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From: edwards@uwmacc.UUCP (mark edwards)
Newsgroups: net.books,net.movies
Subject: Re: THE LIFE AND DEATH OF YUKIO MISHIMA by H.S.Stokes
Message-ID: <1740@uwmacc.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 27-Nov-85 09:21:59 EST
Article-I.D.: uwmacc.1740
Posted: Wed Nov 27 09:21:59 1985
Date-Received: Fri, 29-Nov-85 21:34:14 EST
References: <1440@mtgzz.UUCP>
Reply-To: edwards@uwmacc.UUCP (mark edwards)
Organization: UWisconsin-Madison Academic Comp Center
Lines: 40
Keywords: Westerner, Orientaler
Xref: watmath net.books:2562 net.movies:8504

In article <1440@mtgzz.UUCP> leeper@mtgzz.UUCP (m.r.leeper) writes:
>
>	  THE LIFE AND DEATH OF YUKIO MISHIMA by Henry Scott Stokes
>		       A book review by Mark R. Leeper
>
>very beautiful film, but what I got out of it was that Mishima was acting
>out a role not unlike a character in one of his novels.  
>
> I still do not feel I
>understand Mishima, but at the same time I am developing a profound dislike
>for the man.  
>
>     Mishima, after some reading strikes me as nothing so much as a little
>boy in a man's intellect.  He wants to be big and powerful and mean, and he
>shows it by stomping caterpillars and using magnifying glasses to burn ants.
>He goes around trying to ape a romantic role he saw in a movie once and
>tells himself, "That's what I'm like."  I won't say this completely explains
>Mishima's character; it is just the best explanation I know of.  I should
>probably be more careful of whom I am impressed with.
>

 You should not use your western eyes to judge a non westerner. However
 some of your observations on the content of his novels I would tend to
 agree with. Especially that of his acting out his novels. He wrote a
 short story about seppuku in which he gives full bloody descriptions of
 preparing for it, the wife characters seppuku, the main character acting
 as a second, then finally the main characters seppuku. He details what
 he thinks is going through the minds of each character. In short he
 rehearsed his own seppuku at least once (I think more) in writing.
   Don't forget that seppuku, as well as lovers suicides, and others
are still considered honorable ways to die.
   Inorder to better understand him and his writings, get to know authors
that he read and his peer authors. Look up an author named Akutagawa
who I think Mishima studied at one time. Akuatagawa's stories are
equally as unsual as Mishima's.

 mark
====================================================================
Akutagawa te hen ne. Soo deshoo. Yoku bikkuri suru gurai hanashi o
shite iru no.