Mishima, Aesthetic Terrorist: An Intellectual Portrait

by Andrew Rankin

Half a century after his shocking samurai-style suicide, Yukio Mishima (1925-1970) remains a deeply controversial figure. Though his writings and life-story continue to fascinate readers around the world, Mishima has often been scorned by scholars, who view him as a frivolous figure whose work expresses little more than his own morbid personality.



In Mishima, Aesthetic Terrorist, Andrew Rankin sets out to challenge this perception by demonstrating the intelligence and seriousness of Mishima's work and thought. Each chapter of the book examines one of the central ideas that Mishima develops in his writings: life as art, beauty as evil, culture as myth, eroticism as transgression, the artist as tragic hero, narcissism as the death drive. Along with fresh readings of major works of fiction such as The Temple of the Golden Pavilion and "Patriotism," the book introduces less familiar works in different genres. Special prominence is given to Mishima's essays, which contain some of his most brilliant writing. Mishima is concerned with such problems as the loss of certainties and absolute values that characterizes modernity, and the decline of strong identities in a world of increasing uniformity and globalization. In his cultural criticism Mishima makes an impassioned defense of free speech, and he rails against all forms of authoritarianism and censorship.

Rankin reads Mishima's artistic project, up to and including his spectacular death, as a single, sustained lyric, an aggressive piece of performance art unfolding in multiple media. For all his rebellious energies, Mishima's work is suffused with a sense of ending--the end of art, the end of eroticism, the end of culture, the end of the world--and it is governed by a decadent aestheticism which holds that beautiful things radiate their most intense beauty on the cusp of their destruction. Erudite and authoritative, yet written in clear, accessible prose, Mishima, Aesthetic Terrorist is essential reading for all those who seek a deeper understanding of this radical and provocative figure.

Genres: Biography, Japan, Nonfiction, Literary Criticism, Philosophy, Japanese Literature, Literature

212 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2018

Reviews

[Michael A. · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great, readable study that elucidates Mishima's underlying ideology throughout all of his works: the connection between beauty and death, the reactionary longing for a mythical past, the antimodernist distaste for the impotence of the emperor, repressed homosexuality (which betrays itself through homoerotic situations involving violence and crime), a narcissism that propels itself into the sublime (a beauty that transforms itself into death - Narcissus...) all of which reach the culmination point at his spectacular suicide, which Rankin reads as a symbolic exorcism of the Showa period...

"Mishima's death is, in obvious ways, the logical culmination of his life's work and of all the aspects of his thinking that we have investigated in this book. His extreme aestheticism, his narcissism, his eroticism, his desire to transcend modernity and link to the spirit of Japan's classical literature, to turn himself into a sublime object, and his compulsion toward crime, toward evil, and toward the divine terror, all achieve their clearest expression and, we must assume, their personal fulfillment. Mishima's death also affects a permanent change on his literary works, every one of which now appears to point inevitably to this moment, as if every word he had written was posthumous. Through originality in the arrangement of his fate, Mishima has given his work a seemingly indestructible cohesion." (p. 172)

"An artist who actualizes all his creative possibilities, good and bad, beautiful and ugly, and succeeds - through the pure realization of a will to power that will not yield to anything in this world - in condensing them into a single momentous event, the effect of which is so beautiful yet so shocking that those who contemplate it are left wondering whether it is a work of art or an act of madness, has surely achieved a masterpiece of some kind. It is, as Mishima intended it to be, a cruel and defiant masterpiece: a terror attack on the modern consciousness, a warning to the "last humans," and a challenge to all those coming after Mishima who would dare to call themselves artists." (p. 174)

[TL]

Young Nietzsche wrote in The Birth of Tragedy that "existence can only be justified as an aesthetic phenomenon". It certainly cannot be justified "morally"—it just hurts too much. And, if given the choice, no government would ever accept existence as a viable policy—the cost-benefit analysis comes up way too expensive. "So,", young Kimitake Hiraoka agrees, eyes sparkling innocently: "It can only be justified as a work of art!"

There is absolutely nothing transcendent above us, no higher principle to which you can outsource the contours of your life for critique. After the Death of God, having children and walking your dog and having a 401k and living in the suburbs is exactly as justified as plunging a katana into your stomach and carving six inches across—i.e., not justified at all. De jure, nothing is; meaning, de facto, everything is. It's open season for everybody, milquetoast suburbanites and decadent quasi-fascist suicidal narcissists alike.

So what happens when the decadent narcissist in question is both (1.) ideologically hyper-committed to the aesthetic justification of life, and (2.) an extremely courageous and talented artist? You get Yukio Mishima.

Mishima was not suicidal out of despair, no, quite the opposite; he was suicidal because suicide was precisely what the final act of his meticulously-crafted stage-play demanded. He's the main character; he always was. But he was also the author of the story he starred in. And what he wrote was that the content of his letter of life could only become complete after that letter got signed, sealed, and delivered with a jet of blood. Your death as the key to unlock your life.

This is the only correct reading of Mishima's seppuku: a culminating act of extreme and extremely-self-absorbed performance art. "I want to eat the Sun raw. What kills me makes me stronger".

[Moved to Library Thing adaorhell · Rating 4 out of 5]

wow. this dude fucks. and can fuck me any time. what a brilliant artist, my admiration continues to grow.

[Conor]

Remarkably good - perhaps the first work in English to analyse Mishima's life through the lens of his writings. Detailed, articulate and very insightful. I loved it.

[Azam Ch. · Rating 5 out of 5]

i liked his analysis of mishima, although the last 2 chapters about his uber-nationalism and acceptance of his own death were heartbreaking and soul crushing.
i liked how erudite Andrew was here (extremely well read in different sources and philosophies) and i liked his attempt at constructing something effable out of what i personally believe is ineffable.

[Cole Strickler · Rating 5 out of 5]

Mishima is possessed, seduced by a transcendent beauty that cannot be grasped. He recognizes the irreconcilabilities of being in the way of Camus’ absurd man, but instead of scorn and defiance he revels in Nietszchean oxymoron and contradiction. Beautiful death, elegant destruction, an amoral aestheticism in which the orgasmic climax is only reachable through annihilation. Create only to destroy, Dionysian ecstasy of the kamikaze. Life is a work of art, you create yourself with the same inevitability of a literary character.

- if goodness cannot fully encapsulate the feeling of beauty, if evil can also stake its claim, what does this say about us? About God?
- Mishimas aesthetics of crime and evil are interesting. The criminal as an aesthete, who basks in isolation and subjectivity. who exists in opposition to reality because it isn’t subjective. who commits the violent act to complete his isolation and deepen his own consciousness. Is this purely idiosyncratic? Or do we all hear a call to evil that promises us actualization?
- His theory of intoxication is also thought provoking. He uses a festival, a modern day equivalent is a rock concert. All moral norms break down, we feel as though we are free, but we bound to the rules, the nature of the thing in itself. The concert goers sway and chant with each other, losing their individuality and yet becoming oxymoronically free.
- Mishima believes that individuals with heightened consciousness are less free in this way. They are mere observers. He resents and envies the simple for this reason.
- Lmfao, the saint Sebastian homoeroticism stuff was bit too much for me
- Man I have GOT to read Bataille.
- Mishima was purposefully an anachronism, he crafted himself as a work of art. An ode to the old gods, bidding farewell
- Mishima’s final act was a terrorist attack on the modern consciousness. He believed HE was the culmination of the now dead world.

What a mad lad. A legend

[Rodrigo · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is not a biography of Mishima, but a study of his ideas and philosophy throughout his artistic works. In it we can see a consistent philosophy of paradoxes, for example, a rebellion against westernization of Japan, but at the same time, Mishima being a child of his own time and this same westernization. Also, there's an interesting study of concepts like art as evil and criminal, beauty as both life and death, and also the grasping of this beauty only available through its own destruction

[Pablo Mallorquí · Rating 4 out of 5]

Mishima es uno de los escritores del siglo XX que más me fascinan. Primero por su obra inagotable, siempre de gran calidad, pero también por cómo buscaba impregnar su vida de esteticismo. Acabando por el descenso vertiginoso de sus ideas hacia posiciones reaccionarias. Este ensayo ofrece una biografía intelectual del autor, recorriendo, mediante algunas de sus obras, su vida y pensamiento para entender mejor qué cosmovisión movía su vida. Vida que había convertido él mismo en su obra de arte final.

[Bexan · Rating 5 out of 5]

MIshima is a figure that looms large in my imagination. Ever since I read an article on the death of James Dean he had written, I have been fascinated by this figure who I felt truly understood my own relationship with death, oblivion, and beauty.
Rankin's treatment of him is top notch, drawing you into the world of MIshima without treating him as a silly, ridiculous figure. Rankin treats ihs belief with the seriousness that they deserve, and I love him for it