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Yukio Mishima

    14 gennaio 1925 – 25 novembre 1970

    Yukio Mishima è stato un autore giapponese di spicco, la cui opera è caratterizzata da un'intensa esplorazione della bellezza, della morte e della transitorietà dell'esistenza umana. La sua prosa, spesso stilizzata e ricca di dettagli sensoriali, si addentra nelle profondità della psiche umana, esaminando la tensione tra il desiderio carnale e la ricerca spirituale. Mishima ha frequentemente affrontato temi come l'estetica, l'omosessualità, il tradimento, la violenza e la ricerca di significato nel mondo moderno. Il suo stile unico e i suoi argomenti provocatori lo hanno reso una delle figure più significative e controverse della letteratura giapponese del XX secolo.

    La voce delle onde
    La spada
    Quaderni della Fenice: Madame de Sade
    La scuola della carne
    Le tavole d'oro: Stella meravigliosa
    I grandi tascabili - 354: Lo specchio degli inganni
    • Quarto capitolo della tetralogia 'Il mare della fertilità' dello scrittore giapponese. Insieme alla vita dello scrittore, termina anche la storia del vecchio Honda, protagonista dei quattro romanzi, e ora alle prese con i fantasmi della sua esistenza, irretito in un gioco di inganni della mente. Nel giovane Toru ha creduto di vedere la terza reincarnazione dell'amato Kiyoaki, dopo Isao e Ying Chan. E piano piano il dubbio si insinua nel disperato Honda: il dubbio che Kiyoaki e le sue reincarnazioni non siano mai esistiti, che la sua vita sia stata soltanto illusione.

      I grandi tascabili - 354: Lo specchio degli inganni
      4,2
    • Le tavole d'oro: Stella meravigliosa

      • 208pagine
      • 8 ore di lettura

      Giappone. Una notte d’estate degli inizi degli anni Sessanta, Juichiro Osugi, un uomo che conduce una vita tranquilla al riparo delle mura domestiche e dell’affetto dei familiari, attratto dal chiarore della luna, esce di casa e raggiunge una radura ai margini della città. Lì avviene l’“incontro” che muterà radicalmente la sua vita: un’astronave, luminosa, solenne, si schiude all’improvviso davanti ai suoi occhi. L’uomo la contempla estasiato e scopre un segreto sepolto nella sua memoria... Pubblicato a puntate nel 1962 su "Shinco", rivista letteraria dell’omonima casa editrice, Stella meravigliosa è il frutto di una passione segreta di Mishima: qualche anno prima della pubblicazione dell’opera, lo scrittore aveva preso, infatti, a frequentare riunioni di esperti di ufologia, e a consultare con cura gli studi sulle possibilità di vita extraterrestre. Grazie a una perfetta fusione tra realtà e fantasia, il romanzo si segnala per il suo potere di incantare il lettore, e di indurlo con estrema naturalezza a varcare i limiti della quotidianità.

      Le tavole d'oro: Stella meravigliosa
      3,8
    • Quaderni della Fenice: Madame de Sade

      • 128pagine
      • 5 ore di lettura

      Leggendo la biografia di Sade, Mishima rimane colpito da un episodio apparentemente inspiegabile: la moglie del divino marchese, dopo aver dedicato tanti anni e tante appassionate energie al tentativo di farlo uscire dal carcere, al momento della possibile riunione, anziché accorrere da lui, decide di rimanergli lontana, fa sapere al marito che non lo incontrerà ma più. Come mai? L'ipotetica risposta a questo interrogativo si intreccia, in un testo fra i più rappresentativi della sua produzione teatrale, al tema portante della ricerca estetico-filosofica di Mishima. La bellezza fisica, per il grande scrittore giapponese, è indissolubilmente fusa col valore morale, con la volontà e la forza di incarnare nella propria esistenza ideali di vita elevati. E il Sade di Mishima, limitato nell'uso del corpo dalla sua condizione di prigioniero, ha trasferito il mondo dei sensi e delle passioni su un piano squisitamente intellettuale

      Quaderni della Fenice: Madame de Sade
      3,4
    • La spada

      • 122pagine
      • 5 ore di lettura

      - La spada, di Yukio Mishima - Riflessioni sulla morte di Mishima, di Henry Miller - Proclama, di Yukio Mishima - L'ideologia della morte folle, di Hashikawa Bunzô - Dietro tanta vivacità un senso di vuoto, di Donald Keene - Mishima, di Marguerite Yourcenar 24 foto in appendice.

      La spada
      3,7
    • Senza mai chetarsi, ora infuriata ora implacabile, la voce delle onde ci accompagna durante tutta la lettura di questo romanzo. Si tratta di una storia d'amore che sulla sponda del mare nasce e si sviluppa, raggiungendo apici di toccante e poetica spontaneità e semplicità. La vita, fatta di coraggio e di sacrificio, di un povero villaggio di pescatori giapponesi è lo sfondo per le uscite sul mare in tempesta, la pesca delle perle e i convegni d'amore di due giovani protagonisti, Shinji e Hatsue, su al tempio di Yashiro, che dall'alto del monte domina l'Isola del canto - Uta-jima - come armoniosamente la chiamano i suoi abitanti. Questo racconto, per la sua raffinata sensibilità, occupa un posto di rilievo nella vasta produzione di Yukio Mishima (1925-1970), uno dei maggiori esponenti della letteratura giapponese moderna.

      La voce delle onde
      3,8
    • La via del samurai

      • 198pagine
      • 7 ore di lettura

      "Una straordinaria meditazione sulla morte e un'amara riflessione sulla perdita di tradizioni e valori antichissimi, nel racconto di un grande rappresentante della letteratura contemporanea." [dalla pagina web di Bompiani]

      La via del samurai
      3,6
    • Musica

      • 208pagine
      • 8 ore di lettura

      Un giorno d'autunno, alla porta del dottor Shiomi Kazunori, uno psicananlista che da cinque anni ha aperto uno studio a Hibiya, si presenta un'affascinante ragazza di nome Reiko, che lo informa di non riuscire a sentire la musica. Da qui si sviluppa un'intricata vicenda in cui i molteplici tentativi di risalire alla causa del problema (la musica è una metafora dell'orgasmo) vengono descritti con una suspence da romanzo giallo.

      Musica
      3,7
    • Confessioni di una maschera

      • 224pagine
      • 8 ore di lettura

      Un giovane cui "difetta in via assoluta qualsiasi forma di voglia carnale per l'altro sesso" deve imparare a vivere celando la propria autentica identità. In pagine in cui risultano indissolubilmente commisti sessualità e candore, esultanza e disperazione, il protagonista di questo romanzo, un classico della letteratura giapponese moderna, confessa le esperienze cruciali attraverso le quali è giunto a conoscere se stesso: dalla "adorazione indicibile" per un paio di calzoni all'elaborazione di fantasie sadomasochistiche, dall'identificazione con personaggi femminili celebri alle sconcertanti interpretazioni di fiabe e motivi iconografici occidentali... L'accettazione di se stesso come uomo diverso dagli altri uomini non si attua senza una lotta, tanto strenua quanto vana, per conquistare la normalità: simula vizi immaginari per far passare inosservate le proprie vere inclinazioni, si costringe a corteggiare giovinette per chiarire sino a qual punto la donna possa offrire piaceri reali, corregge con zelo manifestazioni di rischiosa passionalità... Ma "le emozioni non hanno simpatia per l'ordine fisso" e i suoi sentimenti reali rimangono, tenaci, quelli nascosti dalla maschera della correttezza ufficiale.

      Confessioni di una maschera
      3,7
    • Runaway Horses

      • 421pagine
      • 15 ore di lettura

      Yukio Mishima’s Runaway Horses is the second novel in his masterful tetralogy, The Sea of Fertility. Again we encounter Shigekuni Honda, who narrates this epic tale of what he believes are the successive reincarnations of his childhood friend Kiyoaki Matsugae. In 1932, Shigeuki Honda has become a judge in Osaka. Convinced that a young rightist revolutionary, Isao, is the reincarnation of his friend Kiyoaki, Honda commits himself to saving the youth from an untimely death. Isao, driven to patriotic fanaticism by a father who instilled in him the ethos of the ancient samurai, organizes a violent plot against the new industrialists who he believes are usurping the Emperor’s rightful power and threatening the very integrity of the nation. Runaway Horses is the chronicle of a conspiracy — a novel about the roots and nature of Japanese fanaticism in the years that led to war.

      Runaway Horses
      4,3
    • Spring Snow

      • 376pagine
      • 14 ore di lettura

      The first novel of Mishima's landmark tetralogy, The Sea of fertility Spring Snow is set in Tokyo in 1912, when the hermetic world of the ancient aristocracy is being breached for the first time by outsiders -- rich provincial families unburdened by tradition, whose money and vitality make them formidable contenders for social and political power. Among this rising new elite are the ambitious Matsugae, whose son has been raised in a family of the waning aristocracy, the elegant and attenuated Ayakura. Coming of age, he is caught up in the tensions between old and new -- fiercely loving and hating the exquisite, spirited Ayakura Satoko. He suffers in psychic paralysis until the shock of her engagement to a royal prince shows him the magnitude of his passion, and leads to a love affair that is as doomed as it was inevitable.

      Spring Snow
      4,2
    • Patriotism

      • 57pagine
      • 2 ore di lettura

      One of the most powerful short stories ever written, this work discusses the dynamics of patriotism and honor, love and suicide.

      Patriotism
      4,1
    • Five Modern Noh Plays

      • 288pagine
      • 11 ore di lettura

      A great, ancient art form, brought right up to date by one of Japan's foremost writers

      Five Modern Noh Plays
      4,1
    • Death, homosexuality and the spiritual emptiness of post-war Japan: these are the often shocking subjects which Mishima explores. The old world meets the new in this collection of fiction and drama by one of Japan's most celebrated writers. A husband prepares to commit hara-kiri in the name of patriotism; an ascetic struggles with temptation; and a businessman meets a past love in the streets of San Francisco. Violence colours the work of Mishima, as it did his life. But there is also delicate observation, pathos, humour and irony in these beautifully crafted tales. Contents: - Death in Midsummer - Three Million Yen - Thermos Flasks - The Priest of Shiga Temple and His Love - The Seven Bridges - Patriotism - Dōjōji - Onnagata - The Pearl - Swaddling Clothes

      Death in Midsummer and Other Stories
      4,1
    • A beautiful hardback edition of a great Japanese classic, beautiful, lyrical and deeply ominous.A band of savage thirteen-year-old boys reject the adult world as illusory, hypocritical, and sentimental, and train themselves in a brutal callousness they call 'objectivity'. When the mother of one of them begins an affair with a ship's officer, he and his friends idealise the man at first; but it is not long before they conclude that he is in fact soft and romantic.They regard this disillusionment as an act of betrayal on his part - and the retribution is deliberate and horrifying.'Mishima's greatest novel, and one of the greatest of the past century' The TimesVINTAGE QUARTERBOUND CLASSICS: Bound to be beautiful

      The Sailor who Fell from Grace with the Sea: Vintage Quarterbound Classics
      3,9
    • Written when Mishima was only twentysix, Forbidden Colors is a depiction of a male homosexual relationship, in which a rich older man buys the love of a young man who is stunningly handsome but who lacks the ability to love. As in Mann's Death in Venice, the older man's longing for the beauty of youth is associated with aestheticism and death.

      Forbidden Colours
      4,0
    • A haunting portrait of a young man’s obsession with idealized beauty and his destructive quest to possess it fully—and the book that “established Mishima’s claim as one of the outstanding writers of the world" (The New York Times). Because of the boyhood trauma of seeing his mother make love to another man in the presence of his dying father, Mizoguchi becomes a hopeless stutterer. Taunted by his schoolmates, he feels utterly alone and develops a childhood fascination with Kyoto’s famous Golden Temple. While an acolyte at the temple, he fixates on the structure’s aesthetic perfection and it becomes his one and only object of desire. But as Mizoguchi begins to perceive flaws in the temple, he determines that the only true path to beauty lies in an act of horrific violence. Based on a real incident that occurred in 1950, The Temple of the Golden Pavilion brilliantly portrays the passions and agonies of a young man in postwar Japan, bringing to the subject the erotic imagination and instinct for the dramatic moment that marked Mishima as one of the towering makers of modern fiction.

      The Temple of the Golden Pavilion
      4,0
    • The Temple of the Golden Pavillion

      • 256pagine
      • 9 ore di lettura

      After witnessing his mother with another man while his father was dying, Mizoguchi becomes a stutterer and faces bullying at school. Feeling isolated, he finds solace as an acolyte at a renowned temple in Kyoto, where he becomes deeply obsessed with its beauty.

      The Temple of the Golden Pavillion
      3,9
    • Sun and Steel

      • 108pagine
      • 4 ore di lettura

      In this fascinating document, one of Japan's most renowned and controversial writers creates a new literary form that blends various writing styles yet defies categorization. It can be read as an account of a bookish boy discovering the significance of his physical existence; the "sun and steel" symbolize the cult of the outdoors and bodybuilding. Additionally, it serves as a discussion on the relationship between action and art, particularly the author's own refined artistic expression. On a personal level, it chronicles an individual's quest for identity and self-integration, while also illustrating how a deeply individual focus can evolve into a profound philosophy of life. Mishima's complex yet polished style weaves these elements together, merging confession, self-analysis, philosophy, and poetry into a cohesive whole that is both perfect and self-sufficient. This work is as meticulously crafted as Mishima's novels and offers essential insights into understanding them as art. The path to salvation depicted is highly personal, yet it resonates with universal themes, culminating in a poetic vision that transcends the individual. This document is a poignant and significant reflection on the future trajectory of one of modern literature's most compelling novelists.

      Sun and Steel
      3,9
    • The World of the Short Story

      A 20th Century Collection

      • 847pagine
      • 30 ore di lettura

      At age 82, Clifton Fadiman continues his prolific publishing career, here presenting 62 of the world's best short stories from 16 countries. His criteria? "Each story had to be both interesting and of high literary merit." Fadiman fulfills both requirements and much more, offering a cornucopia of superior 20th-century writers that includes Franz Kafka, D. H. Lawrence, Isaac Babel, F. Scott Fitzgerald, William Faulkner, Ernest Hemingway, John Cheever, Sean O'Faolain, Graham Greene, Robert Penn Warren, Colette, John Updike, Donald Barthelme, and James Thurber. (Regrettably, J. D. Salinger is not included due to lack of permission.) Here is a truly remarkable collection of this century's short stories that readers from all over the world will read with delight.

      The World of the Short Story
      3,8
    • Temple of Dawn

      • 320pagine
      • 12 ore di lettura

      Yukio Mishima’s The Temple of Dawn is the third novel in his masterful tetralogy, The Sea of Fertility . Here, Shigekuni Honda continues his pursuit of the successive reincarnations of Kiyoaki Matsugae, his childhood friend. Travelling in Thailand in the early 1940s, Shigekuni Honda, now a brilliant lawyer, is granted an audience with a young Thai princess—an encounter that radically alters the course of his life. In spite of all reason, he is convinced she is the reincarnated spirit of his friend Kiyoaki. As Honda goes to great lengths to discover for certain if his theory is correct, The Temple of Dawn becomes the story of one man’s obsessive pursuit of a beautiful woman and his equally passionate search for enlightenment.

      Temple of Dawn
      3,8
    • The Sailor Who Fell from Grace with the Sea tells the tale of a band of savage thirteen-year-old boys who reject the adult world as illusory, hypocritical and sentimental, and train themselves in a brutal callousness they call "objectivity." When the mother of one of them begins an affair with a ship's officer, he and his friends idealize the man at first; but it is not long before they conclude that he is in fact soft and romantic. They regard their disappointment in him as an act of betrayal on his part, and react violently.

      The Sailor Who Fell from Grace with the Sea
      3,8
    • After the Banquet

      • 270pagine
      • 10 ore di lettura

      A Japanese nightclub owner becomes infatuated with an autocratic and puritanical political leader

      After the Banquet
      3,8
    • Life for Sale

      • 192pagine
      • 7 ore di lettura

      'The best book I've read this year ... darkly comedic and full of tension and surprise' Marina Abramovic 'Life for sale. Use me as you wish. I am a twenty-seven-year-old male. Discretion guaranteed. Will cause no bother at all.' When Hanio Yamada realises the future holds little of worth to him, he puts his life for sale in a Tokyo newspaper, thus unleashing a series of unimaginable exploits. A world of murderous mobsters, hidden cameras, a vampire woman, poisoned carrots, code-breaking, a hopeless junkie heiress and makeshift explosives reveals itself to the unwitting hero. Is there nothing he can do to stop it? Resolving to follow the orders of his would-be purchasers, he comes to understand what life is worth, and whether we can indeed name our price.

      Life for Sale
      3,7
    • Thirst for Love

      • 208pagine
      • 8 ore di lettura

      In this masterpiece of the sexual Gothic, Yukio Mishima creates a portrait ofobsessive love and corrosive jealousy among a young widow, her father-in-law, and a domestic servant.

      Thirst for Love
      3,7
    • This is a tale based on the strike which took place in the mid-1950s at Omi Kenshi, a silk manufacturer not far from Tokyo. The events described reflect the management / labour tensions of the period and is a piece of social commentary on the transformation of Japanese business.

      Silk and Insight
      3,5
    • Star

      • 64pagine
      • 3 ore di lettura

      A haunting novella of fame and disillusionment by a Japanese literary iconAll eyes are upon Rikio. And he likes it, mostly. His fans cheer from a roped-off section, screaming and yelling to attract his attention. They would kill for a moment alone with him. Finally the director sets up the shot, the camera begins to roll, someone yells "action"; Rikio, for a moment, transforms into another being, a hardened young yakuza, but as soon as the shot is finished, he slumps back into his own anxieties and obsessions.Written shortly after Yukio Mishima himself had acted in the film Afraid to Die, this novella is a rich and unflinching psychological portrait of a celebrity coming apart at the seams as the absurdity of his existence comes sharply into focus. With exquisite, vivid prose, Star begs the question: is there ever any escape from how we are seen by others?

      Star
      3,6
    • The Frolic of the Beasts

      • 176pagine
      • 7 ore di lettura

      Set in rural Japan shortly after World War II, The Frolic of the Beasts tells the story of a strange and utterly absorbing love triangle between a former university student, Koji; his would-be mentor, the eminent literary critic Ippei Kusakado; and Ippei's beautiful, enigmatic wife, Yuko. When brought face-to-face with one of Ippei's many marital indiscretions, Koji finds his growing desire for Yuko compels him to action in a way that changes all three of their lives profoundly. Originally published in 1961 and now available in English for the first time, The Frolic of the Beasts is a haunting examination of the various guises we assume throughout our lives, and a tale of psychological self-entrapment, seduction, and violence.

      The Frolic of the Beasts
      3,6
    • Beautiful Star

      • 288pagine
      • 11 ore di lettura

      The Osugi family have come to a realization. Each of them hails from a different planet. Father from Mars, mother from Jupiter, son from Mercury and daughter from Venus. Already seen as oddballs in their small Japanese town in the 1960s, this extra-terrestrial knowledge brings them closer together; they climb mountains to wait for UFOs, study at home together and regard their human neighbours with a kindly benevolence. But Father, Juichiro, is worried about the bomb. He writes letters to Khrushchev, trying to warn everyone he can of the terrible threat. After all, humans may be terribly flawed, but aren't they worth saving? He sends out a coded message in the newspaper to find other aliens. But there are other extra-terrestrials out there, ones who do not look so kindly on the flaws and foibles of humans. And a charming young man, who claims to be from Venus too, tempts daughter Akiko away from the family . . .

      Beautiful Star
      3,2
    • Novela svérázného japonského autora, vypravující o rituální sebevraždě císařského důstojníka, je doplněna obsáhlým faktickým i ideovým komentářem.

      Láska k vlasti
      4,8
    • Tuttle Classics: Spring Snow

      • 389pagine
      • 14 ore di lettura

      Tokyo, 1912. The closed world of the ancient aristocracy is being breached for the first time by outsiders - rich provincial families, a new and powerful political and social elite. Kiyoaki has been raised among the elegant Ayakura family - members of the waning aristocracy - but he is not one of them. Coming of age, he is caught up in the tensions between the old and the new, and his feelings for the exquisite, spirited Satoko, observed from the sidelines by his devoted friend Honda. When Satoko is engaged to a royal prince, Kiyoaki realises the magnitude of his passion.

      Tuttle Classics: Spring Snow
      4,2
    • 花ざかりの森・憂国

      • 352pagine
      • 13 ore di lettura

      二・二六事件で逆賊と断じられた親友を討たねばならぬ懊悩に、武山中尉は自刃を決意する。夫の覚悟に添う夫人との濃厚極まる情交と壮絶な最期を描く、エロスと死の真骨頂「憂国」。16歳の実質的デビュー作「花ざかりの森」、著者の生涯にわたる文学的テーマを内包した「中世に於ける一殺人常習者の遺せる哲学的日記の抜萃」等13編。多彩な魅力の自選短編集。

      花ざかりの森・憂国
      3,0
    • Vestidos de noche

      • 296pagine
      • 11 ore di lettura

      Todo parece ir sobre ruedas durante la luna de miel de la joven Ayako Inagaki. Su marido, Toshio Takigawa, es el hombre ideal: tierno, atractivo, culto, elegante, deportista... Pero hay algo que empieza inquietarle: la extraña relación de Toshio con su madre, una afable y encantadora mujer de porte aristocrático, viuda del embajador japonés en Londres. La señora Takigawa está muy bien relacionada con la alta sociedad de Tokio, incluida la casa imperial, a la que quiere acceder el padre de Ayako, un ejecutivo ambicioso y esnob. En "Vestidos de noche" (sátira feroz con tonos irreverentes de la hipocresía social reinante en la alta sociedad japonesa tras la derrota en la Segunda Guerra Mundial) Mishima explora nuevamente el lado más oscuro e inconfesable del ser humano.

      Vestidos de noche
      3,8
    • Dojoji Et Autres Nouvelles

      • 127pagine
      • 5 ore di lettura

      De l'univers des geishas aux rites sacrificiels des samouraïs, de la cérémonie du thé à la boutique d'un antiquaire, Mishima explore toutes les facettes d'un Japon mythique, entre légende et tradition. D'une nouvelle à l'autre, les situations tendrement ironiques côtoient les drames les plus tragiques : que ce soit la jolie danseuse qui remet du rouge à lèvres après avoir renoncé à se défigurer avec de l'acide en souvenir de son amant, Masako, désespérée, qui voit son rêve le plus cher lui échapper, ou l'épouse qui se saisit du poignard avec lequel son mari vient de se transpercer la gorge... Quelques textes étonnants pour découvrir toute la diversité et l'originalité du grand écrivain japonais.

      Dojoji Et Autres Nouvelles
      3,7
    • Весенний снег

      • 458pagine
      • 17 ore di lettura

      Память - зеркало миражей. Иногда в нем всплывают такие далекие образы, что мы не в силах из разглядеть. Иногда - те, что только кажутся близкими. Весенний снег, кажущийся благословением, оборачивается проклятием для юных влюбленных

      Весенний снег
    • Mein Freund Hitler

      Ein Stück

      • 128pagine
      • 5 ore di lettura

      Die Erzählung beleuchtet die dramatischen Ereignisse der "Nacht der langen Messer" am 30. Juni 1934, als Hitlers Befehl zur Ermordung der SA-Führung und unliebsamer Politiker führte. Yukio Mishima bietet keine tiefgehende Analyse Hitlers, sondern konzentriert sich auf die logistischen Aspekte und die Machtdynamiken, die zu diesem brutalen Machtkampf führten. Die Darstellung der Geschehnisse verbindet Fiktion mit historischen Fakten und zeigt die komplexen politischen Intrigen jener Zeit.

      Mein Freund Hitler
    • Der Held der See

      • 208pagine
      • 8 ore di lettura

      In Yukio Mishimas Roman steht die Liebe zwischen dem Seemann Ryuji und der Witwe Fusako im Mittelpunkt, die den Sohn Noboru in ein emotionales Dilemma stürzt. Fasziniert von Ryuji, fühlt sich Noboru betrogen, als dieser sich für die Ehe entscheidet. Der Roman thematisiert den Konflikt zwischen Idealbildern und der harten Realität.

      Der Held der See
    • Kniha obsahuje dva romány japonského autora – Smäd po láske (1950) a Príboj (1957). Smäd po láske, dráma o pocite odcudzenosti mladej vdovy, žijúcej so svojím svokrom, v obručí rodinných zvyklostí a pokrytectva. Príboj, ľúbostný príbeh dvoch ľudí, ktorým ľudská zloba kladie do cesty prekážky.

      Smäd po láske / Príboj (2 knihy v jednom svazku)
    • Yukio Mishima

      Poesie, Performanz und Politik

      • 269pagine
      • 10 ore di lettura

      Am 25. November 2010 jährt sich die Selbsttötung Mishimas nach Art der Samurai zum vierzigsten Mal. Dieses „theatralische Akt“ hat sich ins allgemeine Bewusstsein eingebrannt und oft den Blick auf sein literarisches Werk verstellt. Aktuell gibt es Anzeichen für eine „Mishima-Renaissance“, die in seinem Leben und Werk einen Vorläufer der post-modernen „Ästhetik der Inszenierung“ sieht. Sich mit Mishima auseinanderzusetzen, bleibt auch vierzig Jahre nach seinem Tod irritierend und schmerzhaft, da er literarische, moralische und politische Empfindungen verletzt. Dies könnte erklären, warum im deutschsprachigen Raum bisher keine umfassendere Auseinandersetzung mit ihm stattfand. Dieses Buch versucht, diese Lücke zu schließen. Die Beiträge reflektieren die ästhetischen, moralischen und politischen Komponenten von Mishimas Werk aus unterschiedlichen Perspektiven und Methoden. Die erste Sektion verdeutlicht die Ambivalenz seiner Poetisierung des Politischen. Die zweite widmet sich den theatralischen, performativen und rituellen Aspekten seines Schaffens. Die dritte behandelt seine literarische Suche nach „Anerkennung“ und sein „unglückliches Bewusstsein“ (Hegel). Im Anhang wird der wichtige, aber bisher kaum beachtete Text Eirei no koe [Die Stimmen der toten Helden] von 1966 erstmals in deutscher Übersetzung präsentiert.

      Yukio Mishima