Confessions of a Mask

by Yukio Mishima and Meredith ( Translated By ) Mishima, Yukio Weatherby

Book Overview

Confessions of a Mask tells the story of Kochan, an adolescent boy tormented by his burgeoning attraction to men: he wants to be "normal." Kochan is meek-bodied, and unable to participate in the more athletic activities of his classmates. He begins to notice his growing attraction to some of the boys in his class, particularly the pubescent body of his friend Omi. To hide his homosexuality, he courts a woman, Sonoko, but this exacerbates his feelings...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 081120118X
• ISBN13: 9780811201186
• Release Date: January 1958
• Publisher: New Directions Publishing Corporation
• Length: 256 Pages
• Weight: 0.62 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.8" x 5.2" x 8.0"

Customer Reviews

A simple story, well-written and chilling

This book is really not lacking very much. Perhaps some other reviewers came into it with high expectations for some sort of pinnacle of Japanese literature, but I only wanted a story and the story that was delivered was overwhelmingly engaging. As a story of obsession and tragedies of the heart it is certainly comparable to Nabokov. I am not a fan of stories that are just depressing or a mountain of uncomfortable drudgery, but Mishima keeps you out of that pit with his tell-all intellectual writing style, simultaneously mocking all the follies of human existence and pitying himself for being so analytical. The story has its rough edges but you really feel that he focuses on all the right details and nothing is left out, which is the hallmark of a superior writer. This is absolutely a great gift for a gay friend. I am not gay but I felt a very close sympathy for the main character's predicament. It seems to be a thin veil over Mishima's own experience, and perhaps the story is semi-autobiographical. The translation is pretty good and the Japanese experience shines through, although the setting of the story definitely lends a hand to that.

Mishsima tells it like it is

Often people draw a definite line between being homosexual and straight, and once you know who you are you always know. Mishima, in detail, describes the inner conflicts of growing up gay. Dealing with the confusions of being able to find a woman beautiful at charming and yet being able to go no further. It is an excellent book for someone doubting themselves right now or for friends or family to know exactly what their loved one had to struggle with for many years and in some ways may still be struggling with.

Harrowing, brutal

--those words only begin to describe this claustrophobic, asphyxiating novel which is really an exercise in language as torture, prose as death sentence. Confessions of a Mask is a remarkable revelation of self and affirmation. It's hard to get a handle on Mishima's influence, but it's harder still to imagine very much of the grim and quite tedious prose coming from "the underground" today without bowing hard in Mishima's direcetion. Highly recommended.

The best book to start with the work of Mishima

It tells the discovering of Mishima's gay identity, during the second world war and after. Very easy to read, very deep. It should be on everyone's shelf. Loic Barriere