The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle : A Novel

Rating:
Summary: Subtler than it seems
Review: -
Nothing happens.

The thought always comes to mind when I think of "The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle". It's not literally true, but it is perhaps the quickest summary of what impresses me so much about the book. Tumultuous events surround Toru Okada, yet in the course of the book he rarely leaves his own neighborhood, and stays mostly in his own block. For a good part of the story it seems that he is a passive receptacle for the stories of the bizarre characters who enter his life. His wife disappears, and for a long time his only response seems to be waiting for others to help him.

Nothing happens. Or: the journey is almost all internal. There is a stillness to Murakmi's story, a meditative quality that I haven't seen in any other contemporary fiction. This seems to me the novel's primary brilliance, for it is in stillness that Murakami is able to show the psychic chaos underlying what might be easily dismissed as straightforward events.

Toru's path is never straight, but the next step is always clear. In this (and others of the book's elements) there are echoes of Lieutenant Slothrop from Gravity's Rainbow, but where Pynchon decides that such seemingly arbitrary movement can only end in dissolution, Murakami makes what seems to me a much braver choice, because it means that he needs to bring everything together in the end.

A teacher of mine was once told (by a fellow writer at a conference in Argentina) that Americans misapprehended Magical Realism. "You have a complicated name for it," the writer said, "but really it's right out there in the hills." I think something similar can be said for Murakami's more "fantastic" elements; to me they seem anything but arbitrary. Some characters appear to drop out of the story, some plot lines to remain unresolved, but I don't think Murakami leaves pieces unfinished simply because he ran out of steam, or found the main plotline completed before he had a chance to tie up loose ends. The structure of the novel seems both deliberate and intelligent to me, although some of the important connections between events remain deeply implicit.

Of course none of this is worth anything if the book doesn't move you. But this in my opinion is where Murakami makes his bravest decisions of all: in spite of the somewhat detached tones of Toru and the other characters, in spite of the clear tendency towards the kind of cynicism that is so popular in contemporary literary fiction, "The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle" ends up being a deeply emotional work. It has been very rare in the past few decades for a book to intelligently handle love as a primary element without resorting to some form of detachment; this book does it as well as any other I've read.

Rating:
Summary: still the best writer in the world
Review: To claim that Murakami is a one trick pony, well, that's just absurd. This novel is nothing like Hard-Boiled. In that novel, the bifurcation of worlds is explicitly expressed, in this one, the theme is much more subtle. And calling this fast-food literature because it makes references to modern culture is as narrow minded as ever. Apparently the previous reviewer wants to revel in the traditional cherry blossomed excesses of Mishima. I don't know how the comparision between Mishima and Murakami can be be made; that's just comparing apples to oranges. Murakami was more influenced by American authors like Raymond Chandler, Raymond Carver, and F. Scott Fitzgerald than he was by japanese nationalists like Mishima, Kawabata, or Oe, who or more interested in the quintessentially japanese than the quintessentially human.

There is no one in the world writing like Murakami at the moment. And if Murakami is a one trick pony, then a writer like Pynchon is nothing more than a broken record, spewing out the same turgid, nonsensical, entropic rigmarole every other novel. Murakami is post modern, but he doesn't resort to the pretentious, ignorant nihilism of impostors like Don Delillo or Jonathan Franzen. Those guys in my opinion are the fast-food writers.
I just can't praise Murakami enough. He defies classification. He mixes the best elements of science-fiction, mystery, and the literary into something that blows his competitors out of the water. So to the previous reviewer who believes that Murakami is shallow and frivolous, well, he's had about as many short stories published in the New Yorker as John Updike, which isn't exactly a magazine devoted to fast-food literature. The way he tackles the themes of alienation, loss, yearning, and the unconscious, is something to be marveled at, and not disparaged simply because of his so-called "hip" and jazzy elements. For those of you who don't get literature, a writer uses his environment as a base to create his narratives. For Murakami, pop-culture,the ravages of capitalism, and everything we tend to know as the modern world are the foundations upon which he builds his mesmerizing tales of human tragedy and human love. Don't expect the heroic fireworks of Mishima in a Murakami novel, because that day has passed. In our time, men die slowly, imperceptibly, not with the flourishes of Mishima's samurai heroism but with a whimper, so much so that we can't tell who's alive and who isn't. Are we dead, are we alive? How can we ever know? Murakami tries to help us out. You can't expect much more from an author than that.

Rating:
Summary: We all like bacon cheeseburgers, don't we?
Review: I've read three Murakami novels--or perhaps I should say, I've read the Murakami novel three times. Because I can't help but note that all his books appear to be literally the same thing. The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World, and Dance Dance Dance all have exactly the same narrative voice and the same choppy, ain't-it-hip plot structures. Murakami seems to have hit on a formula that works and he's sticking to it. Which, I suppose, is fair enough as far as it goes--didn't Celine do about the same thing?--but in Murakami's case, the limitations of his style are blaringly obvious, and one can't help seeing him as a one trick pony.

Still, let's cut to the chase: The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle was an extremely easy read, and I never became bored with it. Murakami's jumpy, short-attention-span style doesn't leave room for boredom, and unlike in the works of, say, Pynchon, neither the linguistic style nor the underlying ideas are ever complex or deep enough to elicit confusion, or indeed to make the reader stop and think about them at all. I plowed through the book in a week, primarily in crowded public transportation, in spite of the fact that I had a very heavy workload at the time. So...yeah. Fun.

Fun, yes, but, incredibly shallow and limited. I'll first take the time to acknowledge the best part of the book; namely, the two 'zoo massacre' chapters. Those have a power and weight that is quite disproportionate to the rest of the novel, and they would work well on their own as short stories--as indeed they did, in the New Yorker.

But other than that, we have problems. I think what it boils down to is that, for all that Murakami is frequently described in breathless laudatory cover copy as 'daring,' over-the-top,' and whatnot, the truth is, he's a very cautious, conservative writer. That might sound counterintuitive at first, but it really makes perfect sense. All of his kee-razy plot twists would indeed be over-the-top...except for the fact that they're *all he ever does.* There's nothing under the top to contrast them with, so that--ironically--their unpredictability and alleged wackiness quickly become totally predictable. And the MTV-style hyperkinetic refusal to stay on any one topic for any length of time is fine to an extent, but Murakami far too often uses it as a crutch to avoid having to deal with any substantial issues in a meaningful way. His modus operandi is to shake you up so as to leave your head in a whirl, then move on--and you're so impressed by the sheer jiggery-poking chutzpah that it takes you a little while to realize that he hasn't really left you with much of anything. Everything is to be danced around, nothing faced head-on. Kawabata could do that, because he was an incredibly subtle writer who was able to write worlds of meaning into impossibly minute nuances. Murakami cannot. It must be allowed that he is a good writer, purely in terms of, well, writing. He creates very vivid images. Which just makes the fact that his books are all sound and fury all the more frustrating.

[Sidebar: I would like to take this opportunity to mock the person who penned the laudatory quote from Publisher's Weekly (this might be from another version of the Murakami novel, but eh, what's the difference?) which claims that "this is the sort of page-turner Mishima might have written." Listen, Mr. or Ms. Publisher's Weekly Hack, I know that all you wanted was to compare Murakami to another Japanese writer and, since the only one you could think of was Mishima, he got the role by default, but that's STILL an amazingly stupid statement. Even if we pretend that Murakami is anywhere near being in the same league, as a writer, as Mishima, their respective oeuvres are absolutely NOTHING ALIKE. Geez. Perhaps next time you can compare Kingsley Amis to Jane Austen--after all, they were both English! End sidebar.]

However, it must be allowed, sometimes you need something light that won't tax your brain too much, and, be you in such a circumstance, I suppose you could do worse that The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle. I'm a little embarrassed for the people trying to claim that this is a Great Post-Modern Novel, but be that as it may, fast-food literature like this has its place; it's undeniably tasty, but it would be a bad idea to eat nothing but.

Rating:
Summary: Loved first third but then unsatisfying
Review: I just loved everything about the first third of this hefty novel. It became disappointing when it dawned on me, that the author wouldn't be able to resolve all the clues and mysteries he'd laid out. The main protagonist started acting increasingly irrational too. I am also didn't particularly like the exceedingly graphic descriptions of war atrocities. It went on for too long too. I love serious fiction and I realize my opinion runs counter to the main stream, but that's the way I feel.

Rating:
Summary: I've certainly never read anything like this
Review: A friend loaned me The Wind-up Bird Chronicle, and I read it knowing nothing more than was on the back cover. A man's cat disappeared, and then he meets interesting people. Talk about an understatement! I don't even know what genre I would classify this as if I tried to find it on a shelf somewhere.

Haruki Murakami appears to be a master of mood. Though his protagonist Toru Okada moves through what appears on the surface to be an ordinary world, we slowly realize that a veil of tension has dropped over the scenery, and as he searches for his cat he comes across a shadow world of sorts, where nothing quite appears as it ought. I'm trying to be clear here; this is not metaphorical. But I also don't want to give anything away.

In some ways Wind-up Bird ventures close to the genre of sci-fi or fantasy, but it is a very subtle fantasy. And unlike some of that genre, there is no final moment when everything is finally revealed. There is only what Murakami chooses to reveal, and only when he wishes it. Much remains a mystery at the end, but it is clear enough to the protagonist and to the reader to make some sense of what actually happened. Now I should confess that of the various storylines, I'm not at all sure how they all fit together. Perhaps that is the point. But the reader who expects every last thread to weave together into an unambiguous tapestry may be disappointed. I was not, though, and I suspect few are.

Rating:
Summary: Again and again and again and again....
Review: I have chosen The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle to review because it exaggerates every Murakami trait. You only have to read one on his novels and you have read them all. I'm not exagerating. It's the same story, same characters, same scenes over and over. I love Murakami's style and I initially enjoyed his symbolism and characters, but he never alters either from book to book. Wow! Just a slight change would be nice, but it is the same main character with a different name disillusioned with his job in an industry that changes only a tiny bit from book to book. Who's tired of the underground well/water symbolism? Who's tired of the music references that add little if any real tone to a scene? And please...in every novel a woman disappears or is killed or in Murakami's world vanishes into a ill-defined nether region. He could have been a great author...sad. And by the way, if you are going to pick one to read make it "Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World." At least it has that relatively clever "even chapters being the second half of the odd chapter's story" thing going on.

Rating:
Summary: Absolutely stunning...
Review: I discovered this book upon listening to a band who had taken the same name, most likely after reading this book as well. Words cannot express the emotion I feel after completing such a profound and beautiful story. Read this book. Better than Fight Club, Ender's Game, Neon Genesis Evangelion, Godspeed You Black Emperor, and Memento combined.

Rating:
Summary: Brilliant
Review: Do not complain about the violence and sex in Murakami's works, it's all part of the theme. Murakami seems infatuated with the dark undertone of violence and sex that has such a strong presence in Japanese culture. In his works, he tries to bring us closer to this world, to get a better understanding of it, as so not to write it off as weird and sadistic.
The Wind-Up Bird Chronicles is a graphic novel. Murakami does not hold back. When he wants to describe violence, he will describe violence. When he wants to describe sex, he does not give a Nabokov-ian innuendo, he describes sex. He's frank, for violence and sex are not flowery and attractive. If we look at two people having sex from a distance, or someone being killed from a distance, it's rather primative and blunt--you just watch it happen, and it happens.
But, the violence and sex are only part of the bigger picture (I myself was never offended by this, I'm just warning others who might): one man's descent into the underworld of Japan, and that is what makes this work so extraordinary. We have the simple man, the underachiever, Toru Okada. He's unemployed, and sits about his apartment for most of the day, accomplishing little. His cat dissapears. His wife, distraught, convinces Toru to search for the missing feline. Toru cannot find it, so Kumiko calls upon a mysterious fortune-teller, Malta Kano, a woman who wears a large, unflattering red hat that seems to clash with her entire outfit. And then we begin.
To write about everyone and everything in Wind-up Bird is impossible. Whenever I rave to people about the brilliance of this book, and am asked to give a summery, I wind up taking hours trying to explain it all, and even then it's not enough. The book is epic, filled with all sorts of bizarre and intriguing characters. Our quiet protagonist goes from place to place, learning about a world he never knew, but had existed all around him. Eventually, there is a moment where, after lying in a dry well for many days, he sinks through the wall, and into a mysterious hotel, into the actual "underworld." Of course, once he gets out, he is determined to find his way back. There are reasons for this, but I will not go into them.
Murakami's imagination and creativity are difficult to match. He is a new Kobo Abe, or, a 21st century Franz Kaftka. Only unlike the two, his books (although it may be Rubins translation) are easily accessabile to readers. We are not lost in an obsolete, verbose prose. Murakami's words flow freely and easily. I know I am able to become completely immersed in his world, never stopping to re-read some offbeat sentence or translate an unknown word.
The characters that Murakami creates are some of the most imaginative ones of the past twenty years. Each character has strange quirks about them, or a strange past, or just a strange story to tell, and although they seem completely bizarre, one gets the feeling that they aren't totally unbelievable. The places Murakami takes us: the hotel/ underworld, the "haunted" house, the old, abandonned wooden tenement, the well, the Manchurian Zoo, the old gulag...is all so brilliantly thought out. It is journey layered heavily in mystery, kind of like a novel "noir," with strange characters and a man who keeps looking to find something (the "truth" I suppose, on one level or another)--only it is offbeat and unorthodox.
Be warned though, this book is long. It never stops, but will slow down during the 400 page mark. But never put it down, for it will pick up again, and the ending is so climatic and excellent that it will leave you deep in thought for days.
I often find that The Wind-Up Bird Chronicles is sometimes so fantastic it reads like a science fiction novel. However, while this may be true, Murakami is able to use fantasy and the unreal so effectively that we never get the feeling that the novel is corny or cheesy. He uses the unreal and the fantastic to make literature, and I think that is one of the most difficult things a writer can accomplish. Read the book, love the book, read other literature, then read the book again, and love it even more.

Rating:
Summary: Japanese Magical Realism
Review: Amazon.com has not yet given the option of rating with half stars, or I would have given this 4.5. This is not a perfect work of fiction, but part, if not most of its charm lies in its imperfection. The only real disappointment is the lack of grace in some of the translation, but that hardly detracts from the beauty of this book.
WUBC is based on a short story from Murakami's collection "An Elephant Vanishes" (also recommended), which becomes the first chapter of this novel, but works very well on its own. In this story a man in present time Japan wakes up to find his wife has left him, with only a vague note of explanation. Prior to WUBC's publication in English, another chapter was published in The New Yorker, about WWII China (Japan is invading Mongolia, I believe), in which a Chinese man falls into a well (yes, "well" as in a deep hole where you get water) and has a somewhat mystical experience. Somewhere along the way, sympathy is found between individuals of the two cultures.
These stories don't sound like the same book, do they? Well, like many of today's postmodern novels, WUBC is a collage of many different stories which lead the reader to a more profound and universal conclusion. This, along with many ambiguously mystical (hence magical realism) experiences - the majority of which occur in wells, with the charmingly reserved and eccentric would-be detective who is the story's main character, and the (mainly) Japanese setting described beautifully from the point of view of this man to whom almost anyone can relate, makes the length of this novel well worth your time.
The writing in this is not genius, but it is a translation. The stories are simply and perfectly told. The novel as a whole is effective if effective means heart wrenching and dear, leaving that longing feeling which makes you sad that it has ended, as if an old friend had disappeared without a trace. I would read this book again, and again. I recommend that anyone with or without the slightest interest in Japanese and Chinese present and past, and/or the slightest bit of the jaded romantic in their hearts do the same.

Rating:
Summary: Creative, emotional and unlike anthying else
Review: Murakami's novel brings ancient struggle between evil and good into a new dimension. The author interplays and intertwines dream and reality, past and present, female and male characters to create complex, disturbing and beautiful experience. I particularly enjoyed the diversity of the threads within this book and the parallels betweens the characters and events. Murakami's writing style is unlike any other that I have encountered. Using very simple words, sentence structures and situations Murakami puzzles and intrigues the reader through the entire book. This is one of those books that you just have to finish.