SOURCE: “Fatal Success,” in The Saga of Dazai Osamu: A Critical Study with Translations, Stanford University Press, 1985, pp. 149–77.

In the following essay, Lyons explores parallels between Dazai's work and life.

I returned to Tokyo [from Tsugaru] feeling something akin to confidence in the pure Tsugaru character that flowed in my blood. In other words, it was rejuvenating to discover that in Tsugaru there was no such thing as “culture,” and accordingly, I, a Tsugaru man, was not in the slightest a “man of culture.” My work after that seemed to change somewhat. … I thought to myself that even if I died at that point, I could be said to have left good enough work as a Japanese writer.

—Dazai Osamu, “Fifteen Years”¹

As far as the Osamu Saga was concerned, Tsugaru had been preceded and now was followed by relative silence. Dazai was obviously busy, but his major...