An Exploration Of Osamu Dazai’s Mental Pressure From The Perspective Of His Literature

Osamu Dazai is a representative writer of the Deviant School in modern Japanese literature. His works tend to reflect a bitter and desperate emotion of the people in modern Japanese society in a humorous and disillusioned style. Similar to his works, his life is covered in a pessimistic shade. From college years on, he committed suicide for love for several times in vain. However, he finally drowned himself at Tamagawa Ditch with Yazamakitomie.Existing researches on Osamu Tazai and his works usually try to interpret his personality and works in terms of his negative and decadent style of writing, besides the stylistic analysis. This thesis mainly examines two master works of Osamu Tazai, namely The Setting Sun (1947) and Human Lost (1948). Based on the analysis of figures in the two works and the investigation of the author’s career and the time background, the author tries to explore and analyze the negative and desperate side of his personality and how both sides formed.Despite the decadency and negativity Osamu Dazai shows, some figures in his works betray his longing for good things and happiness and his expectations for changing the reality and living an active life. However, his growth environment and the society environment made him fragile and sensitive. He lost belief in people around him and fears of communication. The weight of bitterness, as a burden of a deep sense of sin, brought him to suicide time after time. As a result, he pushed himself to a loveless world, though he longed for hope and admission from others. Consequently, the desperate side won and he ended his life by suicide.The main body of this thesis consists of four chapters.Chapter One mainly examines the decadency in The Setting Sun, represented by two figures, Naoji and Uehara. They are different in social status as Naoji is a declined nobleman and Uehara is a man of letters from humble birth. But, they are common in terms of their decadent life, self-abandonment, excessive drinking because of their dissatisfaction with the society and their lost of hope in life. They show the decadent side in the personality of the author himself. This chapter is composed of two parts, each of which analyzes the life style and unhappiness of each figure, in order to reveal their thoughts and views of life. Chapter Two explores the process in which the protagonist in Human Lost, Yozo, loses himself. The whole novel leaves a negative and gloomy impression on readers. The protagonist gets autism and melancholia. His weak and sensitive heart disables him from communicating with and believing in others. Gradually, he feels desperate about his life, fails to find the meaning of his existence, and loses himself at last. Human Lost is an autobiographical novel. The author projects his own experience and mind onto the protagonist Yozo to a large extend. Therefore, the mental analysis of Yozo can thoroughly reveals the ideas and thoughts of the author himself.Chapter Three explores the positive side of the two novels. The present author focuses on two female figures in The Setting Sun, Kazuko and mother, and reexamines Yozo’s confession of his heart, in order to find out the positive side of these figures. The mother in The Setting Sun, mild and hoping for nothing, is called the real blue-blooded. Kazuko is so fearless that she has the bravery to challenge the traditional morality and the reality. Although generally a desperate figure, part of Yozo’s confession betrays his longing and pursuit for nice things. This chapter explores the positive side of Osamu Tazai’s personality through the analysis of these three figures.Chapter Four analyzes the internal and external factors for the formation of the mental pressure of Osamu Tazai. The objective growth environment and social environment as external factors bring a negative impact to his personality formation. The want of parental love makes him fragile and sensitive. He dreams of a world of kindness and love with mutual trust and honesty. However, the hypocrisy of the society disables him from belief in and communications with others. He gets trapped in an abyss of misery and desperation. Gradually, his personality splits, with thirst of care and admission from others and self-negation and self-destruction at the same time. Moreover, he even deliberately destroys his beautiful life in order to describe sin and evil in his works. Finally, he kills himself, unable to forgive the desperate self.