And if you want to sustain that willpower over the long haul, then your quality of life becomes an issue. First of all, you need to live to the full. And my basic idea is that “living fully” means, to some extent, building up the framework that contains the soul, the physical body, and pushing it forward step by step. Living is （in most cases） a tiresome, lackadaisical, protracted battle. If you don’t make the effort to persist in pushing the body forward, then keeping a firm, positive hold over your will and soul becomes, in my opinion, realistically next to impossible. Life isn’t that easy. If you tilt toward one direction or the other, sooner or later the opposite side will have its revenge. The scales tilting toward one side will inescapably return to where they were. Physical strength and spiritual strength are like the two pairs of wheels of a car. When they’re in balance and are functioning well, then the car operates most efficiently and moves in the optimal direction.
To give a simple example, if you have a cavity and your tooth is aching, you can’t sit down and take your time working on a novel. No matter what sort of amazing plot you have in mind, or strong desire to write the novel, and no matter how much talent you might possess to spin out a rich, beautiful story, if you’re hit by a constant, sharp physical pain, there’s no way you can concentrate on writing. First you have to go to the dentist and get your tooth taken care of—get your body ready to go, in other words—and only then can you sit down to write. Put simply, that’s what I’m trying to say.
It’s a very simple theory, but it’s something I’ve learned personally through experience. You have to manage physical strength and spiritual strength so they’re in balance, so they effectively reinforce each other. The more protracted the fight, the more significance this theory takes on.
Naturally, if you’re a rare genius and think that, like Mozart or Schubert, Pushkin or Rimbaud or van Gogh, it’s okay to bloom beautifully for a very short time and produce beautiful, sublime works that move people’s hearts, make a lasting name for yourself in history, and then burn out, then my theory doesn’t apply. Go ahead and totally forget everything I’ve said up till now. And just do what you want to do, however you want to do it. It goes without saying that that is an admirable way of living. And genius artists like Mozart, Schubert, Pushkin, Rimbaud, and van Gogh are indispensable, in any age.
If you’re not like them, however, if you’re not （sad to say） a rare genius, and you wish to, gradually, over time, raise the level of the （more or less limited） talent you do have, and make it into something powerful, I believe my theory might be of some value. You toughen up your will as much as you can. And at the same time you equip and maintain the headquarters of that will, your body, to be as healthy as possible, as sturdy as possible, so it doesn’t, as much as possible, hinder you—and this will link up with an overall balanced, enhanced quality of your life. My basic idea is that as long as you don’t mind putting in honest effort, the quality of the work you produce will also naturally be improved. （To repeat, this theory does not apply to genius artists.）
So, what should you do to raise the quality of your life? The method will be different for each person. Take a hundred people and you’ll have a hundred methods. Each person has to discover their own path. Just like each person must discover their own story, and their own style.
To give an example from Franz Kafka again, he died at the young age of forty from tuberculosis, and from the works he left behind, you get the image of a nervous, physically weak person. The truth is, though, he was surprisingly diligent about taking care of himself physically. He was a strict vegetarian, swam a mile in the Moldau River every day in the summer, and exercised daily. Kafka, with an earnest look on his face, exercising—that would have been quite a sight.
As I’ve lived and matured, I’ve found, through much trial and error, the way that works best for me. Trollope found the way that works best for him, and so did Kafka. You should find what works best for you. Physically and mentally, everyone’s circumstances are different. Everybody has their own theories. However, if my way of doing things might be a useful reference—meaning, that is, if it does have some universality—naturally, that would please me no end.
Regarding Schools
In this chapter I’d like to talk about schools. What kind of place （or environment） did I learn from? How did school education help—or not help—me as a novelist? These are the kind of topics I’d like to discuss here.