“One other thing is that in Japan, my books—and often me personally—were sometimes severely criticized. My basic attitude is that I’m an imperfect person writing imperfect works, so it doesn’t matter what people say, and I haven’t worried much about others’ opinions; but at the time I was still young, and when I heard these criticisms they often struck me as totally unfair. Criticism even ventured into my private life, my family, with things written that were totally untrue, and some personal attacks as well. “Why do people have to say those kinds of things?” I wondered, finding it all more puzzling than unpleasant.
Looking back on it now, I get the feeling this was the Japanese literary world (writers, critics, editors, etc.) at the time venting its frustration. The result of the discontent and gloominess inside the literary industry toward the rapid decline in the presence and influence of the so-called mainstream (pure literature). In other words, a gradual paradigm shift was taking place. People in publishing, though, found this cultural meltdown lamentable and they couldn’t stand it. Many of them thought of my works, and my very existence, as “one of the causes that “has hurt and destroyed the way things should be” and, like white blood cells attacking a virus, tried to drive me out. That’s the feeling I got. For my part, I felt that if the likes of me could damage them, then the problem lay more with them than with me.
“Haruki Murakami’s works are merely a rehash of foreign literature,” I often hear. “The only place they’ll be read is in Japan.” I never ever thought of what I write as “a rehash of foreign literature”; rather, it was an attempt to use the tools of Japanese to actively seek and search for new possibilities—so to tell the truth I saw these remarks as a challenge, that whether my works were read and appreciated abroad would be a kind of test. I’m not really the type of personality who hates to lose, but when I’m not convinced by something I do tend to pursue it until I am.”
“Also, if my work is centered more on foreign countries, then there will be less of a need to deal with the troublesome domestic literary industry. Then they can say what they want and I can just ignore it. This possibility was another reason I decided to focus on doing my best abroad. If you think about it, since criticism within Japan was the opportunity for me to start up activities abroad, you might conversely say I was lucky to be disparaged in that way. It’s the same in every world, but nothing’s more scary than a backhanded compliment.
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“The thing that made me happiest when I published my books abroad was how many people (both readers and critics) said my books were really “original,” unlike anything by any other novelists. Whether they praised the works or not, the basic consensus was that “this writer’s style is totally unlike any other’s.” This assessment was quite different from that in Japan, and it made me very happy. To say that I was original, that I had my own special style—for me nothing could be higher praise.
But when my books started to sell abroad—or I should say when they found out my books were selling abroad—now people in Japan started saying, “Murakami’s books sell abroad because they’re written in easy-to-translate language, about things foreigners can easily understand.” When I heard this I was a bit disgusted. “Isn’t this the exact opposite of what you were saying before?” But I figured there was nothing I could do about it. All I could conclude was that there are a certain number of people in the world who check which way the wind’s blowing and make casual, completely unfounded remarks.”
>All I could conclude was that there are a certain number of people in the world who check which way the wind’s blowing and make casual, completely unfounded remarks.”
IQfy on suicide watch.
98% of IQfy, no exaggeration
I enjoyed this. Thanks for posting. Imagine how much seethe this roast must have caused his enemies, lol.
I read it as a warning to observe the nature and biases of negative criticism because seldom is the critic forward thinking in assessment or prognosis. But, while he is essentially the God of Japanese literature now, he was a newcomer in a wave of edgy pop lit back in the 80s. I don't think the old guard understood any of it but were right in some regards, just not about any of the named particulars of his work.
Now reviews treat him as a kind of novelty instead, which I think also misses the point.
>seldom is the critic forward thinking in assessment or prognosis
Yes, probably true.
I like Murakami and I can't find the excerpt in OP anywhere else but here, not that I've checked exhaustively. But if it is true, I don't think the publishers and critics are the ones seething. It has been years since I read it, but the Air Chrysalis plotline in 1Q84 still immediately floated to the top of my mind. This is the same guy who wrote hundreds of pages about owning critics and publishers with a hoax novel by a moronic girl.
It's from Novelist as a Vocation.
Oh, they're definitely seething. There's nothing worse than being forced to squirm in the fashion he's made them. They put their, supposed, professional opinions out there, were forced by his success to double-talk, and then to have this interview calmly and rationally nail them to the wall for their duplicitous, pretensions—brutal. No one with any self-respect could bear that without great discomfort, and the mere fact they've already double-talked their own criticisms reveals their prideful nature, so they are definitely seething.
The only telling act in the whole affair is when critics
make negative accusations instead of ignore the whole thing. You ignore things that are beneath you instead of giving them power. So he's either worthy of criticism or the critics are shit and miss the point entirely. It's the age old question of whether popular means good, and most popular media goes ignored or is treated differently. It's like when Bloom made the mistake of elevating Rowling and made her worthy of criticism.
>the basic consensus was that “this writer’s style is totally unlike any other’s.”
I agree with the quote, but I agree with the Japanese critics too.
I've read The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle and the style/vibe is very unique (the sort of magical realism in contemporary Japan), but then you have parts of the book that are so bad; Cinnamon and Nutmeg aren't developed and basically just appear to give the house with the dry well to Okada, I also hated how Boris reappeared in the gulag and it's a magical villain just because (you can pretty much remove the whole second act of Boris and the Lieutenant and the book will improve).
The style/vibe of a Murakami's book is amazing, but he needs to write better.
my man is vibes over all, and I respect him pursuing that even if some of his stuff doesn't work for me because of it
Did you read the book in translation? Because then you don't really get a say in this.
I could quote some autor that would support what Murakami said here... and IQfy wont like.
But, i will just say that not only his taste for jazz links him to the likes of Casiopea. And that all that was a main part of those japanese cultural wonder years (from 70s to mid 90s).
Go ahead, I found the whole excerpt interesting because it's the opposite of his western critics. it's hitler, isn't it?
In the passage before this, he speculated that the critics were butthurt over the bubble years diminishing the popularity of "pure literature" and that he was the largest target of the more pop sensibility. I think it's because he highlights how westernized japan was then.
Crabs in a bucket effect. Murakami sticks out and he's super successful. Of course they don't like that.
>Murakami sticks out and he's super successful.
I get why he is and like his work, but I also find him heavily overrated by people who don't know why it sticks out and captivates, and underrated by anyone who has no affinity for the symbolic or sense of humor.
I read a selection of modern Japanese literature, Murakami was like the only who tried to do something ambitious or clever. That's kinda how lit is across the world tbh. You get one actually exciting author and he'll rise to the top because the other choices are so samey
I feel that way about the humor writers like Christopher Moore, who is somehow still a bestseller. Or more outright absurd ones like Tom Robbins. Villa Incognito was the closest thing to Murakami I read 20 years ago, and even that is stretching definitions of closeness.
>he's super successful
>super
what a reddit thing to say
It's funny, Murakami manages to be honest and not so honest at the same time the way he is orginal and not original at the same time. Or at least that's my impression.
How is he not honest?
His work shows a conflict between honesty and escapism (or survival strategies). He will move in the direction of honesty, but at some point his honesty becomes threating to his persona, and then he generally choses survival strategies (avoidance, escapism, fantasy) over truth. Like, in an essay about his first novel he describes in detail his method, challanges and doubts, but he leaves out how he was obviously imitating Brautigan and Vonnegut (even using a Kilgore Trout equivalent). This influence was also pointed out by Kenzaburo Oe (one of his early critics) when the book was first published. Well, of course it's his right to leave things out (and it also follows Bloom's classic anxiety of influence), but at the same time he cultivates that authorial persona of "Look, I'm an honest and humble narrator of my life." (Also explicit in the narrator of Norwegian Wood who stresses his honesty.) But is there a little bit of truth in the accusation of a certain derivativeness in his work? I guess there is. But instead of confronting it straight he conjures up these defensive explanations about a paradigm shift. It's just a general pattern in his work in that at points he chooses comfort over threatening truth, with isekai scenarios and dream worlds and wishfulfilment narratives (not saying it's a bad thing).
>It's just a general pattern in his work in that at points he chooses comfort over threatening truth, with isekai scenarios and dream worlds and wishfulfilment narratives
I would say that he does a very difficult thing where he uses that escapism to explore the subconscious side of the real truth in a way that isn't so straightforward or allegorical as it is usually presented. That has little to do with hiding some of his more obvious early influences or being less than straightforward about his intents and methods, but I think it indicates that there is more to it than being outright derivative or dishonest.
>he cultivates that authorial persona of "Look, I'm an honest and humble narrator of my life."
Does he? He's humble about writing, but it's very clear that he's using the preception and expectations of I-novel to stage something else. I-novels are expected to be honest and real and have an author as narrator. His works aren't that at all and while he inserts into the narrators, they aren't him. Maybe he stole that from Vonnegut as well.
I am the Japan
I have seen Murakami in maid cafe serving beer in frilly dress in Akiba
Very much the disgusting appearances
His book read like cheeseburger
He's not a writer of Japanese literature.
What's Japanese literature?
I wish there was a talented version of Murakami.
There is. It’s Kobo Abe.
The idea of a talented Murakami is an oxymoron because his whole appeal is his ‘Murakami man’ protagonist who is an underachiever. His slacker protagonists are what make his novels so comfy. A talented Murakami would be incapable of writing such a character
The critics are right in that Murakami's work is very derivative of western literature. I read the first chapters of Norwegian Wood and while they were entertaining, I can't comprehend why it gets all that critical acclaim. And this acclaim becomes more doubtful because is easy for a publisher/agent to buy that and because it's Japanese, so it has that "exotic" appeal/mystique that intrigues the western public and weebs. There have been other Japanese authors, like Akutawaga, that were influenced by western works, but that influence didn't permeate their works as heavily as it does with Murakami's.
>read the first chapters
Pseud, shut up. Also, Norwegian Wood is one of his worst novels. Besides, how can you claim they're derivative when you don't speak Japanese, haven't lived in Japan, and are altogether unqualified to exclude Japanese literary influences? You can't.
>ad hominem
calm down Black person
Way to deflect from the argument, pseud. Thanks for proving me right.
there's no argument to begin with, dumb jogger