Book Notes: Haruki Murakami and the Music of Words

Haruki Murakami is my favorite Japanese writer and one of my favorite contemporary writers. So I finally got around to reading Jay Rubin’s (one of Murakami’s English translators) excellent critical commentary on the work of Murakami called Haruki Murakami and the Music of Words. In the book, he chronicles Murakami’s career and comments on his stories and novels, his translations of various American writers, his life before and after becoming a writer, as well as discussing the translation process itself. I was surprised to hear that some countries used the English translation to translate his books into another language, as was the case with the German version of The Wind-up Bird Chronicle. I’ve also recently learned that a colleague of mine, at Toyo University (different campus-Kawagoe) Matthew Stretcher was one of a group of Graduate students at the University of Washington (my alma mater) in the Japanese Literature Ph. D. program, which also included Jay Rubin and Philip Gabriel-Murakami’s other main translator. Stretcher has also written a critical study on Murakami, which I’d like to read a t some point. It was interesting to learn that Murakami had visited the UW in 1992 when I was a student there and had yet to read his work. There’s a description where talks about being approached by a couple reverent Japanese college girls while having beers with the grad students at the Big Time Brewery on the Ave not far from where I lived while in college. All in all an informative, illuminating, and thoughtful look at Murakami the man and his work.

Incidently, there's a symposium on Murakami and his writing, but unfortunately I'll be in Shanghai during his talks.

Comments

[Anders]

Despite the fact that he drinks at the Big Time could you recomend one of his books for a first time reader?

[MC]

Of course I only drink at the College In Pub (gratuitous plug) when I'm in the U-District. I think the short story collection The Elephant Vanishes is the best place to start since it will give you a good overview and an idea of what he's all about. One of the stories in that collection eventually turned into the novel The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle-which I think is his best novel.

Anders you might also be inpressed to hear that he has translated Raymon Carver and F. Scott Fitzgerald, among others, into Japanese.

[Anders]

Thanks Pat. And by the way, happy birthday.

[MC]

Cheers, thanks.