“I am convinced that human life is filled with pure, happy, serene specimens of insincerity.”
The plot of the book in a few lines: non-enthralling story of a Japanese artist, Yozo, with the syndrome of feeling rejected by society. To gain acceptance and be the center of attention he devises empty antics, which over the years have less and less hold on those around him. Nothing relevant would be said, a story like many others devoid of originality; but is this enough to tell the story of the book? No, not even in the slightest.
Who is disqualified? Who is Yozo?
Yozo is the author of the book, with which share many autobiographical aspects. By extension he is also the representative of an entire generation of Japanese who, in the aftermath of the Second World War (the first edition dates back to 1948), find themselves living in a new world, catapulted into modernity and the assimilation of values westerners.
Yozo is Japan that came out of the war resized, in search of a place for the new world order, from which he risks feeling not accepted. Surrounded by other states that look at him with distrust, not convinced if he can be trusted all the way.
Yozo is the hidden part inside all men, when we feel like going in the opposite direction to the rest of society, or infiltrating a party we weren’t invited to. State of mind typical of the youngest age, but which we can assure also returns in waves in adulthood.
Yozo is melancholy.
The writing is syncopated. We don’t know if this is the result of a translation that should be refreshed, or from the desire to remain strictly adherent to the original text. Some reading interruptions, with a search for terminology that did not fully convince us, led us to have to go back to some pages and jump between the lines; as if we were driving a car in which he was wrong to put the petrol and it hardly goes on. Without, however, questioning the quality of the car, which remains of a high value.
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Osamu Dazai, Lo squalificato, Feltrinelli, Milano, 2022
Original edition: 人間失格 Ningen shikkaku, 1948