It's very likely he knew this and it was merely a spectacle to preface his long-planned suicide. The American equivalent of this would be if someone addressed a random group of soldiers and announced they needed to overthrow the illegitimate government in Washington so they could properly return to their rightful position as subjects of the British Crown. By 1970, no popular movement had any pretension of overthrowing the government to resurrect a World War II-era order. It should be noted that, technically speaking, Mishima's intended 'coup' was nonsense. the future Empress Michiko of Japan.ĭespite being mentioned as a potential nominee for the Nobel Prize in Literature even before his fortieth birthday, he is more famous for his ill-advised attempt to incite a pro-Imperial coup against the government of Japan at a JSDF base in 1970, at the end of which he and his Number Two Masakatsu Morita committed Seppuku.

Also, a girl he once went out with via an arranged date was Michiko Shouda. His mother, on the other hand, was very much his first fan and even helped keep his efforts from his father until he met renown. However, his father and grandmother were very authoritarian in their upbringing-with his own artistic expression unsupported (for the usual Starving Artist-related fears). Despite the vicissitudes of the Meiji Restoration, his side of the family never really turned Impoverished Patrician (having married into Self-Made Man relatives too). Perhaps unsurprisingly, his traditional aesthetics root from his descent from both the main house of Tokugawa Ieyasu and one of his retainers.

One of his dear friends was Shintaro Ishihara, future governor of Tokyo, who would later write the book on Japanese neo-nationalism, The Japan That Can Say No. Mishima also spoke Surprisingly Good English so much that he was able to do a famous TIME Magazine interview in 1969 without an interpreter. A Manly Gay given to bodybuilding and Samurai worship, he was part of, and contributed to, the persistent undercurrent of traditionalist right-wing nationalism that persisted after the Japanese defeat in 1945, longing for the days of genuine Imperial rule and a strong Japanese military. Yukio Mishima (三島由紀夫, Mishima Yukio, real name 平岡公威, Hiraoka Kimitake, Janu– November 25, 1970) was one of the greats of post- war Japanese literature.

Mishima: Author, actor, stud, samurai worshiper, failed coup leader.

Forbidden Colors by Yukio Mishima