Schoolgirl is the English translation by Allison Markin Powell of ½÷À¸ÅÌ, which was published in Japan in 1939 when Osamu Dazai was twenty-nine or thirty. It's narrated in the first-person by a young student, maybe in her early teens. She relates one day of her experience, from ¡ÆLaying in bed each morning, I'm always so pessimistic' to going to school to eating dinner to trying to sleep and sleeping. She does this by selectively presenting her internal monologue to the reader and sometimes commenting on it in a manner that is consistently endearing, surprising, moving, insightful to me. She often describes her behaviour and thoughts and feelings as occurring ¡Æfor some reason' or ¡Æsuddenly'. Schoolgirl is a short book. I've read it 4–5 times. By my estimate it's 20 per cent shorter than the short story ¡ÆGood Old Neon' by David Foster Wallace.

read the article here:
http://www.granta.com/New-Writing/Three-Japanese-Books