Sea of Fertility KINDLE MOBI by Yukio Mishima Complete (4 books)

Yukio Mishima's final work, The Sea of Fertility Series of four novels, was not equally accepted by critics, yet by some has been referred to as "the most complete vision we have of Japan in the twentieth century". The main timeline of the story stretches from 1912 to 1975, beginning with a fond view of the Taisho period -- sometimes referred to as Japan's "jazz age", between the patriarchal but modernizing Meiji period and the rising militarism that would culminate in the 1930's. The viewpoint of all four books is that of Shigekuni Honda, a law student in Spring Snow who eventually becomes a wealthy retired judge in The Decay of the Angel. Each of the novels depicts what Honda comes to believe are successive reincarnations of his schoolfriend Kiyoaki Matsugae, and Honda's attempts to save them from the early deaths to which they seem to be condemned by karma. This results in both personal and professional embarrassment for Honda, and eventually destroys him.
The friend's successive reincarnations are:
1. Kiyoaki Matsugae, a young aristocrat
2. Isao Iinuma, a nationalist and violent extremist
3. Ying Chan, an indolent Thai princess
4. Tōru Yasunaga, a manipulative and sadistic orphan
Although The Temple of Dawn contains lengthy arguments in favour of the theory of reincarnation, Mishima's biographers note that he did not believe in it himself. An earlier work of about the same length, Kyoko's House, had been spurned by critics; it has been conjectured that he embarked on The Sea of Fertility in defiant response. It expresses many of Mishima's deepest-held convictions about the nature and purposes of human life, and the last book is thought to encapsulate an (extremely negative) personal assessment of himself and his own legacy.