Reviews

Il padiglione d'oro by Yukio Mishima

sisa_moyo's review against another edition

challenging dark slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

I was so excited to read this one given that I’ve made it a goal to read all of Mishima’s works that have been translated to English. This is the second of his works I’ve read, Star having been mind numbingly disappointing.

It took me so long and so much mental strength to finally finish this book. I don’t regret having picked it up but there were some parts, like internal monologues and such that I think were so unnecessary for the overall effect of the book and the story. However, it was a great and unique lens into the dark mind of this young Buddhist acolyte and his thoughts, a vivid yet fever dreamlike exploration into beauty, what is it and means, and into obsession. 
I think so much time was devoted to building up to the final act, that the climax of the book came much too late with the tension of it all having been lost much earlier. 
It also read very much like a classic, and a translated one at that and so it’s a bit hard to get into in the first few pages, but after a while Mishima’s lyrical writing begins to shine through. 

yet, given that the synopsis centres the story around the burning of the temple, that doesn’t happen or go into motion until the absolute last step of the book, which was thoroughly disappointing for me

schenkelberg's review against another edition

4.0

Not quite the Sea of Fertility but still stunning, pieces of the prose float away on their own and I can only follow them into the clouds. A beautiful book that throws all ideas of beauty and ugliness into question.

sedge's review against another edition

2.0

Boy oh boy, I haven’t written a review in quite sometime and I had managed to forget how daunting this can be.

This one fell a little flat for me. I was really teetering between 2 or 3 stars and I decided to go with the former because of one simple reason. This shit was kinda boring.
If I were to judge it solely on the standard of a novel being able to execute standard literary conventions, it would excel. However, books are so much more than that, they need to elicit some kind of emotional connection between the content and the consumer. This one really lacked emotional depth and that in turn meant that it was all rather forgettable. It was like if a person with very high IQ and very low EQ was turned into a book.
Maybe this can be attributed to the fact that it was initially written in Japanese. Maybe one day I will know how to read Japanese and I can read the pre-translated version and it will knock my proverbial socks off. However, today is not that day.
I’m rambling, goodnight.

melancoil's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

bamairi's review against another edition

challenging dark mysterious slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.75

polpofemo's review

(...?)
8/10?

emsemsems's review against another edition

5.0

‘Because the fact of not being understood by other people had become my only real source of pride, I was never confronted by any impulse to express things and to make others understand something that I knew. I thought that those things which could be seen by others were not ordained for me. My solitude grew more and more obese, just like a pig.’

‘With life, with carnal pleasure, with treachery, with hatred and with love – yes, with every possible thing in this world. And my memory preferred to deny and to overlook the element of the sublime that lurked in all these things.’

It has taken me a few months to resume/edit/post my review – and I few reasons for that. One of them being how I have the novel to blame for (if not its ways of rekindling then of how it has been) setting my gardening urges (an understatement) on a raging, unrelenting wave of flames. Like his other novels, Mishima makes grand references to nature that are strongly reminiscent of (visual) ‘art’ – especially of old Japanese floral paintings. The way Mishima wrote about something as simple as ‘rain’ was brilliantly magical but in the most ordinary sense. It was an absolute pleasure to read this novel – filled with beautiful terror, and terrific beauty. Thanks to Matthew for the kind recommendation, otherwise I might've never read this due to the misleading blurbs. In his review, he too raves about how Mishima wrote, and used the beauty of ‘rain’ in the novel which instantly makes me feel less alone about the mesmerising power of Mishima’s writing. The whole concept of it has an uncanny resemblance to Olafur Eliasson’s ‘Beauty’ – an art installation with a dark room filled with a silky mist of rain lit by a soft rainbow glow. I experienced Eliasson’s art installation with someone precious to me, and I loved every second of it (even though I’m not a fan of humidity – particularly the artificial, man-made sorts). Did Eliasson ever read Mishima? Well, I think he should if he hasn’t.

‘She was called Uiko. Her eyes were large and clear. Perhaps because hers was a rich family, she had a haughty manner. Although people used to make much of her, one could not imagine what she was thinking when she was all by herself. Uiko was probably still a virgin, but jealous women used to gossip about her and say that her looks betokened a sterile woman.’

‘…perhaps with Uiko – I had known a more violent form of carnal joy, a sensuality that had made my entire body seem numb. This provided the source of all my later joys, and indeed those joys were merely tantamount to scooping out handfuls of water from the past. Truly I felt that at some time in the distant past I had somewhere witnessed a sunset glow of incomparable magnificence. Was it my fault that the sunsets which I had seen thereafter had always appeared more or less faded?’

Uiko, for me, was a very memorable character in the novel even though she is only indirectly associated with the protagonist. She rarely appears in the novel except at times when the protagonist is reminded of the ‘beauty’ he had experienced in his younger days. Even so, she’s not physically present at those moments. I like how the women characters are written in Mishima’s (and Dazai’s) novels/work; I’ll even push it further and say that I even like them in Akutagawa’s too (even though I can’t say I’m a fan of his novels in general). Having read all of Murakami’s novels, perhaps, that is why I’m easily pleased and surprised when it comes to this. Every time I criticise Murakami, I instantly think of the blatant disappointment on my Japanese flatmate’s face a few years back. It was the result of me proudly uttering Murakami’s name when she asked me which Japanese writer I favoured. I still appreciate Murakami’s work. I appreciate them for being my gateway books to Japanese literature, but every time I find something better (esp. from Japanese writers), I am thrilled – it makes me feel like I have grown/matured as a reader – and it makes me think of how my taste/preference in literature is constantly evolving, not stagnant.

‘Let’s put it this way – human beings possess the weapon of knowledge in order to make life bearable. For animals such things aren’t necessary. Animals don’t need knowledge or anything of the sort to make life bearable. But human beings do need something, and with knowledge they can make the very intolerableness of life a weapon, though at the same time that intolerableness is not reduced in the slightest. That’s all there is to it.’

Another character – and a character that most readers of the novel can most definitely remember is Kashiwagi. I think he’s very well written. Perhaps it’s Mishima’s intention to use him as a character who is so aesthetically corrupted that it makes every beautiful thing/person he touches a form of corruption too. Kashiwagi is someone that the protagonist is impressed with at first meeting/sight because of his wildly transgressive qualities. He encapsulates the whole philosophy of how one has the power to destroy ‘beauty’ if one is not bestowed with it. And Kashiwagi takes it further and persuades the protagonist that that is exactly what he should do. For Kashiwagi, ‘beauty’ is only physical and material, but for the protagonist, it transcends the flesh (not necessarily in a spiritual/religious way, but it surely does not exclude all that; if anything, it includes that and then makes it deliciously complicated) and this conflict is perpetuated in the continuous tension in their ‘friendship’. For Kashiwagi, ‘beauty’ is for the taking – and it can and should be used/manipulated, whereas for the protagonist, ‘beauty’ is usually connect to nature – and I’d even argue that for him, there is no real ‘beauty’ that isn’t rooted or connected to ‘nature’ in some way or another. As much as he’s obsessed with ‘beauty’, he feels hesitant and conflicted about the idea of possessing ‘beauty’. And that leads to him becoming consumed by it – if not literally then in a figurative sense? I’ve been told that Mann’s [b:Death in Venice|53061|Death in Venice|Thomas Mann|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1627232919l/53061._SY75_.jpg|17413130] flirts with a similar tread of ideas when it comes to ‘beauty’ and obsession, but I’ve not read Mann’s work so I can’t say for sure.

‘The flying of the bee and the shaking of the flower did not differ in the slightest from the rustling of the wind. In this still, frozen world everything was on an equal footing, and that form which had emitted so powerful a charm was extinct. The chrysanthemum was no longer beautiful because of its form, but because of that vague name of ‘chrysanthemum’ that we give it and because of the promise contained in that name. Because I was not a bee, I was not tempted by the chrysanthemum and, because I was not a chrysanthemum, no bee yearned after me. I had been aware of a sense of fellowship with the flow of life and with all the forms in it, but now this feeling disappeared. The world had been cast away into relativity and only time was moving.’

As this is the second Mishima book that I’ve finished, I can’t be sure if all of them are as impressive as the two I’ve read. Even though they have very similar themes playing around the ideas of ‘beauty’ and existential doubts, [b:Star|41081322|Star (Penguin Modern)|Yukio Mishima|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1541625833l/41081322._SX50_.jpg|63082770] and ‘The Temple of the Golden Pavilion’ are very different novels. If translated more creatively, one wouldn’t be able to tell that they both came from the same writer. I do think that Mishima’s work is something one either likes or don’t. Every time I read a Mishima, I’m always reminded of Woolf. The both of them explore different issues/ideas in their work, and are literally separated by oceans, miles and miles – age, language, and more – can’t be anymore different. But – having said that, they have a very similar ‘vibe’. If you enjoy simplistic, straightforward writing, this won’t be for you. You’re going to think that this prose is flowery as fuck (literally and figuratively). I always think of Woolf's [b:The Waves|46114|The Waves|Virginia Woolf|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1645526068l/46114._SY75_.jpg|6057263] as a novel that is written in a way that is as close as poetry as one can get while still being a work of ‘prose’. And that just about sums up my feelings of Mishima too.

'Under present conditions I was still a person of no importance. In this country of Japan there were people by the million, by the tens of millions, who were tucked away in corners and to whom no one paid any attention. I still belonged to their ranks. The world felt not the slightest concern as to whether these people lived or died and for this reason there was something reassuring about them.'

'Then I understood. What made her ugly was – hope. Incurable hope, like an obstinate case of scabies, which lodges, damp and reddish, in the infected skin, producing a constant itching, and refusing to yield to any outer force.'

Reading Mishima’s ‘The Temple of the Golden Pavilion’ reminded me of a time when I was more passionate/serious about pursuing an education/career related to ‘art’. When I was in sixth-forms, after receiving a last-minute invitation to attend Art Basel, I skipped school and got on a plane impulsively. At the event, I met an artist who had a mask on who was doing an installation(s) at the show. I pretty much spent most of my time there watching him work (or at least that how I’m remembering it now because memories do evolve on their own accord, don’t they), and he let me work on one of his pieces. He allowed me to believe that art is never personal; it’s always a shared experience. At first, I was afraid I’ll ruin his work, but he insisted he didn’t care if I ruined it; said something about how these are all priceless materials to begin with anyway – it’s people – who make them worth something.

'My spirits, which had been so cheerful when I left Kyoto, had now been drawn into memories of dead people. As I recalled…an ineffable tenderness arose within me, and I wondered whether the only human beings whom I was capable of loving were not, in fact, dead people.'

'The third-class carriage was not very crowded. There they sat – the people who were so hard to love – busily puffing away at their cigarettes or peeling tangerines.'

Thinking back now, that was such an ironic but powerful statement to make in that occasion and situation. Just because you don’t and/or can’t see the interventions (in an artwork), doesn’t mean they don’t exist. Most interventions are indirect. And nothing is truly yours. Art can only be ‘experienced’. When you purchase an artwork, is it ‘it’ itself that you’re ‘acquiring’? And is it really the artwork that is of value – or the sentiment/feeling that it transpired? I believe once you’ve ‘purchased’ an artwork, it ceases to mean much; and all you’re actually bringing home is a carcass – a memory of what it once was – the memory of your first encounter/experience of it. But it feels unfair to publicly promote this manner of thinking since artists need to sell their art to survive, but that doesn’t mean I believe my earlier statement any less. And this I believe goes hand in hand with what the protagonist felt about the temple and the general ‘beauty’ that surrounds him/his life as he ricochets between that and the chaos/tragedies.

‘Music is like a dream. At the same time it is, on the contrary, like a more distinct form of consciousness than that of our normal waking hours. Which of the two really was music, I used to wonder? Music had the power at times to reverse these two contrary things…My spirit was familiar with the joy of embodying itself in music…music was truly a consolation.’

Art. Music. Beauty. Death. Mishima, oh Mishima – he gathers them all, and composed such a glorious work of it all. I took a while to read the novel because I was taking my time with it – not wanting to finish it all in one go. The poetic quality of his prose is much better when savoured slowly. I have delayed writing my review because I’ve not been in the mood to write a review for the past couple of months. But having been introduced to Kenshi Yonezu’s music a couple days ago, for some reason, I thought about ‘The Temple of the Golden Pavilion’ once again. The protagonist in the novel is the kind of lad who would rather choose death over sustaining a life he didn’t or can’t ‘love’. If I had made this statement casually in public, anyone would have easily and quickly interjected with something like ‘only a person of privilege would say such things’. Now before we get ahead of ourselves, Mishima has cleverly written the protagonist with a background of ‘poverty’. And this I think is what makes Mishima’s writing and characterisation so powerful. The unpredictability of the story arc; the strong and complex character development, and so much more. It’s packed with wicked surprises; and dare I say – it also interferes with your perception of the world after you’re done reading it?

‘What is so ghastly about exposed intestines? Why, when we see the insides of a human being, do we have to cover our eyes in terror? Why are people so shocked at the sight of blood pouring out? Why are a man’s intestines ugly? Is it not exactly the same in quality as the beauty of youthful, glossy skin?’

‘Then I noticed the pack of cigarettes in my other pocket. I took one out and started smoking. I felt like a man who settles down for a smoke after finishing a job of work. I wanted to live.’

I adore, and/but also absolutely hate dearly the lines above about smoking. Doesn’t it then make the feelings more true because it’s more complicated? Instead of going into a lengthy discussion of Mishima’s politics/views, I will simply conclude the review with my direct feelings/reaction to the text. The end of the novel made me want to go and light a cigarette despite not having one for about two years or more now. But thankfully I wasn’t persuaded enough to do so. I’ve never, and still do not believe in the act of trying to convince someone to quit smoking unless I can be of use to them (and often I just can't afford to be of use; and much too tired usually). I do believe that sometimes a cigarette (although ‘bad’ in every way) may be the cheapest way of making one feel more connected to life, and no one has the right to shame someone’s coping mechanism if you can’t promise an alternative sense of ‘relief’ (no matter how small). I’m by no means trying to promote ‘smoking’, but this is was the easiest way to explain my thoughts about the ending of Mishima’s novel. The protagonist’s life – and life in a general sense is but a fantastically absurd blur albeit speckled with chaos and tragedy. Well, at least that’s what I think is the vibe of the ending of the this particular Mishima novel.

‘The sky bore the traces of a violent sunrise. Here and there clouds, still reflecting a red glow, moved across the blue background. It was as though the clouds had not yet been able to get over their shyness…The trees were still wet from the rain that had been falling until the previous evening. The morning glow was reflected on the dewdrops which were abundantly speckled on the surrounding shrubs and it looked as though red berries had started to grow there out of season. The cobwebs that stretched from one dewdrop to the next were also slightly red and I noticed that they were quivering.’

After reading this novel, I’m convinced that there are only a few writers who can match Mishima’s sensitivity to nature, and the world around them. One other writer that comes to mind is undoubtedly Woolf. And another one with a suspiciously similar style that I’ve recently come to like a lot is Federico Falco ( [b:A Perfect Cemetery|55904395|A Perfect Cemetery|Federico Falco|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1605587765l/55904395._SY75_.jpg|50814253] ). Mishima’s play on ‘beauty’ is wildly expansive and extensive. I still can’t be sure of what I think he meant to say about it, except for that ‘beauty’ and life is inseparable. To truly own ‘beauty’ is to also be dearly acquainted with death. Donna Tartt, anyone? ‘Death is the mother of beauty’ – from [b:The Secret History|943784|The Secret History (Audiobook)|Donna Tartt|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1409921127l/943784._SX50_.jpg|221359]. The eroticism of death, and the obsession with beauty – is obviously a Bataillean specialty, and I can’t not think of him. It’s a shame that Bataille never read Mishima; I think that he would have loved Mishima ardently. I’d recommend this to anyone with enough guts and time for the experience. And if you manage to get to the end of my rambling review of Mishima’s brilliant novel, then you might as well read the book. I’m giving the book a 4.5-star rating but I’m more than okay to round off to a full 5-star rating.

‘I knew that my stomach was going to dream. It was going to dream about sweet bread and bean-jam wafers. While my spirit dreamed about jewels, my stomach would obstinately dream about sweet bread and bean-jam wafers.’

Perhaps, I can finally read Mishima’s tetralogy now that I’m ready to bury myself deep in books? Kenshi Yonezu’s music has gently tugged me back into a reading/writing mood after a somewhat long struggle to get out a reading rut – and so I’m going to recommend some to read any Mishimas with :

Lemon
Paprika
灰色と青

sarah_dietrich's review against another edition

4.0

I chose to read The Temple of the Golden Pavilion because I was looking for some dark Japanese literature, and I certainly found it. The story is based around the real event of a young Buddhist monk burning down an ancient temple. The book tells of a man who is an outsider, plagued by stuttering, and becomes obsessed with the Golden Temple from a young age. The temple haunts him, it is everything to him, all that he can think of. He can see the temple and hence the world in ways that noone else can and loses his touch with reality, tormented by the temple: "The special quality of hell is to see everything clearly down to the last detail". This was an intriguing, compulsive read and I really enjoyed it. Mishima has a calm, powerful, clearly defined style that suits this story perfectly.

vekto's review against another edition

4.0

A novel replete with metaphysics, theories of beauty, value judgments on meaning, existentialism, and zen teachings. 
A novel that doesn’t flow, that is dense and difficult to sink into. But it was worth it, and the ending is one of the best I’ve read.

bookishwendy's review against another edition

4.0

Enter the mind of a stuttering Zen Buddhist acolyte (who also happens to be a psychopath) and follow his convoluted inner rationalizations that spiral around the Kinkakuji "Golden Temple". I can't claim to have understood it all, but I *felt* this book very deeply.