The Decay of the Angel (Sea of Fertility, Book 4)

Yukio Mishima's THE DECAY OF THE ANGEL is the last volume of his "Sea of Fertility". It is also the last book he wrote. On November 25, 1970 he sent the manuscript off to the publisher, then went to incite the soldiers of Japan's military headquarters to a coup d'etat. When he failed, he committed seppuku. As might be expected, THE DECAY OF THE ANGEL contains much that that relates to Mishima's dissatisfaction with life, and the cosmic nihilism that he promised would be the ultimate theme of the tetralogy comes to the forefront. The ending is also possibly the most shocking in all of literature.The year is now 1970, and Shikeguni Honda adopts a young orphan named Toru, who he believes is the third successive reincarnation of Kiyoaki. The decay present throughout the book is especially present in Honda, who we meet as as a man of seventy-six and who reaches eighty-one by the novel's end. His physical health, memory, and wife are gone. He keeps company with Keiko, the former neighbour whose secret formed the climax of THE TEMPLE OF DAWN, and they talk inanely about senility and medical ailments. But it's also present in Toru who, although young, possesses none of the beauty of Kiyoaki, the dedication of Isao, or the allure of Ying Chan. In fact, Toru is pure evil, and the bulk of the novel is his plot to destroy his adoptive father. The political commentary here is much more subtle than I expected it to be, considering that Mishima ended his life as a nationalist. Japan is plagued by a loss of its own traditions--Keiko shows interest in Japanese culture, but Honda remarks that she treats it as a hobby instead of authentically living it. The country is overrun with Coca-Cola ads and student radicals. But all in all, it is the mind of Honda that is the important setting, not the country around him.By far the most impressive part of the novel is its surprise ending, which demolishes the entire "Sea of Fertility" cycle in a most impressive way when Honda meets Satoko again, who tells him either the mundane truth or the secret to enlightenment itself. The lectures on transmigration and the self which formed such a large part of THE TEMPLE OF DAWN are there for a reason, and what Mishima does with the no-self philosophy of Buddhism is awesome. If you've read one or more of the earlier volumes and are uncertain about pressing on, I exhort you to make it through this one. Looking back on the cycle, I admire its clever design, where the first two novels set a precedent and the second two undo it, and the general arc where we track Honda from youth to senescence, and Kiyoaki from a praise-worthy youth to despicable brat is skillfully done. The series as a whole is brilliant, read it all.

Fantastic novel series, definitely try it.

The book arrived in excellent condition and exceeded my expectations of a book copyrighted in 1974. The book arrived in a timely fashion

Great book if you’ve read the first 3

Crazy stuff. The consummate sadist. Now on to the SDF HQ and seppuku. No great loss.I have read it many times. It does not seem as good. this can't be all there is. mishima must have been bettwe than this but anglophones will never know.

i love the whole seriestoo bad he killed himself

This is the fourth and final volume in Mishima’s tetralogy, The Sea of Fertility.Class divisions and changing values in Japan due to western influence are major themes. Another theme all the way through the series is reincarnation. In Decay of the Angel, the reincarnated spirit is an orphan. He has a job helping ships in port navigate to their docks. Obviously it was pre-ordained that Honda finds him since he encounters him by simply wandering around the port.Honda, the lawyer, has been a main character through the four volumes. He is now 76 years old but he adopts the young boy. He does this even though, if the pattern holds, he knows the boy will die at age 20. A sub-theme tied in with the reincarnation is how Honda, originally an associate justice in the national courts, is initially all into rationalism and logic. But when he meets the young boy gang leader in volume two, Runaway Horses, he notices three moles on his body identical to his deceased friend from years ago. Despite his rationality, he comes to believe the young boy is his old friend reincarnated.But unlike in the other volumes, the boy in The Decay of the Angel sets out to do evil – thus the ‘decay’ in the title. “I vow it: that when I am twenty I will cast Father into hell. I must start making plans.” The boy is attached to an ugly, obese, mentally ill young woman whom he eventually marries. His evil starts out small, getting his tutor dismissed, but graduates to where he terrorizes his adoptive father by striking him with a poker. He makes his four maids his mistresses.Although you can pick up most of the back story in context, it really helps to have to have read the whole series in sequence.Mishima (1925-1970) was a classic Japanese author. He committed ritual suicide the same day he delivered this book to his publisher. His best-known work is this tetralogy, The Sea of Fertility. I thought the whole series excellent, with the first volume, Spring Snow, the best.

all of the books in the sea of fertility series are amazing.

Really enjoyed reading all of these and although was unexpected maybe it was fitting.

I’m very satisfied

Bleak and dispiriting, the final installment in "The Sea of Fertility", set in the late 1960s of the post-war Japan, which is quick and eager to absorb the rising influx of Western ideals, is about decay of purity and nature of evil. Honda, now rich and dissolute, is besieged by old age and lassitude. Driven by a nihilistic impulse to witness destruction of his physical and spiritual ideal of beauty, he adopts the handsome sixteen-year-old orphan Tōru, identifying him with the two previous reincarnations of his childhood friend Kiyoaki, each of whom died at the age of twenty. He raises the boy as his own child, tending to his every little wish and need, only waiting for him to die. “The Decay of the Angel” reads like an elegy for a bygone era, the cultural spirit of the pre-war Japan that has no physical remnants and which can now only be re-constructed through dreams and memories of its few living descendants.

I bought it as a birthday gift for my friend and she said, she loves the book cause it has such a good story :) i just can recommend the book only thing i want the mention is that i had to order the book twice cause the first order didnt arriver but all in all the book is good and thats the only thing that counts