The Theme of Confessions of a Mask
“But this does not mean that my emotional life was set to rights by my intellectual understanding of these scientific theories. It was difficult for inversion to become an actuality in my case simply because in me the impulse went no further than sexuality, went no further than being a dark impulse crying out in vain, struggling helplessly, blindly. Even the excitement aroused in me by an attractive ephebe stopped short at mere sexual desire. To give a superficial explanation, my soul still belonged to Sonoko. Although it does not mean that I accept the concept outright, I can conveniently use the medieval diagram of the struggle between soul and body to make my meaning clear: in me there was a cleavage, pure and simple, between spirit and flesh. To me Sonoko appeared the incarnation of my love of normality itself, my love of things of the spirit, my love of everlasting things. (Confessions of a Mask, Chapter 4)”
I believe one of the main themes of this book is the detachment of flesh/body and soul. Mishima was deeply ashamed by his own body. He’s ashamed of his lack of masculinity and his sexual desire towards men. The first half of this book mainly is about his flesh, and the other half, with Sonoko’s appearance, mainly talks about his soul. It was clearly stated on the book that Mishima struggle between these two things, which cause him unable to marry Sonoko, a girl he clearly loved.
However, the detachment also appears in the title of this book. After reading this book, the honest words made me assume that everything he wrote was genuine to himself. But the title of this book is called Confessions of a mask, which suggests inauthenticity about the narrator. With the help of some research, I found that Mishima once stated that “the whole thing is a perfect fiction. [1]” He used his actual life experience to create stories in the book, but what he wanted to create was a perfect fictional confession. But what needs to be perfected? I mentioned that Mishima is not satisfied with his own flesh. He’s unable to have sex with other people for a very long period of time. The mask, in my opinion, is him trying to pursue a perfect flesh. Buried behind layers of shame and masks, Mishima is detached from his own body. In that sense, the whole book is about his soul trying to understand his flesh which was lost to him.