biography
| name: |
Mishima, Yukio
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pseudonym of Hiraoka Kimitake
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| sex:
| male
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| lived:
| (1925–70)
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| biography:
| Writer and right-wing activist, born in Tokyo, Japan. He studied at Tokyo University, became a civil servant, then embarked on a prolific writing career which, as well as 40 novels, produced poetry, essays, and modern Kabuki and Noh drama. His first major work was Confessions of a Mask (1949) which dealt with his discovery of his own homosexuality, and the ways in which he attempted to conceal it. His great tetralogy, Sea of Fertility (1965–70) with a central theme of reincarnation, spanned Japanese life and events in the 20th-c. Passionately interested in the chivalrous traditions of imperial Japan, he believed implicitly in the ideal of a heroic destiny. He became an expert in the martial arts of karate and kendo, and in 1968 founded the Shield Society, a group of a 100 youths dedicated to a revival of bushido, the Samurai knightly code of honour. In 1970 he publicly committed suicide by ritually disembowelling himself (seppuku) with his sword after a carefully staged attempt to rouse the nation to a return to pre-war nationalist ideals. |
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