This is the first and only Murakami novel I've read so far and I want to understand it better. I think I understand the general theme of personal quest and the search for oneself and their place in life, but there are a few things I'm confused about;
>Who/what were they and what purpose did Johnny Walker/Colonel Sanders serve? Were they just there to make sure the characters did what they were supposed to?
>What exactly happened to Nakata on that field trip to make him able to talk to cats and have half a shadow?
>Was the forest near Oshima's cabin a kind of metaphor for the sensation of loss and misdirection that Kafka was feeling? What did that little village with the young Saeki represent? A longing to relive the old days?
>What did the two WW2 soldiers represent?
>Was the boy named Crow some sort of alter ego of Kafka? The kind of person he wanted to be?
>Why did Nakata believe he killed Johnny Walker only to find it was Kafka's father? Why did he see someone different?
>>8088830
I don't think there are canon answers to these questions, fampai. You'll have to form your own or rely on someone else's thoughts.
I recall reading some Murakami Q&A where he literally said it took a lot of inspiration out of dreams, so don't expect it to make a whole lot of sense in some aspects.
Some of my shitty conclusions:I think Nakata's spirit/whatever was divided into two when he and the other students went through the mass fainting, losing half his shadow and most of his intelligence. I have no idea why he became able to talk to cats though.The other half of his was passed onto Kafka (somehow) and became the Crow, which would explain why Nakata and Kafka were drawn towards one another and why the latter "felt" his father get killed by the former. I think its thanks to being one and a half person that Kafka was in top condition both mentally and physically.The librarian lady (i forgot her name) is indeed Kafka's mother and the oedipal prophecy his father threw at him ended up being right. One of the cats Nakata talks to mentions he met someone similar to him (talking about his shadow) some time before meeting him and i think it was Kafka's mother. We don't know if she has half a shadow like him but no one ever takes note of it. We DO know that she was also incomplete after coming back from the hidden village.
I may be saying a lot of shit wrong, its been 3 years since i read it.
Murakami is the worst kind of writer
he tricks you into thinking he might be doing something 'important', but unlike the postmodernists he emulates he never engages anything real, it is a bunch of wankery with a head completely in the clouds
How do you know a book is shit in one simple step:Peoplewho'vereaditfeeltheobligationtoincludespoileralerts,inordernottoruintheexperienceforthosewhohadn't
>>8090247
You're completely right about his latest stuff. His earlier books are a lot more down to earth.
He never stopped wanking to his pretentious musical/literary tastes by projecting them into his books though, and it gets really fucking irritating.
>>8090272
Not to mention the endless fucking cuckholding. But that seems to be a generally Japanese thing.
>>8090247
I like it.
>meaning in any murakami book
AAAAAYYYY LMAO MY FRIEND
You got memed, I've read all Murakami books because retards on /lit/ kept saying 'HURR IT GETS BETTER WITH NON FICTION/FICTION/ETC" .
Basically that bastard nip just writes down whatever incest fantasy he has at the moment, add cats and 'supernatural' shit that never develops into anything, he just makes up random shit with no meaning
>>8090254
how to know somebody is autistic
this post
>>8088830
It doesn't take a Murakami expert to tell that he just made up some vaguely controversial-sounding shit on the fly and never had any intention of making sense of it.
