Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in No Longer Human, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Social Isolation and Alienation
Compassion and Mutual Suffering
Depression, Mental Health, and Stigmatization
Self-Expression, Privacy, and Art
Summary
Analysis
A new narrative voice declares that he has lived a shameful life. He doesn’t even know, he claims, what it’s like to be human. Ordinary things seem foreign and strange to him. When he was a child, for example, it took him a long time to grasp the purpose of a small bridge connecting one train platform to another—he thought the bridge was simply there for people to climb, and he found this very “elegant” in and of itself. He lost interest in it when he realized what it was really for. Similarly, he used to think pillowcases were purely decorative, but when he realized they have an actual purpose, he felt deeply depressed by what he saw as “human dullness.”
It's reasonable to conclude that the new narrative voice belongs to the man in the pictures, whom the unnamed speaker described in the prologue. This section, it seems, is drawn from the personal notebooks of the person from the photographs. The unnamed speaker found this person unsettling and somehow unhuman, but now it becomes clear that the subject himself feels somewhat estranged from human life—he doesn’t understand the things that make people tick, and when he does grasp common aspects of human nature, he finds it all so “dull[]” that it depresses him. There is, then, something to the speaker’s idea that this person is fundamentally at odds with the rest of humanity.
Themes
The writer of this notebook is named Yozo. He continues to write about how he has never understood human feelings. As a child, for instance, he was never hungry—he ate, but only because he understood that this was something he was supposed to do. In fact, he always stuffed himself to make his parents happy when he came home from school, doing whatever he could to please them. But he never felt a physical need to eat. He has also never understood human happiness, which he himself has never experienced. It’s mystifying to him that other people manage to find pleasure in life and take interest in mundane things. Yozo, for his part, has felt burdened and tormented by the mere fact of his own existence since he was a young boy, and this makes it impossible for him to appreciate life in any way whatsoever.
From the very beginning of his life, it seems, Yozo has been unhappy. Yozo himself doesn’t necessarily clarify why this is the case, nor does the novel as a whole—but that’s not the point of No Longer Human, which doesn’t purport to explain anything about depression or alienation. Rather, the novel simply puts these things on display by sweeping readers up in Yozo’s feelings of despair and isolation.
Themes
Yozo continues to write about his childhood. Because he’s unable to feel the same things as other people, he invents a way of tricking others into thinking he’s just like everyone else. He starts “clowning,” or figuring out how to make people laugh and give them joy. He himself derives no happiness from this behavior, but he becomes remarkably good at getting others to laugh at him. The idea of people criticizing him in any way horrifies Yozo—in fact, humans in general horrify him, which is why he decides to do whatever he can to make them laugh. If they laugh at him, he figures, then they might pose less of a threat.
Even though Yozo feels isolated and as if he couldn’t possibly understand the people around him, he seems to have a knack for endearing himself to others. In a way, though, his expertise when it comes to “clowning” only makes it harder for him to relate to others, since behaving in this way requires him to actively hide who he really is, thus ensuring that nobody will ever get close to him—and, in turn, that he’ll never genuinely feel part of the surrounding society.
Themes
Yozo’s “clowning” isn’t just something he does at school or in public. He also does it at home, thereby deceiving his family members into thinking he’s a lighthearted, funny boy. Once, though, when his father is about to leave on a business trip, Yozo finds it difficult to please him. His father gathers Yozo and his siblings and asks them each what they want him to bring back as a present, writing their answers in a notebook. When it’s his turn, Yozo can’t think of anything—there’s nothing he could possibly want. His father suggests a lion’s mask, but Yozo still can’t respond, and it becomes clear that this annoys his father.
Part of what Yozo has trouble with is the idea of having to live up to certain expectations, even if those expectations are relatively small or insignificant. For instance, his father expects him to want some sort of gift. Yozo, however, clearly doesn’t want anything and is overwhelmed by his father’s assumption that he would. Because he always tries to please people, though, he doesn’t know what to say. His defense mechanism—which helps him maintain a sense of emotional distance from those around him—thus puts him in a difficult position, as he isn’t sure what to tell his father to make him happy.
Themes
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Yozo’s brother interjects on Yozo’s behalf, telling his father that he should get him a book. His father seems disappointed and angry. Later that night, Yozo realizes that he should have just said he wanted the lion mask—his father clearly wanted to give it to him. He thus sneaks downstairs, finds his father’s notebook, and writes “LION MASK” in it. When his father returns from the trip, Yozo hears him talking to his mother, happily telling her how surprised he was to find “LION MASK” written in his notebook. In a satisfied tone, he says that young Yozo must have wanted the lion mask so badly that he was too shy to say anything.
Although he doesn’t think of it in the moment, Yozo manages to please his father in the end by making him think that he desperately wanted the lion’s mask. In a way, then, the lion’s mask itself comes to represent the great lengths Yozo will go to in order to satisfy others—a tendency that stems from his general discomfort around other people.
Themes
In school, Yozo is extremely successful at getting his classmates to laugh. He can even get his teachers to crack a smile, even when he’s misbehaving. He often draws funny cartoons, which greatly please his peers. For homework assignments, he writes outlandish stories that, although they don’t align with what he’s supposed to write about, ultimately succeed in making his teacher chuckle.
Nobody in Yozo’s life would know how detached and alienated he feels from the surrounding society. Because he’s so successful at pleasing others and acting happy, though, he ultimately isolates himself all the more, making it impossible for anyone to authentically connect with him.
Themes
Of course, Yozo’s “clowning” doesn’t reflect how he feels internally. He’s like an actor who’s constantly performing, even for his family and their many servants. He thus feels like his “true nature” is at odds with his jovial outward demeanor, especially after the family’s servants begin to sexually abuse him. This makes him feel as if he has been “corrupted.” To do this to a child, he writes in his notebook, is the most horrific and vile thing a person can do. At the time, though, he doesn’t say anything, instead “endur[ing]” the abuse and allowing it to inform his overall conception of humanity.
It's noteworthy that Yozo’s sense of alienation and despair comes before he’s sexually abused by his family’s waitstaff. Of course, this traumatic experience undoubtedly exacerbates his feelings of isolation and fear, but it’s not the cause of these feelings—an important detail, as the novel presents Yozo’s sorrow and loneliness as things that are seemingly inherent to who he is as a person; that is, his depression and sense of isolation don’t come from a single experience—they’re more ambiguous and thus harder to address.
Themes
Yozo feels alienated from his own parents, so he doesn’t think to tell them about what the servants have been doing to him. And because he feels like he doesn’t understand other humans, the idea of telling someone about being sexually abused seems impossible, since he has no idea how they would react. In the ensuing years, he notices that women tend to seek him out, and he posits that this is because they see him as “a man who [can] keep a love secret.”
Tragically, Yozo’s isolation from everyone around him makes it feel impossible for him to open up to his family members about his experience with sexual abuse. Even as a young child, then, he feels utterly alone, and this traumatic experience clearly makes him feel even more alienated from his surroundings.
Themes
