Runaway Horses

In the Japan of the 1930s — a nation poised between tradition and catastrophe — a young nationalist named Isao burns with a vision so pure and absolute it can only end in death. When the retired judge Honda encounters this passionate, dangerous young man, he becomes convinced of something extraordinary: that Isao is the reincarnation of Kiyoaki, his beautiful, doomed friend from decades before. The wheel of karma is turning — but toward what fate?

The second volume of Yukio Mishima’s masterful Sea of Fertility tetralogy, Runaway Horses plunges from the serene melancholy of Spring Snow into the electric, violent world of prewar Japanese politics. Mishima renders Isao’s burning idealism with terrifying sympathy — this is a portrait of fanaticism that understands exactly why a young man might choose a beautiful death over a compromised life.

Written with the precision and luminosity that made Mishima one of the twentieth century’s greatest novelists, Runaway Horses is simultaneously a gripping political thriller, a profound meditation on reincarnation and destiny, and an unforgettable exploration of the fatal seductiveness of pure ideals. Translated by Michael Gallagher. Published by Vintage.