What I like about this book is the fact that you can't really say if all these happening or Toru is schizophrenic. I am reading it for the 5th time now and I am getting the feeling that Kirita Kano and Kumiko are the same people and Kumiko never actually left...and the "cat" is the symbol of luck/love that left their life.... It is so magical and also real at the same time...
Just finished reading this book. I share the same sentiments as yours. I was a bit worried when there are only a hundred pages left and I can't still see the light at end of the book's tunnel, but then again I realized that Murakami is not known for connecting the threads. Norwegian Wood is still Murakami's best for me tho. The style and language in NW appeals to me more.
HM’s m. o. is definitely more along the lines of maintaining some ambiguity and lack of closure, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing at all. Sometimes it appears lazy (deus ex machina stuff), but sometimes it appears as deliberate craft. Always nice to meet someone who appreciates NW!
The Wind Up Bird Chronicle is peak Murakami. He’s never been more fully realised than this one. I remember reading all of Murakami one summer vacation when I was younger and just started reading. I didn’t think that it could get any better. Lo and behold I read a lot of my old favourites by him this lockdown and it didn’t hold up as much as they did on the first read through. Wind Up Bird is still my favourite. I have a lot to thank Murakami for introducing me to literature tho. Without him I wouldn’t have read Mishima, Soseki, Dostoevsky, and Chekhov which really got me proper into lit
Oh, no-you’re not supposed to tell me Wind-Up is peak Murakami! I still have several more to go! Just kidding. It’s always great to hold onto those books that stung us earlier in our reading careers. Even if they lose their splendor, they are still a part of who we are. My gateway drugs were Michael Crichton and Stephen King. No shame.
Leaf by Leaf there’s still much to be enjoyed by Murakami after WUBC! Kafka and IQ84 are both very fun reads and I think you’ll like them! Definitely! Have to hold our gateway drugs true. No one comes out swinging with Gravity’s Rainbow under their belt 😂
I just finished up this book and have a lot more thinking to do. this was a great discussion on it, I love the way you talk things out. Ill have to check out some more of yours as I catch up with more novels
Your observation about when one first reads Murakami is on the nose. I first read The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle during a summer in my early 20s when I had nothing more to do than read and work a part time job. Reading Murakami now takes me back to that time. Love your videos!
This was probably the first 'major' book that I read. I dropped out of university after 1 year (19 years old) and had lots of time on my hands, while hunting for a job, that I spent at the library. I can't recall the specifics, but I remember being really moved by a scene where a Japanese soldier tells a story about his experience during WW2 and maybe how he tortured someone or was tortured. It was the first time that the power of good writing punched me in the gut. That being said, all these years later, I'm not sure that I like Murakami as a writer. it kind of brings me the same nostalgia of other things that I enjoyed when I was younger, but that I wouldn't really go back to (ie, listening to certain types of music/bands lol)
Sounds like you were the perfect reader for the typical Murakami novel! His trademark narrator is a young man without a job and lots of time on his hands. I love hearing stories like yours--that moment when the horizon was broadened for us and we realized the vast wealth that literature offers. It doesn't matter how it happens--be it Murakami, J. K. Rowling, or Eric Carle--just that is happens. For me, I was about the same age and I read my first Stephen King novel (Hearts in Atlantis). At that moment everything changed and I got a true hunger for literature. Not just reading to pass the time, but the study of and appreciation for literature. I fizzled out with SK pretty early though. The more recent novels I've tried to read I just can't stick with. But I think he'd like that because he has said that if he ever came to your house he'd better find something better than one of his novels on your night table! Still, the nostalgia for SK and that book remains even if it isn't to my current tastes.
I have read all Murakami's novels in English. I loved them all . Kafka on the Shore is a favorite and a good place to start reading Murakami. It is like Miles Davis's , Kind of Blue is a good place to start listening to Jazz music . Like all everything there are things you will miss if you are not from the culture of the author.
So true. I’m definitely an outsider looking in. Good point to bring up there. I’ve got Kafka on the Shore next, so thanks for amping up my expectation!
I just finished this book today. My main takeaway is that Murakami is a masterful storyteller. He really shined in the chapters as told by Lieutenant Mamiya. But I'm not sure how I felt about the ending...like you said, no major plot holes but I can't help feeling like something was missing. Overall very good, but not mind-blowing. This was my first Murakami so I'm definitely intrigued and will read more. Maybe I'll try Norwegian Wood next.
Having read a handful of his novels, I now realize that that open-ended feeling is part of his trademark. He has no problem hinting at something and never revisiting it. I think the appeal is in the meander. It keeps alive that sense of intrigue.
@@LeafbyLeaf Very true. It did have that sense of a lack of ultimate resolution that I love so much about Pynchon; I'll have to see if I continue to revisit this novel in my mind the same way I always do with Pynchon's novels.
I absolutely love this book, |'ve read 6-7 books by Haruki Murakami and found out he writes a lot of unnecessary nested stories in his novels! For example "A Wild Sheep Chase" was a waste of time in my perspective. but Haruki shows his art in the "Wind up bird chronicle" and if I want to recommend one book of his, it's definitely this book. I truly love the protagonist of the story "Toru Okada" and how he's looking for his identity throughout the novel.
Your review just came at the right moment for me. Because so many readers I know like him so much and I found the movie version of Norwagian Wood on tv quite good I finally decided two weeks ago to read two novels by Murakami (in German translation), and I liked both of them. But just like you said, would I have discovered him much earlier I would have liked them much more. Sputnik Sweetheart is a good novel I would recommend without hesitation, it reminded me of DeLillo's The Words because of its setting and some motives, but it doesn't come close to the quality of DeLillo's novel. The other Murakami I read was After Dark. Although some reviewers do not like it, I found it was the better one of the two. Very short, more a novella than a novel, but what is really behind Murakami's "magical" elements becomes very clear and philosophically convincing in this one. And now I thought I might read a third one by him and had chosen "The Windup ..." already. So that review was very interesting. -- - By the way: Currently I am reading Suah Bae's Untold Night and Day. She is a South Corean writer and her novel is surprisingly similar to Murakami's, full of surreal magic (very good so far).
Glad the review met you so serendipitously! Funny you mention Sputnik and DeLillo (I finished my video on Sputnik Sweetheart last night, and I make a very similar point). I haven’t heard of that Bae novel-thanks for putting it on my radar!
I came to Murakami late (50's), having previously read the magical realism of Cortazar and others. I've read several of his novels, including this one. Overall, I enjoy his "voice" but tire of his tropes (i.e., middle-aged men mixed up with young girls, mystical experiences in wells) and rambling plots. Mostly, I think his books would be much better if they were shorter and more concise. This book and especially 1Q84 really tested my patience, but I managed to plow through them with the assistance of an audiobook. Speaking of middle-aged men and young girls, I'd love to get your take on Nabokov's Lolita, a true masterpiece in my estimation.
I saw somewhere where someone said that they just love the classic Murakami protagonist who stays cool and Stoic, almost nonchalant, even in the midge of chaos and the uncanny. I think they hit on something of the wide appeal with that remark. As regards the Nabokov--an indisputable classic, that. No way around it. And a landmark of literature. My channel is sorely lacking Nabokov (and so many others). Perhaps the difference, besides Nabokov being a better writer all around, is with the blatancy of the taboo. Then again, we are surely close to something of a contradiction on my part. :)
So far I've only read 'Kafka on the Shore'. It was a really good experience, all in all: on one hand it was absolutely bizarre at some places (even absurdly so - not that I didn't enjoy that - but as you also say, pretty cringy), but then on the other hand there's this simple and lucid flow to it, some parts are really tangible and simply fascinating to read, I'm referring to the experience itself here. Not everything unfolds at the end, and I liked that exceptionally. Plus, some really good music and other artsy recommendations along the way! A good leisure-read. Really hyped to read The Wind-up Bird Chronicle!!
Just watched this one after your Hard-Boiled Wonderland and I have to say I'm glad you felt this one was more enjoyable. It gripped me for some time. He's not my favorite writer but definitely worth reading. I recommended it to a friend interested in Chinese, Mongolian, Japanese and Soviet relations. Even though that's not really the point of the book, I enjoyed it a lot for introducing that.
Funny I was a huge fan of Murakami in my early 20's but I gravitate more towards stuff like DeLillo. Great job on reading the same book 7 times and staying interested lol
That's the thought I keep coming back to--had I discovered HM in my teens/early 20s I think I would have been/be a big fan. The same way I was enthused about King at that time in my life but then lost the taste for his work. Oh, well. I've taken a pretty long break between books now, so I think Kafka on the Shore will be met with a fresh mind.
The one interesting in this book is one character connect to another novel which is 1Q84, the character is Ushikawa. But this book is very understanble. Toru is dreaming Luitenant Mamiya story is real Nutmeg and cinnamon story is just story which related to Toru Kumiko not missing she just hidden in some place to kill her brother Macarel the cat is happen to be found The well is owned by some mysterious organisation but maybe is Nutmeg Work? May kasahara also real she like Toru but not in love context. Creta Cano is victor Yeah everything is on the right place, I finish this book in 1.5 half year
...something you haven't seen before: So I loved Wild Sheep Chase, introduced to me when I was in my Mid-30s cracked me up and remains my favorite. So you still hit on it.
This is the only one of his that I've read, and I quite enjoyed it. I definitely remember wishing that the prose had a bit more style to it, and wondering how much of that was him and what might be getting lost in translation, etc. But I loved the dream-like quality to it and the plot was compelling enough to keep me turning the pages. I think I read it in less than a week. I have Kafka on the Shore here for the next time the mood strikes me.
His formula (the majority of his books are basically the same) really works in this one, for sure, so it's a good one to have picked up for your first Murakami. This is the one most HM fans tout as his best, with Kafka on the Shore a close second, so I'm looking forward to checking out Kafka, too.
@@LeafbyLeaf I've been interested in 1Q84. The little I know of it sounds like it might be different than his usual formula (multiple third person points of view being the big difference). Though, as you mentioned, Wind Up has some interesting stuff in the narration dept.
This is the first Murakami I read, almost 10 years ago, and to this day I frequently think about [SPOILERS] the guy getting flayed alive in the Mongolian desert, the guy who could never really enjoy life after being stuck down a well for days (personally I think this is because that psychic fellow soldier had told him he'd survive, rendering the experience hollow), and the teenage girl praying in the moonlight. But no other Murakami I've read since has been that memorable for me (apart from a creepy short story about some guy who claims to burn barns) - Kafka on the Shore was ok, and 1Q84 about 300 pages too long in my opinion.
To be honest I read this book and realized that Murakami might not be for me. I have read Kafka on the Shore and Norwegian Wood when I was younger, and I really enjoyed them, but I think Murakami is most suited to having younger protagonists, because I really didnt care about Mr. Okada. He seemed really juvenile in a way that is very unlikeable for a 30 year old, yet we are supposed to root for him. For example he was an unattentaive husband, and the fact that his wife left him was coming from a mile away, therefore I really couldnt get invested in the whole storyline of him getting his wife back. When I read the synopsis, I also assumed there would be more involving the Manchurian aspect of it, but I think that could have been fleshed out more, and played a more pivotal role, because that was the most interesting part of it. There were also a lot of story lines that I just did not care about, like the whole Nutmeg and Cinammon thing was really uninteresting to me (maybe because at this point I realized I wasnt enjoying the book and reading the last 100 or so pages so that I wouldnt dnf the book). I am not the type of person who dislikes magical realism, I think for me, I just cant get invested into his characters, and the characters that appear in the story. I guess that one could argue that Okada is schizophrenic, but at the same time, I just was not invested enough to really question things surrounding the story. I really think you did a great job reviewing the book, and I think you may have swayed my opinion to be more positive of the book, but at the same time, I have to stick to my conviction, and recognize how I felt while reading the book.
Great review. I love your bookshelfs, this room looks like a very comfy place to read a book in. Also your voice is so smooth and calming. Just one negative. You need to improve your audio a bit.
This has been on my list for years but I felt very burned by 1Q84. I remember finishing that book and wondering why I spent so much time reading it. perhaps I should give this author one last chance.
I'd say it depends on what you're looking for. I have not read 1Q84, but I know it's twice the size. I would approach this as leisure fiction. It's not a beach read--but it's not something that's going to expand your Final Vocabulary (as in Richard Rorty's conception) either. Hope that helps.
@@LeafbyLeaf it does, I would very much describe my reading of 1Q84 as floaty or light. This seems like a perfect summer novel. I was very into cold weather and winter when I was reading my struggle 1-5 so perhaps that may be the perfect time to try this book out. Like you said it's much smaller than 1Q84 so it's not such a commitment.
Ahhhh, My Struggle. I loved every book in that cycle. Amazing writer, that Karl Ove! Murakami and Knausgård are, of course, in two very different camps.
@@LeafbyLeaf there is something very special about my struggle, a man that you don't know is writing about the failings and mistakes of his life and yet you are instantly pulled in. He writes about failing as an author and by doing so becomes the best selling Norwegian author of all time. I am 200-ish pages onto hook 6 now.
Do you think this would be something of a masterpiece if the prose style was artistic? And for people wondering about things being 'lost in translation,' I've read that other Japanese writers dislike the Americanized Murakami because he writes with ease of mass translation in mind at the expense of art.
To tack onto the end of your comment: Murakami has also said that when he read his English translation, he thought, “Yes, that’s me!” Validating that the originally intended voice is coming through. To answer your question: Yes, I think this has all the trappings of a major genre work and adding a dimension of artistic prose style would certainly elevate it. He perfected a lot of things that now appear as “false starts” in the earlier books (Norwegian Wood excluded).
I’ll have to go back and listen for context. I think what I meant was that, since an elevated prose style isn’t the point of Murakami’s work, the book works well with his intentions. This is me using the proper rubric for an individual work.
The Wind-Up Bird Chronicles is Murakami’s best, his Masterpiece! As you said it’s with plots after plots, at times surreal happenings, but he continues to get the reader thinking along the lines of philosophy, psychology, & selfness …immortality with the women…way of killing, murdering …dark side of men… Thanks Chris, for the low down for your analysis 🧐! By the way, your insights & literally experiences really help me out, I’m not really into the literature of analyzing, but you are. Thanks 😊! By the way, did you get a copy of the Bersorah Yahusha Natsarim Version (BYNV) ? This copy restored the True Name YAHUAH instead of “the Lord”, & Yahusha instead of “Jesus “. Introduction of the BYNV outlines the full explanations! Lew White channel or eBay if you are interested. YAHUAH bless you & family!
My pleasure! I haven't checked out the Lew translation yet. I do have a Tree of Life Bible that retains all of the original Hebrew and Aramaic names of people and places, and seeks to be a more literal translation overall. It'll be interesting to compare the Lew. Thanks for letting me know about it!
@@LeafbyLeaf Great, Chris, Lew White in his Torah research, restored the True Name: YAHUAH instead of “the Lord” which means Baal & YAHUSHA instead of “Jesus “ which means Zeus or pig earth, a sun god. The BYNV is in the KJV format! Blessed YAHUAH with Love & Shalom!
Could be, although Murakami has said that when he has read the transactions in English he has been pleased; he thinks, yes this is me. He writes very simply so it is easy to translate since he has such a large anglophone fan base. Nonetheless I am still keeping an open mind.
@@LeafbyLeaf I'm saying that just because Murakami approves of the translations doesn't mean his works carry the same metaphor and analogy that they do in their original language. A lot of times I notice my friends who are less familiar with Japanese history/culture miss themes and motifs in Murakami's work - not because it's translated poorly but perhaps because it's not footnoted. . . . Once upon a time I read a book called "The Annotated Alice" It was Alice in Wonderland with footnotes and bibliography and I was surprised how much more I enjoyed the story after reading that - just speculating. I understand if Murakami just isn't your cup of tea. I have mixed feelings myself. His short stories I enjoy much more than his novels, 1Q84 excepted. I enjoyed this review
@@LeafbyLeaf I'll watch that next, I just recently finished Kokoro for the second time. I find as an older person (I read it first in college) I got so much more from that book. I had no proper appreciation for how things change until I myself became obsolete, lol
Haha! That’s a common feeling when reading great books again later in life. I urge people not to read Moby-Dick (for example) until they’re at lest 30, for the same reason.
I didn't like this book! Norwegian wood is his best novel for me. Definitely. Along with his books on the art of running and on writing. I also enjoyed 1Q84. The only book of murakami I haven't read is underground .
Whoa! I'm not sure if you've mentioned that before and I overlooked it, but you and I seem to be in a minority here. I, too, find NW to be his best so far (I've now read his first 9 novels). Quelle chance!
I’m glad you’re saying that this is his best because it’s the only one I’ve read by him and I found it charming but ultimately relatively tepid, especially stylistically. I ‘m a sucked for well crafted sentences and “le mot juste” and Murakami has none of that. Could be partially to do with translation of course but you can’t blame all of it on that.
A clarification: I don’t think this is his best. His best, in my opinion, is Norwegian Wood. And, you are correct about prose style. I would never recommend Murakami for the prose. You can tell that such aesthetics are deliberately not part of his brand-the opposite, in fact. But if you’re looking for well-crafted sentences and les mots justes, I can recommend quite a list of books (including just about all the other videos on this channel)! 😁
Leaf by Leaf haha yeh I’ve been exploring your suggestions on the channel and look forward to reading more! I do want to say though that style can be exhilarating and truthful while not beautiful (e.g. Hemingway), Murakami just does nothing for me... I might try Norweigan Wood some day though!
Wow ... I understand that you are getting "more and more selective" as you get older ... yet you have consigned yourself to read every single novel of a writer you clearly don't like that much. Especially given the more limited amount of time you have, wouldn't that mean you are actually getting less selective? 🤔 FWIW, I am 51 and only started reading Murakami last year. I would be hard pressed to think of another modern writer who is able to convey such powerful concepts in such a compelling and digestible manner ... which btw does not make it "mass entertainment" ... rather I'd say "popular among folks who read for a good reason."
Yeah, I didn’t really know what I was getting into when I imposed this challenge on myself. But outside of this I’m very selective. And I am starting to find that this is challenging me as a reader in a constructive way.
