The Temple of the Golden Pavilion
Encyclopedia
The Temple of the Golden Pavilion is a novel
by the Japanese
author Yukio Mishima
. It was published in 1956 and translated into English by Ivan Morris
in 1959.
in Kyoto
by a young Buddhist acolyte in 1950. The pavilion, dating from before 1400, was a national monument which had been spared destruction many times throughout history, and the arson
shocked Japan. The story is narrated by Mizoguchi, the disturbed acolyte in question, who is afflicted with an ugly face and a stutter, and who recounts his obsession with beauty
and the growth of his urge to destroy it. The novel also includes one of Mishima's most memorable characters, Mizoguchi's club-footed
, deeply cynical friend Kashiwagi, who gives his own highly individual twist to various Zen
parables (koan).
. But the shariden or reliquary in its grounds, the Kinkaku, grew so famous that the temple became known as the Kinkaku-ji instead.
Buddhist priest who lives and works on the remote Cape Nariu on the north coast of Honshū
. The boy lives with his uncle at the village of Shiraku (師楽), near Maizuru.
Throughout his childhood he is assured by his father that the Golden Pavilion is the most beautiful building in the world, and the idea of the temple becomes a fixture in his imagination. A stammering boy from a poor household, he is friendless at his school, and takes refuge in vengeful fantasies. When a naval cadet who is visiting the school makes fun of him, he vandalises the cadet's belongings behind his back. A neighbour's girl, Uiko, becomes the target of his hatred, and when she is killed by her deserter boyfriend after she betrays him, Mizoguchi becomes convinced that his curse on her has been fulfilled.
His ill father takes him to the Kinkaku-ji for the first time in the spring of 1944, and introduces him to the Superior, Tayama Dosen. After his father's death, Mizoguchi becomes an acolyte at the temple. It is the height of the war, and there are only three acolytes, but one is his first real friend, the candid and pleasant Tsurukawa. During the 1944–5 school year, he boards at the Rinzai Academy's middle school and works at a factory, fascinated by the idea that the Golden Pavilion will inevitably be burnt to ashes in the firebombing. But the American planes avoid Kyoto, and his dream of a glorious tragedy is defeated. In May 1945, he and Tsurukawa visit Nanzen-ji
. From the tower, they witness a strange scene in a room of the Tenju-an nearby: a woman in a formal kimono gives her lover a cup of tea to which she adds her own breast milk.
After his father dies of consumption, he is sent to Kinkaku-ji. On the first anniversary of his father's death, his mother visits him, bringing the mortuary tablet so that the Superior can say Mass over it. She tells him that she has moved from Nariu to Kasagun, and reveals her wish that he should succeed Father Dosen as Superior at Rokuon-ji. The two ambitions—that the temple be destroyed, or that it should be his to control—leave him confused and ambivalent. On hearing the news of the end of the war and the Emperor's renunciation of divinity, Father Dosen calls his acolytes and tells them the fourteenth Zen story from The Gateless Gate
, "Nansen kills a kitten", which leaves them bemused. Mizoguchi is bitterly disappointed by the end of hostilities, and late at night he climbs the hill behind the temple, Okitayama-Fudosan, looks down on the lights of Kyoto, and pronounces a curse: "Let the darkness of my heart [...] equal the darkness of the night which encloses those countless lights!"
. A week later the girl visits the temple, tells her story, and demands compensation for the miscarriage she has suffered. The Superior gives her money and says nothing to the acolytes, but rumours of her claims spread, and the people at the temple become uneasy about Mizoguchi. Throughout 1946 he is tormented by the urge to confess, but never does so, and in the spring of 1947 he leaves with Tsurukawa for Otani University. He starts to drift away from Tsurukawa, befriending Kashiwagi, a cynical clubfooted boy from Sannomiya
who indulges in long "philosophical" speeches.
Kashiwagi boasts of his ability to seduce women by making them feel sorry for him—in his words, they "fall in love with my clubfeet." He demonstrates his method to Mizoguchi by feigning a tumble in front of a girl. She helps him into her house. Mizoguchi is so disturbed that he runs away, and takes a train to the Kinkaku-ji to recover his self-assurance. In May, Kashiwagi invites him to a "picnic" at Kameyama Park, taking the girl he tricked, and another girl for Mizoguchi. When left alone with the girl, she tells him a story about a woman she knows who lost her lover during the war. He realises that the woman she is talking about must be the same one he saw two years before through a window of Tenju Hermitage. Mizoguchi's mind fills with visions of the Golden Pavilion, and he finds himself impotent. That evening a telegram arrives at the university bearing news of kindly Tsurukawa's death in a road accident. For nearly a year, Mizoguchi avoids Kashiwagi's company.
In the spring of 1948 Kashiwagi comes to visit him at the temple, and gives him a shakuhachi
as a present. He takes the opportunity to demonstrate his own skill as a player. In May he asks Mizoguchi to steal some irises
and cat-tails for him from the temple garden. Mizoguchi takes them to Kashiwagi's boarding-house, and while discussing the story of Nansen and the kitten, Kashiwagi starts to make an arrangement, mentioning that he is being taught ikebana
by his girlfriend. Mizoguchi realises that this girlfriend must be the woman he saw at Tenju Hermitage. When she arrives, Kashiwagi breaks up with her, and they quarrel. She runs away and Mizoguchi follows, telling her that he witnessed her tragic scene two years ago. She is moved, and tries to seduce him, but again he is assailed by visions of the temple, and he is impotent.
. Momentarily distracted, he starts to follow a stray dog, loses it, and then in a back alley he runs into the Superior just as he is getting into a hired car with the geisha. He is so surprised that he laughs out loud, and Father Dosen calls him a fool. Over the next two months Mizoguchi becomes obsessed with reproducing Dosen's brief expression of hatred. He buys a photograph of the geisha and slips it into Dosen's morning newspaper. The Superior gives no sign of having found it, but secretly places the photo in Mizoguchi's drawer the next day. When Mizoguchi finds it there, he feels victorious. He tears it up, wraps the shreds in newspaper with a stone, and sinks it in the pond.
As Mizoguchi's mental illness worsens, he neglects his studies. On 9 November 1949, the Superior reprimands him for his poor work. Mizoguchi responds by borrowing ¥3000 from Kashiwagi, who characteristically raises ¥500 of the money by taking back and selling the flute and dictionary he had given as presents. He goes to Takeisao-jinja (a shrine also known as Kenkun-jinja
) and draws a mikuji lot which warns him not to travel northwest. He sets off northwest the next morning, to the region of his birth, and spends three days at Yura (now Tangoyura
), where the sight of the Sea of Japan
inspires him to destroy the Kinkaku.
He is retrieved by a policeman, and on his return he is met by his angry mother, who is relieved to learn that he did not steal the money he used to flee. Obsessed by the idea of arson, one day he follows a guilty-looking boy to the Sammon Gate of the Myoshin-ji
, and is amazed and disappointed when the boy does not set it alight. He compiles a long list of old temples which have burnt down. By May his debt (with 10% simple interest per month) has grown to ¥5100. Kashiwagi is angry, and comes to suspect that Mizoguchi is considering suicide. On 10 June Kashiwagi complains to Father Dosen, who gives him the principal; afterwards, Kashiwagi shows letters to Mizoguchi that reveal the fact that Tsurukawa did not die in a road accident, but committed suicide over a love affair. He hopes to discourage Mizoguchi from doing anything similar. For the last time, they discuss the Zen story of Nansen and the kitten.
on 25 June, and the failure of Kinkaku's fire-alarm on 29 June, seem to him signs of encouragement. On 30 June a repairman tries to fix it, but he is unsuccessful, and promises to return the next day. He does not come. A strange interview with the visiting Father Kuwai Zenkai, of Ryuho-ji in Fukui Prefecture
, provides the final inspiration, and in the early hours of 2 July Mizoguchi sneaks into the Kinkaku and dumps his belongings, placing three straw bales in corners of the ground floor. He goes outside to sink some non-inflammable items in the pond, but on turning back to the temple he finds himself filled with his childhood visions of its beauty, and he is overcome by uncertainty.
Finally he remembers the words from the Rinzairoku, "When you meet the Buddha, kill the Buddha", and he resolves to go ahead with his plan. He enters the Kinkaku and sets the bales on fire. He runs upstairs and tries to enter the Kukkyōchō, but the door is locked. He hammers at the door for a minute or two. Suddenly feeling that a glorious death has been "refused" him, he runs back downstairs and out of the temple, choking on the smoke. He continues running, out of the temple grounds, and up the hill named Hidari Daimonji, to the north. He throws away the arsenic and knife, lights a cigarette, and watches the pavilion burn.
The acolyte's name was Hayashi Yōken, and the Superior's name was Murakami Jikai. The prostitute to whom he boasted was called Heya Teruko. Hayashi's mother threw herself in front of a train soon after the event. His sentence was reduced on account of his schizophrenia; he was released on 29 September 1955, the same year that the rebuilding commenced, and died in March 1956. (Borowitz comments that many accounts avoid giving the acolyte's name, perhaps to prevent him from becoming a celebrity.) The pavilion's interior paintings were restored much later; even the gold leaf, which was mostly all gone long before 1950, was replaced.
Mishima collected all the information he could, even visiting Hayashi in prison, and as a result the novel follows the real situation with surprising closeness.
Novel
A novel is a book of long narrative in literary prose. The genre has historical roots both in the fields of the medieval and early modern romance and in the tradition of the novella. The latter supplied the present generic term in the late 18th century....
by the Japanese
Japanese people
The are an ethnic group originating in the Japanese archipelago and are the predominant ethnic group of Japan. Worldwide, approximately 130 million people are of Japanese descent; of these, approximately 127 million are residents of Japan. People of Japanese ancestry who live in other countries...
author Yukio Mishima
Yukio Mishima
was the pen name of , a Japanese author, poet, playwright, actor and film director, also remembered for his ritual suicide by seppuku after a failed coup d'état...
. It was published in 1956 and translated into English by Ivan Morris
Ivan Morris
Ivan Ira Esme Morris was a British author and teacher in the field of Japanese Studies.Ivan Morris was born in London, of mixed American and Swedish parentage, to Ira Victor Morris and Edita Morris. He studied at Gordonstoun, before graduating from Phillips Academy...
in 1959.
Plot introduction
The novel is loosely based on the burning of the Reliquary (or Golden Pavilion) of Kinkaku-jiKinkaku-ji
, also known as , is a Zen Buddhist temple in Kyoto, Japan. The garden complex is an excellent example of Muromachi period garden design. It is designated as a National Special Historic Site and a National Special Landscape, and it is one of 17 locations comprising the Historic Monuments of Ancient...
in Kyoto
Kyoto
is a city in the central part of the island of Honshū, Japan. It has a population close to 1.5 million. Formerly the imperial capital of Japan, it is now the capital of Kyoto Prefecture, as well as a major part of the Osaka-Kobe-Kyoto metropolitan area.-History:...
by a young Buddhist acolyte in 1950. The pavilion, dating from before 1400, was a national monument which had been spared destruction many times throughout history, and the arson
Arson
Arson is the crime of intentionally or maliciously setting fire to structures or wildland areas. It may be distinguished from other causes such as spontaneous combustion and natural wildfires...
shocked Japan. The story is narrated by Mizoguchi, the disturbed acolyte in question, who is afflicted with an ugly face and a stutter, and who recounts his obsession with beauty
Beauty
Beauty is a characteristic of a person, animal, place, object, or idea that provides a perceptual experience of pleasure, meaning, or satisfaction. Beauty is studied as part of aesthetics, sociology, social psychology, and culture...
and the growth of his urge to destroy it. The novel also includes one of Mishima's most memorable characters, Mizoguchi's club-footed
Club foot
A club foot, or congenital talipes equinovarus , is a congenital deformity involving one foot or both. The affected foot appears rotated internally at the ankle. TEV is classified into 2 groups: Postural TEV or Structural TEV....
, deeply cynical friend Kashiwagi, who gives his own highly individual twist to various Zen
Zen
Zen is a school of Mahāyāna Buddhism founded by the Buddhist monk Bodhidharma. The word Zen is from the Japanese pronunciation of the Chinese word Chán , which in turn is derived from the Sanskrit word dhyāna, which can be approximately translated as "meditation" or "meditative state."Zen...
parables (koan).
Explanation of the novel's title
The temple's real name is the Rokuon-ji (鹿苑寺), from the first two characters of the posthumous name of its builder, Ashikaga YoshimitsuAshikaga Yoshimitsu
was the 3rd shogun of the Ashikaga shogunate who ruled from 1368 to 1394 during the Muromachi period of Japan. Yoshimitsu was the son of the second shogun Ashikaga Yoshiakira....
. But the shariden or reliquary in its grounds, the Kinkaku, grew so famous that the temple became known as the Kinkaku-ji instead.
Childhood
The protagonist, Mizoguchi, is the son of a consumptiveTuberculosis
Tuberculosis, MTB, or TB is a common, and in many cases lethal, infectious disease caused by various strains of mycobacteria, usually Mycobacterium tuberculosis. Tuberculosis usually attacks the lungs but can also affect other parts of the body...
Buddhist priest who lives and works on the remote Cape Nariu on the north coast of Honshū
Honshu
is the largest island of Japan. The nation's main island, it is south of Hokkaido across the Tsugaru Strait, north of Shikoku across the Inland Sea, and northeast of Kyushu across the Kanmon Strait...
. The boy lives with his uncle at the village of Shiraku (師楽), near Maizuru.
Throughout his childhood he is assured by his father that the Golden Pavilion is the most beautiful building in the world, and the idea of the temple becomes a fixture in his imagination. A stammering boy from a poor household, he is friendless at his school, and takes refuge in vengeful fantasies. When a naval cadet who is visiting the school makes fun of him, he vandalises the cadet's belongings behind his back. A neighbour's girl, Uiko, becomes the target of his hatred, and when she is killed by her deserter boyfriend after she betrays him, Mizoguchi becomes convinced that his curse on her has been fulfilled.
His ill father takes him to the Kinkaku-ji for the first time in the spring of 1944, and introduces him to the Superior, Tayama Dosen. After his father's death, Mizoguchi becomes an acolyte at the temple. It is the height of the war, and there are only three acolytes, but one is his first real friend, the candid and pleasant Tsurukawa. During the 1944–5 school year, he boards at the Rinzai Academy's middle school and works at a factory, fascinated by the idea that the Golden Pavilion will inevitably be burnt to ashes in the firebombing. But the American planes avoid Kyoto, and his dream of a glorious tragedy is defeated. In May 1945, he and Tsurukawa visit Nanzen-ji
Nanzen-ji
, or Zuiryusan Nanzen-ji, formerly , is a Zen Buddhist temple in Kyoto, Japan. Emperor Kameyama established it in 1291 on the site of his previous detached palace. It is also the headquarters of the Nanzen-ji branch of Rinzai Zen...
. From the tower, they witness a strange scene in a room of the Tenju-an nearby: a woman in a formal kimono gives her lover a cup of tea to which she adds her own breast milk.
After his father dies of consumption, he is sent to Kinkaku-ji. On the first anniversary of his father's death, his mother visits him, bringing the mortuary tablet so that the Superior can say Mass over it. She tells him that she has moved from Nariu to Kasagun, and reveals her wish that he should succeed Father Dosen as Superior at Rokuon-ji. The two ambitions—that the temple be destroyed, or that it should be his to control—leave him confused and ambivalent. On hearing the news of the end of the war and the Emperor's renunciation of divinity, Father Dosen calls his acolytes and tells them the fourteenth Zen story from The Gateless Gate
The Gateless Gate
The Gateless Gate is a collection of 48 Chan koans compiled in the early 13th century by the Chinese Zen master Wumen Hui-k'ai . Wumen's preface indicates that the volume was published in 1228. Each koan is accompanied by a commentary and verse by Wumen...
, "Nansen kills a kitten", which leaves them bemused. Mizoguchi is bitterly disappointed by the end of hostilities, and late at night he climbs the hill behind the temple, Okitayama-Fudosan, looks down on the lights of Kyoto, and pronounces a curse: "Let the darkness of my heart [...] equal the darkness of the night which encloses those countless lights!"
Friendship with Kashiwagi
During the winter of that year, the Temple is visited by a drunk American soldier and his pregnant Japanese girlfriend. He pushes his girlfriend down into the snow, and orders Mizoguchi to trample her stomach, giving him two cartons of cigarettes in exchange for doing so. Mizoguchi goes indoors and obsequiously presents the cartons to the Superior, who is having his head shaved by the deacon. Father Dosen thanks him, and tells him he has been chosen for the scholarship to Otani UniversityOtani University
is a private Buddhist university located in Kita-ku, Kyoto, Japan. The university was founded in 1901 as "Shinshū University" in Tokyo with Kiyozawa Manshi as the president.-Notable alumni and faculty:*Daisetz Teitaro Suzuki*Kaneko Daiei*Keido Fukushima...
. A week later the girl visits the temple, tells her story, and demands compensation for the miscarriage she has suffered. The Superior gives her money and says nothing to the acolytes, but rumours of her claims spread, and the people at the temple become uneasy about Mizoguchi. Throughout 1946 he is tormented by the urge to confess, but never does so, and in the spring of 1947 he leaves with Tsurukawa for Otani University. He starts to drift away from Tsurukawa, befriending Kashiwagi, a cynical clubfooted boy from Sannomiya
Sannomiya
is a district of Chūō-ku, Kobe, Japan. Today, it is the biggest downtown area in the city.Before the 1920s, Sannomiya was just an edge of the city. The major downtowns were Motomachi and Shinkaichi, which are west of Sannomiya...
who indulges in long "philosophical" speeches.
Kashiwagi boasts of his ability to seduce women by making them feel sorry for him—in his words, they "fall in love with my clubfeet." He demonstrates his method to Mizoguchi by feigning a tumble in front of a girl. She helps him into her house. Mizoguchi is so disturbed that he runs away, and takes a train to the Kinkaku-ji to recover his self-assurance. In May, Kashiwagi invites him to a "picnic" at Kameyama Park, taking the girl he tricked, and another girl for Mizoguchi. When left alone with the girl, she tells him a story about a woman she knows who lost her lover during the war. He realises that the woman she is talking about must be the same one he saw two years before through a window of Tenju Hermitage. Mizoguchi's mind fills with visions of the Golden Pavilion, and he finds himself impotent. That evening a telegram arrives at the university bearing news of kindly Tsurukawa's death in a road accident. For nearly a year, Mizoguchi avoids Kashiwagi's company.
In the spring of 1948 Kashiwagi comes to visit him at the temple, and gives him a shakuhachi
Shakuhachi
The is a Japanese end-blown flute. It is traditionally made of bamboo, but versions now exist in ABS and hardwoods. It was used by the monks of the Fuke school of Zen Buddhism in the practice of...
as a present. He takes the opportunity to demonstrate his own skill as a player. In May he asks Mizoguchi to steal some irises
Iris (plant)
Iris is a genus of 260-300species of flowering plants with showy flowers. It takes its name from the Greek word for a rainbow, referring to the wide variety of flower colors found among the many species...
and cat-tails for him from the temple garden. Mizoguchi takes them to Kashiwagi's boarding-house, and while discussing the story of Nansen and the kitten, Kashiwagi starts to make an arrangement, mentioning that he is being taught ikebana
Ikebana
is the Japanese art of flower arrangement, also known as .-Etymology:"Ikebana" is from the Japanese and . Possible translations include "giving life to flowers" and "arranging flowers".- Approach :...
by his girlfriend. Mizoguchi realises that this girlfriend must be the woman he saw at Tenju Hermitage. When she arrives, Kashiwagi breaks up with her, and they quarrel. She runs away and Mizoguchi follows, telling her that he witnessed her tragic scene two years ago. She is moved, and tries to seduce him, but again he is assailed by visions of the temple, and he is impotent.
Enmity with Father Dosen
In January 1949 Mizoguchi is walking through Shinkyogoku when he thinks he sees Father Dosen with a geishaGeisha
, Geiko or Geigi are traditional, female Japanese entertainers whose skills include performing various Japanese arts such as classical music and dance.-Terms:...
. Momentarily distracted, he starts to follow a stray dog, loses it, and then in a back alley he runs into the Superior just as he is getting into a hired car with the geisha. He is so surprised that he laughs out loud, and Father Dosen calls him a fool. Over the next two months Mizoguchi becomes obsessed with reproducing Dosen's brief expression of hatred. He buys a photograph of the geisha and slips it into Dosen's morning newspaper. The Superior gives no sign of having found it, but secretly places the photo in Mizoguchi's drawer the next day. When Mizoguchi finds it there, he feels victorious. He tears it up, wraps the shreds in newspaper with a stone, and sinks it in the pond.
As Mizoguchi's mental illness worsens, he neglects his studies. On 9 November 1949, the Superior reprimands him for his poor work. Mizoguchi responds by borrowing ¥3000 from Kashiwagi, who characteristically raises ¥500 of the money by taking back and selling the flute and dictionary he had given as presents. He goes to Takeisao-jinja (a shrine also known as Kenkun-jinja
Kenkun Shrine
also known as Takeisao Shrine, is a Shinto Shrine in the city of Kyoto, Japan. The daimyo, Oda Nobunaga, a key figure in the unification of Japan during the late 16th century is deified inside.-Funaoka Matsuri:...
) and draws a mikuji lot which warns him not to travel northwest. He sets off northwest the next morning, to the region of his birth, and spends three days at Yura (now Tangoyura
Tango-Yura Station
is a train station in Miyazu, Kyoto Prefecture, Japan.-Adjacent stations:...
), where the sight of the Sea of Japan
Sea of Japan
The Sea of Japan is a marginal sea of the western Pacific Ocean, between the Asian mainland, the Japanese archipelago and Sakhalin. It is bordered by Japan, North Korea, Russia and South Korea. Like the Mediterranean Sea, it has almost no tides due to its nearly complete enclosure from the Pacific...
inspires him to destroy the Kinkaku.
He is retrieved by a policeman, and on his return he is met by his angry mother, who is relieved to learn that he did not steal the money he used to flee. Obsessed by the idea of arson, one day he follows a guilty-looking boy to the Sammon Gate of the Myoshin-ji
Myoshin-ji
is a temple complex in Kyoto, Japan. The Myōshin-ji school of Rinzai Zen Buddhism is the largest school in Rinzai Zen. This particular school contains within it more than three thousand temples throughout Japan, along with nineteen monasteries. The head temple was founded in the year 1342 by the...
, and is amazed and disappointed when the boy does not set it alight. He compiles a long list of old temples which have burnt down. By May his debt (with 10% simple interest per month) has grown to ¥5100. Kashiwagi is angry, and comes to suspect that Mizoguchi is considering suicide. On 10 June Kashiwagi complains to Father Dosen, who gives him the principal; afterwards, Kashiwagi shows letters to Mizoguchi that reveal the fact that Tsurukawa did not die in a road accident, but committed suicide over a love affair. He hopes to discourage Mizoguchi from doing anything similar. For the last time, they discuss the Zen story of Nansen and the kitten.
Final events
On 15 June, Father Dosen takes the unusual step of giving Mizoguchi ¥4250 in cash for his next year's tuition. Mizoguchi spends it on prostitutes in the hope that Dosen will be forced to expel him. But he quickly tires of waiting for Dosen to find out, and when he spies on Dosen in the Tower of the North Star, and seems him crouched in the "garden waiting" position, he cannot account for this evidence of secret shame, and is filled with confusion. The next day he buys arsenic and a knife at a shop near Senbon-Imadegawa, an intersection 2 km to the southeast of the temple, and loiters outside Nishijin Police Station. The outbreak of the Korean WarKorean War
The Korean War was a conventional war between South Korea, supported by the United Nations, and North Korea, supported by the People's Republic of China , with military material aid from the Soviet Union...
on 25 June, and the failure of Kinkaku's fire-alarm on 29 June, seem to him signs of encouragement. On 30 June a repairman tries to fix it, but he is unsuccessful, and promises to return the next day. He does not come. A strange interview with the visiting Father Kuwai Zenkai, of Ryuho-ji in Fukui Prefecture
Fukui Prefecture
is a prefecture of Japan located in the Chūbu region on Honshū island. The capital is the city of Fukui.- Prehistory :The Kitadani Dinosaur Quarry, on the Sugiyama River within the city limits of Katsuyama, has yielded the Fukuiraptor kitadaniensis and Fukuisaurus tetoriensis as well as an unnamed...
, provides the final inspiration, and in the early hours of 2 July Mizoguchi sneaks into the Kinkaku and dumps his belongings, placing three straw bales in corners of the ground floor. He goes outside to sink some non-inflammable items in the pond, but on turning back to the temple he finds himself filled with his childhood visions of its beauty, and he is overcome by uncertainty.
Finally he remembers the words from the Rinzairoku, "When you meet the Buddha, kill the Buddha", and he resolves to go ahead with his plan. He enters the Kinkaku and sets the bales on fire. He runs upstairs and tries to enter the Kukkyōchō, but the door is locked. He hammers at the door for a minute or two. Suddenly feeling that a glorious death has been "refused" him, he runs back downstairs and out of the temple, choking on the smoke. He continues running, out of the temple grounds, and up the hill named Hidari Daimonji, to the north. He throws away the arsenic and knife, lights a cigarette, and watches the pavilion burn.
Characters
- Mizoguchi (溝口)
- Mizoguchi's father
- Mizoguchi's mother
- Uiko (有為子), the girl who is "cursed" by him
- Tsurukawa (鶴川), his kind friend, a fellow acolyte
- Kashiwagi (柏木), his evil friend, a student at Otani University
- Father Tayama Dosen, the Superior at Rokuon-ji
- Father Kuwai Zenkai, who visits (ch. 10)
- the American soldier and his girlfriend (ch. 3)
- the girl whom Kashiwagi tricks (ch. 5)
- the girl from Kashiwagi's boarding-house (ch. 5)
- the woman from Tenju Hermitage
- the naval cadet (ch. 1)
- the prostitute Mariko (ch. 9)
Literary significance and reception
The novel assured Mishima's reputation as a novelist, and its 1959 translation was instrumental in making his name known overseas.Structure of the pavilion
- the ground floor, Hōsui-in (法水院), from which the Sōsei juts into Kyōko Pond （鏡湖）
- the middle floor, Chōondō (潮音洞)
- the top floor, Kukkyōchō (空竟頂)
Allusions to other works
- The Rinzairoku (臨済錄, late 9th century), a sacred text of the Rinzai schoolRinzai schoolThe Rinzai school is , one of three sects of Zen in Japanese Buddhism.Rinzai is the Japanese line of the Chinese Linji school, which was founded during the Tang Dynasty by Linji Yixuan...
of Zen- In Chinese this is called Línjì-lù, the Record of LinjiLinjiLínjì Yìxuán was the founder of the Linji school of Chán Buddhism during Tang Dynasty China. Linji was born into a family named Xing in Caozhou , which he left at a young age to study Buddhism in many places....
- In Chinese this is called Línjì-lù, the Record of Linji
- The MumonkanThe Gateless GateThe Gateless Gate is a collection of 48 Chan koans compiled in the early 13th century by the Chinese Zen master Wumen Hui-k'ai . Wumen's preface indicates that the volume was published in 1228. Each koan is accompanied by a commentary and verse by Wumen...
(無門關, "The Gateless Gate", 1228)- Jōshū Jūshin is the Japanese rendering of 趙州從諗, Zhàozhōu CōngshěnZhaozhouZhàozhōu Cōngshěn , was a Chán Buddhist master especially known for his "paradoxical statements and strange deeds".Zhaozhou became ordained as a monk at an early age. At the age of 18, he met Nánquán Pǔyuàn , a successor of Mǎzǔ Dàoyī , and eventually received the Dharma from him...
(778-897) - Nansen Fugan is the Japanese rendering of 南泉普願, Nánquán PǔyuànNánquán PǔyuànNánquán Pǔyuàn was a Chán Buddhist master in China during the Tang Dynasty. He was the student and Dharma successor of the Master Mǎzŭ Dàoyī...
(748–835)
- Jōshū Jūshin is the Japanese rendering of 趙州從諗, Zhàozhōu Cōngshěn
- On Crimes and Punishments, by Cesare, Marquis of BeccariaCesare, Marquis of BeccariaCesare, Marquis of Beccaria-Bonesana was an Italian jurist, philosopher and politician best known for his treatise On Crimes and Punishments , which condemned torture and the death penalty, and was a founding work in the field of penology.-Birth and education:Beccaria was born in Milan on March...
(ch. 9)
The real story
The only detailed information in English on the arson comes from Albert Borowitz's Terrorism For Self-Glorification: The Herostratos Syndrome (2005), which includes translations of interview transcripts published in the book Kinkaku-ji Enjō (1979) by Mizukami Tsutomo, a novelist who had known the boy at school.The acolyte's name was Hayashi Yōken, and the Superior's name was Murakami Jikai. The prostitute to whom he boasted was called Heya Teruko. Hayashi's mother threw herself in front of a train soon after the event. His sentence was reduced on account of his schizophrenia; he was released on 29 September 1955, the same year that the rebuilding commenced, and died in March 1956. (Borowitz comments that many accounts avoid giving the acolyte's name, perhaps to prevent him from becoming a celebrity.) The pavilion's interior paintings were restored much later; even the gold leaf, which was mostly all gone long before 1950, was replaced.
Mishima collected all the information he could, even visiting Hayashi in prison, and as a result the novel follows the real situation with surprising closeness.
Film
- EnjoEnjois a 1958 Japanese film directed by Kon Ichikawa and adapted from the Yukio Mishima novel The Temple of the Golden Pavilion. It stands as one of his better known films...
("Conflagration", 1958), directed by Kon IchikawaKon Ichikawawas a Japanese film director.-Early life and career:Ichikawa was born in Ise, Mie Prefecture. In the 1930s Ichikawa attended a technical school in Osaka. Upon graduation, in 1933, he found a job with a local rental film studio, J.O. Studio, in their animation department...
, was by far the most critically successful film to be made from a Mishima novel. - Kinkaku-ji (1976), directed by Yoichi TakabayashiYoichi Takabayashiis a Japanese film director.-Career:Born in Kyoto and graduating from Ritsumeikan University, Takabayashi became a pioneering independent filmmaker working in 8mm and 16mm film, earning awards at foreign festivals for his work. His 1970 film Subarashii jōki kikansha was well-received and earned him...
- The book was one of three Mishima novels adapted by Paul SchraderPaul SchraderPaul Joseph Schrader is an American screenwriter, film director, and former film critic. Apart from his credentials as a director, Schrader is most notably known for his screenplays for Martin Scorsese’s Taxi Driver and Raging Bull....
for episodes in his film Mishima: A Life in Four ChaptersMishima: A Life in Four ChaptersMishima: A Life in Four Chapters is an American/Japanese film co-written and directed by Paul Schrader in 1985. It was co-produced by Francis Ford Coppola and George Lucas....
.
Other
- Kinkaku-ji (1976), an opera by Toshiro MayuzumiToshiro MayuzumiToshiro Mayuzumi was a Japanese composer.-Biography:...
- Kinkaku-ji (2002), a modern dance work by Kenji Kawarasaki (Company East)
Unrelated works of the same name
- Kinkaku-ji (1757-8), the fourth act (now performed alone) of a kabukiKabukiis classical Japanese dance-drama. Kabuki theatre is known for the stylization of its drama and for the elaborate make-up worn by some of its performers.The individual kanji characters, from left to right, mean sing , dance , and skill...
play by Nakamura Akei, Gion Sairei Shinkōki ("The Gion Festival of Faith"), which describes the revolt of Matsunaga Daizen against the Ashikaga family. It has been filmed, and is part of NHKNHKNHK is Japan's national public broadcasting organization. NHK, which has always identified itself to its audiences by the English pronunciation of its initials, is a publicly owned corporation funded by viewers' payments of a television license fee....
's "Masterpieces of Kabuki" series.