Real thought takes courage more than intelligence. - Osamu Dazai

It's his father's fault," she said unemotionally. "The Yozo we knew was so easy-going and amusing, and if only he hadn't drunk—no, even though he did drink—he was a good boy, an angel.

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

The sly ability to steal someone else's experience and recreate it as if it were my own is the only real talent I possess. Really, though, my guile is so bogus as to be offensive. If I were to experience failure upon failure day after day—nothing but total embarrassment—then perhaps I'd develop some semblance of dignity as a result. But no, I would somehow illogically twist even such failures, gloss over them smoothly, so that it would seem like they had a perfectly good theory behind them. And I would have no qualms about putting on a desperate show to do so.