The thing about Murakami, apart from the melancholy and the emotion, not counting how immediately I take in many of his pop culture references for granted into my own life, given the philosophical undertones, the thing about Murakami is the normalisation of the strange. He does it with such ease, such remarkable flow, such passion and such nonchalance, that sometimes I just have to sit back and read it over and over again.
On some days, in some moments, some things just make sense. Like the gorilla in Dance, Dance, Dance. (Or was it Wild Sheep Chase? The books blur into each other in my head.) The way it walks into the room and put him to sleep. Or what he says about the scenery in his memory in Norwegian Wood. They just come back to you. What's even better, are the things that stay. Things that are left unfinished in your head, things that he says offhandedly, things that stew.
For me, Murakami is someone who comforts me, someone I read when I'm lonely. Someone who makes me enjoy my moments of darkness; inspires it, even. And the reason I want to go to Japan sometime in life, the only reason I want to visit Tokyo is so I can go to his cafe (in my head, it's a quaint little place - like the cafe in which Elvis plays in the Hitchhiker's Guide), where there are musicians in a corner, doing their own thing. A place with pretty lights and a prettier view, a place made solely out of corner tables.
The thing about Murakami, the real thing about him, is that he makes emptiness okay, and loneliness a way of life. And that's why I love reading him.
On some days, in some moments, some things just make sense. Like the gorilla in Dance, Dance, Dance. (Or was it Wild Sheep Chase? The books blur into each other in my head.) The way it walks into the room and put him to sleep. Or what he says about the scenery in his memory in Norwegian Wood. They just come back to you. What's even better, are the things that stay. Things that are left unfinished in your head, things that he says offhandedly, things that stew.
For me, Murakami is someone who comforts me, someone I read when I'm lonely. Someone who makes me enjoy my moments of darkness; inspires it, even. And the reason I want to go to Japan sometime in life, the only reason I want to visit Tokyo is so I can go to his cafe (in my head, it's a quaint little place - like the cafe in which Elvis plays in the Hitchhiker's Guide), where there are musicians in a corner, doing their own thing. A place with pretty lights and a prettier view, a place made solely out of corner tables.
The thing about Murakami, the real thing about him, is that he makes emptiness okay, and loneliness a way of life. And that's why I love reading him.
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