Yukio Mishima

He's always given high praise around here but his works are rarely discussed beyond memeing.

Personally Temple of the Golden Pavilion is one of my favourite fiction books of all time.

I really like his works too

Sound of Waves is my favorite. I feel like if he would've been less edgy he could have created some top-tier comfy lit

Bump. Love me some rare Mishimas.

Confessions of a Mask fag here. Could totally identify with getting hard to Saint Sebastian pics.

I think what Mishima really captures in Confessions of a Mask is that certain kind of insecurity and loneliness that comes very early in life, when you're too young to understand but old enough to feel the pain. Honestly, reading about Kochan almost felt like reading about myself we were so similar emotionally. Oddly enough, I'm not gay at all, but the story sill resonates with me very strongly.

I have read 3 books, ...Golden Pavilian, Confessions..., and the Sailor who.. and I liked them all.

I am gay, and with regards to Confessions, while reading it, at first I thought the first half about being a homo teen in love with a pupil was superior to the second half about Sonoko, but at the end I realized I was wrong.
Being gay is so terrible you have to confirm you are 100% gay with no other options, exhaust all possibilities, before embracing it and abandoning all delussions of ever being a straight family man.

I have a copy of After the Banquet, but I want to read other things before going back to Mishima.

Can someone spoonfeed me the end of "Decay of the Angel"?

I don't know if I missed some nuance about buddhist doctrine or if I read Spring Snow wrong or if Mishima is just fucking with me.

Too angsty for me. Not a fan. I'll leave him with Celine and the Beats as "you must be under 25 to ride"

agreed, this undermining of yourself all the time resonated with me a lot, cringed a lot from recognizing myself.

bump

Its the only Mishima I didn't finish. I dunno. I don't particularly like reading 200 pages about what gets some guy (probably Mishima) off.

That's the smile of a pained man

Who the fuck is Beats?

"the" Beats, user.

Did you even read Mishima? Who is he angsty? he's ironic and lofty as fuck. In his second novel he already strikes that condescending and mocking tone of the arrogant above-it-all cultural observer

Confessions of a Masks only purpose is to introduce the tensions present in Mishima's work, they are his worst (serious) novel.

To those who are not aware of it: Mishima's rank as a novelist is equalled by his rank as a dramatist. He is considered the greatest writer of plays in post war japan. Everyone who is interested in this overlooked aspect should read: Mishima on stage. It does not contain his best plays but there is a truly wonderful 60-pages introduction that allows one to access the foreign world of japanese theatre and realize what impact Mishima had on it.

Thirst for love is an underrated novel of his, just as is forbidden colours, which is an overlooked masterpiece.

But of course the best works of Mishima are the first two parts of the Tetralogy. The last two are also great, and often underrated as they are more cold and distanced than the furious first two parts, especially Runaway horses, yet they are feverish and impressive and can keep up with everything else he has written.

As to get deeper into Mishima's aesthetic i can also recommend his film Yukoku. Sadly a decent version with the wagnerian OST isn't available but there is a reasonable version with a fanmade (great) soundtrack by Aaron embry on youtube. Check that out. Fantastic short film, with mishima as actor and director.

Haven't read his work but do know of his story. Where should I start with him?

While I'm at it, I thought it'd be interesting to mention a paper I'd heard about on Goodreads related to Sun and Steel. I can't obtain it myself. It apparently makes the case that Mishima didn't intend for the titled book to be an autobiography. Gavin Walker makes the case that Mishima constructed it in a manner intended to cement his work as a writer with the work in his own personal life so critics could not ever separate the two. Apparently it may have been intended so that future readers would be forced to discuss both. If anyone here is interested in reading it (and can access JSTOR), the paper is called "The Double Scission of Mishima Yukio: Limits and Anxieties in the Autofictional Machine".

Kinoko Nasu is the best Japanese author.

even still. What, Beatniks?

I liked Death in Midsummer. I can't think of another story that captures the weird mundane quality of someone close to you dying. It's always so melodramatic in other stories.

I read Confessions last summer and really enjoyed it. Don't remember much but I recall these ritual torture scenes pretty vividly. I also enjoyed the bit about the boyhood crush. I found the prose a little dense though.

...

Lofty statement. What makes you say such a thing?