ljbooks1 's review for:

The Setting Sun by Osamu Dazai, Donald Keene
4.0

To wait. In our lives, we know joy, anger, sorrow, and a hundred other emotions, but these emotions all together occupy a bare one per cent of our time. The remaining ninety-nine per cent is just living in waiting.

Very sad. But very beautiful.
How does Dazai write of such tragic subjects such as grief and death and sadness in such a poetic way? His writing captivated me and made me feel so many things I have never before. This book made me feel empty and yet not alone at the same time. A truly strange feeling.
I wanted to read this book to learn more about the life and psychology of Osamu Dazai and I saw glimpses of his troubled, complicated and dark mind while reading this. Fascinating.

"When I pretended to be precocious, people started the rumour that I was precocious. When I acted like an idler, rumour had it I was an idler. When I pretended I couldn't write a novel, people said I couldn't write. When I acted like a liar, they called me a liar. When I acted like a rich man, they started the rumour I was rich. When I feigned indifference, they classed me as the indifferent type. But when I inadvertently groaned because I was really in pain, they started the rumour that I was faking suffering. The world is out of joint."