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Yukio Mishima
Life Time
14 January 1925 - 25 November 1970
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On November 25, 1970, five men armed with swords broke into the National Defense Headquarters in Tokyo. As they cleared their way, they burst onto the roof of the building, and one of the five, addressing the thousands of employees gathered below, gave a brief and furious speech. It was Yukio Mishima, a world-renowned Japanese writer who was accompanied by followers of the Shield Society. Yukio, whose real name is Hiraoka Kimitake, was born in Tokyo on January 14, 1925. As the son of a high-ranking
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On November 25, 1970, five men armed with swords broke into the National Defense Headquarters in Tokyo. As they cleared their way, they burst onto the roof of the building, and one of the five, addressing the thousands of employees gathered below, gave a brief and furious speech. It was Yukio Mishima, a world-renowned Japanese writer who was accompanied by followers of the Shield Society.
Yukio, whose real name is Hiraoka Kimitake, was born in Tokyo on January 14, 1925. As the son of a high-ranking official, he could get an education in the best educational institutions in the country, which he did. After graduating from a prestigious peerage school, and then from the University of Tokyo, Yukio became interested in literary creativity, serving simultaneously in the Ministry of Finance.
A great impression on readers, especially teenagers, was made by Mishima’s novel Confessions of the Mask, whose hero discovered homosexuality and was forced to hide it. This work was followed by Forbidden Colors, The Sailor Rejected by the Sea and other novels.
Mishima, a categorical man, did not tolerate the pursuit of modern Japan for material goods, and other trends of the time that took away the face of his country. In the end, this led to what he did in front of many witnesses. Speaking out against the Japanese constitution forbidding the creation of an army, the spiritual emptiness in which the country is mired, Mishima saw that his speech did not touch the audience. And then, in the best samurai traditions, the writer committed seppuku - suicide in protest. His best friend and lover (Yukio was gay), who was present, cut off Mishima's head with his own sword.
In the years following World War II, Yukio Mishima was Japan’s most important writer. His works, like the act of suicide, reflected the agony of Japan as an independent nation, tearing apart the difference between tradition and Europeanization. After the death of the writer, his wife, who did not know about the secret life of Yukio, learned about his hobbies with men from newspaper essays. /