The Decay of the Angel - Yukio Mishima

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have seen and think you have seen it all; but it is no more than the little circle in a thirty-power telescope. You would have been happier, I suppose, if we had let you go on thinking that was the whole world.” “It was you who dragged me out of it.” “And what made you come so happily was the thought that you were different. “Kiyoaki Matsugae was caught by unpredictable love, Isao Iinuma by destiny, Ying Chan by the flesh. And you? By a baseless sense of being different, perhaps? “If destiny is something that takes hold of a person from outside and drags him after, then the other three had destiny. And has anything caught you? Only we, Mr. Honda and I.” Letting the green and gold peacock on her bosom take the fire as it would, Keiko laughed. “We are two bored, cold, cynical old people. Can your pride really permit you to call us destiny? A nasty old man and woman? An old voyeur and an old lesbian? “You may think you have taken stock of the world. The ones who come summoning a boy like you are the ones who have taken stock of the world. The one who drags out the conceited purveyor of awareness is the veteran practitioner of the same trade. No one else would have come knocking on your door, you may be sure. You would have gone through life without
the knock, and the results would have been the same. Because you have had no destiny. The beautiful death was not for you. It was not for you to be like the other three. The drab, dreary heir, that is the role for you. I invited you tonight to let you learn all about it.” Tōru’s hand was trembling, and his eye was on the poker beside the fire. It would have been easy to reach for it, pretending to stir the fire. He would arouse no curiosity, and then he had only to swing it. He could feel the weight of it in his hand, he could see the blood spurting over gold chair and gold doors. But he did not reach out. He was fearfully thirsty, but he did not ask for water. The anger that enflamed his cheeks seemed to him like the first passion he had known. It remained shut up within him.
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Table of Contents Cover Copyright A
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This eBook is copyright material an
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Isle of Houghton, Corner of Boundar
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BY YUKIO MISHIMA THE SEA OF FERTILI
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and then blue distance once more. T
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Very strange. The whole vast space
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maru, due to make port at four. He
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ut now his eye caught, the rustic p
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Receiving and dispatching of ships
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and a cot completed the furnishings
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“Hello. This is Teikoku Signal. Y
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the eye that had nothing to create,
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This orphan, one of the elect, diff
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Tōru shoved the stubby pencil he h
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great beauty might permit herself,
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downtown any more. Every man I pass
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eautiful woman that keeps hell at a
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Kinué came upon a basic but elusiv
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direction, and the stern and prow l
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second mate, on watch. Tōru could
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4 AT ABOUT the same time Honda, at
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heavenly stream of sanctification.
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a man swimming in from the ocean mi
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lungs. Three thirty, and there was
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the vanished rose, clouds scattered
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ustle in the new houses beyond the
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7 HONDA and Keiko Hisamatsu were pe
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would have been her uncle, anyhow i
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their liking. There were no tourist
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humanity. His unhappiness she made
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“That’s it. I was between life
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after each player had received elev
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The lump of mucus, like bêche-de-m
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enjoyment. There was a strange sadn
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It was a chore even to reach for th
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“You tell me to have it repaired,
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“The sin is ours, Kiyo’s and mi
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impossibility, gambled his own life
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as Keiko’s gentleman friend. He w
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8 AT THE OPENING of Robe of Feather
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forth music so beautiful that no mu
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Within the pavilion are angels in p
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had in the cab that had brought him
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them were quite devoid of sanctity.
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Serpent-twined legs spread wide, ha
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sombrero. The crowd clapped. Keiko
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her. On their return they looked in
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10 WAS THERE nothing more to see, w
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the light was behind it to send dow
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might have a look around for our ed
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trance-like mating of the sea and t
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a somewhat worn silver coin; and th
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world to destruction while seeking
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desk. Now he stood up and moved to
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“Very useful work. Keep at it.”
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Asia Line, three yellow crowns on a
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Perhaps there was nothing of the ac
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cigarette. Cigarette in hand, she w
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knows what you know can never be be
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Scotch. Honda had kept one thing fr
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Viennese psychoanalysis; but he cou
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Kinué stopped by in the morning, a
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ystander and now all of a sudden he
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for the sake of a beautiful woman.
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the Denmark-maru, and the Kōyō-ma
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green changed, rose and swelled int
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surface. Five o’clock. The white
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oom. He followed the great hull of
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The ship’s agent answered. “Hel
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embers of two cigarettes were brush
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“The Daichū is coming into three
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There was no concept for which he h
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in which industrious young men were
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investigations.” Tōru frowned. H
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conclusion to cynicism. Tōru had o
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and so long as it was to the Tōru
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15 TŌRU WAS off duty the next day.
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16 SURPRISED to learn that Tōru’
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take the risks. In the decade since
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end of economic growth or with a Co
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een a still-young Honda who had nam
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human volition sought to make histo
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preferred not to. Instead he took a
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He is of course single. Ideological
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17 HONDA CHOSE a day late in Octobe
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“I don’t feel any great need fo
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no virtues more highly prized in Ja
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18 THE THREE TUTORS were all highly
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happiness for him; but he did not f
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“I had no idea there was such a p
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the half circle of coffee dregs. Th
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the body floating there. We all kno
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clouds drifted by. The wind carried
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decorated with a cheap flower desig
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grapefruit. A carefully scrutinized
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felt like a liberated child spittin
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Sometimes he almost thought, after
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heart. Tōru came almost to have ho
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policies calculated to give Tōru a
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For two or three weeks the seventy-
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guard examining a pass. His questio
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22 SUPPOSE YOU keep company with he
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heavy. “How perfectly dreadful. T
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23 RELUCTANT TO LEAVE Tōru by hims
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him. Why had the two of them come i
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“A far more inappropriate simile,
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enches. Honda could see from the an
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and closer, spread color on hard, t
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I know well enough that the more fi
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The little present Momoko gave me i
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and I grow weary of pressing the co
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world. I was too busy receiving oth
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was aware of the situation. Had any
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have looked for a reason. I have fo
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former nurse. Momoko looked aside i
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till four. I urged Momoko inside. T
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There were autumn cicadas in the ev
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I saw how complicated their movemen
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imagine rather older women, but suc
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attract a certain sort of woman wit
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is something that the winter sky ha
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She had given me a little silver ch
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I cannot be sure whether Momoko rea
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Western staircase. Only from it do
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or going out to look, but an overpo
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from outside. If only I could raise
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“Make me a girl who does not love
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moment’s dalliance is a matter of
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25 TŌRU BEGAN preparatory school a
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the position best for the Hondas, f
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All he had to do was enjoy the move
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moved the unresting bustle of the h
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“But you were very sweet while it
Page 268 and 269: 26 THE VERY QUESTION was indignant
Page 270 and 271: Shimizu and installed her in the ga
Page 272 and 273: The cold water would liven his puls
Page 274 and 275: man’s still alive.” That was hi
Page 276 and 277: nature of things. He had taught the
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Page 280 and 281: none. The garden had been made over
Page 282 and 283: Time went past along the indefinabl
Page 284 and 285: had made it possible for Honda to e
Page 286 and 287: were even now engaged in close comb
Page 288 and 289: the left loomed the round wall of t
Page 290 and 291: shirts scattered through the groves
Page 292 and 293: Although the little man showed no d
Page 294 and 295: scream. The man sprang up and looke
Page 296 and 297: Before the woman confronted him, Ho
Page 298 and 299: concepts he had acquired in India?
Page 300 and 301: 27 LATE IN NOVEMBER a splendid engr
Page 302 and 303: immorality, retreated trembling beh
Page 304 and 305: “Turn around. Oh, it’s very nic
Page 306 and 307: Georgette stole, draped down over t
Page 308 and 309: “Just sit down there quietly, if
Page 310 and 311: he had taken a liking? What did you
Page 312 and 313: will die at twenty?” “I think p
Page 314 and 315: unable to remember the exact day. M
Page 316 and 317: would call a simulator. I doubt mys
Page 320 and 321: 28 REMARKABLY, Tōru came to Honda
Page 322 and 323: and now it was the blind Tōru who
Page 324 and 325: of water hit his shining flesh like
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Page 328 and 329: the entrails than from reason, a lo
Page 330 and 331: “Day after tomorrow at three? I d
Page 332 and 333: dinner. The middle-aged housekeeper
Page 334 and 335: him from air-conditioning. It was a
Page 336 and 337: his ears. No doubt other people, sa
Page 338 and 339: And there was no smell of flowers.
Page 340 and 341: Honda had noticed numbers of Kyoto
Page 342 and 343: green platform was like a doll stan
Page 344 and 345: 30 THEY COULD perfectly well drive
Page 346 and 347: coolness of its shadows. There was
Page 348 and 349: among leaves like young swallows’
Page 350 and 351: slumber. They made him think of Tha
Page 352 and 353: A steward probably in his sixties,
Page 354 and 355: If, after so much, the Abbess were
Page 356 and 357: ightness and darkness. For Honda it
Page 358 and 359: girlish curiosity in her eyes, and
Page 360 and 361: Honda was groping through a fog. Hi
Page 362 and 363: Footnote ∗ Translator’s note: t
Page 364: Chapter 19 Chapter 20 Chapter 21 Ch
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