No Longer Human: A Character Study

Photo Credit: Osamu Dazai

No Longer Human, is a semi-autobiographical tale of what it feels like to be alienated from humanity. The main character, Yozo Obo, is one of Dazai Osamu’s most popular characters, as well as one of the most iconic in Japanese literature. Dazai, much like Yozo, struggled with his humanity. He used drugs, alcohol, and more of the like to fill the void. Dazai attempted suicide multiple times throughout his life, and he writes these attempts in detail through his main character, Yozo. These attempts, to me, seem strongly related to autism-induced symptoms, and most of what Yozo is written with is a side effect of autism.

We know Dazai struggled with his humanity, and we know he often attempted and thought of suicide. We also know he spent most of the time he wasn’t writing in a bar, reading books by his favorite western authors. He lived a secluded life, most of his interactions on record are with another famous Japanese poet, Chuuya Nakahara. These interactions seem very catered towards what Chuuya wanted, it is not believed that Dazai hated him, but that he was acting as such because Chuuya claimed to hate him. 

This remains true in No Longer Human. Yozo would do anything to act the way somebody wanted him to, and the acts are so well written it’s hard to believe Dazai didn’t act them out himself. His interactions with Horiki, for example, are very similar to the author’s. Yozo is very aware of the fact that Horiki is using him for amusement, yet he continues to play the willing role of the jester. He doesn’t know how else to behave in front of humans.

As mentioned previously, Dazai’s lifestyle and the way he depicts Yozo’s loss of humanity are very reminiscent of tell-tale autism symptoms. Yozo (and Dazai) are both very intelligent, and though they have been told they were very lucky by the people around them (Dazai was born an aristocrat), they both still struggled with their perception of themselves and suicidal ideation. According to a study done by Carver College of Medicine, autistic children are 28 times more likely to think about or try suicide, and 15% of autistic children have suicidal thoughts. This is increased if the child has an IQ of 120 or higher. “The conventional wisdom is that higher IQ leads to better outcomes, period. Whether you are talking about neurodevelopmental conditions like ADHD or autism, neuropsychiatric conditions like schizophrenia or bipolar disorder, or neurodegenerative diseases like Parkinson’s or Alzheimer’s,” says Jacob Michaelson, “If you don’t look at diagnosis, higher IQ results in fewer thoughts of suicide. However, if you look at IQ among autistic people, we found the opposite—that higher cognitive ability is significantly related to more suicidal thoughts in autistic children.” This correlates to Yozo’s character. We know he’s very smart, the entire novel and his boredom with school as well as his struggle to remain subpar in school are a testimony to that fact, but his autistic symptoms are harder to locate. In his first notebook Yozo writes the following: “It is almost impossible for me to converse with other people. What should I talk about, how should I say it?--- I don’t know.” His struggle with how to speak to humans doesn’t stem from an insecurity with humanity, despite his own lack of humanity he understands the race quite well, but from autism. 

Because he was naturally unable to understand tone inflection or why humans do the things they do, he made an attempt to overcompensate and fully grasp their kind. He shows this many times throughout the novel, but the most notable is when he writes “As long as I can make them laugh, it doesn’t matter how, I’ll be alright. If I succeed in that, the human beings probably won’t mind it too much if I remain outside their lives.” 

Codependency, as a side effect of his self-proclaimed lack of humanity, is also a huge part of why both Yozo and Dazai behave the way they do. Yozo is only able to write and speak of his experiences with other people, his suicides are never attempted alone, and when he isn’t around people the only descriptors we get are of agony and despair. Dazai himself also seemed to struggle with codependency issues. He started to attempt suicide much more frequently after his favorite author, Ryunosuke Akuatagwa, committed suicide. He followed Ryunosuke’s career closely, and when he succeeded in his suicide Dazai lost all hope he had for humanity. Something similar happens to Yozo in this tale, after the success of his lover’s suicide (the first and only woman Yozo ever loved) and the fail of his own, Yozo fell into a deep depression. That suicide attempt was the first of many, much like Dazai’s own life. However, Yozo is only codependent to a certain extent— yes, he does need people to function and tell him how to behave, but he is also very quick to trade his people out. Once someone gets too close, or he feels they’ve discovered the ‘truth’ of his clowning, he flees. He changes addresses, lovers, friends, schools, and even bars multiple times throughout the novel. He blames ‘society’ for pushing him out of the role of a human, but in the end, everything that happened to Yozo was extremely self-sabotaging. 

Yozo lacked humanity, I believe it was Dazai’s goal to portray him in such a way. At first the reader can’t fault him for behaving the way he did, but as the novel goes on, Yozo’s humanity fades more and more.  One of the women Yozo had wreaked havoc upon is the final person to speak in No Longer Human, and she says the following: “It’s his father’s fault, the Yozo we knew was so easy-going and amusing, and if only he hadn’t drunk— no, even though he did drink— he was a good boy, an angel.” The translator, Donald Keene, surmises that this final line proves Yozo was unaware of his own humanity, I disagree. I believe Dazai intended to create himself in Yozo, and Dazai truly believed he was not worthy of the title of human, and he must have believed no one would miss him after his death. It is because of this that I believe he had intended to further prove Yozo was inhumane. Because, even after his supposed death, Yozo was not seen as a human being; he was seen as an angel. 

This is where I think Yozo and Dazai are different. Yozo was made in accordance with Dazai’s own beliefs, and as a result he was painted to be perceived as something inhuman, but Dazai is certainly human. When it comes down to it, there is nothing more human than questioning your own humanity.