As you can imagine, those who had fallen this far had been so worn down by their tortures in the seven other hells that they no longer had the strength to cry out.

For Sayonara, literally translated, ‘Since it must be so,’ of all the good-bys I have heard is the most beautiful. Unlike the Auf Wiedershens and Au revoirs, it does not try to cheat itself by...

And then there was her face: her white skin, her brown eyes, and her expression, so soft and beautiful; she looked as though she were constantly getting ready to ask a question. Even an immaculately...

Real haiku is the soul of poetry. Anything that is not actually present in one’s heart is not haiku. The moon glows, flowers bloom, insects cry, water flows. There is no place we cannot find...

When I was walking in the mountains with the Japanese man and began to hear the water, he said, ‘What is the sound of the waterfall?’ ‘Silence,’ he finally told me.

It would seem that the more irresponsible and crafty one is, the more likely one is to have a talent for storytelling.

I know I have a pretty good sense for music, but she was better than me. I used to think it was such a waste! I thought, ‘If only she had started out with a...

Directly beneath the Lotus Pond of Paradise lay the lower depths of Hell, and as He peered through the crystalline waters, He could see the River of Three Crossings and the Mountain of Needles as...

Als ich sehe, wie Harus Haar verspielt im Wind tanzt und völlig zerzaust wird, und das, obwohl das Grau da draußen doch bleischwer in der Luft lastet, erkenne ich auf einmal, wie weit, weit weg...

In a time like this, let us trust in God even more. To trust when life is easy is no trust.

I have been brought up in a world dominated by honor. I have known neither crime, poverty, nor betrayal, and here I taste hatred for the first time: it is sublime, like a thirst for...

Haiku does not express emotion from the inside out by displaying the mind of a character. Haiku builds the emotional thrust, makes the artistic statement from the outside in, from the physical world to the...

Bushido is realized in the presence of death. This means choosing death whenever there is a choice between life and death. There is no other reasoning.

I was living for one thing only, and that was to confirm my own lack of feeling.

Great robber though he was, Kandata could only trash about like a dying frog as he choked on the blood of the pond.

You know Americans…Self-improvement. No matter who or what we are, we’re always working on ways to become somebody else.

Welcome to thee,O sword of eternity!Through BuddhaAnd through Daruma alikeThou hast cleft thy way.

Dad says there are more than three thousand letters in the Japanese alphabet, which could pose a problem. There are only twenty-six letters in the English alphabet, and I get into enough trouble with them...

I think I was a Japanese schoolgirl in another life. That’s how much I love Hello Kitty.

My fake Japanese was smooth enough to earn me the title of ‘The Emperor of Pleasing Graciousness’ in that country.

If love goes too far, it turns into cruelty.

I could have sworn that the man’s eyes were no longer watching his daughter dying in agony, that instead the gorgeous colors of flames and the sight of a woman suffering in them were giving...

…and where shall we go from here? The Library is vast and infinite.

To be pleasant, gentle, calm and self-possessed: this is the basis of good taste and charm in a woman. No matter how amorous or passionate you may be, as long as you are straightforward and...

Ichigo Ichie–Nishikado Soujiroh