Quotes from Jun'ichir? Tanizaki

When I saw the illustration a new idea came to me. Might it not be possible to have Satsuko's face and figure carved on my tombstone in the manner of such a Bodhisattva, to use her as the secret model for a Kannon or Seishi? After all, I have no religious beliefs, any sort of faith will do for me; my only conceivable divinity is Satsuko. Nothing could be better than to lie buried under her image.

You are being very demanding indeed. Where, I wonder, will we find the woman to satisfy you You really should have stayed single--all woman-worshippers should be single. They never find the woman who answers all the requirements.

The sun never knew how wonderful it was," the architect Louis Kahn said, "until it fell on the wall of a building

So benumbed are we nowadays by electric lights that we have become utterly insensitive to the evils of excessive illumination

Perhaps I am already tired of life—I feel as if it makes no difference when I die. The other day at the Toranomon Hospital when they told me it might be cancer, my wife and Miss Sasaki seemed to turn pale, but I was quite calm. It was surprising that I could be calm even at such a moment. I almost felt relieved, to think that my long, long life was finally coming to an end.

More than anything else, I love the sensation of the weight of the soup in my hand when I hold the soup bowl in my hand and the warm, fresh taste of the soup. It's like having the warmth of a newborn baby's squishy flesh in my hand.

We do not dislike everything that shines, but we do prefer a pensive lustre to a shallow brilliance, a murky light that, whether in a stone or an artifact, bespeaks a sheen of antiquity. . . . we do love things that bear the marks of grime, soot, and weather, and we love the colours and the sheen that call to mind the past that made them.

Teinosuke preferred not to be too deeply involved in domestic problems, and particularly with regard to Etsuko's upbringing he was of the view that matters might best be left to his wife. Lately, however, with the outbreak of the China Incident, he had become conscious of the need to train strong, reliant women, women able to support the man behind the gun.

I wouldn't mind being injured if that would bring Satsuko pleasure, and a mortal injury would be all the better. Yet to think of being trampled to death, not by her but by her dog…

My heart was full of the loneliness that follows merriment.

But it is on occasions like this that I always think how different everything would be if we in the Orient had developed our own science. Suppose for instance that we had developed our own physics and chemistry: would not the techniques and industries based on them have taken a different form, would not our myriads of everyday gadgets, our medicines, the products of our industrial art - would they not have suited our national temper better than they do?

Children retain a great deal, and when they grow up they start going over things and rejudging them from a grownup's point of view. This must have been this way, and that was that way, they say. That's why you have to be careful with children—some day they grow up.

But when Kaname asked: Would you like to separate, then? Misako answered: Would you? They knew that divorce was the solution, and yet neither had the courage to propose it, each was left face to face with his own weakness.

she basked gratefully in the warmth of her husband's love

En aquel momento tenía la sensación de haber accedido bruscamente a otro mundo, había ascendido a una altura vertiginosa, al cenit del éxtasis. Aquello era la realidad, y el pasado una mera ilusión. Estábamos solos, abrazados… Tal vez lo que estaba haciendo acabaría conmigo, pero esos momentos durarían eternamente.

Si dice che un amore eccessivo susciti un odio cento volte più grande.

When I compared them to Naomi, I sensed an unmistakable difference in refinement between those who are born to the higher classes of society and those who aren't... there's no concealing bad birth and breeding.

The conveniences of modern culture cater exclusively to youth, and that the times grow increasingly inconsiderate of old people

My darling Naomi, I don't just love you, I worship you. You're my treasure. You're a diamond that I found and polished. I'll buy you anything that'll make you beautiful. I'll give you my whole salary.

My shoulders were light again, as though I'd been cured of the ague, and my tears stopped.

I know few greater pleasures than holding a lacquer soup bowl in my hands, feeling upon my palms the weight of the liquid and its mild warmth. The sensation is something like that of holding a plump newborn baby.

To Yukiko, however, drawn as she was to the past, there was something very unsatisfactory about this brother in law, and she was sure that from his grave her father too was reproaching Tatsuo.

A igual blancura, la de un papel de Occidente difiere por naturaleza de la de un hosho7 o un papel blanco de China. Los rayos luminosos parecen rebotar en la superficie del papel occidental, mientras que la del hosho o del papel de China, similar a la aterciopelada superficie de la primera nieve, los absorbe con suavidad. Además, nuestros papeles, agradables al tacto, se pliegan y arrugan sin ruido. Su contacto es suave y ligeramente húmedo como el de la hoja de un árbol.

Quiero que ella me vuelva loco de celos. Deseo que me haga sospechar que ha ido demasiado lejos. Quiero que haga eso.