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Haruki Murakami: The Moment I Became a Novelist

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Re: Haruki Murakami: The Moment I Became a Novelist

#31

Post by jasim »

evjan wrote: post #6

This epiphany he writes about sounds almost religious in nature. Did he really not consider writing before that? Does his memory fail him, is this a memory construct that makes for a good story but doesn’t hint at what really happened? I’ve never experienced anything like this myself. I often tell people, when asked about why I do what I do, that I knew I wanted to be a software developer at the age of 10. But it was…

It seems that the magical realism that make his work potent also runs through his self-narrative. As is always the case in honest fiction, the line between the words and the wordsmith is quite blurry.

Re: Haruki Murakami: The Moment I Became a Novelist

#32

Post by evjan »

minikomi wrote: post #20
oska wrote: post #18

Small anecdote: I was living in Taiwan in 1999 and found an English translation of Pinball, 1973 in a bookshop there. It was a Kodansha imprint, for English learners I think. Anyway, I'd already read a number of Murakami books by that time ( Wild Sheep Chase , Dance, Dance, Dance and Wind-up Bird Chronicle ), and enjoyed them so I snapped it up. It was an ok read but far from his best (which for me, still remains Win…

Oh wow I think I have this! It has a glossary in the back to see what Japanese words the English came from. I really liked that idea. Also, Pinball is probably my favorite work of his because all the pieces which appear in later books - cooking, whiskey, the rat, nonplussed antagonist - appear but the book reads like a weird kind of sketch rather than a fully filled in painting.

I wonder when somebody will put together a book called Murakami's Kitchen - The Collected Recipes From All His Books

Re: Haruki Murakami: The Moment I Became a Novelist

#33

Post by whiddershins »

octatoan wrote: post #29

What would be a good introduction to his work?

I have this (obviously poetic) theory there are two kinds of people (just how most people gravitate towards either New York or LA, not both) ... some people prefer "Hardboiled Wonderland and the End of The World," some prefer "Wind Up Bird Chronicles."

Re: Haruki Murakami: The Moment I Became a Novelist

#35

Post by wsc981 »

cmgani wrote: post #34

This should not be of interest to HN readers.

Why shouldn't it be? In past "Ask HN" topics when people asked for book recommendations, often[0][1][2][3][4] this author's books were recommended.

---

[0]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4967473

[1]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3395576

[2]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8717697

[3]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7968586

[4]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1632993

Re: Haruki Murakami: The Moment I Became a Novelist

#36

Post by coldtea »

evjan wrote: post #6

This epiphany he writes about sounds almost religious in nature. Did he really not consider writing before that? Does his memory fail him, is this a memory construct that makes for a good story but doesn’t hint at what really happened? I’ve never experienced anything like this myself. I often tell people, when asked about why I do what I do, that I knew I wanted to be a software developer at the age of 10. But it was…

>This epiphany he writes about sounds almost religious in nature. Did he really not consider writing before that? Does his memory fail him, is this a memory construct that makes for a good story but doesn’t hint at what really happened? I’ve never experienced anything like this myself.

Depends on the person. Life-changing decisions do come like that to some people (usually stuff I think about for months or years I never go anywhere with, whereas decisions I take in the moment, I do carry through).

>Except of course when I turned 13 and got into playing rock music on my guitar. I spent the next 7 years feeling lost, because I really wanted to be a musician but the career opportunities seemed unfeasible. It wasn’t until after a brief stint as a data entry clerk in the UK that I came to the conclusion that I needed to get my shit together and go to uni.

Coincidentally Elvis Costello took the inverse path: working as a data entry clerk he decided he wouldn't take it and followed a career in rock.

So, perhaps people who went to do those more unconventional things have more unconventional "deciding moments"?

Re: Haruki Murakami: The Moment I Became a Novelist

#37

Post by coldtea »

howlingfantods wrote: post #9

Among my group of friends, I've found that everyone's favorite Murakami book is always the first or second they read. After you read a couple, they all start sounding the same. Another angsty young man searches for a girl with serious emotional issues, and there's some metaphor heavy dream sequences and talking animals along the way. I haven't read his recent books but I've read five books of his and it was really ti…

>Another angsty young man searches for a girl with serious emotional issues, and there's some metaphor heavy dream sequences and talking animals along the way. I haven't read his recent books but I've read five books of his and it was really tiresome, repetitive reading after book 2-3

So? Unlike, say, detective fiction, literature is never about the plot, only about the way the story is told and what it carries with it.

Re: Haruki Murakami: The Moment I Became a Novelist

#38

Post by coldtea »

616c wrote: post #24
howlingfantods wrote: post #9

Among my group of friends, I've found that everyone's favorite Murakami book is always the first or second they read. After you read a couple, they all start sounding the same. Another angsty young man searches for a girl with serious emotional issues, and there's some metaphor heavy dream sequences and talking animals along the way. I haven't read his recent books but I've read five books of his and it was really ti…

Or rather: I am so sick of reading about your calendar/planning startup. It is a company with similar people, using similar technology, doing similar things for the same amount of money and cultural mindshare. Sure everyone likes you as you are the new kid on the block, but can you disrupt some other thing you do not enjoy for the sake of your consumer? You are really boring me. No one ask Van Gogh to paint another S…

>No one ask Van Gogh to paint another Starry Night, man. (It is this quite, oft-repeated by my parents, that makes me thinks Jodie Mitchell is a true genius).

That's because he wasn't that famous when he lived anyway. If he had any success, art dealers would ask him to paint "another Starry night" all the time.

Besides, it's not like his work is composed of paintings entirely unlike each other. In that sense, he already has like 10-15 Starry nights.

(Constrast with Picasso, who had several entirely different periods of work).

Re: Haruki Murakami: The Moment I Became a Novelist

#40

Post by coldtea »

cmgani wrote: post #34

This should not be of interest to HN readers.

How can someone pretending to know what "should be of interest to HN readers" not know that:

1) HN readers, as a collective and as subgroups, have many and varied intellectual interests, including literature.

2) It's our voting that defines what "is of interest" to HN readers, and this had been voted to the front page and received lots of comments.

So, unlike the story of Murakami, your comment couldn't be more removed to both the spirit and the mechanics of HN.

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