/lit/ - Literature

> ‘And what,’ she asked with sudden earnestness, ‘are the five signs of the decay of the angel?’… the once-immaculate robes are soiled, the flowers in the flowery crown fade and fall, sweat pours from the armpits, a fetid stench envelops the body, the angel is no longer happy in its proper place. … Death has come too suddenly. Incredulity is written on beautiful, otherwise inexpressive white angel faces… These sentient beings who by the mere fact of their existence lured men into realms of beauty and fantasy must now look on helpless as, in an instant, their spell is stripped away like flaking gold leaf and swept up in the evening breeze. The classically elegant garden is an incline. The gold dust of all-powerful beauty and pleasure drifts down. Absolute freedom soaring in emptiness is torn away like a rending of flesh. The shadows gather. The light dies. Soft powder drips and drips from the beautiful fingers. The fire flickers in the depths of flesh, the spirit is departing… . Beneath shining hair beautiful nostrils are turned upward. The angels seem to be catching the first fore-scent of decay. Petals twisting beyond clouds, azure decay coloring the sky, all pleasures of sight and of spirit, all the joyous vastness of the universe, gone.

yukio was cute i say. CUTE!!!

>>20938394
The woman next to him is Yukimura Izumi (雪村 いづみ), the picture was taken in Syowa 34.

>>20938394
He has my same haircut

>>20938394

>>20938609
Sad part is you probably have none of his talent kek. Get a proper fade.

>>20938609
grow it out, thats an incel look if youre a white guy

best era was his yakuza film star arc

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kmjYkc4MyWA

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MxCvr6U2jjE

>>20939036
It's on YT btw:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o9RZckCvN7s

>>20939084
His acting at 18:50 is actually impressive

>>20938394
He looks like he represses his homosexuality

>homo who killed himself
Why do people think he’s based again ???

>>20939474
read Mishima, ou, La vision du vide

>>20938394
>>20938397
>>20938400
>>20938401
>>20938405
>>20938423
why does this guy have so many photoshoots done of himself?

>>20939650
Because he was an actor and famed writer

>>20939062
Why are they laughing?

>>20939650
He wanted to turn himself into an object of art on top of being a creator of it. He wanted to break past the inherent passivity of writing.

>>20939650
Cus he's gay

>tfw you will never fuck prime Yukio

Recently learned this Mishima quote:
>"Half of Osamu Dazia's depression could have been solved with a towel massage and some gymnastics"
The japanese have been retroactively refuting people for decades apparently

>>20938394

>>20939650
He was gay af what do you expect?

Love that man, I will dump my Yukio folder.
>>20938394
>>20938397
>>20938400
>>20938401
>>20938405
>>20940581
Not rare
>>20938423
Actually rare
>>20939650
He was obsessed with taking photos and seeing himself in the mirror. He even had a mirror in front of him while he wrote. Juan Antonio Vallejo-Najera mentions in his book on Mishima that he suffered from what the Japanese call the "mirror syndrome", when someone needs constant verse to "prove to himself that he exists", like Ozamu in "Kyoko's House" . Many psychologists also speculate that he suffered from schizophrenia, since they would need to prove his very existence, which is a common symptom in schizophrenic patients, but Vallejo-Nájera rules this out.

>>20941421

>>20941424

>>20941428

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>>20941438
Do you think those boys kill cats?

>>20941443

>>20941444
Kek

>>20941458

>>20941463

>>20941468
With his father

>>20941471
With his mother

>>20941477

>>20941480

>>20941482

>>20941488

>>20941496
With the cast of Hitokiri.

>>20941501

>>20941443
looking good

>>20941505

>>20941521
With professor Luis Diez del Corral.

>>20941525

>>20941530

>>20941533
With his sister.

>>20941538
With Tadanori Yokoo.

>>20941544
With an actor portraying Hitler for "My friend Hitler". I know he also took photos with a poster full of swastikas as a promotion for the play, but I haven't found it yet.

>>20941555

>>20941560

>>20941565

>>20941568
Playing kokkuri with Edogawa and some actors.

>>20941569

>>20941571

>>20941577

>>20941580
With Henry Scott Stokes at Mt. Fuji.

>>20941587

>>20941592
Another one with his father.

>>20941596

>>20941601

>>20941604

>>20941607

>>20941614

>>20941622

>>20941627

>>20941633

Haven't seen a lot of these before. Thank you, Mishima folderdumper-sama.

>>20941639

>>20941642
<3

>>20941648

>>20941650

>>20941656

>>20941658
With Donald Keene and Hiroshi Akutagawa

>>20941663

>>20941667
With his grandmother.

>>20941670
With his mom and grandmother.

>>20941674
With his mom.

>>20941681

>>20941684

>>20941688

>>20941692
With Aikihiro Miwa.

>>20941695

>>20941699

>>20941706

>>20941715

Not exactly a rare Mishima but I still laughed

>>20941719

>>20941726

>>20941421
>suffered from schizophrenia
Sorry but that's a fucking 60IQ take by orderlies who need to pathologize the natural human condition so that you'll keep quiet and adapt to this clown world
Mishima was simply a real nigga in a world of frauds.

>>20941728

>>20941734
>>20941733
I agree, I think psychoanalysis is full of bullshit, but it's a theory that was popular back then. Mishima himself went to psychoanalysts in his youth, and ended up giving up on it. He sent a copy of Confessions of a Mask to a psychologist.

>>20941739

>>20941745

>>20941751

>>20941755

>>20941739
What a Chad move.
I identify with Mishima's "pathologies" a lot because I'm a gay sadomasochist who had a near identical teenage sexual development down to fapping to Saint Sebastian. He was the only person on the planet who ever truly helped me understand myself.

>>20941760

>>20941763
Yeah, I think that's also the reason why Douglas Pearce from Death In June became so obsessed with him in the late 80s.

>>20941778

>>20941788

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>>20941854

>>20941893

>>20941896
Random observation but the makeup jobs on his photoshoots are always really good

>>20939474
His literature. Shocking, I know, considering the board we're on, but I'm happy to help you understand.

>>20941434
>yee yee ass haircut

>>20941778
Love Douglas Pearce
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mmQBW2P51Yw

>>20938394
Some of Mishima's best photos are of him doing Kendo

>>20938394
bump

>>20941722
Good to see Mishima is still owning these people from beyond the grave.

>>20943366
oh no no no

>>20938397
>no homo

>>20939650
Homosexual

Obsession: what a strange spectacle to hear unceasing praise for works that celebrate death in intellectual and aesthetic circles. What a grandiloquent and apotheotic death everywhere in the music and cinema of the 80s. What an astonishing apology for Mishima that is periodically found. When we should have either compassion or horror. Because finally Mishima (still praised very strongly this month of June 83 on several occasions in Le Monde) is nothing else than the equivalent of the kamikazes and also of the better in Nazism. The contempt for death to the point that it is given and sought with the same pride. But if for the Nazis and for Mishima it was a reality, taking the taste of death to the extreme, for those who discuss it, it is snobbery. The word "spectacle" came to me spontaneously. It is a show, nothing more. Aestheticism in the worst sense of the word. Discourse that influences and manifests the "death instinct" not sublimated, but exalted, which is the opposite!

>>20938394
>start reading The Sailor who fell out of Grace with the Sea
>realise Noboru is a self insert
>realise Tsukazaki is a self insert
>realise his self insert watches his self insert plough an insert of his mother
Mishima was a pretty fucked up dude.

>>20944780
t. the exact kind of faggot armchair intellectual whom Mishima would tell to touch grass and hit the gym.

>>20941722
This is why a lot of celebrities used to hate coming out. Not because they were afraid of discrimination but because they knew that all of their work would be overshadowed by grifters obsessed with sexual orientation. It happened to Rock Hudson, Liberace, and Sal Mineo. It doesn't surprise me in the least bit that Mishima has started to get the grifters as well.

>>20945559
I'm honestly shocked it hasn't happened sooner. Confessions of a Mask is as gay as it gets and anyone with half a brain can tell it's autobiographical. Was it Japanese honor culture that protected him for a while?

>>20945697

>>20945701

He was one sexy dude.

>>20945697
this is one of my faves. the hammer pose is so strange but great
i love his stuff in europe
mishima was a true artist

>>20941989
Based. He wrote an interesting article about Mishima, but I only have it on Spanish.
>>20945644
He himself admitted it was autobiographical to his publishers, Kawabata, and the psychoanalyst he was going to.

>>20945644
Because he's firmly entrenched in eastern culture. It wasn't until the 21st century through the internet that Mishima was able to get a noticible western following. Not even the Paul Scharder movie actually did much to entice westerners to check out Mishima when it came out in the 80s.

what does this thread think of schrader's film?
i personally loved it even though the casting for the lead is odd

>>20945754
Absolutely false, he was already incredibly popular in Western circles. There were many artists in the 80s making songs referencing him, there were tons of articles written about him. He was probably Japan's most famous author worldwide back then, before Murakami came in.
>>20945757
I love it.

>>20945773
>There were many artists in the 80s making songs referencing him
Would love to hear them if you can link them.
>there were tons of articles written about him
Would love to read them if you could link them.

What other authors were like Mishima in that they tried to do away with the inherent passivity of art/literature/creation?

>>20945814
Norman Mailer

>>20945800
>Would love to hear them if you can link them.
https://youtu.be/k135BXckDaY
https://youtu.be/w8GRIt5gyCY
https://youtu.be/w1AbTRtT7qE
https://youtu.be/PxokqYbqadE
https://youtu.be/hJpwWNV9LkA
It is also known that David Bowie had a big interest on him, and even painted a portrait of him (I posted it above).
>Would love to read them if you could link them.
There are many, but Henry Miller, Gore Vidal and Marguerite Yourcenar wrote about him back then. Westerns who knew him like John Nathan or Henry Scott Stokes wrote biographies about him. Juan Antonio Vallejo-Najera, a Spanish psychiatrist, wrote a biographical essay about him that was incredibly popular in the 80s, and even appeared on Spanish television more than once talking about him.

The mere fact that there was a Hollywood production about him, the BBC did a documentary about him after his death, he published multiple articles on Western media, and he was nominated to the Nobel Prize, organized by a Western Academia, shows his popularity. Also, his movie, "The Rite of Love and Death" was first exhibited in Paris, not in Japan.

>>20945644
>>20941139
>>20939802
So you can't wrote a gay character unless you're secretly gay? Is the guy who wrote Man In The High Castle secretly a Nazi? Why are you putting limits on art? Mishima was married, and there's no reason to believe he was a faggot. This is like a reverse witch hunt; trying to find gays, so we can... honor them in our culture, or something. Just calm down with that shit. It's tiresome.

>>20946032
kek anon nice bait

>>20946032
There's lots of evidence of him being a homosexual besides that. He used to visit gay bars, there are letters on which he explicitely admits to engaging in homosexual activities, he published"Execution of Love" in a gay magazine (his family tried to deny he had written it until the original manuscripts were found on his house), there are statements from his male lovers, the fact that he held lifelong friendship with openly gay figures such a Aikihiro Miwa and Goh Mishima, etc.

The fact that he had a family doesn't prove anything, since other famous homosexuals such as Oscar Wilde did so too.

He himself admitted that Confessions was autobiographical.

Pic rel comes from "Persona: A Biography of Yukio Mishima".
>>20945969
I also forgot to mention the Propaganda Magazine, probably the most important publication on the goth subculture, which had multiple references to Mishima as well. Berger did some photoshoots inspired by Mishima.

No straight man could have ever done what Mishima did. It simply isn't possible. If you know his work, and you know how gays are, it's clear he's a faggot to the very core of his being.

>>20946076
I'm pushing back against this because it's so common to slander the dead with these kinds of accusations. Caravaggio, for example, is said to be gay, despite there being no evidence whatsoever, besides a rumor started by a rival during a time when sodomy laws were enforced.

The image you posted is from a biography, but unfortunately, many biographies are less than trustworthy. There was an autobiography about T.H. White which claims he was a closet sado-masochist homosexual, despite there being absolutely no evidence to support that claim.

Being friends with a faggot =/= being a faggot. Writing for a faggot magazine =/= being a faggot. The letters you mentioned might be damming, but I'll reserve judgement until I read them for myself to make sure it's not taken out-of-context with confirmation bias. Supposed lovers coming forward may be damming, but as we've seen with certain people in the Me Too movement, people are all too eager to lie for the sake of scandal.

You may be right, or you may not. but I'm not going to take your word for it, because I've been fooled to many times.

>>20946121
have you read his fucking books anon? the man was queer as a three dollar bill

>>20946076
I've visited gay bars. The drinks are cheap, and fags flirting with you is a confidence boost. I'm not gay, though.

>>20941421
this is fake, no? I thought he committed seppuku, meaning he cut his abdomen open?

>>20946147
Are you sure you aren't projecting?

>>20946157
answer me, what books have you read by yukio mishima?

>>20946121
Sure, you're free to think as you will, but I think the evidence is overwhelming.
>>20946154
It's from "The Death of a Man", his last photographic album.
>>20946147
Also this, his books are incredibly homoerotic, especially his short stories. Just read "The Martyrdom", "Cigarrette" or "Raisin Bread".

>>20946165
Absolutely 0.

I bet you also project your homosexuality onto Greek statutes and fascist propaganda posters, don't you?

>>20946169
> homoerotic
Are you sure you aren't mistaking philos for eros?

>>20946170
This is a literature board and you're baiting in a thread to debate about an author you haven't read one word of. GTFO.

>>20946191
Sorry, brother. I was just listening to Manowar. It always gets me pumped about how not gay I am.

>>20946169
>>>20946154 (You)
>It's from "The Death of a Man", his last photographic album
ah I was unware, I appreciate it.
Do we have any actual death pictures or is that not something out in the world?

>>20946205
There are photos of his death body, indeed, and of the heads of him and Morita.

>>20946114
This
You can claim he fucked or didn't fuck whoever you want but it's obvious that about 90% of everything he ever did was motivated by love of masculinity. Heteros don't love masculinity, they treat it as a birthright or else a means to an end. Mishima was doing something totally different.

>>20938394
So, was he gay?

>>20938394
mishima was fucking TINY. he was 5'3 or 5'4. His physique is incredibly average for such a turbomanlet, he's essentially a fucking DYEL

>>20938394
>holding a katana

A fag and a weeb. Glad I haven't read him.

Rare Interview of Mishima discussing The Sailor who fell from grace with the sea in English

https://youtu.be/khZssAUb5lQ

other short speech
https://youtu.be/5EJDteenyKA

Mishima conducting an orchestra


https://youtu.be/FoDlfj4pbfs

>>20941501
Tatsuya Nakadai on the right

>>20941501
he's really not that short compared to other japanese of his era

>>20949116
kino. sword of doom is an amazing film starring him

thinking about a samurai movie I saw some time ago but can't remember the title.
It was black and white and I think it had wolf in the title.

There was this scene where everyone was too scared to faced him and he advanced and cut down everyone that charged at him.
I think he lost his mind in the story.

>>20949141
maybe lone wolf and cub

>>20938394
I don't know about you, bros, but I don't think Mishima was gay. I think that idea just comes from jewish propaganda in the west to be honest. In japan he's not seen as gay.

>>20949798
I mean he had two children, he must have been bisexual at least

>>20949798
miwa akihiro

>>20948310
Yukio was cute!

>>20949807
Oscar Wilde also had two children. Being gay doesn't mean can't procreate.

>>20941428
where's this one thailand?

>>20941538
poor imouto...
I wonder if he still miss his little sister?

>>20949942
Miwa denies to have ever been Mishima's lover, and she's quite open about her love life, so it doesn't seem likely she's lying.

this is such an insanely funny picture

>>20950063
never thought wbout that, he's similar to Wilde in that regard

>>20950063
Didn't Wilde repent for being gay and became straight in jail?

this has been a special thread
thanks anons who submitted

>>20951294
>Didn't Wilde repent for being gay and became straight in jail?
That's not how it works, get off /pol/.

>>20939677
They're listening to an average /lit/fag stuttering his philosophical musings.

>>20945644
>Confessions of a Mask is as gay as it gets
There isn't a single point in the whole book where he talks about wanting to fuck a man. Not even once. His fantasies were weird as fuck, and there's obviously a homoerotic aspect to them, but it seems misguided to call him gay when he was mostly jerking off to the idea of torturing people or being tortured himself instead of any actual sexual act, and the book is also clear that, in his own weird way, he also loved Sonoko.

>>20945757
It's pretty good. Made my girlfriend watch it with me. She liked it, but thought Mishima was kind of weird. The soundtrack is amazing as well.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GVAUnKK1DdQ

>>20951294
Yes, he did.
>>20952952
>straight men can totally turn bi in jail or if they are roommates with a femboy, but the opposite is impossible
Will you explain us how it works, anon? Science has never been able to prove that you're born gay (maybe in your case it's true though, faggot), and, if anything, data shows that people can turn gay later in life.

How would you rate the styles of the 4 books in his tetralogy?
Translation issues aside, every Mishima book I've read so far has been very different from the rest, and I haven't enjoyed all of them. The Sailor Who Fell From Grace With The Sea was great and Sun And Steel was fascinating in its own weird way, but Confessions Of A Mask and Spring Snow felt fluffier, and left me pretty indifferent (though the scene in Spring Snow where Matsugae tries to be nice to one of his classmates and gets completely shut down was great).
Thematically, Runaway Horses seems like it could be similar to Dostoyevski's Demons, so I'm tempted to give it a chance, but I would really enjoy a return to a tauter style.

>>20939005
who uses haircuts as a measure of talent?

>>20953374
>Runaway Horses seems like it could be similar to Dostoyevski's Demons
Haven't read Demons, but Runaway Horses is pretty good, albeit a bit too long. More ambitious than most of his novels, but I'd rank it lower than his masterpieces like Sailor. Perhaps the most interesting part is that out of all his books, this is the one that shows that Mishima wasn't just some blind autistic fanatic as his death may make people think. He actually thought deeply and critically about his political ideas. He was well aware that there was something foolish about his idealism, and the in the novel there are plenty of characters who are critical to them, to different degrees and from different perspectives. There's a particular instance of a letter written by Honda to Mishima's stand-in telling him why his romanticism for purity and death is misguided, and he absolutely nails it down. But at the same time in the book Mishima also explains why such ideas were still so attractive to him and worth pursuing to the end.

>>20953177
it was weird

>>20946191
He was defending the man's honor, and asking for evidence that Mishima was indeed a wretched sodomite, a claim that you failed to prove, you saucy knave.