Author: Haruki Murakami
Translator: Jay Rubin
Publisher: Vintage International 2000
I look up as I walk
So that the tears won’t fall
Remembering those spring days
And tonight, I am all alone
I look up as I walk
Counting the stars with tearful eyes
Remembering those summer days
And tonight, I am all alone
Happiness lies beyond the clouds
Happiness lies above the sky
I look up as I walk
So that the tears won’t fall
But the tears well up as I walk
For tonight, I am all alone.
Sukiyaki song — Kyu Sakamoto
Watanabe is a shy 19-year-old. He likes to read classics and enjoys listening to Jazz, and classical music. He is a straight talker and not very tactful with girls.
He has a problem. He gets attracted to his friend’s girlfriends. It is like a challenge for him. He has no interest in having a long-term relationship with other girls. If he can sleep with them easily, then he loses interest very fast.
Watanabe had a girlfriend when he was in high school. He broke up with her before moving to Tokyo to go to college. The reason why he wanted to end that relationship was that she was becoming serious. She slept with him. It was too easy.
Naoko was the girlfriend of his best friend in high school. When they went out, Watanabe went with them. Naoko would bring another girl for Watanabe, but he was not interested in meeting those other girls. He was attracted to Naoko.
Watanabe’s best friend committed suicide when he was only 17. Then he lost all contacts with Naoko.
In Tokyo, Watanabe moves into an all-male dormitory where he meets smart and rich Nagasawa who is studying to be in the foreign service.
Meanwhile, Watanabe ran into Naoko in Tokyo and started to see each other. Long story short, Watanabe finally managed to sleep with Naoko. He remembers her cry as the saddest sound of orgasm he had ever heard. However, she disappears soon afterwards.
Watanabe goes with Nagasawa when he goes out with his girlfriend Hatsumi. Watanabe finds Hatsumi attractive. Another challenge. He refuses to meet any of Hatsumi’s friends.
Nagasawa is not committed to Hatsumi, however. He goes out and find other girls for one-night stands. Watanabe too goes with him and sleeps with several girls. However, He gets bored with sleeping with strange girls. His longing for Naoko intensifies.
The day Nagasawa passed the foreign service exam, he, Hatsumi and Watanabe goes to a fancy restaurant to celebrate. Hatsumi could not tolerate Nagasawa’s boasting of sleeping with other girls. She asks Watanabe to take her home. So, he did, but he could not and did not sleep with her. She remained another challenge for him. Years later, when he heard that Hatsumi committed suicide, he terminated all connections with Nagasawa.
He meets Midori, a daughter of a bookshop owner, at the college. They enjoy each other’s company and continues to meet regularly. However, Midori has a boyfriend, and she does not want to sleep with Watanabe. Midori became his newest challenge.
Watanabe found out that Naoko lives in a sanatorium and goes there to see her. But she does not want “anybody going inside her again”. Watanabe now has two challenges: Naoko and Midori.
His selfish behavior threatens both relationships. An older woman that he met at the sanatorium may be his only hope of growing up.
Murakami’s writing style is poetic and extremely pleasing to read. I stopped reading and listened to every song whenever he mentioned a song in this book. The above-mentioned Sukiyaki song by Kyu Sakamoto is one of them.
No comments:
Post a Comment