Ikiru Quotes

Life is brief / Fall in love, maiden / Before the crimson bloom / Fades from your lips / Before the tides of passion / Cool within you / For those of you / Who know no tomorrow...

We have to be greedy for life. They say greed is a vice, but that's outdated. Greed is a virtue, especially greed for enjoying life.

All these 30 years - what have I been doing there? I can't remember no matter how I try. All I remember - is just being busy - and even then I was bored.

It's fascinating. I realize it's rude to call you fascinating, but you're an extremely rare individual. I'm just a slacker who writes second-rate fiction. You've really started me thinking. They say there's something noble about suffering and it's true.

What have I been living for all these years?

"You've never had a day off, have you?" "No." "Why? Are you indispensable?" "No. I don't want them to find out they can do without me."

Misfortune teaches us the truth. Your cancer has opened your eyes to your own life. People are fickle and shallow. We only realize how beautiful life is when we face death. And even then, few of us realize it. The worst among us know nothing of life until they die.

How tragic that man can never realize how beautiful life is until he is face to face with death.

That's not art. A striptease isn't art. It's too direct. It's more direct than art. That woman's body up there? It's a big juicy steak. It's a glass of gin. It's a hormone extract. Streptomycin. Uranium!

I can't afford to hate people. I don't have that kind of time.

You're amazing! Rebelling against your past self at this age! That rebellious spirit moves me. You were a slave to your own life. Now you'll become its master. It's our human duty to enjoy life. Wasting it is desecrating God's great gift.

Ecce homo. "Behold the man." This man bears a cross called cancer. He's Christ. If you were diagnosed with cancer, you'd start dying right away. But not this fellow. That's when he started living.

Come on. Let's go reclaim the life you've wasted. Tonight it will be my pleasure to act as your Mephistopheles, but a beneficent one who won't ask for your soul.

Kanji: Tell me, where do they sell women's stockings?
Toyo: You want to buy some? Western clothing stores carry them.

After 30 years without an absence, you deserve at least six months off.

Kanji: Well, yours had holes in them.
Toyo: Do holes in my stockings make your feet cold?
Kanji: Don't get me wrong...
Toyo: I was just kidding. I know you did it out of kindness, but I feel awkward at times like this. That's why I made a bad joke. Forgive me.

Toyo: Why did you buy them for me?

Toyo: I'll cover for you. I'm not like Carp Windsock.
Kanji: Carp Windsock?
Toyo: Yes, Mr. Sakai is a human carp windsock. His lips are always flapping, but he's just hot air inside. Plus he always acts like such a big shot. He makes 200 yen more a month than I do, so he looks down on me.

Kanji: Why are you quitting?
Toyo: I'm bored. It's killing me. Every day is like the one before. Nothing new ever happens. I've put up with it for a year and a half, but the only novel thing that's happened was that you took five days off - and now this new hat of yours. That's it.

Toyo: All I do is make these little things.
Toyo: Just making these is so much fun. I feel like I'm making friends with every baby in Japan. Why don't you try making something too?
Kanji: What could I possibly make at that office.
Toyo: Yeah, it's hopeless there. You should quit and go somewhere...
Kanji: It's too late - - No - It's not too late. It's not hopeless. Even there, there's something I can do. I just have to find the will.

Kanji: Now I remember: I nearly drowned in a pond once when I was a child. I felt exactly the same way then. Everything's going black. I writhe and thrash around, but there's nothing to hold on to - except you.
Toyo: What about your son?
Kanji: Don't talk to me about him! I have no son. I'm all alone.
Toyo: But...
Kanji: No, you don't understand! My son is somewhere far away. Just as my mom and pop were when I was drowning in that pond. Remembering it now, it's even more painful than it was then.

Toyo: What help am I?
Kanji: You - just to look at you makes me feel better. It warms this - this mummy's heart of mine. And you're so kind to me. No; that's not it. You're so young, so healthy. No; that's not it either... You're so full of life. And me... I'm jealous of that. If I could be like you for just one day before I died. I won't be able to die unless I can do that. I want to do something. Only you can show me. I don't know what to do. I don't know how. Maybe you don't know either, but, please... if you can... show me how to be like you!

Kanji: ...I did it all for my son's sake. But as it turned out, my son doesn't seem to give a whit.
Toyo: But you can't blame it all on your son... Not unless he asked you to make a mummy of yourself. My mom gives me the same kind of line sometimes. "The things I've suffered for you." And I'm grateful she had me. But it's not my fault I was born...

Drinking this expensive sake is like paying myself back with poison for the way I lived all these years.

Dying is very difficult.

I don't know what I've been doing with my life all these years.

How beautiful! Truly beautiful. A sunset. I don't think I've really looked at one in 30 years.