“weakening the roots of the revolutionary ideal in Japan”
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Yukio Mishima
Kimitake Hiraoka , known by his pen name Yukio Mishima , was a Japanese novelist, playwright, short story writer, actor, martial artist, model, and the leader of an attempted coup d'état that culminated in his seppuku. He is considered one of the most important postwar stylists of the Japanese language.
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entertainment · Japanese author and coup attempt leader (1925–1970) · writer · prose writer · novelist · playwright · screenwriter · poet · essayist · translator · critic · stage actor · also Yukio Mishima, Mishima Yukio, Kimitake Hiraoka, Hiraoka Kimitake, Mishima
Born 14 January 1925 · Died 25 November 1970 · Q134456
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Q 2008-01-14 Yukio Mishima
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2026· 8 entries
“As long as you refer to the Emperor as”
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“they could not escape established leftist thinking”
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“You may read this tragedy as an allegory of the relationship between Ōkubo Toshimichi and Saigō Takamori”
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“The ancient community ethics portrayed in this novel were attacked by progressives at the time, but no matter how much the Japanese people changed, these ancient ethics lurk in the bottom of their hearts. We have gradually seen this proven to be the case.”
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The Japan Times: A Yukio Mishima stage adaptation pulls genre-bending strings
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Public attention spiked: 9,405 Wikipedia readers in one day, 3.4× the usual 2,780, with 0 article edits.
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Public attention spiked: 9,724 Wikipedia readers in one day, 3.5× the usual 2,780, with 0 article edits.
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2025· 2 entries
Bay Area Reporter: Yukio Mishima’s ‘Voices of the Fallen Heroes’ – Stories from the depths of human experience
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The Conversation: Genius, madman or both? Japanese literary icon Yukio Mishima died leading a coup. He would have been 100 today
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2024· 1 entry
朝日新聞社: Yukio Mishima’s words gave lifelong support to student in ’68
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2020· 2 entries
毎日新聞: Edging Toward Japan: Yukio Mishima, a life in pursuit of Nietzsche
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A documentary titled Mishima Yukio vs
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2017· 1 entry
ジャパンタイムズ: ‘The Sound of Waves’ stands alone in the sea of Yukio Mishima’s works
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2016· 1 entry
The Guardian: The school of flesh: erotic portraits of Yukio Mishima – in pictures
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2014· 1 entry
Japan Today: Yukio Mishima – 'The Lost Samurai'
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2011· 1 entry
The Guardian: Rereading: The Sea of Fertility tetralogy by Yukio Mishima
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2008· 1 entry
The Village Voice: Yukio Mishima, A Life in Four Chapters, and Countless Contradictions
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2001· 1 entry
The Guardian: Yukio Mishima's other side
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1998· 2 entries
The writer Jirō Fukushima (福島次郎) published an account of his relationship with Mishima in 1951, including fifteen letters (not love letters) from Mishima
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By the literary publisher Shinchōsha to recognise groundbreaking Japanese literature
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1994· 2 entries
Madame de Sade was evaluated as the "greatest drama in the history of postwar theater" by Japanese theater criticism magazine Theater Arts (シアター・アーツ)
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“greatest drama in the history of postwar theater”
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1991· 1 entry
And later in Finland, Slovenia and Portugal
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1990· 2 entries
That "the four novels remain one of the outstanding works of 20th-Century literature and a summary of the author's life and work"
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Scott-Stokes told Takao Tokuoka (徳岡孝夫), who was entrusted with the Geki by Mishima just before the Mishima Incident, that he understood the meaning of "green snake" was the U
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1977· 1 entry
Involving four persons (including one former Tatenokai member) connected by the Mishima Incident
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1970· 6 entries
Died 1970-11-25.
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“I want to make a poem of my life.”
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“Human life is limited but I would like to live forever.”
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“I had no taste for defeat — much less victory — without a fight.”
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“All my life I have been acutely aware of a contradiction in the very nature of my existence. For forty-five years I struggled to resolve this dilemma by writing plays and novels. The more I wrote, the more I realized mere words were not enough. So I found another form of expression.”
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Mishima wrote that the writers he paid most attention to in modern western literature were Georges Bataille, Pierre Klossowski, and Witold Gombrowicz
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1968· 5 entries
Mishima formed the Tatenokai ("Shield Society"), a private militia, for the purpose of protecting the dignity of the emperor as a symbol of national identity
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Mishima formed another troupe, the Roman Theatre (浪曼劇場, Rōman Gekijō), and worked with Matsuura and Nakamura again
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Mishima wrote a play titled My Friend Hitler, in which he depicted the historical figures of Adolf Hitler, Gustav Krupp, Gregor Strasser, and Ernst Röhm as mouthpieces to express his own views on fascism and beauty
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His early mentor Kawabata won the Nobel Prize and Mishima realized that the chances of it being given to another Japanese author in the near future were slim
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When the award went to his countryman and benefactor Yasunari Kawabata
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1967· 2 entries
With 19,590 votes, beating Toshiro Mifune by 720 votes
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Published On Hagakure: The Samurai Ethic and Modern Japan (葉隠入門, Hagakure Nyūmon), an impassioned plea for a return to bushido, the putative "samurai code" of Japan's past
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1966· 1 entry
Published his short story "Voices of the Fallen Heroes", in which he denounced Emperor Hirohito for renouncing his own divinity after World War II
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1965· 2 entries
Awarded ACA National Arts Festival for Madame de Sade (1965).
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Mishima wrote the play Madame de Sade that explores the complex figure of the Marquis de Sade, traditionally upheld as an exemplar of vice, through a series of debates between six female characters, including the Marquis
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1964· 1 entry
Awarded Mainichi art award for Silk and Insight (1964).
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1963· 2 entries
1964, 1965, 1967 and 1968 (he and Rudyard Kipling are the two younger nominees in history), and was a favorite of many foreign publications
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"The Harp of Joy Incident" (喜びの琴事件, Yorokobi no Koto Jiken) occurred within the theatrical troupe Bungakuza, to which Mishima belonged
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1962· 1 entry
Mishima produced his most artistically avant-garde work Beautiful Star, which at times comes close to science fiction
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1960· 2 entries
The author Shichirō Fukazawa had published the satirical short story The Tale of an Elegant Dream (風流夢譚, Fūryū Mutan) in the mainstream magazine Chūō Kōron
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Which so closely followed the events surrounding politician Hachirō Arita's campaign to become governor of Tokyo that Mishima was sued for invasion of privacy
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1959· 1 entry
Mishima published the artistically ambitious novel Kyōko no Ie
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1956· 3 entries
Awarded Yomiuri Prize for The Temple of the Golden Pavilion (1956).
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Tried boxing for a short period of time
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Is a fictionalization of the burning down of the Kinkaku-ji Buddhist temple in Kyoto in 1950 by a mentally disturbed monk
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1955· 2 entries
Awarded Kishida Theatre Award (1955).
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Mishima took up weight training to overcome his weak constitution, and his strictly observed workout regimen of three sessions per week was not disrupted for the final 15 years of his life
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1954· 2 entries
Awarded Shinchosha literature award for The Sound of Waves (1954).
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Fell in love with Sadako Toyoda (豊田貞子), who became the model for main characters in The Sunken Waterfall (沈める滝, Shizumeru taki) and The Seven Bridges (橋づくし, Hashi zukushi)
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1952· 1 entry
Took a world tour and published his travelogue as The Cup of Apollo (アポロの杯, Aporo no Sakazuki)
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1948· 2 entries
Kawabata, who praised this work, published an autobiographical work Boy (少年, Shōnen) describing his experience of falling in love for the first time with a boy two years his junior
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And placed Mishima in the ranks of the Second Generation of Postwar Writers
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1947· 1 entry
A brief encounter with Osamu Dazai, a popular novelist known for his suicidal themes, left a lasting impression on him
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1946· 2 entries
Mishima began his first novel, Thieves (盗賊, Tōzoku), a story about two young members of the aristocracy drawn towards suicide
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Describes a homosexual love he felt at school and being teased from members of the school's rugby union because he belonged to the literary society
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1945· 2 entries
Mishima began the short story "A Story at the Cape" (岬にての物語, Misaki nite no Monogatari) and continued to work on it throughout World War II
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At age 17, and a younger brother, Chiyuki (平岡千之)
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1941· 3 entries
Mishima wrote an essay about his deep devotion to Shintō, titled The Way of the Gods (惟神之道, Kannagara no michi)
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When this debut work was serialized, Hasuda praised Mishima's genius: "This youthful author is a heaven-sent child of eternal Japanese history
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At the age of 16, Mishima was invited to write a short story for the Hojinkai-zasshi, where he submitted Forest in Full Bloom (花ざかりの森, Hanazakari no Mori), a story in which the narrator describes the feeling that his anc
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1938· 1 entry
And in 1943 he was recalled to active service for deployment as a first lieutenant in the Southeast Asian theater
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1925· 1 entry
Born 1925-01-14.
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