Philip Glass' soundtrack to the 80's film Mishima has become one of my favourite albums. The "Mishima VI, Closing" piece is some of his best work.
The author's final observation, "Perhaps we need a Mishima to shock us out of our complacency." is something he should be careful about wishing for. (Though the idea of Ian McEwan storming a military base was very funny, I thought Stephen Fry would be even better equipped. "...ah, well, right then, moving along..." )
What makes Mishima so dangerous today is that he produced beautiful art and culture from which the downstream political conclusions were unavoidable. This is one side effect of good art. Political theory itself is a kind of vulgar pseudo intellectual haggling compared to aesthetic truths and their self evidence that great art demonstrates. As an example from another of today's threads, a Chopin mazurka does more for Polish national identity than any explanation could do. Writing itself is an inferior (but necessary) form because it only describes in a narrow dimension instead of demonstrates over multiple senses. This is what I think Misihma also understood. I only read the Sea of Fertility books (in English some years ago) and they're demanding, but this muscular and humane expression of aesthetic truth and even divine power is the seed for the survival of the human spirit. A revolt against becoming the bland, homogenized "last man," may very well originate from the sentiments Mishima was able to bring words and life to.
I'd highly recommend the film you mention, Paul Schrader's Mishima[1] to anyone, not just those interested in the author, though of course especially them. It's one of the most beautiful films I've ever seen, and Philip Glass' music (which I agree is some of his best work) just makes it that much better.
Also you don't find a lot of far right artists now, Mishima's works and his political stand is a really interesting combination.
Just watched the Mishima film a couple weeks ago, the Cinematography awed me the most, the director clearly studied a ton of Japanese cinema (I think he's going for that style), the theatre scenes are easily one of my top scenes of all time. The music on the other hand I think it's a little bit over-scored, like a lot of other Philip Glass' scores they sound amazing stand-alone but not always fit to the films, just personal taste..
The only thing different about him was that he came to his fascism in a kitsch fashion after it had otherwise been broadly repudiated for its destructive consequences (largely for psycho-sexual reasons, he was decapitated in his “coup” attempt by his young lover).
But in prewar Japan, there were plenty of avant-garde artists who turned fascist as it subsumed the country. In the postwar period, they were rightfully turned on by their fellow citizens who had watched their country razed to the ground and families destroyed by proponents of an irrational nihilism. Their recuperation only began in earnest when US intelligence services began purging leftists from the cultural sector and funding proponents of “traditional” Japanese culture in literature and the arts in the 1950s-60s. I know that Kawabata Yasunari received CIA funding through cultural front organizations and I wouldn’t be surprised if Mishima did as well (they were close friends and shared work with each other). All of this was intended to combat the otherwise widely popular emergence of leftist culture in the post-occupation period.
> What makes Mishima so dangerous today is that he produced beautiful art and culture from which the downstream political conclusions were unavoidable.
This is strange to me. I can see a line between the kind of characters young Mishima constructed (extremely perceptive in limited ways, weird, [sometimes literally] impotent, and prone to mixing shame and violence and adoration) and the pretty basic understanding I have of the political ideas of the older Mishima. But the political ideas hardly seem "unavoidable". It's certainly plausible to me that somebody (apparently) traumatized by childhood weakness and confused identity would take up right-wing politics. It's also plausible to me that they would take up bodybuilding (check), realize that physical strength wasn't totally the problem (not check?), and, I dunno, go see a therapist or something.
I guess I see the eventual politics as one natural way all that could have played out. But to me the root themes of Mishima's work aren't intrinsically political. This may also be biased because I've only read Confessions of a Mask and The Temple of the Golden Pavilion, which Wikipedia tells me pre-date his political writings, in the former case by quite a while.
Some people go to therapists, some people form paramilitary cults to a divine monarchy, stage coups, accept failure with ritual suicide, and become immortal legends. Different strokes for sure.
The author's final observation, "Perhaps we need a Mishima to shock us out of our complacency." is something he should be careful about wishing for. (Though the idea of Ian McEwan storming a military base was very funny, I thought Stephen Fry would be even better equipped. "...ah, well, right then, moving along..." )
What makes Mishima so dangerous today is that he produced beautiful art and culture from which the downstream political conclusions were unavoidable. This is one side effect of good art. Political theory itself is a kind of vulgar pseudo intellectual haggling compared to aesthetic truths and their self evidence that great art demonstrates. As an example from another of today's threads, a Chopin mazurka does more for Polish national identity than any explanation could do. Writing itself is an inferior (but necessary) form because it only describes in a narrow dimension instead of demonstrates over multiple senses. This is what I think Misihma also understood. I only read the Sea of Fertility books (in English some years ago) and they're demanding, but this muscular and humane expression of aesthetic truth and even divine power is the seed for the survival of the human spirit. A revolt against becoming the bland, homogenized "last man," may very well originate from the sentiments Mishima was able to bring words and life to.