When I pretended to be precocious, people started the rumor that I was precocious. When I acted like an idler, rumor 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 rumor 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 rumor that I was faking suffering. The world is out of joint.

As for love . . . no, having once written that word I can write nothing more.

To be a friend of the weak-that is the artist's point of departure as well as his ultimate goal.

But happiness is being able to hope, however faintly, for happiness. So, at least, we must believe if we are to live in the world of today.

The weak fear happiness itself. They can harm themselves on cotton wool. Sometimes they are wounded even by happiness

What uneasiness lies in being loved.

One day, I went to a soba restaurant outside town, and while I was waiting for the zarusoba I opened an old graph magazine. There was a picture of an exhausted, lonely kneeling woman who wore a checked patterned yukata after the tradegy of a large earthquake. With the intensity of my chest ready to burn up, I fell in love with that poor woman. I also felt a horrifying desire for her. Maybe tragedy and desire are back to back to one another.