Beauty is something that burns the hand when you touch it.
Interpretation
Beauty can be both alluring and dangerous, evoking strong emotions.
In this quote, Yukio Mishima conveys the idea that true beauty is not merely a superficial quality; it possesses a profound intensity that can lead to emotional or physical consequences. The metaphor of beauty 'burning the hand' suggests that engaging with beauty can be a risky endeavor that stirs deep passions and tumultuous feelings, reminding us that while beauty invites admiration, it can also lead to discomfort and strife.
In practice
During a lecture on the nature of art, this quote can be used to highlight the complex relationship between beauty and emotional response.
What I wanted was to die among strangers, untroubled, beneath a cloudless sky. And yet my desire differed from the sentiments of that ancient Greek who wanted to die under the brilliant sun. What I wanted was some natural, spontaneous suicide. I wanted a death like that of a fox, not yet well versed in cunning, that walks carelessly along a mountain path and is shot by a hunter because of its own stupidity.
a samurai is a total human being, whereas a man who is completely absorbed in his technical skill has degenerated into a ‘function’, one cog in a machine.
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.
…the samurai ethic is a political science of the heart, designed to control such discouragement and fatigue in order to avoid showing them to others. It was thought more important to look healthy than to be healthy, and more important to seem bold and daring than to be so. This view of morality, since it is physiologically based on the special vanity peculiar to men, is perhaps the supreme male view of morality.
Young people get the foolish idea that what is new for them must be new for everybody else too. No matter how unconventional they get, they're just repeating what others before them have done.
Is there not a sort of remorse that precedes sin? Was it remorse at the very fact that I existed?
Art is never chaste. It ought to be forbidden to ignorant innocents, never allowed into contact with those not sufficiently prepared. Yes, art is dangerous. Where it is chaste, it is not art.
I think that's why often people in creative fields can feel so alone is because there's a constant third eye, that constant watcher.
I have never followed fashion. What is fashion to me? I just think of things that inspire me, that inspire women, and I design that way.
I don't hate people who colour-blind cast, but I hate people who colour-blind cast and pretend that they're not, who pretend that these bodies on stage don't actually carry specific meaning.
Documentaries deal with people who live real, everyday lives. But if these people trusted us and told us the truth about their lives, it could be used against them - which sometimes happened.
Musicals are plays, but the last collaborator is your audience, so you've got to wait 'til the last collaborator comes in before you can complete the collaboration.
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