I was a young fool in love and she had a 1992 black Mazda Miata with all the trimmings: removable hardtop, BBS lace wheels, tan skins and Nardi wood shifter. One was high maintenance, the other a car.

That first-generation roadster, known as the NA (released in 1989 as a 1990 model), lives in memory and all those crossword-puzzle words that it brought to mind: yar, spry, bandy, caper. Getting after a mountain road in that tiny roadster was nothing but mechanical joy. You could let the car drift fearlessly, pitch the tail around to get the nose pointed right and cane it like a Jeddah shoplifter.

It was easy. It was fun. The steering was perfect, like a high-price go-kart. The 1.6-liter naturally aspirated four-cylinder with a five-speed manual had 116 horsepower and 100 pound-feet of torque at the crank, but it would shed blood to please. When the roads straightened and the fence posts fanned, that car buzzed something marvelous, like a swarm of bees. The Miata in spirit was the reliable British roadster that you couldn’t buy from Britain.

Twenty-six years and nearly 1 million cars later, the MX-5 Miata—Mazda tried to drop the “Miata” name in favor of simply “MX-5,” to no avail—has returned to first principles. The fourth-generation MX-5, the ND, is significantly leaner, lighter (by about 150 pounds depending on options) and a bit down on power (by 12 hp, to 155 hp) compared with the previous model. In fact, at 154.1 inches in length, the new car is 4 inches shorter than the previous generation and even a shade shorter than the original a quarter-century ago.

Darty. Tempestuous. A car that turns like a cat chasing his tail. The new Miata embraces power-to-weight minimalism and stick-and-rudder driving in a way not seen since the NA model. They could have called it the Déjà Vu.

Mazda Miata MX-5

Let’s start with a number: 2,332 pounds. The curb weight of the U.S.-spec 2016 MX-5 is almost what the car weighed 20 years ago. To hit that mark Mazda gouged and sweated grams out of every corner of the car: The use of aluminum body panels (except for doors, rear fenders and windshield pillars) saved 45 pounds. Whittling down the cast-aluminum transmission housing and workings saved 16 pounds; light-weighting of suspension parts (front wishbone/rear multi-link) kicked in 26 pounds.

The convertible-top mechanism is 20% lighter thanks to the use of aluminum bow stays. It is also the cleverest in the universe. To open it, you grab the latch at the headliner, over the mirror, and throw it over your shoulder. The top folds in an instant to form its own canvas tonneau. You only need to reach back to push-pop it into the secure position. To raise the top, you push again. It pops up and you can attach it to the headliner in about two seconds. Brilliant.

And, very much central to the driving experience: Replacing conventional padded and sprung, steel-frame seats, the Miata’s seats are like Aeron chairs, with a lightweight, high-tech fabric stretched across the aluminum armature. These seats are both lighter (17 pounds apiece than the alternative) and more comfortable than stiff-backed composite shells.

To eliminate the weight of a seat-height adjuster, the seat rails are inclined so that as occupants slide forward the seat rises gradually. To save a bit of gear, the steering column tilts but doesn’t telescope.

The windshield and cabin have been pushed rearward along the fuselage, and the spandex seats put the driver’s rump nearly an inch closer to the ground and a bit closer to the centerline. The visual effect is a longer hood, a longer axle-to-dash and a bit more raffish silhouette, at the same time moving the driver’s inner ears closer to the center of rotation. All this happens even though the car is actually 4 inches shorter than the previous model.

Also, glad news for anyone 6-feet tall or better: the MX-5 redesign gives a bit more refuge behind the now slightly raised windshield. Entry and exit of the car with the top down is easy and natural. Getting in with the top up requires a bit more patience lest you bang your left ear on the partially retracted side window.

Fiat-Chrysler will begin production of a Fiat roadster based on the MX-5, much as Subaru and Scion have conspired on the BRZ/FR-S. The Fiat 124 Spider will have its own sheet metal but Mazda’s suddenly sexy silhouette is in a great place to start.

For its product Mazda invoked the design mood “Kodo—Soul in Motion,” which I guess includes the car’s dangerously mischievous face. This Pokémon space catfish is coming to eat you. Those are compact, weight-saving LED headlamps and running lights, like channel-set zircons in the lateral front bumper. The close-cropped nose and surprisingly low hood line afford good sightlines past the muscular front fenders, shades of an Opel GT.

The MX-5 is surprisingly leggy. Minimum ground clearance of our Grand Touring tester ($30,885 delivered), with the 17-inch alloy wheels, was 5.32 inches. Wheel arches clearances are ample, and the truth is the Miata suspension tuning is anything but laced down and hard core. Driven in haste around an autocross course, the Miata rolls and gimbals like a ship’s compass in a storm.

I have on occasion white-knuckled a 12-cylinder, seven-figure streamliner to more than 200 mph, flirting with the turbulent vortices of chance. That was fun, I guess. And then there is the kind of fun where you come home with your license and your life. That’s the Miata. Mazda Motor Corp.

You wouldn’t think that would be a recipe for motor-sports glory, and yet: My friend Ezra Dyer (Yahoo Autos, Popular Mechanics) and I went to an autocross event last weekend sponsored by the local Porsche club. The course was laid out on a tar-crazed, broken parking lot—a synecdoche of America’s crumbling infrastructure?—and right in the middle was a speed bump cars had to cross twice. Porsche Boxsters and 914s had to slow to walking speed to get over this lump of asphalt. Me and my borrowed Miata, with practical ground clearance and nothing much by way of front aero, hit it full throttle in second gear, fairly leaping over it and landing with its white hinder up in the air, like a woodland creature.

Erza logged a time of 41.7 seconds in a fire-breathing, world-beating 650-hp Corvette Z06. The MX-5 gave up 495 hp to the ‘Vette. Elapsed time? 41.7 seconds. So there is more nuance to the “Is it fast?” question that one might credit.

The 2.0-liter “Skyactiv” direction-injection four pulls for all its worth. Overall engine torque is up a bit (8 lb-ft) and that grunt is available across a lower, broader rpm. The short-throw shifter is peachy. The three-pedal positioning, perfected over decades, makes it easy to heel and toe, if you remember how. Rev-matching isn’t available. Of course, Mazda designers were careful to retain the car’s blatty, Sopwith Camel exhaust out of dual silver-tipped pipes. Compression ratio? A spitting 13.0:1.

Is the MX-5 fast? Relatively, it’s a slug. Zero-60 mph is around 6 seconds (that same ‘Vette is 2.95 seconds) and you would be a brave soul to take it over about 110 mph. That’s the genius of it. I have on occasion white-knuckled a 12-cylinder, seven-figure streamliner to more than 200 mph, flirting with the turbulent vortices of chance. That was fun, I guess. And then there is the kind of fun where you come home with your license and your life. That’s the Miata.