The complicated life and work of Yukio Mishima has fallen under the spotlight once more. Mishima was born Kimitake Hiraoke in Japan in 1925. His alter ego was so much more than a mordant chronicler of twentieth century Japan. He was a true master of the dark arts within a literary sensibility.

His greatest influence came from the Decadent movement, Oscar Wilde in particular. He was fascinated by the amorality of Dorian Grey. Whereas Grey was an archetype, Mishima humanizes the most monstrous of characters. Mishima really gets under the skin of his characters. A less capable writer would represent villainy through cliché however he had a rare gift as he could empathise with the monster.

Mishima was a transgressive writer. In his work the world is just a façade, beneath this there is no beauty, no moral purpose and existence has little meaning besides being nasty, brutish and short. His characters are driven by lust and avarice and their souls are pitifully hollow.

There is a parallel which can be drawn between Mishimas fictional kingdom of monsters and the post Atom bomb fable of Godzilla. Within that tale the sea monster Godzilla emerges from deep beneath his lair to save the remaining humanity in his wake. Mishima`s characters redeem themselves in an unorthodox way. They are the mirror of a strict and militaristic society that has no room for feelings. This is where the reader arrives to invest hope and humanity into these nihilistic beings.

Mishima died in a ritual suicide in 1970. However now that we have access to his greatest works of fiction we can see how he wanted to transcend beyond the society and culture that he lived in. He is a literary legend who dared to delve into a world rarely traversed by other writers.

There is a universal truth about life which is often forgotten, in that when we are first brought into the world we are innocent. Guilt is actually something imposed upon us by adults, but as children it is impossible for us to understand such things. Even our conception is a process which occurs out of our control. Our supposed “birthright” is therefore completely out of our hands, whether we are born from the union of two paupers or two monarchs.

As soon as we are able to make decisions we can either honour our privilege or reject it. We can strive hard to overcome our disadvantage or merely succumb to our fate. All human beings struggle with this, some regret their life choices but there are others who are thankful for making them. In the fable “The Little Prince” the eponymous hero descends upon our planet with wide eyed fascination. His naivety and unworldliness are heroic as he bears no malice, prejudice or even any ulterior motive. He is simply curious.

The author of this fable was Antoine de Saint-Exupery, the same writer of “The Wind, Sand and the Stars”. He was born into privilege but he later became an author and war hero as a pilot during the Second World War. His greatest literary achievements were inspired by his adventures. His missions were mainly undertaken at night, a time when people feel a peculiar sense, a kind of “dark night of the soul”. He also felt this, alone, afraid, in darkness and travelling above a distant world, he nonetheless created his greatest ideas whilst flying.

The Nazis preached their abhorrent philosophies while Saint-Exupery figuratively and even literally shot them down. The worst theory invented by the Nazis was blood purity. Scientifically speaking this is nonsense as blood has the same level of purity in all human beings. However ethically and morally these policies lead to the darkest period of our human civilization. The Nazis believed that they were the “master race” and also the sole custodians of art and culture. They believed that they were superior and they initiated a regime of death and destruction against so-called “degenerates”.

Thankfully the Nazis did not win, and many lives were saved through Allied efforts. In spite of the privations and indignities of war, hope and courage did not die, but most importantly the notion that our “blood” controls our destiny was banished.

Last month the denizens of Dublin celebrated “Bloomsday” an annual celebration of their once exiled son James Joyce and his misunderstood classic novel “Ulysses”. As the years have passed Irish people have rehabilitated the man and his literary reputation. When once he was a figure of disgrace, now he is part of the history of Dublin. No-one can forget his paean to the city and its people in his short story collection entitled “Dubliners”.

However as a young man he was ambitious and utterly convinced of his own genius, and it seemed that his ego was too large to be accommodated in Ireland. At 22 he moved to the Continent in an attempt to begin a new life as an aesthete, free from the shackles of convention and polite Irish society. This was a society dominated by the influence of the Catholic church and its dogma, which in Joyce`s eyes prevented the development of free thinking, both intellectually and artistically.

Joyce worked as a language teacher in Trieste. He found himself at home here because it was a modern cosmopolitan city and a beacon for artists and writers. He was accompanied by his great love, Nora Barnacle and their two children Giorgo and Lucia. Lucia was a sickly child and unused to the many upheavals and changes in fortune owing to her father`s literary career.

Lucias adolescence was marked by insecurity and mental instability. Some people, including her own father believe that this was inherited. However this is a moot point. Joyces literary work is characterized by grandeur and sometimes linguistic impenetrability but he could not be classified as mentally ill. Lucia in contrast began her life in a pauper`s hospital and struggled with her health in early infancy. She was also born with an eye condition which made her appear cross eyed . She had a famous dalliance with Samuel Beckett but it abruptly came to an end. She also had a fervent hope that she could become a professional dancer but failed in her endeavor. Then she developed schizophrenia and spent most of her life in psychiatric institutions. She died in a Northampton asylum in 1982.

Ironically it was a pioneering psychiatrist from Trieste who sought to change mental health care and the perception of psychiatric patients. Dr. Franco Basaglia devised a more humane system of treatment focusing upon the individual patient. He found the regime of restraint and confinement distasteful and counterproductive to the patient`s recovery.

His ideas became part of a more modern approach to treat psychiatric patients but it took time for these to become accepted by his peers. However these radical approaches began to filter through and spread beyond the medical establishment in Trieste. These new ideas even influenced health policy here in the UK. Enoch Powell was an unlikely advocate when he was health minister in 1960. His “Hospital Plan” to modernize the Psychiatric Hospitals did not come to fruition, however.

Twenty years later Powell`s plans (inspired by Dr.Basaglia)came back into favour. “Care in the Community” became official policy in 1983, too late for vulnerable people like Lucia Joyce, but a sign that mental health issues should not be hidden away or become a source of shame for patients and their families. For decades family members were banished to asylums and rapidly became institutionalized. The effects of this were horrific, gradually the person they loved would disappear in a recognized side effect of institutionalization known as “depersonalization”.

The new policy modernized the psychiatric hospital. Patients were allowed to wear their own clothes,often had a room to themselves and would only stay as in patients during the acute stages of their illness. Then they would be encouraged to adapt to the outside world through therapy provided by out patient services. Staff at these units also would wear their own clothes rather than uniforms. Gradually patients could recover this way before returning to the community rehabilitated. Thankfully the Basaglia project has made mental health services more humane and allowed us to turn away from the bad old days of the institution which ultimately failed luminaries like Lucia Joyce and her fellow travelers.

I was a belligerent adolescent. I used to fantasise about running away from school. I imagined meeting fellow runaways, but they were much better at it. Unlike me they were fleet of foot whereas I struggled to get out of the starting blocks whenever we had track practice at school. They were witty and clever and had dazzling, mercurial ways of expression. I was virtually mute at school and more like a doormat when it came to levels of self-esteem.

I had hoped that I would get better teachers at secondary school. I was wrong. All teenagers believe that they are outsiders for one reason or another. However I believed that I was being unfairly persecuted by the school. I couldn`t wait to leave such an oppressive institution and be myself.

I left school in the summer of 1991. I managed to acquire 5 GCSEs, the minimum required for Sixth Form College. That following September I was consumed with a very bourgeois kind of ennui. I was looking for a new cause. Rave had become the bete noire of the tabloids. Young people, some of them just a year or two older than I had flocked to raves. These were almost like mobile discos run by a new breed of travelling minstrel, the “New Age Travellers”.

These travelers were much braver than I was at the time, they put their rebellion into action. They left their homes, dropped out of conventional society and criss-crossed the country in second hand trucks. Some were convinced that they were on a noble quest to reconnect themselves to our ancient ley lines but most were committed to just having a good time in a field.

It wasnt just the tabloids, the travelers and their lifestyles met the opprobrium of politicians. The rave music they used to party to was characterized as a "series of repetitive beats". Reducing an entire culture like this was a perfect example of the establishments prejudice. I lacked the courage and defiance of the travelers but I was inspired by their example of individualist spirit.

Social media can be congratulated for many things but it has been criticized as a toxic influence on the young. The most damaging accusation is that it encourages narcissism. Narcissists have always existed but social media sites have been blamed for enabling them.

There is certainly more visibility associated with this phenomenon. Young people are more visually orientated than previous generations due to the ubiquity of smartphones. Previous generations relied on magazines, the radio and the four terrestrial television channels. While young people today are being accused of being fragile and frankly rather vain, previous generations were derided as being rather over earnest with politics and self absorbed.

Plus ca change indeed! Young people have always been blamed by the ones who have gone before just as that song goes. We tend to forget our own foibles as young people. When we remember those things we wince at the memory but grateful that we survived relatively intact. This story of growing up is as old as time itself and we must bear this in mind next time we glance at yet another “snowflake” story.

In Maori folklore the archipelago that defines New Zealand was formed from a giant fish reeled in from a mischievous creature called Maui. The fish became North island, the South island was formed from his canoe and Stewart Island was borne out of the canoe`s anchor. Spiritually Maoris believe that they are created from the physical phenomena of the lands. The people and the land are indivisible from each other.

Everyone remembers the cinematic triumph of “Whale Rider” a film made from a visionary novel of the same name. It brought Maori culture to the rest of the world and revealed how an ancient and proud people struggle with so called modern western values. It was also an incredible allegory which is still pertinent today, 30 years after the original book was written.

Jacinda Ardern is now at the helm, guiding a new generation into a new and frightening world. She has achieved something unthinkable. She has acquired the respect of all of the people and was given a Maori honour. Her aim to boost the well-being of the nation has only just begun and she will have to follow the footsteps of the ancient people, those giants of the land, the sea and the stars.