Voices of the Fallen Heroes

And Other Stories

De: Yukio Mishima, Stephen Dodd - editor, John Nathan - introduction

Narrado por: Brian Nishii

A new selection of Yukio Mishima (author of Spring Snow and The Sailor Who Fell from Grace with the Sea) short stories from the 1960s—his final decade—Voices of the Fallen Heroes offers a unique glimpse into the mind of one of Japan’s greatest writers.

In the title story, "Voices of the Fallen Heroes," a séance brings forth the spirits of young officers in the Imperial Army and the kamikaze pilots of World War II, who reproach the Emperor and mourn Japan’s modern decline. In another, Mishima recounts the true story of the time a deranged fan broke into his home at dawn, insisting on meeting the author and imploring him to "tell the truth." Elsewhere, a beautiful youth achieves eternal life through violent murder, and an ill-matched couple seal their fate with a pack of cards, tangled in the web of time and unfulfilled desire.

Available in English for the first time, and carefully selected by a team of expert translators, these captivating stories serve as the perfect introduction to Mishima's work, on the 100th anniversary of his birth.

Death as Art

Among its many posessions, the Metropolitan Museum of Art has an entire department devoted to, of all things... weapons.

To read Mishima is to flirt with violent objects. This does not make us readers ourselves macabre; to the contrary, to read Mishima is to ask, "what is our relationship to mortality?" To violences great and small? To all things martial? To death?

You will answer how you will; Mishima only polishes the mirror. This is violence with the business-end sheathed, its ornaments dusted and clean. This is war in a museum case, where all good generals hope to keep it.