La decomposizione dell'angelo

The Sea of Fertility #4

by Yukio Mishima

"Se la causa della decadenza è la malattia, allora la causa fondamentale di essa, la carne, è una malattia. L'essenza della carne è la decadenza. La funzione della carne, collocata nel trascorrere del tempo, è quella di testimoniare la distruzione e la decadenza."

Honda Shigekuni, indimenticabile protagonista della tetralogia Il mare della fertilità che trova compimento in questo romanzo, giudice ormai in pensione, adotta con grande slancio l'orfano Tōru. In lui vede l'ennesima reincarnazione del suo amato e perduto compagno di scuola Kiyoaki. Ma si tratta dell'inseguimento di qualcosa di impossibile da raggiungere… Un grande romanzo sul dolore e sul disfacimento di ogni illusione, completato da Mishima il giorno stesso in cui commise seppuku.

Genres: Fiction, Japan, Japanese Literature, Classics, Literature, Asia, Historical Fiction

250 pages, Kindle Edition

First published November 1, 1970

About the author

Yukio Mishima (三島 由紀夫) was born in Tokyo in 1925. He graduated from Tokyo Imperial University’s School of Jurisprudence in 1947. His first published book, The Forest in Full Bloom, appeared in 1944 and he established himself as a major author with Confessions of a Mask (1949). From then until his death he continued to publish novels, short stories, and plays each year. His crowning achievement, the Sea of Fertility tetralogy—which contains the novels Spring Snow (1969), Runaway Horses (1969), The Temple of Dawn (1970), and The Decay of the Angel (1971)—is considered one of the definitive works of twentieth-century Japanese fiction. In 1970, at the age of forty-five and the day after completing the last novel in the Fertility series, Mishima committed seppuku (ritual suicide)—a spectacular death that attracted worldwide attention.

Reviews

[Jim Fonseca · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is the fourth and final volume in Mishima’s tetralogy, The Sea of Fertility.

Class divisions and changing values in Japan due to western influence are major themes. Another theme all the way through the series is reincarnation. In Decay of the Angel, the reincarnated spirit is an orphan. He has a job helping ships in port navigate to their docks. Obviously it was pre-ordained that Honda finds him since he encounters him by simply wandering around the port.



Honda, the lawyer, who is another main character through the four volumes. He is now 76 years old but he adopts the young boy. He does this even though, if the pattern holds, he knows the boy will die at age 20. A sub-theme tied in with the reincarnation is how Honda, originally an associate justice in the national courts, is initially all into rationalism and logic. But when he meets the young boy gang leader in volume two, Runaway Horses, he notices three moles on his body identical to his deceased friend from years ago. Despite his rationality, he comes to believe the young boy is his old friend reincarnated.

But unlike in the other volumes, the boy in The Decay of the Angel sets out to do evil – thus the ‘decay’ in the title. “I vow it: that when I am twenty I will cast Father into hell. I must start making plans.” The boy is attached to an ugly, obese, mentally ill young woman whom he eventually marries. His evil starts out small, getting his tutor dismissed, but graduates to where he terrorizes his adoptive father by striking him with a poker. He makes his four maids his mistresses.

Yukio Mishima is one of my favorite authors. Here are links to my reviews of other books by Mishima:

Spring Snow

The Sailor Who Fell from Grace with the Sea

Runaway Horses

The Temple of Dawn

The Sound of Waves

The Temple of the Golden Pavilion

Forbidden Colors

Although you can pick up most of the back story in context, it really helps to have to have read the whole series in sequence. For those who want to read this book but have not read the preceding volumes, here are brief summaries for each book:

Spoiler for the first volume, Spring Snow:
The plot revolves around a love story between a boy and the daughter of the neighboring household. They have known each other all their lives and she has loved him since they were children. But his feelings toward her are on-again, off-again; he mistreats her and pretends he doesn’t care for her. Finally she gives up on him and becomes engaged to a son of a noble family, actually a member of the Emperor’s household. At this point (she’s 21; he’s 19), and after the engagement has been approved by the Emperor himself, finally he decides he loves her and begins to pursue her. They begin a sexual relationship and she becomes pregnant. If word of any of this gets out, it would be the equivalent of a national scandal! When the boy’s father learns what is going on, after spending his whole life ass-kissing the emperor and the nobles, to say he is apoplectic is putting it mildly. Never having lifted a hand to his son before, he beats him with a pool cue. She enters a convent and the son later dies of a disease.

Spoiler for the second volume, Runaway Horses: A young boy of high school age leads a band of youths (average age 18) who want to restore honor to the Emperor. They are fiercely anti-western and anti-capitalist. With rice famines and great rural poverty (it’s around 1932, still before World War II but during the worldwide Great Depression), they blame the newly-wealthy Western-oriented capitalists who have taken over the parliament, deprived the Emperor of power, and weakened the honor of the samurai class. (They can’t carry swords, for example.) The boys are not just anti-western, they even refer to “Buddhist lackeys” and want to restore more of the original Japanese religion, Shinto. The boys hatch a plan to assassinate the upper echelons of the capitalist leadership and then kill themselves by seppuku, ritual suicide. But their plotting is betrayed to the police. Honda, their lawyer gets them off, but the boy still kills one of richest men in Japan and then commits ritual suicide.

Spoiler for third volume, The Temple of Dawn. The boy is reincarnated as a young woman, a princess in Thailand. The young woman is kept isolated because she is considered mentally disturbed because she talks of having lived other lives in Japan. Honda meets with her and even quizzes her on dates and is satisfied that she is the ‘real thing.’ Other than these ‘memories,’ which disappear as she gets older, the young woman is quite normal and eventually visits Honda’s family in Japan. There he spies on her to confirm that she has the ‘three moles’ on her chest that mark the reincarnated individuals. (And for those who follow these things, it is actually common for individuals who claim to be reincarnated to lose those memories of past lives as they leave childhood.)



Mishima (1925-1970) was a classic Japanese author. He committed ritual suicide the same day he delivered this book to his publisher. His best-known work is this tetralogy, The Sea of Fertility. I thought the whole series excellent, with the first volume, Spring Snow, the best.

Photo of Japanese a port in the 1930's from i.pinimg.com/originals
The author from theguardian.com/books

[Adam Dalva · Rating 4 out of 5]

A strange, swift landing to the Sea of Fertility tetralogy, and a book that can't help but be altered by the fact that Mishima's strange, ritualistic suicide occurred the day after he handed it in, on the date on the last page of the mansucript. There is a lot to like in this volume, which cleverly inverts the reincarnations of Kiyoaki by questioning whether this particular rendition (a sociopathic ship watcher named Tōru Yasunaga, a character w/ virtually no inner life) is a complex imposter. The middle of the book, Toru's journal, is an interesting return to the first book, set in 1970s Japan, as the lead, Honda, battles old age. But there are shortcomings here: the book moves too fast, accepting its strangeness as a matter of course, and cutting short the intriguing push and pull between Honda and his adopted son, who have so much in common. It's almost as if Mishima himself is in dread of his aged narrator, whose gradual disintegration is treated rather grotesquely. The ending, however, is excellent: something we've waited for for 4 books...for 60 years of plot.

As an overall project, The Sea of Fertility is fascinating to consider: flawed, weird, autobiographical, ambitious. I enjoyed my journey through its lush, barren pages.

[William2 · Rating 3 out of 5]

What’s this one about, do you suppose? There is in all translations of Mishima’s work I have read—by a host of translators—a fundamental woodeness or clunkiness of description, especially in his philosophical flights. In Japan he is often referred to as a stylist with a penchant for archaic Japanese word forms. So it could be that Mishima’s use of archaisms means he doesn’t translate well into English. I don’t know. But this fourth volume of The Sea of Fertility tetralogy seems to me in the first half worst of the batch. One has no idea why the characters are alternately so goddamned indifferent then so cruel. The novel seems to be all surface. Why is there mention of evil out of the blue like that? What’s evil? I'd like to be shown Tōru's evil and not simply be told about it. It would do wonders for the suspense. Yet the motivations are often completely opaque. Except at the end, there is little or no insight into character. Tōru is without parentage. No past for him is ever given. He lives alone without friends, motivated like most Mishima protagonists, entirely by a mix of naïveté and cryptic self inquiry. The day after Mishima finished this MS he committed suicide. He was 45. Maybe that was his only alternative. He certainly makes clear here, as in all his books to some degree, his absolute detestation of old age. The book seems to me a farrago, a pastiche whose fragments are not without interest, but a novel they do not make.

[Sana · Rating 5 out of 5]

خیلی به خودم افتخار میکنم که این چهارگانه رو خوندم و بدون پشیمونی پول و وقتمو خرج این چهارگانه کردم.
عنوان این چهارگانه:
برف بهاری
اسبهای لگام گسیخته
معبد سپیده دم
زوال فرشته
راستش من برای هیچ کدوم ریویو ننوشتم همش تنبلی میکردم😁
اما واقعا من لذت بردم از قلم میشیما هرچقدر هم بگم که گفتم البته از نظر من چون خیلی نظرات منفی درموردش خوندم.
قهرمان اصلی هوندا که ما پا به پاش همراه می‌شویم وشاهد تمام اتفاقاتی که رخ میده می‌شویم.
راستش من نمیدونم چطور احساساتمو در مورد این چهارگانه بیان کنم ولی واقعا خوشم آومد.
جلد آخرش واقعا برای من متفاوت ترین کتابی که خوندم.
پادکست تراژدی رو هم ازدست ندین یکی از اپیزودهاش راجع به میشیما که نشون میده چقدر زندگی پیچیده و عجیبی داشته.
میشیما نویسنده‌ای که سعی کرده بر زنده نگه داشتن آداب امپراطوری ست.

[Luís · Rating 4 out of 5]

In the recent review of "The Temple of Dawn," the third installment in Mishima's tetralogy, we left Honda, the fiftieth lawyer, prey to the pangs of the noon demon and unable to curb obsessive voyeurism.
We find him in 1970 in the last opus entitled "The decaying angel" in the guise of an old man of 76 years, now widowed and walking painfully with the help of a cane. Since the death of his wife, he has lived more or less with Keiko, a neighbor of his age. However, it has kept a pronounced penchant for beautiful young women, an inclination that harmonizes quite well with the voyeurism of Honda.
We have known this central figure in the tetralogy since his 18th birthday, the date from which a growing attraction for the ancient Indian laws of Manu was manifested in him, which gave particular importance to reincarnation.
This Honda has approached, twice already in its life, two people who, in its eyes, were the reincarnation of Kiyoaki, its friend of youth, tragically disappeared:
- in 1932, he took the criminal defense of a young nationalist, Isao, accused of an attempted assassination. Then, in 1940, he met fortuitously during a professional trip to Bangkok a Siamese princess, Moon Light, a young woman he saw again a few years later in Tokyo under very particular circumstances.
Like Kiyoaki, Isao and Moon Light had three perfectly aligned moles under their left arms at armpit level.
As "The Decaying Angel" begins, Toru Yasunaga is at his observation post and watches for the arrival of the cargo ships off the port of Shimizu. Its job is to alert the various port institutions one hour before the boat dock.
Orphan of exceptional beauty, this sixteen-year-old boy is wholly convinced that he does not belong to this world. But, by observing the horizon line, the conviction that he comes from another planet had forged in his mind.
Three moles mark his left side, and the reader quickly understands that Toru is the third reincarnation of Kiyoaki. What will be the relationship between Toru, the young man who looks like an angel, and Honda, the older man assaulted by his past demons? The ultimate Mishima tragedy is in place. The outcome is approaching, the central character slowly advances towards the end of his life, and a deep sadness gradually gains the reader, who turns, regretfully, to the last pages of "The angel in decay."
He knows that just now, his literary work completed, the great Japanese writer will truncate his pen for the saber and that the man will go, in the pure samurai tradition, towards the destiny he has chosen. Thus ends this famous tetralogy entitled "The Sea of Fertility" concerning a body of water on the moon (also called "The Sea of Fertility"). Few writers have contemplated the heavens as Mishima did. Many of his novels contain descriptions of the sky and the sky more magnificent than the others, and this strange title was probably not chosen in the hazard.
Oddly enough, when a book fascinates me, I love to drag through the last chapters, so I regularly start a new book while the suspense intensifies in the current one. So, of course, this cobblestone of Mishima, with constant twists and turns, has not departed from this habit of making the pleasure last. Moreover, a period of settling between each opus of the tetralogy is not excessive. So much is the author's erudition on historical, philosophical, and religious themes.
Some time ago, amazed by the beauty of the prose of "Spring Snow," I was inspired by a splendid reference of Mishima to the constellation Orion to evaluate this first dazzling book. So naturally, the eight stars of the Orion harness retained during this rating are subjective.

[Flo · Rating 4 out of 5]

I waited for Satoko's return from the moment I finished 'Spring Snow'. Books 2 and 3 of this tetralogy were a struggle, but Mishima really knows what a great ending is, and he delivers one of the best I've ever read with this one.

[Matthew · Rating 5 out of 5]

To be as honest as possible, I must run the risk of not making any sense: this is simultaneously my favorite and least favorite book in the series. Parts of it were hugely gorgeous -- the prose was pure and had an almost cleansing aura to it, and I felt alive while reading it. However, I wanted to strangle Mishima for writing some other parts that I felt were not only uncalled for but intentionally annoying to read (I'm looking at you, several descriptions of harbor boats). I know that Seidensticker is apparently revered as some sort of translator god in the Japanese world, but I couldn't help but feel he edited it sentence by sentence with his mindset alternating between "How do I make this as beautiful as possible?" with "How can I make this as tedious as possible?"

Where has Honda come to, then? He was first the friend of Kiyoaki Matsugae, then the lawyer of Isao Iinuma, and finally the friend/voyeur of Ying Chan. Now he's the guardian of Toru, a diabolical young teenager who in wanting to see himself as superior to everyone else decides to be evil. Honda's journey has been as remarkable as it has been beautiful, and according to him that may be for the better. It would appear that beauty is perhaps one of the most undefinable things in the universe. It is pain, fragility, distance, youth, and above all death. When you put it together, it seems to be that it becomes the "art of suicide" - to kill yourself before you really grow up. Beauty, then, becomes nothing more than the physicality of your being, your existence, as an independent entity - a transcendental adolescence, and by killing yourself at that stage, your life becomes synonymous with that beauty. Hell, if that was Kiyoaki's objective, I think he did a bang-up good job.

The last twenty pages are worth reading it all again for, though. It makes me want to go back and read the first one again, if only that. There's a throwback to a scene from the end of Spring Snow, where Honda, at wits end, decides to visit someone he hasn't seen in sixty years. The discussion that ensues chills me.

"Memory is like a phantom mirror. It sometimes shows things too distant to be seen, and sometimes it shows them as if they were here."

Has this all, then, been but a dream? No, it wasn't all just a dream. That would be silly. Mishima isn't some nutjob with a pen -- well, okay, maybe he was... but let's be honest with ourselves here. Mishima might actually be testing us with this one. He wasn't a Buddhist, but there's definitely something weird going on in the last installment, and the writing itself betrays a sort of unsettling of his own philosophy. There might be a good reason why Mishima chose to stage his coup right after finishing this final piece. Perhaps it is not Honda but Mishima who arrives with the reader where there is no memory -- to the place where the noontide sun of summer flows over an empty garden.

[M.Qaid · Rating 4 out of 5]

أمررت بتجربة مماثلة؟ أن تكون مستمتعاً بحياتك لا ينقصك شيء ثم تقرر فجأة أن تسدي معروفاً لأحدهم. ذلك المعروف الذي ينقلب عليك ويحيل حياتك جحيماً. إن مررت بتلك التجربة فستتفهم مامر به هوندا، وإن لم تتعرض لها...فأنت محظوظ.

هذه هي الرواية الرابعة والأخيرة في رباعية بحر الخصب ليكويو ميشيما. والتي انتحر بعد إنجازها فكانت ختام أعماله وخاتمة حياته.

تتميز الرواية عن سوابقها بقلة الاستطرادات وخفض الثرثرة الجانبية. لذا فهي أكثرهن تركيزاً في الأحداث وأقلهن مساحة ورقية. أُضيفت شخصيتان حيويتان للرباعية وهما تورو، الشاب الخجول المنعزل الذي تغيره الظروف ليصبح شيئاً آخر، وهناك كينوي، الفتاة التي لا حظّ لها من الحسن غير أنها تعيش واقعاً افتراضياً تُقحم من حولها فيه. ستُذكِّرك الشخصية بالكثير من الرجال والنساء رأيتهم بأم عينك وإن كان إعتلالهم أقل حدّة.

أجد هذا الجزء إلى جانب الجزء الأول هما أكثر حلقات السلسلة إمتاعا وتجانسا. أما الرباعية ككل فلم تكن بمستوى توقعاتي بصراحة. لا أنكر أن هناك شعورا بالألفة و "العِشرة" قد تكون بيني وبين العمل بشخوصه وأماكنه ومفرداته، شأن العديد من الأعمال الطويلة التي تغطي عدة مراحل عمرية، تواكب أجيالاً مختلفة وتصف حقباً متعددة.

ختاماً أيها القارئ العزيز، إذا كنت من هواة أدب التشويق والأحداث المتسارعة والحبكة المذهلة، فلا أعتقد أن الرباعية ستلائمك. أما إن كنت من يبحث إثراء خلفيته في الأدب العالمي والنهل من معين الثقافات، الأديان والمذاهب الفلسفية الغريبة عنه، سواء راقت له أم لم ترق، فإليك أُهدي هذه الرباعية.

[P.E. · Rating 4 out of 5]

WISHFUL THINKING

1970, Honda is now 80. He meets Toru, a young signalman he immediately surmises to be a reincarnation of Ying Chan, Isao and his deceased friend Kiyoaki. A contemplative orphan, Toru also looks like Honda in terms of personality. Honda decides to adopt him, paving the way for a merciless strife for domination between the two men...


Koishikawa Kōraku-en, Tokyo


MAJOR THEMES:

⬤ Universal decay.
Be it trash, rotten vegetables, old flesh, everything comes down to be mere matter. Even angels rot. Everything is germinating, maggoty, eaten by corruption. Decay and corruption lie at the very heart of life. Life itself is corruption.

⬤ Futility of politics, pointlessness of time and absurdity of being.
In the Sea of Fertility cycle, Nowhere else than in The Decay of the Angel are references to politics and contemporary events in Japan that scarce in the narrative.

The main reference to foreign affairs is one about the US military operations in Cambodia, which rings quite ironically, after reading The Temple of Dawn, taking place as the Japanese imperial army fights in the South-Eastern Asia area, a mere 25 years before.

⬤ Toru, a living embodiment of non-being.

⬤ Unescapable vulgarity, derision and debasement in Westernized Japan.

⬤ Set-ups and cover-ups.

- Toru has his fiancée working to her own demise, dictating her a letter exposing degrading motives behind her union with Toru : in this letter, her father is said to have worked this scheme of marrying his daughter to Toru because he is after Honda's money.
- This story also displays crual plots designed by Honda and Toru against one another. Toru even resorts to gaslighting and blackmail... This sadistic and masochistic backgroung is not a little reminiscent of Spring Snow, the first book in the Sea of Fertility series, of Dangerous Liaisons or of The Seducer's Diary.

⬤ Obsessing over meaning: the ceaseless need to construe reality.


Koishikawa Kōraku-en, Tokyo


SIMILAR WORKS:

Painstaking deconstruction and analysis of life, the fixation with decay:
The Simulacra
Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?
Martian Time-Slip
Nausea

Non-being and unnaturalness:
Against Nature
No Longer Human
Mephisto
The Train

Epistolary novels, diaries and masquerades :
The Seducer's Diary
Dangerous Liaisons
The Unbearable Lightness of Being

Mind tricks from other adept writers :
Black Water Lilies
Mind of Winter

Beauty and finiteness :
Urbex : 50 lieux secrets et abandonnés en France
Ruines et vestiges


SOUNDTRACK :
The Unforgiven - Metallica


〜 〜 〜 〜 〜 〜 〜

VŒU PIEUX

1970, Honda a maintenant quatre-vingt ans. Il fait la rencontre de Toru, un jeune observateur de navires et orphelin qui lui paraît immédiatement être la réincarnation de Ying Chan, d'Isao, et de son ami Kiyoaki. Contemplatif, il lui apparaît aussitôt qu'il est comme la copie crachée de sa propre personnalité. Il décide de l'adopter. S'engage alors une relation de domination et de surenchère à la cruauté entre les deux hommes, dont chacun n'existe qu'autant qu'il nie l'autre.


Koishikawa Kōraku-en, Tokyo

----

LES THÈMES :

⬤ Le pourrissement universel.

Tout se réduit ici à de la matière : déchets, pourriture, végétaux en décomposition et vieilles chairs plus particulièrement. Même les anges pourrissent. Tout est germinatif, véreux, mangé de corruption. Le pourrissement et la corruption existent au sein même de la vie. La vie même est corruption.

- Les personnages Honda et Keiko, vieillards, ont un dégoût pour la vieillesse affiché qu'accompagne une jalousie de la jeunesse. Ils s'appuient l'un sur l'autre pour tromper leur ennui et leur déclin.


⬤ Vanité de la politique, du temps et de l'être.

Il me semble que nulle part ailleurs que dans L'ange en décomposition la politique et les évènements contemporains sont si peu présents dans la narration.

La principale référence est celles des opérations armées des États-Unis au Cambodge. Ce qui, à peine 25 ans après Le Temple de l'aube : La mer de la fertilité III et les opérations militaires de l'armée impériale japonaise en Asie sud-orientale... laisse un arrière-goût amer d'éternel retour.


⬤ Toru et le non-être, Toru et l'anti-nature, Toru, contradiction vivante de la vie.

- Lorsque Honda rencontre Toru, il est presque renversé par la ressemblance de sa personnalité avec la sienne.
Toru témoigne un mépris infini pour le monde. Il pratique une forme de solipsisme ultra-analytique très proche de celui de Honda, à la différence que pour Toru, il n'y a pas d'arrière-plan métaphysique ou mystique, seulement une immensité indigo indicible... Tous deux sont des voyeurs pratiquement dépourvus de volonté et qui mènent une vie sans enjeu, sans marées, "sans poésie et sans félicité". Du reste, Honda décèle le mal absolu en Toru et le reconnaît pour sien.

- Toru la conscience exacerbée, Kinué l'enfermement en soi ?
Dans les deux cas, il y a refus du monde. Négation du monde extérieur, confondu avec le monde intérieur.


⬤ Vulgarité, affreuse dérision et contrefaçon des idéaux.

- Le sanctuaire de Mio, visité par Honda et son amie Keiko, est devenu un parc d'attraction bruyant.
- Toru, incarnation dérisoire de la conscience Alaya ?
- Toru détruit le journal de Kiyoaki. Il détruit et salit tout ce que Honda a pu rassembler.


⬤ Montages et mises en scènes.

- Toru fait collaborer sa fiancée Momoko à un stratagème qui va la perdre : il lui dicte une lettre qui avilit les motifs derrière son union avec Toru : il ne serait question que de faire un bon parti pour son père désargenté.
- Mises en scènes cruelles de Honda et de Toru l'un contre l'autre. "Gaslighting", chantage... Chez les deux personnages, masochisme et sadisme. Qui ne sont pas sans faire penser à Neige de Printemps, aux Liaisons dangereuses ou au Journal du séducteur.


⬤ La manie d'interpréter.

- Arrivé à un point de l'histoire, la vieille amie Keiko s'entiche de culture japonaise traditionnelle et entend tout de travers, du moins l'interprète, erronément, à sa façon. Ce qui ne manque pas de faire doucement sourire Honda. C'est un thème qui revient obstinément. Qui est exempt de ces biais, de cette manière d'envisager le monde par le petit bout de la lorgnette, ou bien en s'affranchissant de ce qui vient contre notre façon de voir ?

- Sur la fin de ses jours, Honda connaît une invasion onirique. Dans le monde éveillé comme en sommeil, tout lui sert d'aliment à théorie, tout lui sert de signe, est perçu comme signal. Au point de ne plus bien faire la différence entre le signe, le signifiant et le signifié. Bref, entre le monde et ce qu'il veut bien en voir.
Toru, lui, est visité par des visions inquiétantes qui le visitent sans prévenir. On dirait un peu les apparitions inquiétantes de Raskolnikov dans l'excellent Crime et Châtiment...

- Mishima lui-même, maître du grand montage, induit le lecteur en erreur en l'incitant à faire des rapprochements entre des évènements peut-être fortuits. En fin de compte, jusqu'à la prose de ce livre est désossée par ces rapprochements, ces perceptions gratuites mais toujours interprétées de la manière la plus concluante possible. Honda clôt le cycle en retournant à Gesshuji, où Satoko a passé sa vie comme abbesse.
Il est accueilli par l'image du néant.


Koishikawa Kōraku-en, Tokyo


MON AVIS :

A l'origine, je comptais terminer ce cycle en hiver, pour avoir une belle régularité dans la lecture de ses quatre livres : Neige de printemps en mai, Chevaux échappés en juillet, Le Temple de l'Aube en septembre et puis L'ange en décomposition pour cet hiver. Et puis je me suis dit : bah, à quoi bon patienter. J'en suis à un stade où clairement ce sont les lectures qui battent la mesure de ma vie, et ce cycle de La mer de la fertilité a donné forme à cette étrange année 2020, au moins autant que les évènements de politique intérieure et internationale.

Bref, je l'ai proprement dévalé, et n'était le travail, je l'aurais lu en une traite.

L'évolution de la personnalité de Honda m'a vraiment frappé à partir du Temple de l'Aube. Ici, impossible de ne pas garder en vue la date de remise du manuscrit, qui coïncide avec celle du suicide de Mishima. Il y a fort à parier que l'auteur y a mis beaucoup de sa conception du monde et de sa personne tout simplement. Je suis pris à la fois de sympathie et saisi par la vie étrange de cet homme. Cette étrangeté n'est pas la mienne, mais elle me permet de mieux remarquer combien étranges sont les vies que l'on mène. De combien de préconceptions et de raccourcis, par quels détours et quels rapprochements hasardeux, de quelle incohérence et de quelles contradictions nous nourrissons ce qu'il faut bien appeler sa vision du monde.

----

ŒUVRES VOISINES :

Décomposition des mécanismes de la vie et morbidité :
Simulacres
Blade Runner : Les androïdes rêvent-ils de moutons électriques ?
Glissement de temps sur Mars
La Nausée

Le non-être et l'anti-nature :
À rebours
La Déchéance d'un homme
Mephisto
Le Train

Jeux de regards et de miroir, tenue d'un journal ; pouvoir extraordinaire de simulation des mots. Montage épistolaire :
Le journal du séducteur
Les Liaisons dangereuses
L'Insoutenable légèreté de l'être

Savants montages de la part d'autres écrivains :
Les Nymphéas noirs
Esprit d'hiver

Beauté et finitude :
Urbex : 50 lieux secrets et abandonnés en France
Ruines et vestiges


THÈME MUSICAL :
The Unforgiven - Metallica

[Flo · Rating 4 out of 5]

Do you think that your hopes and those of someone else coincide, that your hopes can be smoothly realized for you by someone else? People live for themselves and think only of themselves. You who more than most think only of yourself have gone too far and let yourself be blinded.
You thought that history has its exceptions. There are none. You thought that the race has its exceptions. There are none.
There is no special right to happiness and none to unhappiness. There is no tragedy and there is no genius. Your confidence and your dreams are groundless. If there is on this earth something exceptional, special beauty or special evil, nature finds it out and uproots it. We should all by now have learned the hard lesson, that there are no ‘elect.’

Like a knife. So… the last volume of The Sea of Fertility tetralogy. It tells the story of an elderly Honda and Tōru, a 16-year-old he adopts after noticing that the boy had a certain characteristic that led the old man to believe he was in the presence of Kiyoaki’s third reincarnation, the protagonist of Spring Snow, the first volume, which, despite my previous doubts, is still my favorite of the series. This book is far from mediocrity, however, I can’t say, even while having the same rating, that it matches the first installment’s excellence.

I have to admit that I suffered. I was expecting repulsion, mostly. I didn’t imagine I was going to be this disoriented, fluctuating between annoyance and boredom. So I suffered for almost the entire book. It only takes one allusion to abuse – in any way, shape, or form; in this case, toward the elderly – for me to feel incredibly sad. I can’t describe the feeling when such situations stop being fiction. In any case, Honda’s vulnerability made me forget, from time to time, the disgust I felt in The Temple of Dawn, the previous volume. My ultimate cause of suffering was the adopted son, who symbolized the vastly unoriginal juxtaposition of external beauty and internal ugliness. Clichéd to the point of boredom, if this isn’t your first novel of the kind. As I told someone before, I think I reached the limit and can’t tolerate more stories involving handsome and aloof boys/men who think girls/women are shallow and fairly unnecessary if it weren’t for lust.
Aside from that, Tōru is the embodiment of evil. In that sense, the story felt forced and rushed. It took forever to start and then, quite abruptly, we find a diabolic adolescent whose mission in life is to injure - among others - his adoptive father. By the end, we are given some explanations we all heard before but it was too late to revert the process. I was already looking forward to a conclusion.

Having read a fair amount of his books, Mishima remains a conundrum to me. A delightful enigma endowed with the ability to attract and repel. As ever, his writing is painfully poetic, and when it clashes with obnoxious ideas or disgusting actions, the counterpoint has an enthralling effect. The search for beauty – something that never leaves the sphere of the flesh, a word the author loves, as well as self-respect – still continues and everything that interferes with the narrator’s visions of what’s pure and beauteous is severely ridiculed. The aversion to aging is almost insulting. Moreover, the idea of rising against not a machine but a natural and inexorable process is an absurd way to experience life.
Too many signs of decay.

This book was meandering toward the 3-star realm, but the last few chapters struck a chord. The following quote is part of one brutal rebuke. The little cloud of evil had found an implacable opponent.

[…] All puffed up by illusions born of abstract concepts, you strut about as the master of a destiny even though you have none of the qualifications. You think you have seen to the ends of the earth. But you have not once had an invitation beyond the horizon. You have nothing to do with light or enlightenment, there is no real spirit in flesh or in heart.

Honestly, there was nothing special about the previous 'reincarnations' either, as they were all brimming with selfishness, the most ordinary of qualities. From a practical point of view, humanity is defined by a self-absorbed, completely narcissistic nature; nothing more commonplace. A trite old joke with an air of uniqueness, with delusions of grandeur. The truly remarkable is the opposite; kindness, empathy, altruistic acts amid so much filth.



April 2, 18
* Later on my blog. Note to self: edit.
** The Sea of Fertility:
Spring Snow
Runaway Horses
The Temple of Dawn

[Argos · Rating 4 out of 5]

Bereket Denizi dörtlemesi son kitabının okunmasıyla bitti. Üçüncü kitapta kopan öykü bu son kitapta yeniden karşımıza çıkıyor. Yine 3. kitaptaki felsefik ve mistik arayışlar burada da devam ediyor ancak bu sefer bağımsız olarak değil öyküye yedirilerek veriliyor.
Mişima’nın Budizm konusunda ikircikliği yer yer devam etse de artık Budizm’e teslim olduğu anlaşılıyor. Toru’nun güncesi Mişima’nın kuyrukları birbirine değmeyen bin tilkili kafasını çok iyi anlatıyor. Sonu belirsizlikle ve okuyucuyu bir çok soruyla karşı karşıya bırakarak kitabı yani dörtlemesini bitiriyor. İlk iki kitaptaki yüksek çıta üçüncüde biraz düşse de son kitapta tekrar yükseliyor.
Goodreads’ten en büyük kazançlarımdan biri Yukio Mişima’yı, Japon Edebiyatını tanımış olmamdır.

[Emilio Berra · Rating 4 out of 5]

...poi... il silenzio
Il quarto volume della tetralogia 'Il mare della fertilità' è anche l'ultima opera di Mishima, che spedì all'editore poche ore prima di darsi la morte.

L'ormai vecchio Honda, che già ben conosciamo dai precedenti tre romanzi, ha 76 anni. L'altro protagonista è un sedicenne, Toru, orfano, impiegato come guardia costiera, il quale "sapeva che la ricchezza e la virtù erano incompatibili" e "viveva lontano dall'ambizione, dall'avidità, dalle passioni".
La prima parte è un susseguirsi di grandiose descrizioni marine : "Il sole spuntò di nuovo, e di nuovo il sole si trasformò nella placida dimora della bianca luce" ; "il bianco delle onde diventò per un istante del colore della rosa gialla, annunciando l'arrivo della sera".

Honda, "dopo aver superato i settant'anni, ciò che aveva visto ogni mattina al suo risveglio era il volto della morte". La sua vita ha un'ulteriore svolta quando si convince che Toru sia la reincarnazione del suo amico di gioventù Kiyoaki, morto ventenne, tanto che decide di adottarlo.
Si susseguono aspetti sconcertanti che inquietano per il loro acuto pessimismo : l'approfondimento psicologico dei personaggi fa emergere un'ambiguità interiore che ci sorprende, quasi increduli.
Si evidenzia la perdita di punti fermi, di valori, "in cui le convenzioni sociali venivano usate a proprio piacimento, e l'onestà e la sincerità trasformate in gioco". Giochi perversi, dove l'obiettivo freddo e consapevole è ferire o godersi la morte dell'altro. Personaggi che conoscono il male che alberga in loro, in bilico fra disperazione e compiacimento.
L'idea della morte è spesso presente : "la carne stessa rappresenta un'affezione, una morte latente".
Conoscendo la biografia dell'autore è facile passare dalle pagine del testo al travaglio dell'intera sua vita : dai successi fino all'orrore delle immagini della tragedia finale.

La scrittura di Mishima , durante l'intera narrazione, si mantiene ad un livello letterario sempre molto alto. Il lungo capitolo conclusivo è indimenticabile sorprendente eppure in qualche modo atteso : ricongiunge l'ultima vicenda a fatti di sessant'anni prima. Si tratta di un piccolo gioiello narrativo, che si apre a innumerevoli interpretazioni. Una scena semplice e solenne, l'ultima che lo scrittore ci ha lasciato ...prima del silenzio.

[Hakan · Rating 5 out of 5]

meleğin çürüyüşü, 1912 yılında başlayan bereket denizi dörtlemesini 1970'lere taşıyıp muhteşem bir finalle sonlandırıyor. "bereket denizi'nin sonu" yazan son sayfa çevrildiğinde "bu kitaplara yaşamla ve bu dünyayla ilgili hissettiğim ve düşündüğüm her şeyi yansıttım" diyen ve romanı tamamladığı gün intihar eden mişima'nın sade, derin, şiddetli ve acımasız gerçekliğini yanıbaşımızda buluyoruz.

mesele ne japonya'nın kültürel yozlaşması ne de kaybettiği savaş. ne tutkusuz, amaçsız, aşksız insanların varlığı ne salt akılcılığın boşluğu. ne eski çare ne yeni, ne doğuda bir yaşam var ne batıda. dört roman, baştan sona ağır ağır ama kararlıkla görülen her ışık zerresinin üstüne gidiyor, önce ışığı görünür kılıyor sonra üzerinden geçip yok ediyor. kopkoyu bir karanlık kalıyor geride bereket denizi'nden.

bereket denizi: ay yüzeyindeki geniş düzlüğe verilen ad. bereket denizi, bereketli değil. bereket denizi, deniz bile değil. bereket denizi, bir damla su bile değil. bereket denizi susuzluğun ta kendisi. mişima yokluğu, hiçliği anlatmasa eserine bu adı neden versin?..mişima'nın "yaşamla ve bu dünyayla ilgili hissettiği ve düşündüğü her şey" neden hiçlik olmasın?..(mişima sadece japonya geleneksel değerlere dönsün diye neden intihar etsin?..)

[Tessa Nadir · Rating 5 out of 5]

"Ce putere, ce poezie, ce binecuvantare!" - un citat ce descrie perfect acest minunat roman.
Rareori mi se intampla sa raman fara cuvinte, insa opera de fata este de o perfectiune si frumusete deosebita. Cartea are stilul ei specific, rece si distant, dar si o capacitate extraordinara de a te tine captiv in lumea si starea pe care ti-o transmite. Cateva zile dupa ce am terminat-o, nici nu am mai putut sa citesc alta carte, inca mai fiind sub influenta sentimentelor pe care ea mi le-a indus.
Descrierile sunt foarte vii, pline de figuri de stil, un adevarat rasfat pentru cititor, comparatiile mai ales fiind neobisnuit de frumoase si referindu-se adesea la mare, la port sau la far:
"Soarele era ascuns intr-un cocon de nori subtiri, ca un vierme de matase stralucitor."
"... marea capata un aer inciudat si melancolic, plina de iesituri ascutite, de o culoare intunecata, ca niste spini pe o ramura de trandafiri."
"Valurile mici se adunau la mal. Cu o clipa inainte de a se sparge, isi aratau crestele impodobite cu alge inchise la culoare, ca penajul privighetorilor."
"Un port adevarat este un sir de dinti albi, mereu stralucitori, indreptati catre mare. Dinti albi ai docurilor, macinati de mare."
"Ingerul decazut" este ultima parte a unei tetralogii, in care il avem in prim plan pe Shigekuni Honda, un avocat ajuns la varsta de 80 de ani ce intalneste un tanar neobisnuit pe care doreste sa-l infieze crezand ca este reincarnarea prietenului sau din tinerete Kiyoaki. Acesta a mai avut trei incarnari pe care autorul le trateaza in celelalte trei parti.
Tanarul orfan de 16 ani, Toru, face parte din personalul de semnalizare al portului, lucrand in far si in ciuda varstei sale fragede este cel care practic decide soarta fiecarui vas, unde si la ce chei va doca. Personal il invidiez, chiar daca pare o activitate tipic masculina, eu as fi fericita sa ma ocup cu asa ceva si sa privesc ore in sir marea cea involburata (in timp ce probabil vapoarele se ciocnesc in voia sortii). :)
Baiatul intruchipeaza un inger intunecat ce desi pare pur si inocent are o latura malefica si o rautate ce vor iesi la iveala dupa ce acesta va fi infiat. Mi-au placut mult trasaturile sale care seamana cu cele ale unui samurai:
"Toru avea un chip frumos si palid, ca sculptat in gheata, pe care nu se citeau nici sentimente, nici dragoste, nici lacrimi."
"Fusese inzestrat cu scoarta groasa din nascare. Scoarta dura a dispretului."
Toru credea despre sine ca "lumea ar trebui sa imi fie recunoscatoare pentru stapanirea mea de sine. In acelasi timp, batranul avocat gandea despre el ca "tanarul e raul pur".
In ceea ce priveste titlul, se face referire la cantul lui Hagoromo in care un pescar ii fura vesmantul unui inger si acesta nu se mai poate intoarce in ceruri, fiind supus astfel decaderii. Ne sunt descrise cele 5 semne ale decaderii unui inger (acestea fiind usor diferite de la o opera japoneza la alta): cununile de flori i se ofilesc, vesmintele i se ponosesc, la subsori i se scurge sudoarea, nu se mai bucura de sine si isi pierde aura.
Din pacate am aflat ca dupa terminarea acestei carti autorul, care a facut parte dintr-o familie de samurai si a crescut in conformitate cu cerintele unei educatii stricte si traditionale, a apelat la gestul sinuciderii rituale prin seppuku. In roman avem si o viziune despre sinucidere la pagina 147 in care un profesor de-al lui Toru ii povesteste ca exista un fel de sinucidere care este acceptabila, "aceea pentru afirmarea sinelui". In sprijinul acestei afirmatii istoriseste parabola soarecelui care se inchipuia pisica. Este foarte interesanta si merita ca cititorul sa reflecteze asupra ei.
Romanul este o capodopera care te rascoleste si te impresioneaza foarte mult, din care avem multe de invatat, in special de la batranul Honda care este un etalon pentru demnitate dincolo de orice. Am retinut doua lucruri de la el: sa nu privim viata printr-un telescop, asa cum o face Toru, urmarind vapoarele care vin si pleaca ci sa vedem dincolo de el, caci e mult mai mult. De asemenea sa "radiografiem" oamenii, adica sa cautam si scheletul de sub pielea lor, pentru ca, adesea, lucrurile intunecate sunt la interior nu la exterior.
In incheiere atasez cateva citate superbe, mare parte dezvaluind intelepciunea si filosofia de viata a protagonistilor:
"Daca privitul insemna intalnirea dintre ochi si existenta, sau mai bine zis intalnirea dintre existenta si existenta, atunci era intalnirea a doua oglinzi ale existentei."
"Numai o femeie frumoasa poate cunoaste pe de-a-ntregul, asa cum se reflecta in ochii barbatului care o priveste, uratenia lumii si adevarata fata mizerabila a omenirii, care nu mai poate fi mantuita."
"Frumusetea umana, si cea trupeasca, si cea sufleteasca, de fapt tot ce tine de frumos se naste numai din necunoastere si iluzie."
"E foarte important sa nu-ti pierzi respectul de sine, chiar daca asta aproape te va ucide."
"Dar eu am nevoie de dragostea ei si trebuie mai intai sa-i ofer cutitul cu care se va rani singura."
"Amintirile sunt ca niste ochelari magici. Uneori arata lucruri prea indepartate pentru a putea fi vazute si le aduc aproape, ca si cum ar fi langa noi."

[merixien · Rating 5 out of 5]

Bereket Denizi’nin sonu.

Eğer Bereket Denizi dörtlemesini okumak istiyorsanız, öncelikli olarak yazarı tanımanızı ve de budizme dair biraz fikir sahibi olmanızı tavsiye ederim. Özellikle de Şafak Tapınağı ve Meleğin Çürüyüşü birbiriyle oldukça bağlantılı. Her ne kadar serinin okunması en zor kitabı da olsa, üçüncü kitabı gerçekten dikkatinizi vererek okumak bu serinin temelini oluşturuyor. Çünkü bir noktada Mişima’nın yıllar süren kafa karışıklığı ve düşüncelerinin ardından Budizme teslim olmasını da içerdiği için son kitaba gömülmüş pek çok alt anlam ve sembolizm budizmden ve Budizme yönelik manevi bir arayışın pratiği üzerine bir deneme olan Şafak Tapınağı’ndan köken alıyor.

Kitabın alt metninde; güzelliğe karşılık çürüyenden alınan zevk, kötülüğe karşı yapılan kötülükle birlikte zıttıyla dengelenen bir mükemmeliyetçilik takıntısı var. İlk kitaptan beri hikayesini takip ettiğimiz Honda’nın yıpranmış sonunu ve çürüyüşünü, kaderindeki ayrışmayı aktarıyor. Doğu felsefesinin bu kadar öne çıktığı bir kitapta da bu ayrışmanın - ruh ile bedenin ayrışması- aynı zamanda ahlaki bütünlüğün ve inancın da ayrışması olarak gözlenmesi kaçınılmaz oluyor. Ancak seri boyunca göndermeler ve imgeler daha derine gömülüyor. İlk iki kitapta söyleyeceklerini çok açık bir şekilde yüksek sesle ifade etmesine karşın, seride mistizm arttıkça göndermeler de soyutlaşıyor. Mişima ikinci kitapta kendi sonunun provasını yaparken - ve konu daha siyasiyken- bu kitapta intiharının ayrıntıları farklı sembollere ve varlıklara gizlenmiş durumda. Seppukuyu Isao’da olduğu gibi bir direkt anlatı yerine Suruga Koyu ve gemiler ilişkisi üzerinden çağrıştırıyor. Anlatının yönünde böylesine keskin bir değişim yaşanmasına karşın seri boyunca yaşadığınız edebi tatmin korunuyor. Özellikle de altmış yıl önceki hikayenin yeniden yazımı ve sizi bütün kafa karışıklığınızla baş başa bir sessizliğe hapseden sonuyla çok basit ama uzun süre zihninizi meşgul edecek bir kapanış sunuyor. Eğer doğu felsefesinin getirdiği çileciliğe ve inançlarına çok mesafeli biriyseniz ve akıp giden hızlı okuma yapma beklentisindeyseniz size çok da uygun bir seri değildir. Ancak bu tanımın dışındaysanız mutlaka okuyun derim. Benim hayatımın farklı bir döneminde, biraz daha yaş aldıktan sonra tekrar okumayı ve bu okumamdan farklı neler bulacağımı görmek istediğim bir dörtleme oldu. Çok sevdim.

“Onları, alın yazılarının peşine takılıp uçmaktan alıkoyacak, kanatlarını kopartacak, gökyüzüne yükselmelerini engelleyecek, kalabalık yığınlarla birlikte yürümelerini sağlayacak ön bilgilerle donatması gerekirdi. Dünya, uçmayı onaylamaz. Kanatlar, tehlikeli silahlardır. Kanatlar daha kullanılmadan bile, öz yıkımı çağırırlar.”

[مجید اسطیری · Rating 4 out of 5]

به نظرم این رمان پسرعموی رمان "مرگ در ونیز" اثر توماس مان بود که پارسال خواندم و آنجا هم دو مفهوم انحطاط و مرگ خیلی پررنگ است. این رمان هم همان طور که از اسمش پیداست درباره زوال یک شخصیت فرشته گون است
رمان مرگ در ونیز هم مثل این رمان در بستر یک فرهنگ ایده آل گرا شکل گرفته. ژاپن و آلمان . دو بستر برای تولید فاشیسم. دو بستر برای خودکشی روح های ایده آل گرا. هیتلر و میشیما
کجای رمان به شفاف ترین شکل میشود این ایده خودکشی ایده آلیستی را دید؟ آنجا که معلم با تورو صحبت میکند و بی مقدمه از او میپرسد "آیا تا به حال به خودکشی فکر کرده ای؟" و بعد تمثیل موشی را مطرح میکند که خودش را گربه میپندارد
به نظرم این تمثیل جالب و عمیق از موشی که میخواهد گربه باشد جانمایه تمام نگاه و اندیشه ایدئالیستی میشیما است و همان چیزی است که خود او را هم مثل موش این تمثیل کوتاه وادار به خودکشی میکند.


"میشیما چنین باور داش�� که کشورش در سال های پس از جنگ دوم جهانی، تاریخ، فرهنگ و راه و روش دیرین خود را از یاد برده و به عکس برگردانی از کشورهای غربی تبدیل شده و پذیرش چنین الگوهایی سبب کشیده شدن مردم به ویژه جوانان به ورطه ی فساد و تباهی شده است. او خود را مرثیه خوان پیوندهای فروپاشیده ی خانوادگی، آداب و رسوم زیبای فراموش شده ی از بین رفته و سلوک و رفتار ویژه ی ژاپنی می دانست."

"اگر تماشا برخورد چشم است با چیزی که وجود دارد، یعنی دو هستی، پس این روبرو شدن دو آیینه است با هم. نه، این چیزی فراتر بود. تماشا همواره در پی هستی است، مثل بال گرفتن پرنده!"

"بنارس جایی مقدس و کثیف بود. کثافت به تنهایی مقدس بود. این چهره ی هند بود. ولی در ژاپن، زیبایی، آداب و رسوم، شعر، هیچکدام به وسیله ی دست های مقدسات آلوده نشده بود. کسانی که به این مقولات دست می یازیدند و بالاخره با آلودگی خفه شان می کردند از هر گونه تقدسی عاری بودند؛ دست تمامی آنان مثل هم بود، تمیز و شسته و رفته!"

"زیبایی جسم، زیبایی روح و هر چیز وابسته به زیبایی، زاییده ی جهالت، نادانی، تاریکی و تنهایی ست. دانا بودن و زیبا بودن همزمان مجاز نیست. اگر جهالت و تاریکی مثل هم باشند، پس کشمکش بین روح، که هیچ چیز را نمی تواند پنهان کند و جسم، که یارای آن را دارد تا همه چیز را در پس نور خیره کننده اش مخفی کند، کشمکشی بیهوده است. زیبایی فقط زیبایی جسم است و بس."

"شاید او در این دنیای بزرگ تنها بود ولی آزاد و بدون هیچ دلبستگی به ظواهر در قصری کوچک و یخی زندگی می کرد، دور از هر گونه حرص، طمع، شهوت و چیزهایی از این دست که آدمی را از پا می انداخت. هرگز دوست نداشت که خود را با دیگران مقایسه کند زیرا چیزی به نام حسادت و غبطه خوردن را نمی شناخت. تمام پیوندها و علایق به دنیا را در خود کشته بود و در نتیجه از هیچکس عیب جویی نمی کرد. گله ای نداشت."

"فقط با گذشت زمان و پا به سن گذاشتن است که انسان در می یابد ثروت و حتی سرمستی در دل هر لمحه و هر قطره‌ی زمان نهفته است؛ قطره های زیبای زمان مثل قطره های شرابی کمیاب، غليظ و ناب! و زمان همچون قطره های خون فرو می چکید. پیرمردان دم فرو می بستند و می مردند، زیرا تلاش نکردند تا زمان را در شکوهمندترین لحظه هایش متوقف کنند، چرا که هر قطره ی خون باعث از خود بیخود شدن و سرمستی شان می شد."

"یک دختر معمولی و یک فیلسوف بزرگ مثل هم هستند: از دیدگاه هر دوی آنها، کوچک ترین و پیش پا افتاده ترین نکته می تواند دنیا را به نابودی بکشاند!"

"مردم حیوانات خانگی را که عمرشان بیشتر از خودشان باشد، دوست ندارند. عمر کوتاه نخستین شرط دوست داشتن است!"

"اگر در این کره ی خاکی چیز خارق العاده ای باشد، مثل زیبایی ویژه یا زشتی ویژه، طبیعت آن را پیدا می کند و ریشه کن می سازد. همه ی ما باید این درس سخت را یاد بگیریم که هیچ کس «برگزیده» نیست."

"توی گورستان اتومبیل ها، ماشین های زرد و آبی و سیاه بی هیچ نظم و ترتیبی روی هم چیده شده و رنگ های براق شان زیر نور آفتاب آب می شد. هوندا با دیدن این صحنه ی غم انگیز پنهان شده زیر اتومبیل ها، ماجرایی را به یاد آورد که در کودکی خوانده بود. داستان توده ای از عاج در باتلاقی که فیل ها هنگام مرگ برای مردن به آنجا می رفتند. شاید اتومبیل ها هم نزدیک شدن مرگشان را حس می کردند و در گورستان خودشان گرد هم جمع می‌شدند."


رمان بسیار توصیف گراست. این هم سنت ادبی ژاپن است هم ناشی از این است که میشیما میخواهد تا جای ممکن نویسنده ای کلاسیک باشد
من خرداد ماه 98 شبها میخواندمش و بی اندازه با توصیفاتش از زندگی پسرک در فانوس دریای لذت میبردم. سه تا خردادم را گذاشتم روی مطالعه آثار یاشار کمال ترک و حالا باز برگشته ام سراغ میشیما

[Ali Ahmadi · Rating 4 out of 5]

با این که ترجمه و ویرایش درهر کتاب ایراداتی داشت که تا حدی جلوی یک تجربه خوانش یکدست و روان را بگیرد و به همین علت به هیچ کدام از کتاب ها پنج ستاره ندادم، اما نمره کلی این چهارگانه از نظرمن چیزی کمتر از 5 نیست.
-----------------
می‌شیما این کتاب را چند روز یا حتا چند ساعت قبل از خودکشی‌اش به پایان رساند؛ دانستن این نکته در یک زمان هم راهگشا و هم کلیشه‌ساز است. با این که این مجموعه بدون شک نیم‌نگاهی (و شاید بیشتر از نیم‌نگاه!) به اندیشه‌های نویسنده در ماه‌های پایانی عمرش دارد، ریزه‌کاری‌های کتاب‌ها و نقب عمیقی که به درونی‌ترین حفرات ذهن و قلب انسان می‌زند آنقدر پیچیده‌ است که بعید است بتوان آن را در کالبد یک شخص جای داد.
-----------------
این بار هوندا مردی‌ست هشتاد ساله، با اندوخته‌ای سرشار از سرمایه، بدون همسر و فرزند، که صمیمی‌ترین دوستش زنی هم‌جنس‌گرا و هم‌سن خودش است. او همیشه تجسمی از درک خطیِ زمان بوده، همچون تونلی مستقیم در دل هشتاد سال از تاریخ ژاپن. اما درعین این وابستگی شدیدش به ادراک، منطق (و صدالبته شانس) که دستاوردش ثروت هنگفت و جایگاه اجتماعی بالای یک ژاپنیِ تمامن غربی‌شده بوده، هیچگاه نتوانسته دلبستگی عمیقش به چرخه‌ی مرگ و زندگی، کارما و سامسارا را به کناری بیفکند.

این بار هوندا پسر شانزده ساله‌ای را می‌بیند و آنقدر از بودن خودش در مرکز زمان و مکان مطمئن است که شک ندارد تورو چهارمین تناسخ دوست نوجوانی‌اش کیوآکی‌ست. هوندا سرمست از این که وضعیتی استنثنایی دارد و نقطه تلاقی این دو برداشت متضاد و هم‌زیست از زمان است، تلاش میکند با اراده‌ی خودش علیه این نظم‌های ازپیش‌تعیین‌شده‌ی زمانی بشورد و آن‌ها را در اختیار خود درآورد. غافل از این که تورو، که حالا فرزندخوانده‌ی هوندا شده، به اندازه‌ی پدرخوانده‌اش خود را در مرکز جهان می‌بیند و این رویارویی مرگبار چیزی جز تباهی را برای هر دوی آن‌ها به ارمغان نخواهد آورد.

فصل انتهایی، شاید از درخشان‌ترین پایان‌بندی‌های ادبیات معاصر باشد. بلاخره هوندایی که نهایت درد جسمی و روحی را از سرمی‌گذراند، به قلمرویی خارج از زمان و مکان وارد می‌شود. جایی بدون خاطره. جایی که تنها حال معنی پیدا میکند. دیگر نه خبری از زمان خطی است و نه خبری از مرگ‌ها و تولدهای پیاپی. تنها وجودِ ناب لحظه است و بس.
-----------------
باز هم غلامحسین سالمی و نشر نگاه.

[Azin · Rating 4 out of 5]

“جلد آخر از مجموعه ی چهار جلدی دریای حاصلخیزی”


میشیما جزو نویسندگان معروف ژاپنه و برای شناختش اصلا نیازی به مطالعه ی زیاد و یا شناخت آنچنانی از ادبیات ژاپن نیست!
اکثر نویسندگان معروف ژاپنی حتی اگر با آثارشون شناخته نشده باشن با روش مرگ و خودکشی های دراماتیکشون اسم خودشون رو به نحوی ماندگار کردن!
اغلب این نویسنده ها زاده و بزرگ شده ی دوران مِیْجی و دورانهای بعد از اون هستن و درصد بالای وجود این احساس پوچی و نارضایتی از زندگیشون برمیگرده به همین دورانی که عمرشون رو توش سپری کردن!
دوران میجی دوران مهمی در تاریخ کشور ژاپن محسوب میشه.
امپراتور میجی شروع به تغییر قوانین اساسی کشور و اصلاحات غربی کرد و ژاپن روز به روز بیشتر به سمت مدرنیته پیش رفت!
خیلی از ژاپنی ها به خصوص کسانی که نسب سامورایی داشتن از این اصلاحات و غرب زدگی به شدت ناراضی بودن!
توی تمامی سریالها و کتابهایی که از اون دوران به بعد ساخته و نوشته شده میتونید به وضوح شاهد این اختلاف و بلبشویی که در ژاپن اون دوران اتفاق افتاد باشید!!
میشیما یکی از همون نویسنده هاییه که از روند مدرن شدن ژاپن و از بین رفتن یکی یکیِ سنتها ناراضی بود و توی اکثر آثارش و همین چهارگانه هم این ناخشنودی قابل مشاهده ست..
حتی نوع مرگش هم(خودکشی به روش هاراکیری) به دلیل عدم موفقیتش در کودتایی برای تغییر قوانینی بود که از سمت آمریکا حمایت میشد!

خوندن این مجموعه و باقی کارهای میشیما و حتی آثار نویسنده های دیگری که مربوط به دوران میجی یا تایشو(و یا حتی شووا) هستن مثل سوسه کی، تانیزاکی، دازای، کاواباتا و.. میتونه اطلاعات مفیدی از ژاپن در حال تغییر و مردمی که از پیشرفت و غربی شدن، خوشحال و یا ناراضی هستن، در اختیار مخاطبان علاقه مند و کنجکاو بگذاره..!



به جز جلد اول این مجموعه شاید صحبت کردن راجع به داستان باقی جلدها کار درستی نباشه چون به طور کل این مجموعه راجع به کارما، تناسخ و تولد دوباره ست و توی سه جلد دو، سه و چهار با تکرار داستان مواجهه هستیم و صحبت از هر جلد باعث اسپویل جلدهای قبلی میشه..


این مجموعه توسط نشر قطره و مهناز هم به چاپ رسیده ولی مترجم هر سه نشر، همین غلام حسین سالمیه که متاسفانه چندان هم خوب عمل نکرده،
ویراستاری هر چهار جلد هم سرشار از ایراده، به خصوص این جلد آخر که تمامی افعال ماضی، مضارع و امری جابجا نوشته شده بود!
با وجود تمامی ایراداتی که مربوط به ترجمه و ویراستاریه خوندن این مجموعه رو به همه پیشنهاد میکنم فقط اگر تجربه ی چندانی از ادبیات ژاپن ندارید فعلا سراغ این مجموعه نرید..

در نهایت امتیاز کلی من به مجموعه چهار از پنجه(البته به دو جلد اول بدون در نظر گرفتن ترجمه ی بد و مشکلات ویراستاری، قطعا پنج میدم.) ولی فکر میکنم اگر ترجمه قابل قبول تر میبود درک بیشتری از بعضی قسمتها میداشتم و لذت بیشتری میبردم و به تبع امتیازم هم بالاتر میرفت..
(طبق سرچی که کردم متوجه شدم متاسفانه فعلا فیلم یا سریالی از این مجموعه ساخته نشده!)

[Matthew Ted · Rating 3 out of 5]

86th book of 2022.

Well, that's it, The Sea of Fertility tetralogy is done. A strange ending. This book is just slightly boring on the whole too. With the amount of significance Mishima placed in the tetralogy, it's surprising that so much of this book was given to describing boats coming in. Honda never really amounts of much as the central character of the series but I don't think he's meant to, he's our mostly-passive observer throughout. By the end, with Mishima's decision regarding the ending, I did feel letdown; but it is worth reading, simply for Mishima's prose. There's not much you can say about this final book without spoiling what's come before, so I'll leave it there, I guess. More thoughts in my completed review of the whole tetralogy.

[Meltem Sağlam · Rating 5 out of 5]

İlk gençlik yıllarından, yaşlılığa uzanan bir aşk ve bilgelik yolculuğu.
Doğu ve Batı felsefesini özümseyen, karşılaştıran ve eleştiren inanılmaz sayfalar.
Her dört kitap da insan hayatının farklı evrelerindeki duygular, düşünceler ve beklentiler ile kötücüllükleri çarpıcı bir incelikle ve bütünlük içerisinde anlatıyor. Her cümleyi yeniden ve yeniden okumak istedim.
Japon Kültürünü tanımak ve Japon Edebiyatına adım atmak için en doğru seçim.

[Omar Sabri · Rating 4 out of 5]

A great ending to a great tetralogy , the ending is drilled in my memory like a painting I can see Honda on his cane questioning his life , and Satoko guided by her assistant gazing at the garden ( a place that had no memories as Honda said ) with the sunlight streaming on the trees .

[Michael Battaglia · Rating 5 out of 5]

Much like listening to Joy Division's "Closer", there's an inescapable feeling of finality when reading the last novel of the quartet that goes beyond simply it being the last novel. If you're at all interested in Mishima or the quartet, you're probably well aware that as soon as Mishima finished the novel, he went out, attempted to stage a coup that failed miserably and then committed a ritual suicide, all of which made perfect sense to him in his worldview but don't seem entirely like the acts of a rational person. Yet we have this. As his death was clearly planned, when reading the final pages of the novel you are definitely reading the last words of a man about to die and who knew that he was about to die. And that knowledge is somewhat haunting.

Not surprisingly the notion of mortality creeps up more than once in the course of the slimmest of the four novels, although the quartet as a whole has been obsessed with the idea of growing older and losing the fire of youth, it seems more poignant here even as Mishima eschews sentimentality almost entirely. We run into Honda again and find the man in his eighties, old enough to realize that the good times are behind him (even though he's quite rich) and prepared to slide into oblivion the same way he has coasted through life, unable or unwilling to leave or make much of an impact. Always at the back of his mind is the notion of reincarnation, embodied by his childhood friend Kiyoaki, who keeps showing up in different guises throughout his life, dying tragically young each time.

This time it seems that his old friend has become an orphan named Toru. Spying those telltale birthmarks, Honda adopts him as a teenager with the intent of watching him grow up and perhaps seeing if he can finally be spared the fate of all the other incarnations and not perish at a young age. Sounds like as good a retirement plan as any, right?

Yet it quickly becomes different. The other incarnations were marked by what Honda perceived as an inner beauty, a fiery passion that was inspiring in the way a bonfire can be. You can stand back and admire it without daring to get too close. Instead Toru seems wayward and petty, not possessed with any grand romance or ideas for Japan, content in casual cruelty and not struck with any arcing ambition. And before long, the old man and the kid are starting to get at each other's throats, with Toru rather fond of seeing the old man die (and nicely inheriting his wealth) while Honda's initial desire to save the youth from what he believes was his fate becomes an insistence on surviving long enough to see him die, so he can have the satisfaction of having lived longer. Meanwhile the world erodes and decays around them both, as Toru's inability to grasp beauty even in the midst of his petty evil makes Honda wonder if he indeed is a reincarnation, or he has perhaps devoted his energy to the wrong course. But his sureness in the rightness of it is what keeps him going, in a sense, the notion of being eternal and lasting beyond what he is, exemplified in the continual reemergence of his old friend.

Its an interesting reversal from the early volumes, a subtle undermining of all that we saw before. Doubts that never existed before begin to linger, the Japan outside Honda slipping further away as we spend more time in his thoughts, even as his thoughts become ossified. Mishima has no love for old age, a disdain that crackles throughout the book but seems to take on a particular focus here. There are moments when the fear of losing the fire of one's youth and settling into senescence practically leaps off the page, a chilling intensity that comes near to desperation. The sensuality that lingered in the pages of "Temple of Dawn" or the raw passion that infused "Runaway Horses" has been replaced here with a crumbling decay that doesn't realize how fragile it has become, a weakly swaggering Honda lost within himself, detached from a Japan that Mishima perceives as already detached from itself, lost in a spiral where the arc is no longer beautiful. The final scenes resonates with a chill that goes past despair, into a cold realization that can only occur when one feels that finally all the layers are stripped away and what remains in undoubtedly the truth.

In the light of this, the ending becomes remarkable, upending everything that both we and Honda have known all along, stripping away the mysticism and philosophy that marked the first volumes and perhaps leaving us with what was there all along, the spaces between words, the spaces that make up words and the voids that comprise ourselves. The blissful continuation of nothing, arrived and achieved. Taken as a whole the volumes of the quartet have done their best to gradually take away the layers we thought existed, setting up a world where we're convinced certain notions are true, against all hope, and by the end reinforcing that our original ideas were true all along. We have no one else, Mishima seems to suggest as the book races toward its and his end, no one else and not even ourselves. Just the universe, maybe, a single point of hard dark light too far away to be touched and unable to be unseen. So what do we have then, when the point is finally grasped? The ending has a suggestion that Mishima may have ultimately taken in its fragile clarity, or his interpretation may have been the only way he could have seen it, having perhaps striven for so long to see what needed to be there, what had to be present. But we negate in our faltering absences, acting without blinking. Thus it becomes. It acts as a mirror that turns us into glass. It becomes better every time I read it. Not truer, but better. It fits where it has to, and in that becomes its own perfection, and maybe worth the effort in ways he was unable to imagine.

[Deniz Balcı · Rating 5 out of 5]

Bereket Denizi'nin Sonu...

Son kitap özellikle sarsıcı sonu ve cevapsız bıraktığı bazı şeyler ile kuşkusuz serinin en ilginç kitabı. İnsanı uzun süre düşünmeye mahkum ediyor/edecek. Bu kitabı iyi kavramak kesinlikle üçüncü kitabın iyi anlaşılması zorunluluğunu getiriyor. İnanılmaz gizli bağlantılar var. Simgesel, içsel ve mistik... Yavaş yavaş okumanızı tavsiye ederim. Mishima kendi imgelerini oluşturmuş bir yazar. Hiçbir genel-geçere affı yok. Hepsini kökten değiştirmiş. Bu serinin bitmesi ile insan en başından beri sahip olmaya çabaladığı, köksel düşüncelerinin dibine kezzap döküldüğünü hissediyor. Ne edin ne yapın bu seriyi okuyun.

5/5

[Eylül Görmüş · Rating 5 out of 5]

"Deniz: Adı olmayan bir deniz, Akdeniz, Japon Denizi; Suruga Koyu tam karşısında uzanıyordu; yoğun, adsız, mutlak bir karmaşa 'deniz' denilen şeyle yaptığı büyük savaşımdan sonra yakalanmıştı ve kendisine bir ad konulmasını kabul etmiyordu."

Bereket Denizi dörtlemesi, Meleğin Çürüyüşü ile bitti. Öyle tuhaf, öyle karanlık, öyle kirli, öyle şeytanî bir final ki bu - sahiden çürümüş bir şeylerin yaydığı tekinsizlik sinmiş gibi her köşesine. Bence serinin de en iyi kitabı, bu uzun yolculuğu muazzam bir finalle sonlandırıyor Mişima.

Dört kitaptır tanıdığımız Honda artık seksenine merdiven dayamış. Bundan önceki kitaplarda olduğu gibi, aynı ruhu arıyor yeryüzünde ve onun ruh göçü ile bu defa hangi bedene girdiğini kovalarken Toru'yu buluyor. Aradığı kişi o, kovaladığı ruh o bedende - Honda çok emin.

Toru hayatımda okuduğum en unutulmaz karakterlerden biri olacak şüphesiz. Kendi kendini tanımladığı sözcükle tanımlayayım: bir "iblis" sahiden o. Ama nasıl katmanlı bir iblis ve bu nasıl yazmaktır ya Mişima? Okuyup Toru'nun içindeki sinsi, hesapçı, tuhaf karanlıkla tanıştıkça neredeyse bana dahi zarar verebilirmiş gibi bir huzursuzluk hissettim. Toru kötü, ama salt kötü mü? O kadar karmaşık ki ruhu, Toru'daki hiçbir şey "salt" olamaz sanırım. Müthiş yazılmış bir karakter, Mişima insanlara dair bildiği her şeyi damıtıp Toru'ya akıtmış sanki.

Gemiler... "Varoluşun olanca düzenini paramparça ederek ufukta beliren" gemiler. Bu kitaptaki çok güçlü onlarca imgeden sanırım aklımda en çok bu gemiler ve kokusuz çiçekler kalacak. Mişima'nın kullandığı alegorilerin ne kadarını anlayabildim, seride görünenin ardındakini idrak edebilmek için özümsemesi şart olan üçüncü kitabı ne kadar sindirebildim bilmiyorum ama aldığım kadarı da beni ziyadesiyle tatmin etti. Hayatta insanın karşısına nadiren ona okurluğunu sorgulatan, kendini yetersiz bir okur gibi hissettiren ve tam da bu yüzden zehirli bir haz veren kitaplar çıkıyor - Bereket Denizi de işte onlardan biriydi.

İyi ki öyleydi, iyi ki okudum. Hayalî kadehimi çürüyen her şeye, gemilere, dünyaya geri dönen ruhlara, karanlığa, arılığa ve hiçliğe kaldırıyorum - çünkü bu seriden bana kalanlar bunlar oldu. Teşekkürler Mişima.

[Kay · Rating 5 out of 5]

How can an angel decay? An "angel" in this context is not the haloed, winged messenger of the Christian deity. In Buddhist cosmology, angels are "celestial beings" who live in the sixth realm of rebirth. Those with good karma can be reborn there, and the pleasure and comfort it offers far exceed that of the human world. However, this is not the unqualified paradise it may sound like. No matter how many eons and kalpas may pass, beings cannot stay in the sixth realm. Like the other realms, good and bad, it is part of samsara--the endless cycle of death and rebirth. A perfect being must eventually fall from perfection. Nothing in the world of samsara is permanent, all is subject to change.

Honda, now an old man on the verge of death, is undergoing change. His wife has died. Wealthy, he no longer needs to work. He looks in the mirror and sees the physical signs of decay advancing daily. The one constant in his life is seeking out the reincarnations of Kiyoaki, all of whom have died by the age of twenty. This time around it appears to be in the form of Toru Yasunaga, a sixteen-year old boy working a menial job far below his abilities.

As the story progresses two themes emerge. Decay is one of course, but also uncertainty. Unlike with the past reincarnations, we are not sure by the end of the novel that Toru is really authentic. Honda himself comes to believe he probably isn't, especially since he does not die at twenty. Decay is evident in Honda and the depiction of human aging, but also in the land itself. Honda visits the famous pine tree of Miho, supposedly the place where a divine being once danced, only to find it full of pollution and tourists. Elsewhere he notes the increasing clutter and debris of modernity, in a passage emblematic of Mishima's disdain for Western innovation:

"The Daigo district was a clutter of all the dreary details of new construction, to be seen throughout Japan: raw building materials and blue-tiled roofs, television towers and power lines, Coca-Cola advertisements and drive-in snack bars. Among heaps of rubble below cliffs where wild daisies stabbed at the sky were automobile dumps, blue and yellow and black, piled precariously one on the other, the gaudy colors molten in the sun."

This was Mishima's last work before his suicide, and this story takes on greater significance once you know more about what he was thinking, or rather obsessing over during this point in his life. Mishima was a man who desperately wanted to exist, and exist authentically. Writing was one way of doing this, but paradoxically, so was dying. It is fitting that his final book was about death and dying, and the illusion of life.

As the story draws to a close the narrative takes on almost dream-like qualities. Honda returns to Gesshuji to see Satoko, and tries to relive Kiyoaki's last moments there. He becomes both Honda and Kiyoaki, imagining that his friend is waiting for him at the inn, even has Honda himself makes the excruciating climb toward the temple. Arriving at the gate, he thinks to himself "only an instant had passed." I don't believe Mishima intended this to be poetical. Only a moment really has passed. Time is yet another illusion, a figment we insist upon.

Once admitted inside, he (and we) finally see Satoko again, one of the few characters who is not reintroduced in the earlier books. Although older, she is not decayed. Her presence in the first and last books is like bookends, meant to tell us something important. She tells a baffled Honda that she never knew a Kiyoaki, leading him to doubt that anything in the previous books happened, and that "perhaps then there has been no I."

While this may sound like an existential crisis, ending with what seems like a "it was all a dream" trope conclusion, it becomes more than that when you consider Mishima's intense focus on Buddhist doctrines throughout the Sea of Fertility. Honda's existential doubt is essentially the teaching of "anatman"--the belief that because the "self" cannot be located or identified as anywhere or as anything, it does not really exist. One is simply a collection of "skhandas" or phenomena (flesh, blood, bone, etc.) that comes together for a time, and later, disintegrates. These phenomena are "reborn" again and again, but what is reborn is "not you and not another." Realizing this truth is a step on the path to Enlightenment, because it frees you from attachment. Satoko, having attained this wisdom, is not the wizened, disappointed creature Honda is in his old age. He chased phantoms all his life in a quest for some kind of permanence, only to realize at the end that nothing is permanent.

As the reader, we observed Honda much as Honda observed others, and like him we are shocked by revelation. Was any of this real? Why did we believe it was? Honda was convinced that the reincarnations happened mostly because of factors that appeared airtight as evidence, but on second thought may only have been a coincidence. What, in the end, was his proof? Three moles on the left side of a body? Along for the ride, we accepted this reasoning by the final book only to have our confidence dashed. What does it mean to be reborn? What, for that matter, does it mean to live?

[Ahmed · Rating 5 out of 5]

رباعية بحر الخصوبة.....يوكيو ميشيما
ت/ كامل يوسف حسين

ان هذه الرباعية( ثلج الربيع- الجياد الهاربة-معبد الفجر- سقوط الملاك) ملحمة حقيقية بكل معنى الكلمة، ملحمة اتخذت من الانسان والمجتمع موضوعها الأساسي، فتعمقت فيه وانغمست في تشريح كل منهما، لتخرج لنا في النهاية نص متكامل، يجمع بين الروحانية الشديدة في تصوير المجتمع الياباني بطقوسه وعاداته، وبين واقعية لتصرفات الإنسان لتمزج في النهاية بين هذا وذاك بكل اتساق.

من الصعب ان نقول كلاما كثيرا عن هذه الملحمة، لتدفقها الشديد في الوصف وتعمقها في بيان الطقوس والعادات، ولكنه في النهاية ستشعر أنك قد عشت في اليابان عند انتهاءك منها، حاربت معهم، وحضرت معاركهم ومسابقاتهم، وشربت الساكي الساخن، وبارزت بأحد سيوفهم الشهيرة، والأهم هي نظرتهم للأشياء فنظرة الياباني لأبسط الأمور تختلف كليا عن باقي الأجناس.

قد يكون الموت هو بطل الرواية الخفي(وهذا طبعا مفهوم عند شخصية استثنائية كميشيما)، ظلال الخسارة الفادح من الفقد، دائما في خاطر الشخصية صديق توفي، أو ذكرى مرتبطة بموت أحدهم، ليعايش تلك التفاصيل مرة أخرى ونجده يسير في حياته مدفوعا بمصير الخسارة إلى الأبد.

الرباعيىة ملهمة فعلا، في تفاصيلها الكثيرة والحالة التي كنت فيها عند القراءة، ذكرتني بقراءة الأخوة كرامازوف من حيث التأثير والمعايشة مع الشخصيات( وتُقرأ بالترتيب لأن كل جزء منها يحتوي على إشارات وإحالات لأحداث سابقة).

مناسبة جدا للقراءة في رمضان، هادئة ووديعة وبها جو صوفي ممتع مريح، وترجمتها متقنة جدا، سلسة وواضحة، كعادة العظيم كامل يوسف حسين.

[وائل المنعم · Rating 4 out of 5]

نهاية رائعة للرباعية، تيمة إختلال موازين القوى من تيماتي المفضلة. وتمثل هذه الرواية مع مسرحية الأنسة جوليا لسترندبرج وفيلم الخادم لجوزيف لوزي وسيناريو هارولد بنتر أفضل الأعمال التي قدمت هذه التيمة. الإختلاف بين الرواية من جهة والمسرحية والفيلم من جهة أخرى أن الشخصية التي تفقد مركز القوى في هذه الرواية - هوندا - واعية تماماً لما يحدث بل وتدفع في إتجاهه على عكس جوليا وتوني.
كينوي شخصية جذابة فهي تمثل الإنكار الجسدي والذي ترتب عليه بالضرورة الجنون في حين أن تورو يمثل الإنكار النفسي - أو الروحي - وبسبب إرتباطه بفكرة التناسخ فقد فرديته وتفوقه وكان سقوطه.
لم أستشعر العلاقة بين الرواية وقرار إنتحار ميشيما وإن كان بالرواية حكاية رمزية - الفأر الذي ظن أنه قط - قد تساعد على فهم فكرة الإنتحار والغرض منها والتأكيد على أنها عمل إيجابي وليس سلبياً وفقاً للثقافة اليابانية.
النهاية صعبة التفسير ومفاجئة للغاية، توقعت ألا يقدر هوندا على لقاء ساتوكو ويلحق بكيواكي - التجلي الأول - لكن اللقاء كان مربكاً لي.
إجمالاً، الرباعية عمل أدبي فذ لابد وأن يكون على قائمة القراءة لهواة الأدب عامة والرواية بشكل خاص.

[morgan · Rating 5 out of 5]

I'm in disbelief on how much I love this book and the rest of the tetralogy 🌸 I'm rather upset that's it's over :(

[امیرمحمد حیدری · Rating 2 out of 5]

داستان‌پردازی خیلی خوب بود و روندش آهسته و پیوسته بود. طوری که خواننده را به‌راحتی داخل داستلن می‌کشاند و زوال را با او شریک می‌کرد. اما نوع روایت، آن‌قدر خشک بود که نتوانستم ارتباط لازمه را بگیرم. در کل، اثر بسیار خوبی که با سلیقه‌ی من سازگار نبود.

[Jay · Rating 3 out of 5]

In my review of The Sea of Fertility tetralogy’s third volume, The Temple of Dawn, I complained that (when compared to the series’ majestically phrased first two outings) some of the beauty of Mishima’s prose appeared to be missing. Thankfully, from a writing point of view, he is back with a vengeance in this fourth and final book. It is filled with his famously sinister descriptions of nature, and, throughout, that strangely wooden but nonetheless alluringly poetic style of his runs along nicely at its voluptuous best. Because of this, the series regains some of its lost mystical energy; some of the wind seems to be back in Mishima’s sails. But does The Decay of the Angel live up to the first two volumes? — I’m not sure. I’m conflicted.

Up until this point, my sense has been that the tetralogy would have been better had Mishima stopped writing after Runaway Horses. For me, the first two books work brilliantly as a standalone duo. However, unlike the largely disappointing and unnecessary Temple of Dawn (volume 3), The Decay of the Angel (volume 4) does add some more meat to the series as a whole. It also slightly reshapes my understanding of what was truly going on with the man, Mishima, in the run-up to his insane suicide.

I think the problem in these later books is ultimately with what Mishima is trying to express. The Decay of the Angel can, I think, be summed up (somewhat simplistically) by the Neil Young lyric it’s better to burn out than fade away. It troublingly presents a depiction of the fade away — a soulless, nihilistic and empty end to life through the experience of old age. The first two volumes in the tetralogy represent the burnout (or, perhaps, more accurately, “the flameout” or “self-destructive explosion”). Through its attempt to demonstrate that Neil Young was correct, The Sea of Fertility has compromised itself. The final volumes feel like a relatively meek fade into emptiness, whereas the first two (Runaway Horses in particular) feel white hot and urgent. And so, by becoming less interesting as it progresses, the series — in its own roundabout way — proves its own point.

This is a book almost impossible to discuss without talking about its closing few pages. I think there are a few separate ways to interpret them. Here are my three conflicting theories (with major spoilers):



--

Theory no. 1: Kiyoaki never existed and Satoko is telling the truth when she says she doesn’t know who Honda is taking about. Memory is like a phantom mirror, she says, and Honda has spent his life suffering from delusions and false memory, trying to find meaning by spotting a continuous pattern of renewal and decay when the truth is that there is none.

“There was no other sound. The garden was empty. He had come, thought Honda, to a place that had no memories, nothing.”

For me, this would be a difficult turn of events to properly swallow. The series’ omniscient narrator has always been presented as wholly reliable up until this point. And, given that we’ve always seen characters in the story interact with the Kiyoaki entity countless times, it feels like a cheat to suddenly say that none of that actually happened.

--

Theory no. 2: Satoko herself, is a very old woman, who is also suffering from the same phantom mirror effect. Kiyoaki did exist as we saw him, as did his reincarnations, but she simply doesn’t remember. This version of events would lead to questions like: why does Honda humour her? Why is he so psychologically vulnerable that he can be made to doubt himself with so little input?

--

Theory no. 3: There is some poetic truth to both theory 1 and theory 2. Perhaps Satoko does remember Kiyoaki, but she is indicating that she has emotionally and spiritually moved on from that time in her life. Kiyoaki was ultimately just not very important, his death just one more meaningless tragedy in a barren Universe. She is hinting to Honda that he has wasted too much of his one and only life worrying about the issue of reincarnation. He understands this when he says:

“If there was no Kiyoaki, then there was no Isao. There was no Ying Chan, and who knows, perhaps there has been no I.”

In this version of the truth, Isao, Ying Chan, and Tōru may or may not be reincarnated versions of Kiyoaki. Perhaps they were simply incidentally similar people whom Honda had convinced himself were Kiyoaki. Honda understands that his life has been an exercise in making meaning out of senselessness, and the sea of fertility that he thought he was seeing all around, here on Earth, was, the whole time, just an illusion: a silly story that organised the chaos of life in his analytical and logical mind. The maps of meaning he made from the continuous cycles of incarnation and decay were nothing more than barriers which obscured the truth that lay hidden below the surface of that strange, unsettled sea. The truth that there is nothing there.

“That too is as it is in each heart.”

I like interpretation no. 3 best, and I hope I’ve articulated what I mean by it clearly.


----


This is a hard book to rate. I think there’s more than enough inside its pages to justify a comfortable 4-star rating. It is certainly much better than the series’ low point (The Temple of Dawn); however, I can’t shake the nagging feeling that the series itself would have been better if it had concluded much sooner than it did. If that’s true, it would be better if these last two volumes didn’t exist at all, which is worrying, because saying that the world would be a better place if any given book didn’t exist might just be the most damming critique you could possibly give it.