In Osamu Dazai’s 1948 cult-classic novel, No Longer Human, which turns 75 this year, the protagonist Yozo Oba might bring some of these characters to mind as he whiles away his days in 1930s Tokyo.

THE FLOWERS OF BUFFOONERY (New Directions, 96 pp., paperback, $14.95), a 1935 novella newly translated by Sam Bett, features an earlier version of Yozo and explores Dazai’s usual concerns in a ...

The Japanese novelist’s dark-hearted comedies are at once unhinged and brilliant. Osamu Dazai, 1924. Where to begin the story? It’s tempting to start at the end—on the morning of Osamu Dazai ...

The author Osamu Dazai committed suicide — several times. The first was on a cold December night in 1929, just before his school exams. But the overdose of sleeping pills he took was not enough ...

Osamu Dazai, trans. from the Japanese by Sam Bett. New Directions, $14.95 trade paper (96p) ISBN 978-0-8112-3454-2 This beguiling novella from Dazai (1909–1948) revisits the protagonist from the ...

Most of Dazai's information about Tsugaru is in the form of long quotations from other authors. He is more concerned with people than place, and the book unfolds as a series of encounters with ...

A portrait drawn by literary giant Osamu Dazai (1909-1948) has gone on display for the first time since it was created more than 70 years ago.