WRITER

Yukio Mishima

1925 - 1970

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Kimitake Hiraoka (平岡 公威, Hiraoka Kimitake; 14 January 1925 – 25 November 1970), known by his pen name Yukio Mishima (三島 由紀夫, Mishima Yukio), was a Japanese author, poet, playwright, actor, model, Shintoist, ultranationalist, and the leader of an attempted coup d'état that culminated in his seppuku (ritual suicide). Mishima is considered one of the most important postwar stylists of the Japanese language. He was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature five times in the 1960s—including in 1968, when the award went to his countryman and benefactor Yasunari Kawabata. Mishima's works include the novels Confessions of a Mask and The Temple of the Golden Pavilion, and the autobiographical essay Sun and Steel. Read more on Wikipedia

His biography is available in different languages on Wikipedia. Yukio Mishima is the 143rd most popular writer (down from 137th in 2019), the 14th most popular biography from Japan (down from 11th in 2019) and the 4th most popular Japanese Writer.

Yukio Mishima is most famous for his vivid, existential works exploring themes of beauty, death, and nationalism, as well as for his dramatic death by ritual seppuku in 1970 after a failed coup attempt to restore the emperor's power. His life and work continue to evoke fascination and controversy. His most famous works include The Temple of the Golden Pavilion, Confessions of a Mask, and The Sea of Fertility tetralogy, which comprises Spring Snow, Runaway Horses, The Temple of Dawn, and The Decay of the Angel.

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Among WRITERS

Among writers, Yukio Mishima ranks 143 out of 7,302Before him are Charles Bukowski, Jonathan Swift, Paul Verlaine, Lewis Carroll, Boris Pasternak, and Dr. Seuss. After him are Karl Adolph Gjellerup, E. T. A. Hoffmann, Cato the Elder, Cyrano de Bergerac, Vladimir Nabokov, and Henry David Thoreau.

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Contemporaries

Among people born in 1925, Yukio Mishima ranks 8Before him are Margaret Thatcher, Pol Pot, Barbara Bush, Richard Burton, B.B. King, and Paul Newman. After him are Mahathir Mohamad, Patrice Lumumba, Robert Edwards, Gilles Deleuze, Alija Izetbegović, and Zygmunt Bauman. Among people deceased in 1970, Yukio Mishima ranks 9Before him are Bertrand Russell, Gamal Abdel Nasser, Erich Maria Remarque, António de Oliveira Salazar, Sukarno, and Abraham Maslow. After him are Jimi Hendrix, Alexander Kerensky, Max Born, Nelly Sachs, Shmuel Yosef Agnon, and Édouard Daladier.

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In Japan

Among people born in Japan, Yukio Mishima ranks 14 out of 6,245Before him are Tokugawa Ieyasu (1542), Emperor Meiji (1852), Miyamoto Musashi (1584), Naruhito (1960), Toyotomi Hideyoshi (1536), and Haruki Murakami (1949). After him are Yasunari Kawabata (1899), Hideki Tojo (1884), Emperor Taishō (1879), Murasaki Shikibu (973), Shinzō Abe (1954), and Satoshi Nakamoto (1975).

Among WRITERS In Japan

Among writers born in Japan, Yukio Mishima ranks 4Before him are Matsuo Bashō (1644), Miyamoto Musashi (1584), and Haruki Murakami (1949). After him are Yasunari Kawabata (1899), Murasaki Shikibu (973), Osamu Dazai (1909), Kenzaburō Ōe (1935), Ryūnosuke Akutagawa (1892), Natsume Sōseki (1867), Kazuo Ishiguro (1954), and Sei Shōnagon (966).