Two Books from Haruki Murakami 117
| A Wild Sheep Chase and Dance, Dance, Dance | |
| author | Haruki Muarkami |
| pages | 304 / 393 |
| publisher | Vintage Books |
| rating | 8.5 |
| reviewer | David Mazzotta |
| ISBN | 037571894X / 0679753976 |
| summary | The real and surreal clash in post-modern Japan. |
In A Wild Sheep Chase (1989) the main character and narrator lives a mediocre existence. He is passionless; seemingly unaffected by his wife's betrayal and subsequent divorce, and only attracted to his current girlfriend because he finds her ears to be "marvels of creation" that can incite irresistible desire in any man who sees them. This shallow view of life is further emphasized by the fact that, throughout the book, no characters are referred to by proper names.
When the "Rat," a nomadic friend of the narrator, sends him a photograph of some sheep from Hokkaido, a chain of events is set in motion. The sheep picture comes to the attention of a shadowy figure simply known as the "Boss" -- a mythically powerful underworld kingpin -- who has a dire need to get a hold of one of the sheep in the photo. The Boss sends a messenger to the narrator making it clear that unless he finds that sheep, he will face financial ruin, if not worse.
What follows is a surreal journey from Tokyo to Sapporo and points north, including a hotel that could be right out of a Kubrick film and creature known as the Sheep-Man, who is worthy of David Lynch. In the course of this journey, and in the face of extraordinary events, our narrator confronts his superficial world view and the affect it has had on his life.
Set six years later, Dance, Dance, Dance (1994) is murder mystery, but one in which the clues are revealed by chance rather than dogged investigation - often by a seemingly random psychic encounter. Our narrator has resumed a normal life as a freelance copywriter. He refers to this as "shoveling cultural snow" -- doing the thoughtless and thankless work that needs to be done to clear the path. He is fairly well disengaged from humanity, spending a lot of time alone doing absolutely nothing. Yet, in the midst of this anti-social life, he finds that his long missing girlfriend, the one with the amazing ears -- is calling to him as if in a dream, and she is weeping.
Once again, a chain of events is set in motion. He travels back to the strange hotel to find it modernized and corporate. He has another encounter with the Sheep-Man who tells him to "keep dancing." In the course of story he encounters, and finds sympathy for, a disaffected adolescent girl from a dysfunctional family, and an old high-school acquaintance who has become a famous movie star. Through his relationship with these characters he solves the mystery of his missing girlfriend, not through directed investigation but just by staying engaged with life and society -- by keeping up the "dance."
As a Westerner reading these novels, I was struck by how different the Japan portrayed here is from the hyper-efficient, sanitized, sexless and safe Japan of common impression. This is late twentieth-century post-modern Japan. References to Western pop culture are incessant. Call girls abound. Characters find themselves entangled in confusing, neurotic relationships worthy of HBO original programming. And nobody is practicing Kendo.
These books are hard-boiled -- that is to say, they are written in the hard-boiled style defined in the mid-twentieth century by U.S. mystery writers Raymond Chandler and Dashiell Hammet. There is a stark contrast between the blunt, gritty realism of hard-boiled style and the surreal, supernatural events that occur. This causes the stories to seem solidly planted in the real world, despite the occasional bizarre episodes.
There are certain shortcomings; the camera's eye perspective of the hard-boiled school lends itself to a bit too much dwelling on the details of setting. This is primarily in evidence at the beginning of A Wild Sheep Chase. And one suspects something is lost in the translation from the original Japanese. For example, this passage from Dance, Dance, Dance:
"... and if you consider the telephone as an object, it has this truly weird form. Ordinarily, you never notice it, but if you stare at it long enough, the sheer oddity of its form hits home. The phone either looks like it's dying to say something, or else it's resenting that it's trapped inside its form. Pure idea vested with a clunky body. That's the telephone."
There is a certain vagueness that may not be intentional. One is left with the feeling that "form" doesn't quite convey the same meaning it did in the original language.
Reading Murakami has been described feeling like you've just awakened from a deep sleep and you aren't sure if you're still dreaming. These are fascinating, engrossing books that will leave you full of ideas and impressions to dwell on for a long time to come.
You can purchase A Wild Sheep Chase and Dance,Dance,Dance from bn.com. Slashdot welcomes readers' book reviews -- to see your own review here, read the book review guidelines, then visit the submission page.
Even better than either of those... (Score:1, Interesting)
Re:Even better than either of those... (Score:3, Informative)
I'd agree. Wind Up Bird Chronicles is my favorite book, tied with David Foster Wallace's Infinite Jest.
About a year ago, a friend recommendeded it to me, the first time I'd encountered Murakami other than having eyed Norwegian Wood because of it's cover design.
The first thing I noticed about Murakami was his pacing. It's a little on the slow side, but feels just right. The characters are honest and seem very real, especially his ubiquitous disaffected male leads. The story got weirder and weirder, but as the reviewer says, his hard-boiled style makes it all seem plausible, somehow.
After I finished it, I read 6 more of his books all in the next 8 months, and a couple of those twice.
The only one I found disappointing was Sputnik Sweetheart, it felt like a weaker Norwegian Wood or South of the Boarder, West of the Sun (both of which I read twice.)
As for the Philp K. Dick angle....
if you like the structural weirdness that Dick frequently employes, his habit for changing EVERYTHING you know to be true half way through a story, or the way the aforementioned make you think about stories in general, I *highly* recommend Italo Calvino and Jorges Luis-Borges.
Specifically: The Collected Short Fiction of Jorges Luis-Borges, and "If on a winter's night a stranger" by Calvino.
Re:Even better than either of those... (Score:1)
The previous post mentioned Borges and Calvino, both fathers of speculative fiction. Just to clarify - Calvino's most popular work is titled in english "If on a Winter's Night a Traveler" and is well worth reading, deconstructing the novel while you read it.
recommendations | others (Score:1)
Who translated these? (Score:1)
My wife and I get a kick out of the horrid Japanese->English butchering that passes for subtitling these days.
Re:Who translated these? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Who translated these? (Score:1)
I also remember hearing an interview he gave in english.
To sum it up, I guess Murakami himself plays a big role in the english translations of his books.
Re:Who translated these? (Score:1)
Philip Gabriel (Score:1)
Rubin and Birnbaum simply have different styles. Rubin's is much more masculine (if translation can be described that way) and Birnbaum's is more lyrical. I get the distinct feeling sometimes reading Birnbaum that he isn't 100% faithful to the original text, a feeling I don't get with either Rubin or Gabriel's translations, but the book is certainly none the worse for it.
Murakami is great (Score:2)
I'm not a science fiction fan, but his books are just barely science fiction. They usually leave me feeling depressed (like the stereotypical main characters of his books... always a depressed, solitary male) but they're amazingly well written.
Sheep Chase is great for a quick introduction, but once you've read that, I highly reccomend reading The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle. It's 600 dense pages, so chunk out some time, but it's absolutely worth it.
Re:Murakami is great (Score:2)
---
Traffic was jammed solid in the direction on Shinjuku. Evening rush hour, among other things. Past a certain point the cars seemed practically glued in place, motionless. Every so often a wave would pass through the cars, budging them forward a few inches. I thought about the rotational speed of the earth. How many miles an hour was this road surface whirling through space? I did a quick calculation in my head and came up with a figure that could have been no faster than the Spinning Teacup at a carnival. There're many things we don't really know. It's an illusion that we know anything at all. If a group of aliens were to stop me and ask, Say, bud, how many miles an hour does the earth spin at the equator? I'd be in a fix. Hell, I don't even know why Wednesday follows Tuesday. I'd be an inergalactic joke.
I've read And Quiet Flows the Don and The Brothers Karamazov three times through. I've even read Ideologie Germanica once. I can even recite the value of pi to sixteen places. Would I still be a joke? Probably. They'd laugh their alien heads off.
Would you care to listen to some music, sir? asked the chauffeur.
Good idea, I said.
And at that a Chopin ballade filled the car. I got the feeling I was in a dressing room at a wedding reception.
Say, I asked the chauffeur, you know the value of pi?
You mean that 3.14 whatzit?
That's the one. How many decimal places do you know?
I know it to thirty-two places, the driver tossed out.
Beyond that, well...
Thirty-two places?
There's a trick to it, but yes. Why do you ask?
Oh, nothing really, I said, crestfallen. Never mind.
Also a Murakami fan (Score:2)
This is true of so many excellent books (and music, and films, etc.) but still many love them. I'm sure there's a lesson to be learned here, but I'm not quite sure what it is.
Other good Murakami (Score:1)
"The Elephant Vanishes", available in English as a Vintage International paperback, is a collection of short stories into which you can immediately jump.
[Warning: Plot description but no spoiler included.]
My favorite story from the collection is "The 100% Perfect Girl," in which he passes (you guessed it) the 100% perfect girl on the street and, only after losing her, figures out exactly what he would have stopped and told her. This substory comprises the bulk this short short story and describes the story of two young lovers and their 100% perfect love potentially being lost to foolishness.
Murakami is best known for
- Norweigan Wood
. From the Amazon.com description: "In 1987, when Norwegian Wood was first published in Japan, it promptly sold more than 4 million copies and transformed Haruki Murakami into a pop-culture icon. The horrified author fled his native land for Europe and the United States, returning only in 1995, by which time the celebrity spotlight had found some fresher targets." I have not read it so I will not comment (nor karma-whore, as it were) further.Re:Other good Murakami (Score:1)
By the way, I didn't think Minority Report was PhilDickian at all. Another evisceration job by Hollywood.
Re:Other good Murakami (Score:2)
I've been a Phil Dick fan for years, ever since I read A Scanner Darkly. There are definitely resemblances in Murakami - a feeling of dissociation from the world, a sense that you can peel back it's surface and find something totally different. Murakami is, I think, a more subtle writer, and his characterizations are stronger than Dick's (although character wasn't the focus of Dick's work in the way that it is in Murakami). If I have to compare his writing to another writer's, I usually think of Raymond Carver (whose writing he's translated into Japanese). But it is probably safe to say that if you enjoy Phil Dick, you'll like Haruki Murakami.
I was surprised - I didn't hate Minority Report. I thought it was a credible job, and Tom Cruise only annoyed me for the first half hour. I haven't read the story that the movie was based on, but I got the sense that Spielberg didn't capture the kind of perspective shifting that Dick did so well. As a movie, I enjoyed it, but I'm still waiting for someone to bring Phil Dick to the screen properly.
Re:Other good Murakami (Score:1)
Re:Other good Murakami (Score:2)
that may sound a bit far fetched... but don't forget that mishima's literary club, the "shield society", followed him in his attempt to overthrow the government by force of arms.
Re:Other good Murakami (Score:1)
They're published by Harvill [randomhouse.co.uk]
The binding on this edition is a bit dodgy, so if you do find them, handle them gingerly.
Hmmmm. (Score:2)
Even better, how does this guy rate against Heinlein and Asimov?
BlackGriffen
Re:Hmmmm. (Score:1)
His literary skills surpass both - although this is the first time I've come across him being compared to SF! He inhabits the strange end of literature - the only Western authors I would compare him too would be Will Self or Alisdair Gray.
He's far less formulaic than than most SF writers (although Dick, Heinlein & Asimov all have fine work to their name), the closest parallel would I can think of is JG Ballard.
Warmly recommended
Re:Hmmmm. (Score:1)
Re:Hmmmm. (Score:1)
Re:Hmmmm. (Score:2)
Come on! Give this guy some Karma! It's funny. Laugh.
Re:Hmmmm. (Score:1)
Re:Hmmmm. (Score:2)
So you're asking for an opinion backed up without facts? You've come to the right place!
Philip K. Dick (Score:1)
Re:Philip K. Dick (Score:1)
Re:Philip K. Dick (Score:1)
www.piers-anthony.com/totalrecall.html
This off topic post was brought to you by me.
Re:Philip K. Dick (Score:1)
Based on the Philip K. Dick short story "We Can Remember It For You Wholesale".
Murakami best novels (Score:2, Interesting)
His masterpiece is Norwegian Woods, which tells the story of a young man, in the mid of the japanese 68. We can say that there are a lot of biographical points in the book: the music, the environment, probabily the personal experiences.
I can tell you, Norwegian Woods is one exceptional, emotional book. It's not science fiction, but still, one of the best books I've ever read.
Murakami has also witnessed two of the recent tragedies of modern Japan: the sarin gas attack in the subway and the Kobe earthquake.
In the book (Underground) about the sarin (nerve) gas attack from a religious sect, Murakami acts as a journalist, interviewing survivors and members of the sect, trying to find a logic in what happened.
The Kobe earthquake is handled differently: it is a collection of short stories, mainly of people marginally touched by the earthquake, and how it affected their lives. You can find fictional stories, where the earthquake is caused by a huge worm living underground, to more personal, intimate stories.
Anyway, Murakami is an excellent writer, you should read at least one of his books.
Short story online (Score:5, Informative)
Sexless? (Score:1)
Hentai and anime aside, you could read James Clavell's Sho-gun. Granted, it is written by a westerner, but it is still entertaining and portrays the lives of the ancient Japanese aristocracy.
barista
Re:Sexless? (Score:2)
Obviously the japanese have sex. There are erotic and pornagraphic works of all kinds. And throughout Japanese history and culture it has been treated with considerably more candor than in most of the western world. But perhaps that's not what he was talking about. I think one could make a pretty good case that romance plays a rather small role in Japanese culture, and that compared to western style romance is so faint as to be almost irrelevant. Or perhaps he was talking about something else entirely.
Foreign Literature? (Score:2)
Re:Foreign Literature? (Score:1)
Re:Foreign Literature? (Score:1)
Also, Georges Battaille is one of the most radical, subversive writers I can imagine. "The Story of the Eye" and "Blue of Noon" are both wickedly politically transgressive while being hilarious *and* making my cock hard at the same time. (I know, it's a weird criteria for judging literature, but it's what I like)
Re:Foreign Literature? (Score:2)
A friend of mine swears by the Egyptian writer Naguib Mahfouz, though I certainly couldn't tell you how he reads in the original Arabic.
Also, although he writes in English, I'd urge you to consider the great Anglo-Japanese writer Kazuo Ishiguro. Japanese and English people are both known to outsiders for their senses of reserve and decorum, and Ishiguro taps into that beautifully in his "The Remains of the Day." But if you are looking for something more overtly allegorical, you will do no better than the quietly bizarre novel "The Unconsoled" certainly one of the best books I've ever read.
Re:Okay, I've never read him.. BUT.... (Score:1)
In word-for-word translation, "Hitsuji wo Meguru Bouken" is "Adventure over a Sheep." I think "A Wild Sheep Chase" is a good title. It well represents the sense of a little incongruity which native Japanese speakers have when we see the original title.
Re:Okay, I've never read him.. BUT.... (Score:1)
Galactic Pot Healer
Flow my Tears the Policeman said
The Man Whose Teeth Were All Exactly Alike
like the other chap said.. what the fuck are you on about?
Original Language (Score:1)
Only now can I honestly say I've attained that goal, after having finally passed the JLPT Level 1 (the much-feared "ikkyuu") and reading "Hituji wo meguru bouken" right-to-left twice.
Murakami's prose is abstract and intense, even in translation. However, in my estimation it is well worth giving his works a shot in the original Japanese, if you're up to the challenge. If you can honestly say you've read his novels, then you're well-prepared to use Japanese in most any professional situation.
Hard-Boiled Wonderland (Score:1)
I never realized there were any Japanese cyberpunk authors until I read it. Most cyberpunk seems to be a glossy update to good old fashioned Orientalism. Anyway, the guy is a great author.
Re:Poor Philip K... (Score:1)
You might be interested to know that my local university (Otago University, New Zealand), has included DADOES in their lit course. He's not Joyce, but damnit people should take him seriously. Now if only hollywood would cease raping his novels and short stories....
hard-boiled wonderland (Score:1)
it's the duality that intrigues me. not just duality, but the dark, shadowly nether-realm of duality. almost like a dream. the two halves of 'hard-boiled wonderland' are twisted about each other with the perfection of a double helix in repose.
and the solitary narrator--always solitary--who almost slips through life with a calm and tranquility only possible in dreams. chotto... hen desu ne.. but in a good way.
my only regret is never making it to the dunkin' donuts in sapporo.
Aaaaggh... (Score:1)
Give 'The Wind-Up Bird Chronicles' a read, if you want a really great book. It's dense, filled with interesting characters, and it's full of those fun moments where you just kind of sit back, shake your head, and go 'what the fuck... ?'
It really is a great read.
His more recent books (Norwegian Wood and Sputnik Sweetheart) are also -incredibly- well written. These two, and Wind-up Bird, are 3 of my top 5 favorite books. These two are both a lot more *real* than his other works (not nearly as crazy as 'HardBoiled Wonderland at the End of the World'), and it's really easy to identify with the characters.
Obviously, I'm no book reviewer, but.. if Murakami interests you, the three books to check out (imo) are 'Norwegian Wood,' 'Sputnik Sweetheart,' and 'Wind-Up Bird Chronicles.'
Re:Aaaaggh... (Score:2)
Norwegian Wood was Murakami's *first* major book, not a more recent one.
Re:Aaaaggh... (Score:1)
Wind-up Bird Chronicle and South of the Border, West of the Sun are much better quality, IMHO.
huh? (Score:1)
[rant]
post-modern?
what is that? 99.5% of the time when people uses the phrase "post-modern", they have no clue what they are talking about, which is really annoying because it will ruin a perfectly good review like this. let us analyze this a bit in detail:
linguistically speaking, post-modern is oxymoron. modern: Of or relating to recent times or the present. post modern would refer to the future, hence making absolutely no sense if you are talking about a "current-era".
in the arts, we have "post-modernism", which would make a *little* more sense. misnomer aside, it refers to the succession of "modernism," however -- we are sure as heck not talking about avant-garde arts. and as far as i know Japan's art culture has never really had a significant "post-modernism" era.
so... geez people. stop using that phrase!
[/rant]
and oh yeah, japan is nothing like you see on animes; "japan has no homeless people" is a flat lie. and the place looks, in general, much more run-down than you would imagine. Still better than Miami, though.
But Murakami is clearly a postmodernist. (Score:1)
"With" a sense of humor?!! (Score:1)
Haruki Murakami isn't sci-fi!!!!! (Score:1)
Recently, I have read two stories by Murakami--"Super-Frog Saves Tokyo" which was translated and published in last month's issue of GQ, and "Airplane" which was translated and published in last week's New Yorker. Airplane was definitely not a science fiction book, but I could see some would consider Super Frog to be a sci fi short story. I would consider it a modern fantasy though.
Whereas Phillip K. Dick usually would tell us wary stories as to how we should be careful with our use of tech, Murakami is more about telling us how we should be considerate to others. In "Airplane", it is about how a man who has weird "moments"(can't think of a better word right now) and his woman, and in Super Frog, it is about a man who is considered brave not because of brute strength, but the selfless determination of an ordinary man to help others.
I definitely recommend "Super Frog Saves Tokyo" to everyone who is interested in Haruki Murakami. It was only a few pages long, but in light of Sept. 11, I'd say Super Frog is an interesting and fantastic read. =)
Underground (Score:3, Insightful)
The reason Murakami is compared to PKD is that he uses the most mundane of language or situations, with a slightly shifted psychological circumstance, perhaps even apocalyptic conditions. So for example, in a Dickian twist, Murakami's "TV People" describes how one day some people come to his home to deliver a TV, they're perfectly regular in every sense but one, they're only 3/4 scale people.
I've read a lot of Murakami in the original Japanese, and it's a very interesting experience. Many writers use complex language forms but Murakami is relatively plain, it is hard to describe the subtle monotony and relentlessness of his plain language. Probably his most startling work was "Underground" which is just now available in English for the first time. It's the book where he writes the least, the book mostly transcripts of interviews with victims of the Aum Shinrikyo poison gas attack in 1995. But between the interviews is Murakami's reconstruction of the events, and essays about Japan's society and how Aum could have happened right in front of everyone's eyes.
And here's where Murakami sort of goes off the deep end. I've read a few of M's essays lately, he has taken on the role of social critic. His essays focus on "ishiki no arikata" which is loosely translated, "the way people are supposed to think about things." He made some particularly hilarious remarks denouncing recent fashion trends like "yamamba" and "ganguro" as unJapanese and would lead to the moral corruption of the nation. He sounds like he's becoming an old fart, cranking about what's gone wrong with those darn kids today. My opinion was confirmed after I read a couple of his travel books. They're all full of gripes like "I hiked around Malta, the food was greasy and the toilets were dirty. I had to have fresh sushi sent by DHL from Tokyo once a week or I'd have nothing decent to eat."
Re:Underground (Score:1)
Seriously, both authors improve with age and return to themes that fascinate them. With Austin it was the role and social acceptability, the mating of wants and desires with the perceived ideal of what is socially correct. With Murakami it is his focus on the mind, thought, and indeed exploring the idea of deciding what is socially responsible.
One hypothesis put forward by Jay Rubin in his bio of Murakami was that while swimming against the current of the mainstream literati in Japan it was inevitable that he would eventually assume that role.
and you might also like... (Score:1)
i really enjoyed murakami's "sputnik sweetheart" [amazon.co.uk], and "norwegian wood" [amazon.co.uk]...
however, my favourite japanese author is actually banana yoshimoto; "kitchen" [amazon.co.uk] and "lizard" [amazon.co.uk] are both beautiful books that i would recommend without reservation to everyone. if you have not read anything by her, or are wondering whether you would like contemporary japanese literature then "lizard" would be the perfect book to test the water, as it is actually six short stories.
finally, shusako endo's "silence" [amazon.co.uk] is well worth reading, but would never qualify as a light afternoon's read
as an aside... anyone based in london, uk, and know of a good course that teaches japanese? anything sponsored by the embassy perhaps? i've been looking to learn for some time. started teaching myself a while ago, but had too much work going on to pursue it properly. thx...
Murakami? Subarashii! (Score:1)
I've read both Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World [amazon.com] and The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle [amazon.com], and will gladly attest to Murakami's talents. They were both very good books, well worth the reading. However, I should note that these are not (thankfully, to some degree) American or European books. Their denouements don't come along in the usual way or at a constant pace, and the stories themselves, much like the films Maborosi [imdb.com] and Wandafuru raifu [imdb.com] (English title: "After Life"), focus more on details and setting than moving a plot along. Not that this is a complaint; I quite enjoy such story telling.
Having not (yet) read the books reviewed here, I can't say anything about them. But I think the name Murakami, like that of Akira Kurosawa, warrants a look-see regardless.
Coins in your pocket (Score:1)
100y and 500y in the right pocket and 10y and 50y in the left. A hand in each pocket and count them simultaneously. The presumption that the right brain and left brain keep separate tabs and you can bring together the result at the end.
Reminds me of 6800 registers...
Dick Comparison Maybe isn't the best (Score:2, Interesting)
My two favorites by him are Wild Sheep Chase and Pinball, 1973 (translated into English by Kodansha, but not sold in the states, maybe Bookfinder...)
Both those books have a touch of magical realism working, but could be seen as modern takes on noir.
It is strange, as Murakami's biggest hit in Japan was Norwegian Wood, a title that, due to culture as much as anything, really captured the imagination of Japanese men and made him a superstar--but it's hard for an outside like myself to get into quite the same way.
Maybe the biggest secret to Murakami Haruki is the way pretty much all his characters are outsiders, loners, and the women they meet the same, coming as he does from a country, Japan, where the biggest focus is on the group.
Definitely recommend Wild Sheep Chase, Pinball, 1973 uses the same characters and serves as a kind of prequel.
Philip K. Dick? (Score:1)
Oh, and anyone who thinks Dick doesn't have a wicked sense of humor might want to go back and re-read his stuff.
murakami (Score:1)
I'm suprised Hard Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World wasn't included in this review. It may not be Murakami's best work, but it is the most Sci-fi oriented and argualby the most closely related to Phillip Dick's writing.
All of Murakami's novels have a certain mystical element reminicent of Dick's later books. The world created, like Dick's, lasts largely intact from novel to novel. But what makes it interesting is that Murakami's world is a much less hostile one. Although the paranoia is justified, and the femme fatal always double crosses, you get the feeling that the main character suspected it all along and went along just for the crazy ride.
late-showa era lit. (hm's predecessors) (Score:3, Informative)
kobo abe - "woman in the dunes" [kirjasto.sci.fi]. existentialist tragedy that makes camus look like a comic book. avoid the movie (thankfully).
yukio mishima - "the sailor who fell from grace with the sea" [thingsasian.com]. mishima tried to overthrow the japanese government by force of arms in the 70's and committed suicide after failing. let's see thomas pynchon do that! alarming parable of post-war reconstruction of japan. depravity, vengence, ennui... it's all here. avoid the movie.
kenzeburo oe - nip the buds shoot the kids [geraldinesherman.com]. oe won the 1994 nobel prize for literature. this first novel is his grittiest. it's often compared to the lord of the flies but this is only because the main characters are children faced with the difficult decisions of wartime that even adults often cannot deal with. no movie.
Re:late-showa era lit. (hm's predecessors) (Score:2, Interesting)
Not his best stuff (Score:2, Interesting)
Also by Murakami, but much better (Score:1)
Joe-Bob gives it five stars... Go check it out!
For those of you that have enjoyed Murakami... (Score:1)
PKD? Howsabout RC? (Score:2)
And then, maybe Vonnegut is closer.
In any case, Murakami feels a lot less like a methanphetamine trip than PKD, and less of a bad mushroom experience than Burroughs.
I love Haruki Murakami (Score:1)
Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World
The Wind-up Bird Chronicles
Norwegian Wood
The Elephant Vanishes (short stories)
Underground (non-fiction)
There are more, but those are my favorites
And now, an anecdote: I was introduced to Murakami in an English class at UC Berkeley (haven of DWM's and ethnic literature, but largely void of anything else). The professor teaching the class approached the science fiction and fantasy genres as amusing trivialities and kept attempting to lead discussions into figuring out which of many parallel universes in the books was the "real" one. The students kept trying to introduce this wanker to the postmodernist idea that none of the universes is any more real or valid than the others. So finally, the guy pulls up Hard-Boiled Wonderland and says "do you really expect me to think this is a normal Japanese salaryman living a normal life?" At which point the Japanese exchange student raises her hand for the first time in weeks and says "well yes, of course he is. Strange things happen to him, but he's a totally normal person."
It was enjoyable to see.
For the record... Why now?? (Score:2)
Katoktok only asking.