I want to write stories that are different from the ones I've written so far, Junpei thought: I want to write about people who dream and wait for the night to end, who long for the light so they can hold the ones they love. But right now I have to stay here and keep watch over this woman and this girl. I will never let anyone-not anyone-try to put them into that crazy box- not even if the sky should fall or the earth crack open with a roar.

What was lost was lost. There was no retrieving it, however you schemed, no returning to how things were, no going back.

The power to concentrate was the most important thing. Living without this power would be like opening one’s eyes without seeing anything.

This was never any place I was meant to be. This isn’t a place for me.

Everybody feels safe belonging not to the excluded minority but to the excluding majority. You think, Oh, I’m glad that’s not me. It’s basically the same in all periods in all societies. If you belong to the majority, you can avoid thinking about lots of troubling things.

We all die and disappear, but that's because the mechanism of the world itself is built on destruction and loss.

In Japan, the writers have made up a literary community, a circle, a society. I think 90 percent of Japan's writers live in Tokyo. Naturally, they make a community. There are groups and customs, and so they are tied up in a way.