EIJI YOSHIKAWA QUOTES

Japanese novelist (1892-1962)

Eiji Yoshikawa quote

The greatest happiness of life was to stand at the difficult border between success and failure.

EIJI YOSHIKAWA

Taiko

Tags: success


Her only weapons were her tears.

EIJI YOSHIKAWA

Taiko

Tags: tears


To Kiyomori each stall, each soul here seemed borne under by the crushing weight of the world; everyone here was a pitiful weed, trodden underfoot -- a conglomeration of human lives putting down roots in this slime, living and letting live in the struggle to survive; and he was stirred by the fearful and magnificent courage communicated by the scene.

EIJI YOSHIKAWA

The Heike Story


Oh, you crows! Feast away! What a spread! Soup straight from the eye sockets! And thick red sake! But don't have too much Or you'll surely get drunk.

EIJI YOSHIKAWA

Musashi


When a woman dislikes the man who is courting her, she parries him cleverly, like a willow in the wind.

EIJI YOSHIKAWA

Taiko

Tags: dating


Think what you like. There are people who die by remaining alive and others who gain life by dying.

EIJI YOSHIKAWA

Musashi

Tags: death


It is easy to surpass a predecessor, but difficult to avoid being surpassed by a successor.

EIJI YOSHIKAWA

Musashi


Hold on to your life and make it honest and brave.

EIJI YOSHIKAWA

Musashi

Tags: life


It does happen, of course, that the priesthood has been on bad terms with womankind for some three thousand years. You see, Buddhism teaches that women are evil. Fiends. Messengers of hell. I've spent years immersed in the scriptures, so it's no accident that you and I fight all the time.

EIJI YOSHIKAWA

The Way of the Samurai

Tags: women


People tend to be put off by the idea of selling sex, but if you spend a winter's night with one of them and talk with her about her family and so on, you're likely to find she's just like any other woman.

EIJI YOSHIKAWA

The Art of War

Tags: prostitution


The bitter winds in February were sometimes called the First East Winds, but the longing for spring somehow made them seem more piercing.

EIJI YOSHIKAWA

The Heike Story


The world is a stone wall ... and they have put the stones so close together that there is not a single crack through which one may enter.

EIJI YOSHIKAWA

Musashi


The summit is believed to be the object of the climb. But its true object--the joy of living--is not in the peak itself, but in the adversities encountered on the way up.

EIJI YOSHIKAWA

Taiko

Tags: mountain climbing


The truth of the scholar, alone in his study, does not always accord with what the world at large considers to be true.

EIJI YOSHIKAWA

Musashi

Tags: truth


There's not much benefit in attacking an empty house.

EIJI YOSHIKAWA

Taiko


Enemies were teachers in disguise.

EIJI YOSHIKAWA

Musashi


Danger was the grindstone on which the swordsman whetted his spirit.

EIJI YOSHIKAWA

Musashi

Tags: danger


A wise man who cultivates wisdom may sometimes drown in it.

EIJI YOSHIKAWA

Taiko

Tags: wisdom


It is easy to crush an enemy outside oneself but impossible to defeat an enemy within.

EIJI YOSHIKAWA

Musashi

Tags: enemies


Sincerity, even if it speaks with a stutter, will sound eloquent when inspired.

EIJI YOSHIKAWA

Taiko

Tags: sincerity