yukio mishima

“ Thus in a single phrase I can define the great illusion concerning 'love' in this world. It is the effort to join reality with the apparition. ”

“ Mine was the unbearable jealousy a cultured pearl must feel toward a genuine one. Or can there be such a thing in this world as a man who is jealous of the woman who loves him, precisely because of her love? ”

“ 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. ”

“ Ever since then violent anticipation has always been an anguish rather than joy for me. ”

“ That which proceeds from a mans soul shall shape his soul; that which proceeds from his speech shall shape his speech, and deeds that proceed from his body shall shape his body. ”

“ But there is no such thing as individual knowledge, a particular knowledge belonging to one special person or group. Knowledge is the sea of humanity, the field of humanity, the general condition of human existence. ”

“ Other people must be destroyed. In order that I might truly face the sun, the world itself must be destroyed. ”

“ I had been handed what might be called a full menu of all the troubles in my life while still too young to read it. But all I had to do was spread my napkin and face the table. ”

“ A person who has been seriously wounded does not demand that the bandages that save his life be clean. ”

“ However, as words become particularized, and as men begin - in however small a way - to use them in personal, arbitrary ways, so their transformation into art begins. ”