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Yukio Mishima

Yukio Mishima Quotes

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Famous Yukio Mishima Quotes

“나는 이러한 얼굴에 직면한다. 중요한 비밀을 고백할 때에도, 미에 대한 격렬한 감동을 호소할 때에도, 자신의 내장을 꺼내어 보여주는 듯한 경우에도, 내가 직면하는 것은 이러한 얼굴이다. 인간은 평소에 인간을 향해 이러한 얼굴을 보이면 안 된다. 그 얼굴은 더할 나위 없이 충실히 나의 우스꽝스러운 초조감을 그대로 흉내 내어, 마치 무시무시한 거울처럼 변해 있었다. 아무리 잘생긴 얼굴이라도, 그럴 때에는 나와 똑같이 추한 얼굴로 변모한다. 그것을 본 순간 내가 표현하려고 생각했던 중요한 것들은 기왓장이나 다를 바 없는 무가치한 존재로 전락하고 만다.......”

“When a captive lion steps out of his cage, he comes into a wider world than the lion who has known only the wilds. While he was in captivity, there were only two worlds for him - the world of the cage, and the world outside the cage. Now he is free. He roars. He attacks people. He eats them. Yet he is not satisfied, for there is no third world that is neither the world of the cage nor the world outside the cage.”

“Time is what matters. As time goes by, you and I will be carried inexorably into the mainstream of our period, even though we’re unaware of what it is. And later, when they say that young men in the early Taisho era thought, dressed, talked, in such and such a way, they’ll be talking about you and me. We’ll all be lumped together…. In a few decades, people will see you and the people you despise as one and the same, a single entity.”

“To see human beings in agony, to see them covered in blood and to hear their death groans, makes people humble. It makes their spirits delicate, bright, peaceful. It's never at such times that we become cruel or bloodthirsty. No, it's on a beautiful spring afternoon like this that people suddenly become cruel. It's at a moment like this, don't you think, while one's vaguely watching the sun as it peeps through the leaves of the trees above a well-mown lawn? Every possible nightmare in the world, every possible nightmare in history, has come into being like this.”