Yasunari Kawabata had Parkinson's disease), a possible illicit love affair, or the shock caused by the suicide of his friend Yukio Mishima in 1970. Unlike Mishima, Kawabata left no note, and since (again unlike Mishima) he had not discussed significantly in his writings the topic of taking his own life, his motives remain unclear. However, his Japanese biographer, Takeo Okuno, has related how he had nightmares about Mishima for two or three hundred nights in a row, and was incessantly haunted by the specter of Mishima. In a persistently depressed state of mind, he would tell friends during his last years that
A Wild Sheep Chase especially the younger generation, and to do so in stylish, swinging language. Mr. Murakami'</nowiki>s novel is a welcome debut by a talented writer who should be discovered by readers on this end of the Pacific." This is the third book in Murakami's '"The Rat" Trilogy', preceded by "Hear the Wind Sing" and "Pinball, 1973". All three books follow the sometimes surreal adventures of an unnamed first-person narrator and his friend, nicknamed 'The Rat'. All three novels begin from or refer back to November 25, 1970, the day on which Japanese author, poet, playwright and right-wing activist Yukio Mishima committed seppuku