Chapter 8 break down barriers of isolation

(Editor's note: The New York Times commissioned this long-form interview with Murakami by Jay McInerney, a member of PEN International and an American writer who has written novels set in Japan. Differences, the relationship between Eastern and Western cultures, personal writing pursuits, etc. This article has been abridged.) On my way to do an interview with Haruki Murakami, I happened to walk past the awning at the theater where "Why I Hate Hamlet" was being played, and it struck me.This reminds me of the invitation letter we sent to Haruki Murakami, calling him the successor of Yukio Mishima.This preconceived notion may be called an apt expression of ignorance of recent developments in Japanese fiction.Haruki Murakami is similar to Mishima mainly because they are both Japanese, but other similarities are very far-fetched.Mishima is one of the outstanding Romantic writers, a heroic tragedian, an intellectual, an esthete, a man soaked in Western culture, but at the end of his life, he transformed into a Japanese militarist. By.

And Haruki Murakami, I think, even when he's writing about the more uncanny subjects—such as his obsession with sheep—his feelings involve a skepticism of reality.His narrator is necessarily everyman, a contemporary Tokyo counterpart, a city man in his thirties who works his way into unflappable white-collar jobs like advertising and public relations; he is, to some extent, a passive person , I have no expectations for life, no matter what happens, I will treat it with a dull and calm attitude.His motto might be "no fuss".Like the vast majority of Japanese people, the typical Murakami character considers himself to be purely middle-of-the-road. To quote Mr. Murakami’s novel, he comes from an “ordinary family” that is “not particularly rich, not particularly poor. There is an affordable ordinary house, a small Courtyard, Toyota Crown.” However, unexpected things are likely to happen to the anti-heroes in Mr. Murakami’s novels.Girlfriend committed suicide.Friends become sheep.The beloved elephant disappeared without a trace.However, if they want to make a fortune by chance, they must be cursed.

Mr. Murakami's protagonists are on the fringes, at arm's length from a society that demands total commitment from its members, and they are only willing to float on the fringes of society.This rejection of the collective must have enormous appeal to contemporary Japanese readers.This is not to say that his work does not have the same appeal for us, but it clearly represents a break with the themes of previous generations of Murakami, such as Yasunari Kawabata's world-weary aesthetes, Junichiro Tanizaki's rigid aristocrats, and Mishima tortured youth. McInerney: When you started writing professionally, did it ever occur to you to rebel against old Japanese writers like Mishima?We are all familiar with the influence anxiety and patricide of the young writer; the father must be killed to make room for the sons.

Haruki Murakami: In Japan, the three important writers of the generation before me are Mishima, Kobo Abe and Kenzaburo Oe.Among them, I must say that I like Abe the most and Mishima the least.I have barely read Mishima, so I don't think there is much resemblance between me and Mishima. I have no sense of rebellion against previous generations of writers, or betrayal of writers such as Kawabata and Tanizaki.If there is a difference, I think it should be more precisely said that it has nothing to do with these writers.I mean, I never read any Japanese novels with real interest until I started writing novels at the age of 29. When I was a teenager in Kobe in the 1960s, I found that I didn't like Japanese novelists very much, so I made up my mind not to read them.American culture was alive and well at the time. Its music, TV shows, cars, clothes, everything really influenced me.It's not that the Japanese adore America, it's that we just love that culture.So bright, so bright, it seems like a fantasy world at times.We love that fantasy world.Only America could afford that illusion in those days.

I was an only child, and when I was thirteen or fourteen, I was alone in my room listening to American jazz and rock, watching American TV, and reading American novels.Kobe is a port city and there are a lot of used bookstores, and I had no trouble getting very cheap American paperbacks.It's like opening a treasure chest.I mostly read hard-boiled detective stories and science fiction—Raymond Chandler or Ed McBain or Mickey Spillane. Later, I discovered Scott Fitzgerald and Truman Capote.They are so different from Japanese writers.They opened a small window in the wall of my room.I think that my experience is destined to be similar to that of the Argentine writer Manuel Puig, who grew up in the environment of obsessing with Hollywood movies and later embarked on the road of novel writing.

McInerney: I think there are some common features that can explain the younger generation of Japanese writers.It seems to me that we all have a fairly common frame of reference, a deposit of international popular culture—low culture, as Lionel Trilling would roughly call it—but which, for better or for worse, seems to be Writers in Italy, Sweden, Japan, and the United States provided common touchstones. I think serious American writers still don't feel comfortable dealing with film, TV, and rock and roll.I don't see this restraint in the younger generation of Japanese writers.I wonder if this is partly and somewhat paradoxically derived from the island loneliness and sense of difference that Japanese people feel from time to time.I could sense a piercing urge to cross the gulf that separates Japan from the rest of the world with the most readily available weapons.

Haruki Murakami: Yes, very correct.At this level, it may be somewhat non-ethnic, but it is not what I am pursuing.If that's what I'm after, I thought maybe I'd have to set the story in America.If I actually set the story in New York and San Francisco, it would be easier to write. But, you know, my first quest was to write about Japanese society in reverse, through the other side of what was happening in New York and San Francisco.You might as well call it the Japanese nature, the kind of thing that you throw at one another, all those things that look very "Japanese" when piled up.I think my novels will go more and more in this direction.

As a teenager, I thought how awesome it would be if I could write novels in English.I can feel that if I write that way, it will be more straightforward than if I write in Japanese.However, with my limited English proficiency, it is impossible.I struggled for a long time before barely writing my first novel in Japanese.That's why I didn't write a novel until I was 29. Because I had to create, create by myself a new Japanese language in which to write my novels.I cannot borrow from existing languages.On that level, I think I'm original.Raymond Chandler was my idol in the 1960s.I read "The Long Farewell" a dozen times.His protagonists are all independent, and I was impressed by the way they lived alone.They are lonely but looking for a decent life.

As you know, Japan is an extremely group-conscious society, and it's hard to be independent.Many people, especially young people, want to be more independent, but it is difficult, and they suffer from feelings of loneliness.I think this is one of the reasons why young readers support my work. McInerney: The protagonists of your work always have a certain personality, which is similar to Raymond Chandler's protagonists, suspicious, cynical, living somewhere outside of society.But he doesn't necessarily see himself as a rebel soberly. Haruki Murakami: Stylistically, I definitely borrow a lot from Chandler.It's been 10 years since I wrote that book, and I've changed a lot since then.I must say that it was very difficult to transpose Chandler's style into Japanese.First of all, Japanese and English convey completely different cultural concepts.But this is exactly what I am actually trying to do, to update concepts while replacing language.

My contemporaries and I tried to create a new language.Tanizaki once wrote that the Japanese language is completely different from English or other Western languages, and it is somehow more beautiful than Western languages.This beauty should be protected with great care, he said.Tanizaki is a very good novelist, a great man, but I disagree with him because one language is not better than another.His statement is wrong. McInerney: But Tanizaki is certainly not that extraordinary in terms of the superiority of the Japanese language.There is by no means a minority in Japan who feel that there is something peculiar about the Japanese character which cannot cross the barrier of translation.Moreover, this sentiment is often expressed through a cultural imperialism that sees Japan as a special place.One of the characteristics of your work, and that of some of your contemporaries, is the rejection of this notion.

Haruki Murakami: Many Japanese believe that their language is so unique that foreigners cannot grasp its essence, beauty and delicacy.Moreover, if a foreigner claims that he has captured the essence, no one believes him.One reason they think so is because Japan has never been invaded by other countries except for a short period of occupation after World War II.Its culture is not threatened by other cultures.So the Japanese language is always isolated.isolated for about two thousand years.This is why the Japanese are so sure of its uniqueness, nature, structure and function. I think what some young Japanese writers are doing is trying to break and destroy this obstinacy, to rebel against this affirmation.I lived on an island in Greece for a few years, and it was a very small island, but everyone I greeted said, "I drive a Nissan. It's a nice car." Tired, but I realize that Nissan, Casio, Seiko, Honda, or Sony are the only Japanese words they know, the only Japanese things they know.They don't know anything about Japanese culture, Japanese literature, Japanese music, or anything like that.So I think we have to do something to break this isolation that the Japanese have cherished for a long time. I think what young Japanese writers are doing is trying to reconstruct our language.We appreciate the beauty and delicacy of the language Mishima employs, but those days are long gone.I should do something new.What we are doing is breaking down the barriers of isolation so that we can talk to the rest of the world in our own language.There should be a central place where we can go and exchange information with people from other cultures. People have to have self-respect, and that self-respect comes from your ability to express yourself freely to other people.The Japanese people achieved material victories all over the world, but they did not speak culturally to other peoples, and as a result, they did not regain their sense of pride.They've always wondered if something went wrong.Now they start to reflect on themselves.The Japanese government is very active in cultural exchange activities, organizing projects to introduce Kabuki and Noh to other parts of the world.However, Kabuki and Noh, although very fine arts and traditional forms, belong to the past and cannot speak to contemporary Japanese. McInerney: I would imagine that there might be some degree of outrage in the Japanese literary world about your popularity and your refusal to acknowledge certain traditions in Japanese literature.What do older and more traditional Japanese critics think of your work? Haruki Murakami: Very simple.They don't like me.There is a struggle between generations in the Japanese literary world.There is a strong sense of hierarchy in Japanese literature, and you have to work your way up from the bottom.Once you've reached the top, you've become judges of other writers.You read each other's work and give each other awards.But the high-ranking people may not really care about the efforts of young writers who are climbing. As soon as my first novel came out, they said that Japanese literature was in decline.It's not actually a decline, it's just a change.Many people don't like change.Older writers live in a very closed world where they don't really know what's going on.