Haruki Murakami
Haruki Murakami
Haruki Murakamiis a contemporary Japanese writer. His books and stories have been bestsellers in Japan as well as internationally, with his work being translated into 50 languages and selling millions of copies outside his native country. The critical acclaim for his fiction and non-fiction has led to numerous awards, in Japan and internationally, including the World Fantasy Awardand the Frank O'Connor International Short Story Award. His oeuvre received, for example, the Franz Kafka Prizeand the Jerusalem Prize...
NationalityJapanese
ProfessionWriter
Date of Birth12 January 1949
CountryJapan
I may not be the most likable person in the world, but I try not to upset people.
I think certain types of processes don’t allow for any variation. If you have to be part of that process, all you can do is transform—or perhaps distort—yourself through that persistent repetition, and make that process a part of your own personality.
Whenever I get into something, I shut out everything else.
You know what it’s like when you’re trying to fall asleep and it only makes you more wide awake?
It seemed to me that this world has a serious shortage of both logic and kindness.
Like a Chinese box, the world of the novel contained smaller worlds, and inside those were yet smaller worlds. Together, these worlds made up a single universe, and the universe waited there in the book to be discovered by the reader.
My grandpa always said asking a question is embarrassing for a moment, but not asking is embarrassing for a lifetime.
In order to pin down reality as realilty, we need another reality to relativize the first. Yet that other reality requires a third reality to serve as its grounding. An endless chain is created within our consciousness, and it is the maintenance of this chain which produces the sensation that we are actually here, that we ourselves exist.
To be able to grasp something of value, sometimes you have to perform seemingly inefficient acts.
Some people can work their butts off and never get what they're aiming for while others can get it without any effort at all.
I'm the kind of person who has to totally commit to whatever I do.
You have to make an effort to always look at the good side, always think about the good things. Then you've got nothing to be afraid of. If something bad comes up, you do more thinking at that point.
It's just a feeling I have. What you see with your eyes is not necessarily real. My enemy is, among other things, the me inside me.
I want to write stories that are different from the ones I've written so far, Junpei thought: I want to write about people who dream and wait for the night to end, who long for the light so they can hold the ones they love. But right now I have to stay here and keep watch over this woman and this girl. I will never let anyone-not anyone-try to put them into that crazy box- not even if the sky should fall or the earth crack open with a roar.