Author's Note ~ 2

by Osamu Dazai

This novel is written in the form of letters from a 20-year-old boy, battling illness at a sanatorium called "Health Dojo," to his best friend. The letter format might have been uncommon in previous newspaper novels. Therefore, readers might be a little confused for the first few installments, but the letter format has a strong sense of reality and has been attempted by many writers since ancient times.

Regarding the title "Pandora's Box," it will be discussed in detail in tomorrow's first installment, so there will be no specific mention of it here.

This has turned into a somewhat blunt preface, but sometimes novels written by men who give such unsociable greetings can be surprisingly interesting.

Please don't misunderstand, you. I'm not down in the dumps at all. Reading your letter of comfort, I was a little confused and blushed with embarrassment. I felt strangely restless. You might get angry if I say this, but after reading your letter, I thought, "How old-fashioned." A new curtain has already been raised, a completely new curtain that our ancestors never experienced.

Let's stop with the old pretensions. Most of them are lies anyway. Now, I don't even care about the illness in my chest. I've completely forgotten about the illness. Not just the illness, but everything. I didn't enter this health retreat because I suddenly became afraid of death after the war, nor because I wanted to build a strong body and achieve success, nor out of tearful filial piety to quickly cure my illness and relieve my parents' worries. But I didn't come to this remote place out of some strange desperation either. Isn't it an old "ideological" mistake to explain every single human action? Forced explanations often end up as fabricated lies. I've had enough of theoretical games. Concepts have already been exhausted. So, I want to say that there's no particular reason why I entered this health retreat. One day, at a certain time, the Holy Spirit crept into my chest, tears streamed down my cheeks, and at that moment, I cried a lot by myself, my body felt light, and my head felt cool and transparent, and from that moment on, I became a different man. Although I had hidden it until then, I immediately told my mother.

"I coughed up blood."

My father chose this mountain health retreat for me. That's really all there is to it. What do I mean by "one day, at a certain time"? You'll understand too. It was that day. It was noon on that day. It was that moment when I cried and apologized to a voice from heaven, almost like a miracle.

Ever since that day, I feel as if I've been placed on a new, large ship. Where this ship is going, I don't know either. I'm still in a dreamlike state. The ship smoothly pulls away from the shore. I can vaguely sense that this route seems to be a completely new, maiden voyage that no one in the world has ever experienced, but for now, I just feel like I've been welcomed onto a new, large ship and am obediently proceeding according to the heavenly currents.

But, please, don't misunderstand me. I am by no means becoming something like a void born of despair. The departure of a ship, regardless of its nature, always evokes some faint sense of expectation. That is one of the unchanging aspects of human nature since ancient times. You know the story of Pandora's Box from Greek mythology, don't you? Because she opened a box that should not have been opened, all sorts of ominous things crawled out—sickness, sorrow, jealousy, greed, suspicion, malice, hunger, hatred—and humans were doomed to suffer eternally in misfortune. But in a corner of that box, a tiny glowing stone the size of a grain of sand remained, and on that stone was written the word "Hope."

That has been decided since ancient times. Despair is impossible for humans. Humans are often deceived by hope, but similarly, they can also be deceived by the concept of "despair." I'll be honest. Even when humans are plunged into the depths of misfortune and tumble around, they always manage to find a glimmer of hope. That is a fact that has been ordained by the gods of Olympus since Pandora's Box. Leaving behind those who grandiosely lecture with optimism and pessimism on the shore, our ship of a new era glides smoothly forward, a step ahead. There is no congestion whatsoever. It is like the spreading of a plant's vine, resembling the natural heliotropism that transcends consciousness.

Truly, from now on, let us stop with the pretentious talk that indiscriminately treats people as unpatriotic and blames them. It only makes this unfortunate world even more gloomy. Isn't it often the case that those who blame others are the ones doing bad things in secret? I hope there are no politicians who, just because we lost the war again, are hastily fabricating temporary deceptions and trying to pull off something clever. Such shallow excuses have ruined Japan, so I truly hope they will be careful from now on. If we repeat such things again, we might become the laughingstock of the world. Let's stop boasting and become simpler, more straightforward people. The new ship has already glided out into the sea.

I, too, have experienced a great deal of hardship so far. As you know, last spring, immediately after graduating from junior high school, I developed a high fever and pneumonia, and was bedridden for three months. Because of that, I couldn't take the high school entrance exam, and just when I thought I could finally get up, I had a persistent low fever, and the doctor suspected pleurisy. While I was just idling at home, this year's exam period also passed by.

From that time on, I lost the desire to go to a higher school. When I think about what I'm going to do now, everything goes dark before my eyes. I felt sorry for my father just playing around at home, and I was filled with a sense of shame towards my mother. You might not understand since you haven't experienced being a ronin, but it's truly a painful hell. At that time, I was simply weeding the fields diligently. By imitating a farmer, I was at least trying to save face.

As you know, there's a field of about a hundred pyeong behind my house. For some reason, it seems to have been registered under my name for a long time. Perhaps because of that, when I step into the field, I feel a sense of ease, as if I've escaped a little from the surrounding pressure. For the past year or two, I've become something like the head of this field. I've been pulling weeds, turning over the soil, and making stakes for tomatoes, hoping to contribute even a little to increasing food production, somehow getting through each day.

However, my friend, a lump of anxiety like a black cloud that I just can't shake off clings to the depths of my chest. Living like this, what will become of me? I'm nothing, just unemployed. When I think that, I'm dumbfounded. I have no idea what to do. And when I think that my living, being such a slovenly person, only causes trouble for others and is utterly meaningless, it becomes unbearably painful.

A genius like you might not understand, but there's nothing more painful than the awareness that "my existence is causing trouble for others. I am superfluous."