suicides in novels

[Calidore]

You've clearly never read anything by Mishima.

You are correct. Does he do that?

[Ecurb]

If suicide is good enough for Anna Karennina, it's good enough for other fictional characters.

[Shaman_Raman]

Wouldn't writing about it be beneficial for those with suicidal thoughts? To help them understand the pain and suffering everyone would feel? You don't end suicide by repressing it in literature, quite the opposite I think. A helpful insight to anyone about anything is that they're not alone.

And if your assumption is that writing about it makes it glamorous, then I'd have to say your wrong. A book wouldn't become popular merely if a character outed themself, but a well written book with a character that commits suicide just may gain popularity. In literature, I think how you convey something is much more important than the thing itself.

[Delta40]

The way you're explaining how the suicide of a character leaves you feeling Cacian only adds strength to the very reason why a writer would use such a tool. You're actually testifying in the case for rather than against without realising it!

[TheFifthElement]

You are correct. Does he do that?

Certainly suicide figures heavily in his fiction, I was thinking in particular of Runaway Horses which is part of his Sea of Fertility tetralogy. Mishima himself committed ritual suicide, and I think you find, if you read Japanese fiction, that the idea that suicide arises only out of depression or desperation is not the only intepretation. Certainly there is an element of ritual suicide being perceived as honourable under the code of 'bushido', as described by historian Stephen Turnbull here:

In the world of the warrior, seppuku was a deed of bravery that was admirable in a samurai who knew he was defeated, disgraced, or mortally wounded. It meant that he could end his days with his transgressions wiped away and with his reputation not merely intact but actually enhanced. The cutting of the abdomen released the samurai’s spirit in the most dramatic fashion, but it was an extremely painful and unpleasant way to die, and sometimes the samurai who was performing the act asked a loyal comrade to cut off his head at the moment of agony.

I don't think summarising the exploration of a suicide as 'boring' or only relevant to the characters left behind adequately accounts for the the nuances involved.

[cacian]

The way you're explaining how the suicide of a character leaves you feeling Cacian only adds strength to the very reason why a writer would use such a tool. You're actually testifying in the case for rather than against without realising it!

Hi Delta fair enough but I can assure my attention is to swerve from it. Suicide is passé in my opinion and books need a spring clean of new ideas. Time changes and so must people. I think is one way for literature to revamp its looks/standards and lead diversified literary movements in cumulation of individuality. Prospectives ideals based on actual personal experiences/feelings/views rather past ones is what is needed.
In order to conquer suicide one must conquer its root by pulling it out completely and not implanting deeper within the pages of literary idealism.That is my opinion

[hillwalker]

Prospectives ideals based on actual personal experiences/feelings/views rather past ones is what is needed.
In order to conquer suicide one must conquer its root by pulling it out completely and not implanting deeper within the pages of literary idealism.That is my opinion

I'm guessing that no one in your family has committed suicide - so because it never happened to you one shouldn't have to read about it. You're suggesting that suicide is some kind of antisocial activity like dropping litter or drug-taking, and the only thing writing about suicide achieves is to 'implant it deeper within the pages of literary idealism'? In other words, writing about it somehow glamourises it.

Do you even give a moment's pause to think about what you've written before posting it? Is there not perhaps a case for a writer exploring the reasons why someone commits suicide? A case for bringing it out into the open so that those who are left behind to deal with their own guilt (a common reaction) are somehow able to put these events into perspective?

One wonders what you actually do read.

H

[kev67]

Cacian, don't read Norwegian Wood by Haruki Murakami.

[poetrygirl16]

for me suicide is not good at all and i have a lot of experience with that because my father committed suicide

[hillwalker]

So. . . are you suggesting that suicide is off limits when it comes to literature? Or are you merely saying it's something you would rather not read about personally?

I also have a family member who killed herself, but that doesn't mean that I'm no longer able to treat the matter objectively.

H

[Lokasenna]

If you find that you yourself can't cope with a theme, then don't read books about it. That's absolutely fine. But saying that to have such themes in literature is distasteful is a different thing entirely. I've never had a suicide in the family, but that doesn't make me incapable of empathising with people who have - but nor does it prevent me from seeing the use to which such a subject can be put by talented artists.

I've had a family member who was murdered. I've a family member who is a murderer. Does this stop me from enjoying whodunnits? Of course not. Should I be saying that all books featuring murders should be scrapped because it is a distatestful subject to me? Not at all. If we censor something, if we make it taboo, then in the long run we make it harder on ourselves because we create something that we cannot subject to the catharsis of artistic interpretation.

Oh, and for the record - everyone stop going on about the mildness of fairy tales! If you read the orginal Grimm/Anderson material, then you will see that they are brutal beyond belief: full of plenty of sex, death, violence and all manner of other things to which cacian objects.

[YesNo]

The portrayal of suicide seems OK to me. What I would object to is the moral approval of the suicide, but I wouldn't want the work of art censored. You need the work of art as evidence that there are nuts in the world.

Here are some examples, based on what people have mentioned as well as others.

1) Japanese ritual suicide: My take on this is that it is disgusting. If this is what the Japanese do, they should stop doing it.

2) Political-religious suicides: Whether it is a Muslim terorist or a Buddhist monk this activity discredits the religion itself.

3) Love problems: Anna Karenina is the kind of person who couldn't make anyone happy, not even herself. She should have started to behave better, but Tolstoy was probably getting tired and the thought of writing another 100 pages to make a better ending was more than he could handle.

4) Illness and old age: Although I don't believe in prolonging one's life, this might be the time for a person to reflect since there is nothing else to do.

5) Metaphysical-philosophical suicide: The movie Melancholia was about a huge rogue planet that came by to swallow up the earth and end all life in the universe. (The assumption was life only existed on earth.) The message of the movie is that life is bad and since we just won't kill ourselves, we need a planet to kill us. The message is pathetic, but the movie was made well enough that I can use it in arguments against people who take these positions.

[Volya]

Why do you find the idea of ritual suicide disgusting?

[cacian]

Why do you find the idea of ritual suicide disgusting?

Hi Volya don't you think it is? suicide is death and to make it a ritual is suggesting there is something not right within oneself. It is disgusting and frankly terrifying.

[hillwalker]

Isn't it a case of respecting cultural differences, especially those from past cultures, rather than dismissing something you don't understand as 'disgusting and frankly terrifying.'?

Bushido - which amongst other things advocated honour to the death - played a major part in the code of chivalry as practised by the samurai. Ritual suicide was seen as a gentlemanly way of admitting defeat. The particular method of suicide employed (seppuku) was a way of liberating the spirit at the moment of death to erase disgrace and dishonour.

The fact that it has been written about doesn't mean you have to practise it yourself. And to write off those who followed this code of conduct as being 'not right' is a little simplistic don't you think?

H