectation made me shudder I could only reply, “Of course I will,” forcing my face into a faint, melancholy smile. I mustn’t make her angry, I thought, frightened. I had to distract her somehow. I became so focused on placating this ugly, disagreeable woman that I soon found myself entertaining her. I tried to make her laugh with my jokes, and w
hen she bought me presents (they were always in the worst possible taste, and I gave most of them away to people like the old man running the yakitori stall) I forced myself to feign delight. One summer night when she simply wouldn’t leave me alone, I led her into a dark alley and kissed her in the hope it would make her go home. Instead, she grew wild with excitement, and, overcome by a crude madness, hailed a taxi to take us to one of the tiny offices the movement rented secretly, where we raised quite the racket until dawn. I smiled wryly as I wondered just what kind of elder sister she thought herself to be.

  Along with the girl at my boarding house, I had no choice but to see this “comrade” every day, and, unlike the other women I’d known, there was no way to avoid them. Before long my usual anxiety took over, and I was running myself ragged in my attempts to keep the both of them happy. I felt trapped, unable to move so much as a finger.

  Around the same time one of the waitresses at a large Ginza café did me an unexpected favor. Though I’d only met her the one time, I couldn’t dispel my sense of obligation, so, again I found myself all but paralyzed with worry and imagined fears. I’d learned by then to affect sufficient impudence that I no longer needed Horiki to guide me about town. I could take the train on my own, go to Kabuki plays, and even walk into cafés, dressed though I was in cheap, threadbare clothes. On the inside, of course, I was the same as I’d always been, and the suspicion, terror, and anxiety I felt toward the violence and confidence of human beings was undiminished. Only on the surface had I slowly reached the point where I could greet people with a straight face. Well, no, that’s not precisely true. I invariably employed the wry grin of a defeated clown, but, regardless, though my greetings and small talk might be hopelessly confused, I’d nevertheless managed to cultivate a “talent” for it. Was it thanks to my work with the movement? Or was it women? Or liquor? The main reason I was starting to acquire these new skills, I suspect, is that I was broke. This induced in me a state of constant terror no matter where I was, and I thought the sense of oppression might ease somewhat if I immersed myself in the jostling crowd of drunks, waitresses, and busboys typical of big cafés. So it was that, with ten yen in my pocket, I went alone to a Ginza café and, grinning at the waitress, said, “I’ve only got ten yen, so don’t expect much.”