“From the Wilderness”
by Yukio Mishima (1966)
translated from the Japanese by John Nathan
from the November 4, 2024 issue of The New Yorker
What a wonderful surprise this is: a newly translated story from Yukio Mishima, who has been gone since taking his own life in November, 1970. Not only that, but the translator is John Nathan, who knew Mishima personally, who translated his works in the 1960s, and who wrote a 1974 biography of Mishima. “From the Wilderness” was originally written in 1966, and it will be included in the forthcoming collection Voices of the Fallen Heroes: and Other Stories.
Here is how “From the Wilderness” begins:
One morning in the rainy season, I went to bed at 6 a.m. after working all night and was on the verge of falling asleep when I was startled by the sound of my father’s voice coming through the air-conditioner next to my bed.
I am very excited to read and share thoughts on “From the Wilderness.” Please share your thoughts below!
I didn’t know about this upcoming new collection of short stories by Mishima. I have enjoyed several of his books, so thanks! I hope it will be available eventually through Edelweiss Plus!
My experience of Mishima’s writing is primarily limited to _Temple of the Golden Pavillion_ , which I read many years ago. My knowledge of his life is very general, and largely about his death. Neither is enough for me to fairly assess “From the Wilderness” in relation to Mishima as author or person. I did read the interview with the story’s translator. Regardless of that, I feel it’s best that I try to comment on the story as if I had read none of the above.
Even though the narrator is also named “Mishima”, and having read that the incident described in the story is purportedly real, I will here assume the story is fiction (which it could largely be), and take the narrator, a novelist, to be a fictional narrator/novelist (which he may be, for all I know).
The narrator has related his witnessing of an intruder in his home, what he has been told by other members of his family, and a few remarks he heard from the police—mere moments of observation, and some hearsay. The intruder no more than asks him to “please tell the truth”, with no explanation.
Yet the narrator presumes to deeply evaluate the intruder’s mentality. As fiction this is unrealistic: with so little familiarity, he could have no more than assumptions and notions. So as a reader I take the narrative to be an expression of the narrator’s thoughts and feelings, inspired by the incident, about loneliness and the effects he believes his and other novelists’ writing may have on readers, especially lonely ones.
We don’t know what the the Intruder has read (nor does the narrator). I suppose some fiction could so intoxicate some readers enough to compel them to extreme behavior. Such an incident understandably might distress a writer enough to inspire great concern about the possible effects their writing may have on unstable readers. The narrator is having an episode of this. That works as a story. I’m not convinced, however, that his concerns are warranted to the extreme he describes. Did the author imagine/believe they are? I don’t know.
Yes, I’m sure there are unstable people who would/will respond in irrational ways certain books they may read. Were authors to attempt to write in a way that prevents this ever happening, imagine how that would impoverish literature!
Having said all this (never mind my wordy over-analysis): It’s a an effective story. Although I may not agree with all of the narrator’s (author’s?) views on loneliness, I do appreciate their theoretical insight. I plan to read some other Mishima stories I have in some anthologies.
I like the ending (spoiler allert!):
“I’m not sure what he had in mind when he demanded the truth from me, but I have complied. I have told the truth.”
(Would this have satisfied him? Or would it have driven him mad?)
Now, would someone who has read more Yukio Mishima and knows more about him than I do comment from that perspective?
I can’t comment from a more knowledgeable perspective, as my only reading of Mishima was ‘Spring Snow’ about 30 years ago which I recall being lovely. What I find interesting here is how he seems to be prescient in imaging future mentally ill people misinterpreting art such as Manson with The White Album or Mark David Chapman and Catcher in the Rye. Even the stalker idea seems something not very commonly dealt with in 1966. I don’t know whether this is “Mishima” or Mishima who experienced this incident, but either way I think a statement is being made about the responsibilities a writer or artist might feel. Even if this isn’t accurately depicting the intruder’s mind, no artist whose goal is to impact, to stir, to move, to provoke thought could really help ignoring potential consequences and these were consequences less discussed in 1966 than since.
It’s an odd story. And we don’t know if he was a very successful novelist or not and there is a bit of joke when he writes, “I am not so starved for popularity that I must welcome the adulation of a psychopath.” Rock stars and movie stars are more likely to have stalkers than successful novelists.
But even assuming he was a very successful novelist, you seem to never seem to hear about a really successful novelist being stalked. Or if they have been they don’t talk about it but it makes a different sort of story.
Then there is the question of whether a true psychopath would have the focus and concentration to read a 200 page novel although a less severely afflicted psychopath might feel calm enough to patiently read one.
Always anything can happen in a novel or a short story. And making the loneliness of the writer making him dream up a stalker as though he were his own stalker is interesting as a literary device. As far as telling the truth maybe the stalker is telling him he needs to be authentic, to write something worth reading instead of something that would drive someone crazy. Unless any truth could drive a person crazy. It makes me think of Edgar Allen Poe. Because being too lonely is maybe some kind of very ordinary horror. It is very odd but interesting in the implied questions being asked.
First of all, I’m pleased to see more comments lately. I was becoming discouraged. I’m glad to see comments from Ken, and Larry Bone: you always contribute something unique to the discussions.
Not so much more commentary from me here, but some quoations that I think speak for themselves:
Mishima the narrator says the intruder “was clearly a criminal”. Yes, he violated the rights of others and broke the law. But is he a “criminal mind”? Or is he merely “obsessed”, a term used by the narrator?
He also says:
“I had the feeling that I was looking at my own shadow. Not that I had ever been a madman.”
“Madman” is hardly a technical term…
But soon the world would come to regard Yukio Mushima as one.
“I am not so starved for popularity that I must welcome adulation from a psychopath.”
The opinion of the narrator is evident.
But *is the intruder a “psychopath”? or even a “madman”?
Interesting to note that this story was alternately called “From the Depth of Solitude”. The narrator tells us:
“Reading a novel is a lonely enterprise, and so is writing one. Through the printed word, our loneliness penetrates the loneliness of others…”
“I had unwittingly been supporting the loneliness that was the root of his madness.”
“I myself have been not unfamiliar with such loneliness.”
I think it’s reasonable to deduce that the author has used the incident and his narrator to expound his own views, or at least reflections.
“Where did my young man come from? … He came from inside me. From the world of my ideas.”
Might he even believe that the Intruder was delivering a valid message?
The story is dated 1966, which makes it a fairly late one for Mishima the author, when he was already very well known. He was also controversial, so maybe we shouldn’t be surprised if he was stalked.
I recall both incidents, of Manson and Chapman, very well. They didn’t come to my mind when reading this story, probably because they were murderers. The term “psychopath” is surely more justified for them, one more than the other. But I can appreciate the connection in relation to “obsession”.
Does anyone reading this believe authors should write with consideration for what may obsess some readers and drive them “mad” enough to commit heinous crimes?