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Backwords
Guest
Anyone a big Mishima fan? I didn't see his name on the list...does this site have a search feature?
Daniel del Real
Moderator
Huge Mishima fan here.
The Sea of Fertility is the most amazing saga of books I've ever read. The book I liked the most from the tetralogy was Runaway Horses.
Spring Snow it's a great beggining too. The Temple of Dawn falls down a little bit it it closes in short but brilliant way with The Decay of the Angel.
The Golden Pavillion is a very fine work about the concepts of beauty and destruction.
Confessions of a Mask an almost autobiographical novel was a great initiation novel for Mishima and gives you the eye to follow Mishimas's perspective of life and how he evolves during his later work.
The Sailor who fell from Grace with the Sea was very good but I don't remember a lot about it. I think it has to do a lot with redemption and critics about the adult world in Japan.
The last one I've read was After the Banquet, a book quite mediocre for Mishima's standards.
B
Backwords
Guest
Thought The Sailor Who Fell From Grace With the Sea a poetic title, acquaintance of mine scoffed at it.
Noticed someone with it in Starbucks the other day. A Japaneses acquaintance told me about a similar peeping experience, they have thin walls in Japan. :O
Makes me think of being that age myself...be careful of those 12 year olds and their gangs.
Profoundly implicit violence as well prepared on the page as it was in the author's life. I read that around the same time as Selma Lagerlof's The Treasure. I imagine Lagerlof was not a physically violent woman and she shows the violence on the page were Mishima does not.
I read Spring Snow awhile back and started Runaway Horses only to put it down. Have been wanting to get back to it for awhile, maybe soon.
Oh yea, the dvd of Mishima's short film Patriotism, staring himself and with some interviews and so forth, is good.
Noticed someone with it in Starbucks the other day. A Japaneses acquaintance told me about a similar peeping experience, they have thin walls in Japan. :O
Makes me think of being that age myself...be careful of those 12 year olds and their gangs.
Profoundly implicit violence as well prepared on the page as it was in the author's life. I read that around the same time as Selma Lagerlof's The Treasure. I imagine Lagerlof was not a physically violent woman and she shows the violence on the page were Mishima does not.
I read Spring Snow awhile back and started Runaway Horses only to put it down. Have been wanting to get back to it for awhile, maybe soon.
Oh yea, the dvd of Mishima's short film Patriotism, staring himself and with some interviews and so forth, is good.
I only read fragments of Confessions of a Mask and some stories from his collection Death in Midsummer & Other Stories, for a course in japanese literature i attended earlier this year. I was very impressed with the stories The Pearl, Onnagata and, most of all, Patriotism.
I have Mishima on my To Read list but have been loath to read him in suspicious Spanish translations; I'll order his books in English.
I have Mishima on my To Read list but have been loath to read him in suspicious Spanish translations; I'll order his books in English.
I love The Sailor who fell from Grace with the Sea andConfessions of a Mask. After the Banquet is by no means a waste of time but is still of a noticeably lower quality.
I can also recommend Sun and Steel, a book-length essay where he explains the reasoning behind his bodybuilding and martial arts training.
I recently bought the tetralogy and just started on Runaway Horses. Too early to tell if I like it better than Spring Snow, which was brilliant.
My favorite Japanese author, with Kenzaburo Oe a close second.
I can also recommend Sun and Steel, a book-length essay where he explains the reasoning behind his bodybuilding and martial arts training.
I recently bought the tetralogy and just started on Runaway Horses. Too early to tell if I like it better than Spring Snow, which was brilliant.
My favorite Japanese author, with Kenzaburo Oe a close second.
Daniel del Real
Moderator
I don't know who I like the most, Mishima or Murakami. Both are excellent but very different from each other. Couldn't say one is better than the other IMO.
A little below there are two other masters of Japanese XX novel like Kenzaburo and Kawabata. Again, very different from each other, amazing in their own unique way.
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Backwords
Guest
...and Kobo Abe?
waalkwriter
Reader
Was this the first Japanese Nobel Laureate?
Peeping Tom
Reader
The first Japanese Nobel Laureate was Kawabata.
Daniel del Real
Moderator
Way below this 4 masters of Japanese novel. I didn't like that much The Face of Another.
Another Japanese writer I enjoyed a lot, but I've only read a novel, is Natsume Soseki. I should get around him soon.
Let's not forget Natsume Soseki, the master of them all. Soseki was the real innovator of the modern Japanese novel. He was as important as Flaubert and Tolstoi for western literature.
Mori Ogai was also very important and influential in the early decades of the twentieth century.
Mori Ogai was also very important and influential in the early decades of the twentieth century.
B
Backwords
Guest
Kawabata himself said that Mishima was the better writer. At that time since he was older the Nobel went to Kawabata and since they don't like to give it to the same country too often...Mishima was out of luck.
There is an amusing interview with them both sitting casually and Kawabata puts on a humble almost school girlish act when asked about the prize claiming he didn't seek or want it. Mishama does not suffer the sham modesty silently
I read somewhere that for the period of a year after Mishima's death Kawabata was afflicted with nightmares until finally ending his own life.
----
Personally I don't consider Kobo Abbe any lower in stature. I agree with Kenzaburo Oe's evaluation of Abbe's value.
There is an amusing interview with them both sitting casually and Kawabata puts on a humble almost school girlish act when asked about the prize claiming he didn't seek or want it. Mishama does not suffer the sham modesty silently
I read somewhere that for the period of a year after Mishima's death Kawabata was afflicted with nightmares until finally ending his own life.
----
Personally I don't consider Kobo Abbe any lower in stature. I agree with Kenzaburo Oe's evaluation of Abbe's value.
stephendedalus
Reader
I think I could agree on this with Kawabata, from the little I've read of them both. As to Mishima, we have a handful of his short stories in polish translation and that's how I read them. Some of them I found mesmerizing, Patriotism impressed me most.
bogotabibliophile
New member
Huge Mishima fan here! I lived in Japan a while, and even visited his grave
I started with the Temple of the Golden Pavillion. That was hard work, because of the long digressions about beauty and a fairly thinly spread plot. The Sea of Fertility on the other hand i rate as the best cycle of novels ive ever read, especially Spring Snow. And Patriotism stayed with me for ages.
I read comparisons with Murakami, whom i by no means dislike, but for me they are not in the same league.
Kenzaburo Oe and Mishima never got on and Oe scoffed at Mishima's suicide, saying it was a stunt put on for foreign journalists (i couldnt find the exact words he used. sorry!
In "The Japan Diaries", Donald Richie gives an interesting account of his personal friendship with Mishima. anyone interested, check it out...
I started with the Temple of the Golden Pavillion. That was hard work, because of the long digressions about beauty and a fairly thinly spread plot. The Sea of Fertility on the other hand i rate as the best cycle of novels ive ever read, especially Spring Snow. And Patriotism stayed with me for ages.
I read comparisons with Murakami, whom i by no means dislike, but for me they are not in the same league.
Kenzaburo Oe and Mishima never got on and Oe scoffed at Mishima's suicide, saying it was a stunt put on for foreign journalists (i couldnt find the exact words he used. sorry!
In "The Japan Diaries", Donald Richie gives an interesting account of his personal friendship with Mishima. anyone interested, check it out...
waalkwriter
Reader
Kawabata himself said that Mishima was the better writer. At that time since he was older the Nobel went to Kawabata and since they don't like to give it to the same country too often...Mishima was out of luck.
There is an amusing interview with them both sitting casually and Kawabata puts on a humble almost school girlish act when asked about the prize claiming he didn't seek or want it. Mishama does not suffer the sham modesty silently
I read somewhere that for the period of a year after Mishima's death Kawabata was afflicted with nightmares until finally ending his own life.
----
Personally I don't consider Kobo Abbe any lower in stature. I agree with Kenzaburo Oe's evaluation of Abbe's value.
Then there's the little thing about Mishima committing suicide at age 45. He was a rampant militarist, a neo-conservative. My Japanese cultural studies teacher embedded in us a deep-seated dislike of Mishima because of his political radicalism. At the same time Kawabata is a truly beautiful cultural writer, particularly the Master of Go, and as far as I'm concerned, few, if any writers, surpass the agonizing, personal depths of Oe's writing, much less that frilly little post-modernist Murikami.
Daniel del Real
Moderator
Glad to see another Mishima enthusiast in the forum. I'm also an admirer of Mishima's work and I agree with you that The Sea of Fertility is probable the best cycle of novels I've ever read. Golden Pavillion is another great book with many reflections to beauty and the relationship with the individual. Haven't read Patriotism but I completed other readings like Confessions of a Mask, The Sailor who Fell from Grace with the Sea, After the Banquet and recently bought Forbidden Colors that I'll be reading next month.
bogotabibliophile
New member
The Temple of the Golden Pavillion is really a great example of an older era of Japanese lit, probably more representative of the whole Japanese canon in general than the Sea of Fertility. Mishima was deeply influenced by Goethe and Mann(especially Magic Mountain) in writing it, especially in the long descriptive passages. But Mishimas appreciation of Japanese aesthetics, despite the western influences, run through the novel.
Drawing on real events was a hallmark of his too, that pops up in After the Banquet, the tetralogy and Patriotism as well as Temple of the G.P.
The Golden Pavillion was the first Mishima I read and having read all the major ones (that have been translated) now, I think its the most difficult.
Mishima was actually a far more productive writer than the output that has been translated suggests. The most important work yet to be translated is called Kyoko's House. I live in hope!
Drawing on real events was a hallmark of his too, that pops up in After the Banquet, the tetralogy and Patriotism as well as Temple of the G.P.
The Golden Pavillion was the first Mishima I read and having read all the major ones (that have been translated) now, I think its the most difficult.
Mishima was actually a far more productive writer than the output that has been translated suggests. The most important work yet to be translated is called Kyoko's House. I live in hope!