Ten Needles
One—Certain People
I know that there are certain people who are in this world. These people analyze and they dissect. To put it another way, a single rose, to these people, along with being beautiful, is ultimately seen as the Rosaceae in botany textbooks. Even when they are snapping off the flowers…
But intuitive people are happier than those people. One of the virtues of what might be called seriousness is not granted to those people (who analyze and dissect). Those people exhaust their whole lives in a terrible game. All sorts of happiness, in order for these people to dissect, is diminished, and likewise all sorts of pain, in order to dissect, is amplified. The phrase, “If I was never born,” describes these people perfectly.
Two—We
We are not necessarily we. Our ancestors all breathe within us. If we abide by the ancestors within us, we must fall into unhappiness. “Past deeds” is used to figuratively explain this sort of unhappiness. “Finding ourselves,” then, is finding our ancestors within us. And at the same time finding the gods in heaven which control us.
Three—The Crow and the Peacock
The most terrifying fact for us is that is that we, in the end, cannot overcome ourselves. If we blindfold ourselves with all sorts of optimism, a crow cannot become a peacock, no matter how long we wait. A single poem of a given poet is always all of his poems.
Four—Bouquet in the Air
Science explains all sorts of things. And in will most likely do so in the future. However, what we esteem is science itself, or perhaps art itself: that is, just a bouquet caught in the air of our mental activity. Even if we do not say l’home est rien, we, “as people,” are not particularly distinct. You can find Baudelaire “as a person” at any mental hospital in the country. But Les Fleurs du mal and Prose Poems have not once been in their hands.
Five—2+2＝4
2+2＝4 is a fact. But as a matter of fact you must confirm the innumerable factor of the + (plus) in between. That is to say, all sorts of problems are contained within this +.
Six—Heaven
If we were able to create heaven, it would just be on the earth. This heaven, naturally, would most likely be a heaven where roses bloomed among the thorns. There, besides people contented by that despair known as “resignation,” there would just be many dogs walking around. There is nothing at all bad about becoming a dog.
Seven—Repentance
Our hearts must be moved by all sorts of repentance. But, the shape of all repentance is, “try and not do what I HAVE done. Try and do what I have SAID.”
Eight—Other Certain People
I also know certain people. These people are completely and totally insatiable. They try to get one more woman or one more idea or one more China pink or one more slice of bread. Therefore there is no one who lives more in luxury than these people. And at the same time there is no one who lives more in misery than these people. These people, unawares, have become the slaves of many things. Accordingly, even if they were offered heaven by a stranger—or perhaps the path to heaven—in the end, heaven cannot become a possession of these people. Most likely these people have been granted the words, “Greed will be the death of you.” These people cannot in the least receive satisfaction from even a fan of peacock feathers or a meal of suckling pig. These people inevitably cannot find anything but sadness and pain (in addition to the natural sadness and pain not looked for but found). There these people are digging a trough to separate them from other people. These people are not fools. But, they are fools above fools. What saves these people may just be what is changed by people besides them. Therefore there is no way they can be saved.
Nine—A Voice
It is thought that a single voice talking in a great throng of shouters can never be heard. But, it truth it can be heard. As long as a single lick of flame remains in our hearts: then from time to time his voice may hold a microphone of posterity.
Ten—Words
We cannot transmit our feelings easily to strangers. That is just dependent on the people we transmit our feelings to. In the long ago days of Sakyamuni, of course, when even a newspaper article of a hundred lines or so did not satisfy a stranger’s feelings, there is nothing that can possibly be understood. The one who understands “his” words must always be “the second him.” However, that “him” always grows like a plant. Therefore his words of a certain era may not be understandable to anyone but “him” of a second era. No, he may even appear to be a stranger to even himself of a certain era. But, fortunately “the second him” believed he understood “his” words.
(July 1927)*
(Posthumous)
*Akutagawa committed suicide on July 24, 1927, so this is likely one of the first of Akutagawa’s works published posthumously. I imagine literary magazines would have been rushing to publish any stories they had received and not run yet.