三島由紀夫

Hi there, me and some friends are doing a kind of book club thing where we each lend each other a book and then write about it after we’ve finished. I really want to lend Runaway Horses but I’m a bit conflicted because obviously it’s the second book in the series, however I feel like the references to spring snow are innocuous enough and RH itself provides enough context that you could read it on its own without having read the first one.

Any thoughts?

Hi, I just finished reading Confessions of a Mask as my first Mishima novel, what a stunning book, superb introspective, I love the autobiographical aspect, the recounting of his memories, what other Mishima book can be considered as very autobiographical? Forbidden Colors? Kyoko House?

Greetings! This subreddit is curiously tiny, but that also means it's not banned, I guess. I'm pretty sure my question would be swiftly removed in any other space, so that's a boon?

Am I correct in my impression that Mishima was tremendously pessimistic about his current (and future) Japanese culture? Apologies as I've only read the Wikipedia page (attention span, hello), but it just feels so... inadequate? My loaded question would be - was the Japan of the 1960s that much worse than that of the 2020s? Was he hugely overreacting? Or was he anticipating a terrible cultural degeneration of the... 2040s+ or something?

My few brain-stormed hypotheses:
1, yes, the 1960s Japan was indeed much worse as the student communist movement wanted literally to depose the Emperor (although it's funny how the socialist mayor of Tokyo went to Juche Korea - because Juche Korea has its emperor just fine while being socialist);

2, old Japan had more young people, and thus more yucky change, whereas the Japan after Mishima's death stopped breeding and ossified into something good?

3, the Japan of Mishima's time still remembered the glory before 1945, and the peace time looked bleaker in comparison than it was in reality?

4, Mishima himself was hugely coping due to his rejection of military service and homosexuality (which is fine, everyone has his own impetus to artistic creation)?

All in all, I feel like while Mishima is definitely correct in his own way and for his own subset of the population, I don't think he would be objectively correct to speak for the entire nation? I just don't see Japan to be that bad? I feel like all that memetic anime "degeneracy" would be swept in a day if WW3 drew close. Even with the Internet, the American culture has barely penetrated Japan, and they still remain pagan savages under the most superficial civilised varnish. Collectivist to the core, hateful of anyone stepping out of line, dogmatic and uncaring for anything foreign. Maybe if America occupied them for a thousand more years, they would grow weak, but doesn't seem the case yet even now?

P.S. And no, I'm not one of those Japanophiles who consider Japan to be a saintly nation. If anything, Burma is much more traditional than Japan (purely by virtue of being ravaged by civil war). And modern Juche Korean religious fervour likely surpasses that of even the JP WW2 holdouts. And there's a real danger of anime, low fertility, and Christian secret societies in power. Maybe my "optimism" for Japan is coloured through the lens of my own continent's history whose cultural heritage has been defiled since Constantine...

I want to order "Confessions of a Mask", does anybody know if the German or English translation is the best?

Hello all!

I am currently writing a paper on Yukio Mishima, his life, projects, death, etc. I am currently working my way through Life For Sale and Confessions of a Mask for some exposure, but do not know a ton about the man. I would love any opinions on his life or ideas, fun facts etc. anything helps 😁

Thank you very much

There's a couple of them in my native language, ill list them, hopefully someone has read the original work or some other translations.

Kyoko's House (鏡子の家), 1959

The School of Flesh (肉体の学校), 1963

The Music (音楽), 1964

Evening Dress (夜会服), 1967

The Age of Blue (青の時代), 1950

Anyone have a PDF of The Sailor Who Fell From Grace With The Sea, in original Japanese? It could be the 1963 publication, or any other one granted that it is in Japanese. All I can find are these English translations.

So I just finished reading the temple of the golden pavilion and it was truly an amazing book. But I just had a nagging thought. I read the one published by vintage, which I understand belongs to penguin. In the summary on the back it says that the protagonist has a stutter "Because of the boyhood trauma of seeing his mother make love to another man in the presence of his dying father" but after reading the whole book it was never clear what happened that night that they all slept under the mosquito net. Did I miss something? Every other publication of the book doesn't say anything like that in the summary. I'm confused cause I feel like I misread the book. I mean, I get that it was implied, but isn't it a bit weird to have it on the summary since it's not clear that this happened and that this is how he got his stutter? I feel like the summary was misleading because it gave too mush emphasis to that night and in the book it's only mentioned very briefly. I just feel like I read the book wrong so feel free to correct me.

I believe this comes from a dream sequence, probably from spring snow. The scene is a man and a woman in or around a rickshaw, the man cuts down multiple other men with a sword, cuts a path for the woman to walk.

I would appreciate anyones help in finding it.

I read it in French (a collection of 4 plays and 135 theoretical texts on Mishima's theater was published last year), and wondered what you thought of it. At the end of the play, two characters in the police station are the only ones to hear the sound of the "koto du bonheur" ("harp of happiness"), and I'm not sure I understand what it symbolizes... For those of you who have had a chance to read the play, what do you think?

title says it all wondering his max weight on squat, presses curlz etc.

Does anyone have info on a short story called "The Perfect Companions?"

I see a copy of an old literary journal called "Antaeus" (1974) on eBay that contains this story but I can't find any more info about it. Curious if anyone has this, has read it, or knows anything more?

So I have been thinking about getting Confessions of a Mask, but now im reluctant, since I read somewhere it's just basic commonly known stuff about Mishima (closeted homosexuality, ideation of youthful death, yearning for pre war Japan and samurai values etc...), so im thinking about just picking up his Temple of the Golden Pavilion. What do more experienced readers reccomend?

So I am writing a paper about Mishima and Tatenokai. While of course I found a lot of information about Mishima, I can’t find a lot of scholarly work on Tatenokai. Does anyone know any good books or articles that discuss Tatenokai a bit more than just few sentences?

Rilke writes that modern man can no longer die a dramatic death. Instead, he dies in a hospital room, like a bee inside a honeycomb cell. Death in the modern age, whether due to illness or accident, is devoid of drama. We live in an age without heroic deaths.

This reminds me of the 18th-century samurai classic, Hagakure, which famously states, "The way of the samurai is found in death." That era resembled our own, where the dreams of the Warring States period had faded. Although samurai continued to train in martial arts, achieving a glorious death in battle became increasingly difficult. There was corruption and a fallen aristocracy, with delinquents akin to today’s “Ivy set” appearing among the samurai.

In the midst of this turmoil, the author of Hagakure wrote: "When it comes to either/or, there is only the quick choice of death." He preached this idea repeatedly, yet he himself died in bed at a ripe old age. Even a samurai like him could not find the opportunity to die with honor and instead had to go on living while dreaming of such a death.

We entered our 20s filled with these thoughts. In contrast, today's youth may seek thrills; they are not exactly unafraid of death, but their existence is not tense, with death as the precondition of life.

We soon tire of living solely for ourselves. It necessarily follows that we need to die for something. That something used to be called a "noble cause." To die for a noble cause was once regarded as the most glorious, heroic, or honorable way to die.

However, there are no noble causes today. Democratic governments clearly have no need for noble causes. If one cannot find a value that transcends oneself, life itself, in a spiritual sense, becomes meaningless.

That is why I pray for an honorable death—a death for the sake of something. Yet, like the author of Hagakure, I feel I was born in the wrong era. I will probably die in bed after a life spent dreaming of a very different end.

https://preview.redd.it/wnsuxkadr6wd1.jpg?width=1080&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=568f82033b48a80df343aae2fc99d5c3fe4fa6f7

Regarding the previously announced upcoming short story collection, Voices of the Fallen Heroes, here is the final listing of content (via an advance proof I came across on eBay):

1. Strawberry (Ichigo/苺), 1961 – tr. Paul McCarthy
2. The Flower Hat (Bōshi no Hana /帽子の花), 1962 – tr. Stephen Dodd
3. Moon (Tsuki/月), 1962 – tr. Stephen Dodd
4. Cars (Jidōsha/自動車), 1963 – tr. Jeffrey Angles
5. Poor Papa (Kawaisō na Papa/可哀さうなパパ), 1963 – tr. Oliver White
6. Tickets (Kippu/切符), 1963 – tr. Juliet Winters Carpenter
7. The Peacocks (Kujaku/孔雀), 1965– tr. Juliet Winters Carpenter
8. True Love at Dawn (Asa no Jun'ai/朝の純愛), 1965 – tr. John Nathan
9. The Strange Tale of Shimmering Moon Villa (Gettan-sō Kitan/月澹荘奇譚), 1965 – tr. Aoyama Tomoko
10. From the Wilderness (Kōya yori/荒野より), 1966 – tr. John Nathan
11. Voices of the Fallen Heroes (Eirei no Koe/英霊の聲), 1966 – tr. Paul McCarthy
12. Companions (Nakama/仲間), 1966 – tr. Paul McCarthy
13. Clock (Tokei/時計), 1967 – tr. Hannah Osborne
14. The Dragon Flute (Ranryō-ō/蘭陵王), 1969 – tr. Sam Bett

Will there ever be a translation for the book? After watching the life in four chapters movie by Paul Schrader the Kyoko’s house section was just on its face the most compelling to me. Destroying his life of bodybuilding and for an abusive partner who causes him to self harm in the pursuit of beauty just on its face is so poetic to me (also I’m sucker for boxing stories). If all of that can be conveyed in 20 minutes of film making I feel like I need to read the story whether that be by learning japanese or paying someone to translate it. Is there any progress being made toward a translation that anyone knows about?

Quite a few times i've seen people call this book a hard read.
thats where my question comes from

Quick study that I did today.

I've come across multiple queer people who are enticed by what they read in Mishima's work. There's nothing wrong with sensing an overlap of experiences, especially when you're marginalised and live your life restricted, however a great error occurs when that overlap turns into speculation. This error is not mererly about mere intellectual speculation, but what this speculation does to ourselves. I think this is important to underline because it's the existential lapse caused by the dysmorphia Mishima seeks to answer. This dysmorphia is not solely about gender or body dysmorphia, nor 'reactionary' appeasement.

Everyone who convinces themselves of this, not only fail to see the self-awareness prevalent in Mishima's works, but convinces themselves of an ultimately incomplete picture of dysmorphia. Mishima's dysmorphia, which most times is reduced to muscle worship, is actually about the question of death, which underlies the question 'Why is there something rather than nothing?'. Mishima's answer is sacrifice, that everyone is a martyr for a cause, because everyone has to face death one day. It's not about homophobia or straight colonialism of queerness (whatever that means), but the rejection and isolation that comes with failure of aging -- physically and mentally together; any young queer man knows the sad desperation older men express on Grindr, this is the concern at hand.

This concern fails to be captured by feminist or queer deconstruction of patriarchy, and ironically enough is captured by the reactionary right, however not in resistance but in embrace. Straussians like Allan Bloom and his sexual relations with his students is a manifest case, but nowadays it has formed into an identity. Take Costin Vlad Alamariu known as BAP, literarily standing for Bronze Age Pervert, and the obsession with holding on to youth, and when that fails, to the sexualisation of young men. Mishima, who surely had his perversions, ultimately tried to stand his ground against them, this is a major component in the four-volume book which he finished on the morning of his death.

Anyway, going back to the dysmorphia. Rather than focusing on the difference and coming in dialogue with the books you're reading, you're looking for overlaps to mirror your identity. There's no worthwhile recognition in dead authors and books, only the projection of the will. Recognition comes only about embracing the difference of each other and attaining respect, there's nothing stoping you from doing that. An actual dialogue about gender dysmorphia and what Mishima speaks of, is worthwhile. Attempts to frame Mishima within a diagnostic frame are however far from doing that.

Even in the case that Mishima was gender dysmorphic, don't you realise that what makes queer experiences queer, is that there are none alike? Don't allow false movements or walls of profiles, such as on Grindr, to turn your life into a simulation.

This is the same delusions that Mishima warns against via the characterisation of Honda in the 'The Sea of Fertility'. Mishima's message is much more clear and self-aware, the answer is neither detachment nor intellectual production of reality, it is the embrace of the body, innocent youth and the polity. This is not unique to transpeople, but everyone, it is this fact that Mishima points too again and again in his works. Mishima saw that only those who've already embraced this mindset, could read his message; for his last work he dedicated four volumes making a character out of those who repeatedly miss the point entirely -- the point, not of his message -- but of life itself.

Even if he experienced gender dysphoria it doesn't entail anything more than just that. The transgender identity, just like the homosexual identity, is a modern construct that came about as resistance to the institutionalisation of sex. Yukio Mishima knew this intuitively which is why he never called himself gay even though he committed gay acts. Mishima is an anti-colonialist par excellence, he lived and flourishes in a western dominated life, yet he dedicated it entirely to the idea of an emperor as god, and as the basis of polity -- but not as in French Absolutism. This idea which the Europeans lost, is the antinomy of capitalist modernity, and forgetfulness which began when the Europeans turned away from the innocent youthful spirit found in Rome. This message is as clear in the 'The Sea of Fertility' as it is in his short novels like 'Sea and Sunset' or 'Martyrdom'

Stop falling into the same trap as some 'Byzantium' scholars who want to identity certain saints as queer; without realising they perpetuate modern colonial identities, constructions which were not only foreign to pre-colonial peoples, but would have been anathema to their essence of life. Ironically enough Mishima would end up admiring those saints, the youthful Christianity of Rome, while also despising what it had turned into in the West.

My relation to Mishima, in recognising the significance of death as sacrifice, brings me as close as possible, yet this unity is still one of two worlds apart. I wrote this text a bit emphatically because it's not about Mishima per say, his works point beyond himself. The Death of The Author doesn't constitute mere freedom of interpretation, but making universal the problem they sought to answer. The following shouldn't have to be said, but since its continual failure persists, it has to be repeated: our interpretation is our answer to the problems posed by the authors, and reflect more on us, than anything else.

Don't seek overlaps with Mishima's works, as any overlap is as meaningful as the medium which allows intelligibility to begin with -- what matters is the difference, what it entails for us, and what our answer is.

People say that Yukio Mishima was super gay. His first novel, "Confessions of a Mask", which propelled him into fame, was a semi-autobiography he wrote at the age of 24. It was all about his childhood and more specifically his struggle with homosexuality and sadism and his doomed but ongoing insistence on repressing those parts of himself. Yukio eventually married at age 33 and had kids, although it was somewhat of an open secret that he would frequently have affairs with men.

The trouble is, according to the popular understanding of sex and gender at the time, he was gay. But looking back at his life now, it seems undeniable that he was actually trans, or at least suffering from gender dysphoria. In fact, his gender dysphoria is rather explicitly stated as the reason for his eventual suicide.

Here are some relevant quotes from "Confessions of a Mask":

This quote covers a story in chapter one spanning a couple pages:

"I stole into my mother's room and opened the drawers of her clothing chest. From among my mother's kimonos I dragged out the most gorgeous one, the one with the strongest colors. For a sash I chose an obi on which(…) My cheeks flushed with wild delight when I stood before the mirror(…) I stuck a hand mirror in my sash and powdered my face lightly(…) Unable to suppress my frantic laughter and delight, I ran about the room crying: 'I'm Tenkatsu, I'm Tankatsu!' (Shokyokusai Tenkatsu, a famous Japanese actress he had seen perform) (…) My frenzy was focused upon the consciousness that, through my impersonation, Tenkatsu was being revealed to many eyes. In short, I could see nothing but myself. And then I chanced to catch sight of my mother's face. She had turned slightly pale and was simply sitting there as though absentminded. Our glances met; she lowered her eyes. I understood. Tears blurred my eyes."

That first moment of 'otherness' really strikes a chord with me. And its interesting that it doesn’t happened during a moment of attraction towards men- it’s during a moment of gender euphoria and honest gender expression.

This quote comes shortly after Yukio described how his childhood friends were all girls:

"But things were different when i went visiting at the homes of my cousins. Then even I was called upon to be a boy, a male. (...) And in this house it was tacitly required that I act like a boy. The reluctant masquerade had begun. At about this time I was beginning to understand vaguely the mechanism of the fact that what people regarded as a pose on my part was actually an expression of my need to assert my true nature, and that it was precisely what people regarded as my true self which was a masquerade."

Not much more needs to be said here. Next quote:

"It was not until much later that I discovered hopes the same as mine in Heliogabalus, emperor of Rome in its period of decay, that destroyer of Rome's ancient gods, that decadent, bestial monarch."

Heliogabalus, or Elagabalus, a Roman Emperor who is now considered a trans woman.

This quote comes after Yukio describes how he had his first orgasm looking at Guido Reni's painting of Saint Sebastian:

"It is an interesting coincidence that Hirschfeld should place 'pictures of St. Sebastian' in the first rank of those kinds of art works in which the invert takes special delight. This observation of Hirschfeld's leads easily to the conjecture that in the overwhelming majority of cases of inversion, especially of congenital inversion, the inverted and the sadistic impulses are inextricably entangled with eachother."

Hirschfeld is the guy who founded and ran the Berlin Sex Institute, famous for being the first place to perform a Sexual Reassignment Surgery for a trans woman, and for being raided and having all of its research burned by Nazis.  And the 'inversion' Yukio mentions is short for 'sexual inversion', which was the term used at the time for trans people (basically it misclassified being transgender as a type of homosexuality).

Lets fast forward 20 years, to 1970. Yukio Mishima organized a retrospective exhibition devoted to his literary life to be displayed at the Tobu department store in Tokyo. Yukio wrote a catalogue to be handed out as a guide to the exhibition. In the catalogue, he wrote that he saw his life as being divided into four rivers—Writing, Theater, Body, and Action, all finally flowing into the Sea of Fertility. The exhibit was opened two weeks before his suicide. The literal sword that was used by his friend to behead him as part of his ritual seppuku was on display at the exhibit. Here is an exert from the accompanying catalogue:

"The River of the Body naturally flowed into the River of Action. It was inevitable. With a woman's body this would not have happened. A man's body, with its inherent nature and function, forces him toward the River of Action, the most dangerous river in the jungle. Alligators and piranhas abound in its waters. Poisoned arrows dart from enemy camps. The river confronts the River of Writing. I've often heard the glib motto, 'The Pen and the Sword Join in a Single Path.' But in truth they can join only at the moment of death.

"This River of Action giver me the tears, the blood, the sweat that I never begin to find in the River of Writing. In this new river I have encounters of soul with soul without having to bother about words. This is also the most destruction of all rivers, and I can well understand why so few people approach it. This River has no generosity for the farmer; it brings no wealth nor peace, it gives no rest. Only let me say this: I, born a man and alive as a man, cannot overcome the temptation to follow the course of this River."

'I born a man and alive as a man, cannot overcome the temptation to follow the course of this river.' and 'With a woman's body this would not have happened.' It hurts to read, knowing what happened.

Seriously, how is he only known as having been gay? How come nobody talks about this?

I am interested in Mishima's writting and would want to know how to begin reading, is there a book that is best for the start?

I follow a traditionalist blogger on Substack and today they posted about Yukio Mishima and his midlife crisis. Nothing too deep but an interesting take on the matter: https://newtraditionalism.substack.com/p/yukio-mishima-and-the-crisis-of-the