Yukio Mishima Another traditional element of the suicide ritual was the composition of so-called death poems before their entry into the headquarters. Mishima planned his suicide meticulously for at least a year and no one outside the group of hand-picked "Tatenokai" members had any indication of what he was planning. His biographer, translator John Nathan, suggests that the coup attempt was only a pretext for the ritual suicide of which Mishima had long dreamed. Mishima made sure his affairs were in order and left money for the legal defense of the three surviving "Tatenokai" members. Mishima's grave is located at the Tama
Yukio Mishima author Michizō Tachihara (1914–39), which in turn created an appreciation for classical Japanese poetry form of "waka". Mishima's first published works included "waka" poetry, before he turned his attention to prose. He was invited to write a short story for the Gakushūin literary magazine and submitted , a story in which the narrator describes the feeling that his ancestors somehow still live within him. Mishima's teachers were so impressed that they recommended the story to the prestigious literary magazine "Bungei-Bunka". The story makes use of the metaphors and aphorisms that later became his trademarks and was published in book form