Haruki Murakami

I'm reading Norwegian Wood at the moment. Or, I started it months ago and stalled halfway through, to be more accurate, because I wasn't really enjoying it. The main character just seems like a dick.

Which is the old one about a dude who was cheating on his wife? That felt pointless

pointlessness and dickish characters are two of my favourite things about murakami !

I like the pointlessness and the dickishness too. My issue with Norwegian Wood was with the female characters, who are just fantasy objects or plot devices for the main character. Naoki's (sp?) death was like a right of passage for the narrator, allowing him to bury his childhood, and that seemed like a poor (not beautiful) destiny for a human being.

This is an issue with his work in general but it was more glaring and off putting in NW for me.

Ah, so that was NW. I guess I should read it again, but despite some nice moments it felt like a...waste of time.

at moments i could almost see how people would think it is a classic bildungsroman, but it is just such a vulgar example of that genre -- pulling out all the stops -- that i just couldn't like it.

I finally finished 1Q84 and it was a fun read, no where near the greatness of the wind up bird, but I'm happy to have finished it. It was more apparent and sort of tidy while still being weird. Better than Kafka on the Shore, which really bothered me for reasons I can't remember.

that's heartening. i think he works better in large doses than small ones. hardboiled wonderland or whatever it's called was too short... you didn't really *feel* the protagonist's ordeal the way you do in wind up bird. both are cool though because they are journeys to the heart of the psyche in which not much is discovered but something is learned.

What I enjoyed the most about 1Q84 was the length, I love long forays into minute detail, and Murakami does it very well. I can get lost in his stories. I think I keep hoping to find the enjoyment I found in reading Moby Dick.

what I enjoyed the least about 1q84 was its unstylistic and unstructural repetitiveness I don't mind long forays into minute detail if that's what they are

I like Murakami but IQ84 is basically drivel.

Sorry, 1Q84.

it may as well have been called iq84

"HO HO," said the keeper of the beat.

i'm in the book where the twitchy investigator gets his own entries

Urgh just finished 1q84. Wanted to get to the end but parts were so bad (mostly the aomame pep talks and breast fixation) that I felt embarrassed reading it

dammit

http://www.harukimurakami.com/author

the desk of murakami
what a cool room

how are those early ones that just got (re)published in usa

interesting, we share a mug with haruki murakami.

unsanitary

how are those early ones that just got (re)published in usa

― johnny crunch, Friday, August 14, 2015 10:07 AM (4 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I wouldn't count on them being very good at all. But I would gladly be proven wrong by someone who has read them...

they are okay, worth checking out now that it's easier to do so if you are a big fan in general. a chance to see some of the idiosyncrasies crystallize might be pretty refreshing now that they have ossified somewhat.

first new novel in 7 years 'Killing Commendatore'
http://mainichi.jp/english/articles/20170110/p2g/00m/0et/071000c

first new novel in 7 years

Just finished Wind-Up Bird Chronicle and oh my god what an incredible book; exactly the kind of surrealist mindfuck that I wished it would be. I know it's a lazy and trite comparison, but I loved how it was complex like how Twin Peaks is complex: things happen without explanation, there's multiple plot threads, and you're not gonna get every answer that you want -- but that's okay, because its fun to revel in the mystery and try to connect the dots yourself. And the Hotel Room is a well-executed rip-off of the Red Room. I was surprised to see some critics' reviews of it wishing it were more linear, but to each their own I guess. Also some user reviews called it boring, and like I could understand if someone was bored its endless prose but goddamn i could not stop reading it

it was the perfect length too. I haven't read 1Q84 (or any other book by him) but it looks like overambitious gobshite.

i hated every moment i spent with that book but i either don't get murakami or i hate his translators

really? I really loved that book

looking forward to 1Q84

honestly given the way other people talk about him i just really hate his style i think

j.'s reference upthread to murakami's "clunky" prose in 1Q84 seems otm to me just with a different book

I listened to Wind-Up Bird Chronicle as an audiobook. I really think an audio experience makes almost any book more enjoyable, but I get your point

I think the “clunkiness” is a deliberate effect. There is a real clinica detachment and awkwardness to his style that lends it a kind of weird naivete/documentary quality... i don’t think it’s a translation thing

That’s why i like him though. I feel his books are of variable quality. Norwegian Wood struck me as trite and bad whereas Wind Up Bird Chronicle was an incredible experience

I am halfway through reading Windup Bird... it just seems very Japanese modernist/introvert. It could be a weird translation but I can see why people are so gaaah over him.

note: i never really wanted to read him before because every indie boy ever in brooklyn was over the moon about him so I wanted to stay away. Now that I just hit 40, I figure it's time.

Brooklyn indie boys are good though

Oh and I guess I saw the Norwegian Wood movie with Virginia plain? when it came out ages ago. I only remember there being too much slo-mo to depict ANGST!

I am not into Canterbury Tales types of books so I am going to be pissed if there are tons of shorts stories the remainder of this book.

Yeah, i think that book is really bad; I can imagine the movie would be bad too. Such boilerplate coming of age, set in the 60s, although even so there was somethinf “off” about it that made it even less enjoyable. It’s possible I didn’t get it.

The wind up bird chronicle is just an amazing trip. I had ideas at the time about the way history figures into the narrative—how it only appears as trauma and is otherwse invisible—but it’s been too long for me to really talk about it

“That book” = norwegian wood obv

I just loved Malta the clairvoyant, the backyard pathway, the open space between the apartments, the missing cat, the abandoned house, the knowing teenage girl May Kasahara, the dream states, the bottom of the well...that last aspect reminds me a little of The Red Haired Woman by Orhan Pamuk

I think the “clunkiness” is a deliberate effect

yeah i'm aware of this. and i hate it

i enjoy it possibly only filtered through the cinema of wong kar-wai

When you guys read it do/did you see it through the eyes of a japanese dude or through your own eyes? I was wondering about this earlier this week.

note: i never really wanted to read him before because every indie boy ever in brooklyn was over the moon about him so I wanted to stay away. Now that I just hit 40, I figure it's time.

Hah now I'm wondering how re-reading it in my early 40s would compare to when I was a LA indie dork in my early 20s

You should do it and let us know. I mean it's fine to read on the subway but Terrace House is 100xs better.

When I talked to him he told me he wrote Wind-Up Bird when he was living in Orange County (CA), which kinda blew my mind.

What? No way