Norwegian wood
Murakami, Haruki. Norwegian Wood. Vintage International. 2000. Translated by Jay Rubin.
I must begin how Murakami opens up his memories.
“Eighteen years have gone by, and still I can bring back every detail of that day in the meadow. Washed clean of summer’s dust by days of gentle rain, the mountains wore a deep, brilliant green. The October breeze set white fronds of head-tall grasses swaying. One long streak of cloud hung pasted across a dome of frozen blue. It almost hurt to look at that far-off sky. A puff of wind swept across the meadow and through her hair before it slipped into the woods to rustle branches and send back snatches of distant barking – a hazy sound that seemed to reach us from the doorway to another world. We heard no other sounds. We met no other people. We saw only two bright, red birds leap startled from the center of the meadow and dart into the woods. As we ambled along, Naoko spoke to of wells.”
A sense of helplessness, repeated frustration, continues to swirl, surround and overwhelm this simple, yet unspeakably moving, story. Simple language proves to be yet effective to plainly tell a story of a boy coming of age, and only let the true feelings and the story itself seduce readers’ heart. Indeed, when such of book takes life of its own, rests only in your palms, not on the shelf, you start to realize fancy words, flowery description do not belong in the hall of true literary enjoyment. Praise alone however falls short of capturing all the wonder brought to life in this little book. Let’s dive in to parse together Murakami’s world. -- keep in mind that Watanabe keeps saying his favorite book is the great gatsby and he has his fair share of unreliable narration as well.
Kizuki vs. Nagasawa
It is as if history were repeating itself when we put Kizuki and Nagasawa side by side. Both are well off, can have any number of friends, but for some reason all chose Watanabe to be their best friends. You might wonder why – and Murakami did not disappoint us. He lets Nagasawa reveals the answer – the very answer that Wantabe should have told us, but the truth and the answer scared even Watanabe himself. Nagasawa said, “Where Watanabe and I are alike is, we don’t give a damn if nobody understands us… That’s what makes us different from everybody else. They’re all worried about whether the people around them understand them. But not me, and not Watanabe. We just don’t give a damn. Self and others are separate.” (pp. 209) Watanabe got stung when listening to this precise description of the reason Nagasawa and he can get along – he knew it, but was truly scared. “No way,” he answers. I still care about a very few number that I deem worthy. And Nagasawa waves his hand by saying “we’re then 98% the same.”
Kizuki did not articulate this. But Naoko helped him to say it – Kizuki and I grew up together and did not know the rest of the world at all. You to us are the rest of the world! Both Kizuki and Nagasawa wanted a friend oblivious of the world, for that’s what they know (voluntarily or involuntarily)
Same beautiful girlfriends. Same double dates. Same confession the girls that they prefer to date while Watanabe is around for he brings out the better sides of their boys.
“Hatusmi’s death has extinguished something. This is unbearably sad and painful, even to me.” Says Nagasawa. (pp. 212) The only difference between Kizuki and Nagasawa is that Nagasawa is stronger, more self independent, knows how to release his stress. And the outcomes are simple – Kizuki dies in his relationship and Hatsumi dies in hers.
Why did Kizuki commit suicide? And why did Naoko?
Kizuki must have realized Naoko’s schizophrenia – and we get the clue from her sister’s death that this might run in the family – and also does not know how to get Naoko wet in order to have sex with her (for a teenage boy, this must have been devastating.) While we all thought Naoko lived under the shadow of her boyfriend’s death, the true reason might have been that Naoko had known Kizuki had died for her, and she could not exonerate herself. She finally asserts, “the dead will always be dead, but we continue to live.” This is her breaking point from the shadow and the trigger is the fact that she had sex with Watanabe and was able to wet. She enters active treatment immediately afterwards in order to embrace a new life with Watanabe.
She did not give herself again to Watanabe and did not make any promise – 2 reasons. One I will discuss here, and the other I will use excerpts from the book.
1. She failed to get better. She kept telling Watanabe and Reiko that she wants to give a healthy Naoko to Watanabe. This is a very sensible thing for her to do especially considering how she blames herself for Kizuki’s death. She cannot let history repeat itself. She cannot walk into Watanabe’s arms with the same set of problems that had wrecked her first love, and can potentially wreck Watanabe. Murakami artfully gave more hints by telling Reiko’s story. She had a loving, caring husband, a daughter. And she lived healthy for a long time. But failure to cure her mental problem lays seeds for her second snap where she lost her mind again and hurt everyone that deeply loved her. Naoko knew it and fears to death similar things can happen again, to her!
2. “Once, long ago, when I was stil young, when the memories were far more vivid than they are now, I often tried to write about Naoko. But I was never ble to produce a line. I knew that if that first line would come, the rest would pour itself onto the page, but I could never make it happen. Everthing was too sharp and clear, so that I could never tell where to start – the way a map that shows too much can sometimes be useless. Now, though, I realize that all I can place in the imperfect vessel of writing are imperfect memories and imperfect thoughts. The more the memories of Naoko inside me fade, te more deeply I am able to understand her. I know, too, why she asked me not to forget her. Naoko herself knew, of course. She knew that my memories of her would fade. Which is precisely why she begged me never to forget her, to remember that she had existed. The thought fills me with an almost unbearable sorrow. Because Naoko never loved me.” (pp. 10)
Midori
I tried to resist the temptation to write about Midori. But how can I omit such an important character. It is safe to bet that in Japanese Midori means “the dead will always be dead, but we continue to live.” In my opinion, this is the theme of the book. Sadness uncontrollably sprouts out of the numerous deaths in the book, and the living invariably carry the heavy baggage on their shoulders, forever immersed the shadow, and never managed to emancipate. Midori is the opposite though. She takes life and death easily. Her father’s death for example did not affect her or her sister much. Death is emancipation to Midori – she says, “compared to months of hard work at the hospital taking care of my dying father, the funeral was incredibly easy.” She is life. She is what a girl friend really is like. Let’s think over the things she has done for Watanabe – lunch dates, cooked for him, watched a fire on the rooftop, went to see dirty movies, went drinking whenever depressed, took him to see her dying father and let him take care of her father. Watanabe had no chance. He thought he was deeply in love with Naoko, but who on earth can resist such a girl “with real blood in my vein, and have lots of feelings, a trust from my father, cooks etc.” Watanabe chose Midori, but Naoko dies before he can work things out. What an easy way to solve the problem! But sadness re-emerges with death. Indeed except for Midori, no one could take it easily. And Reiko comes to help Watanabe out, talks to him about the real meaning of life, and prompts him to call Midori.
I must end with Murakami’s wonderful ending
“Gripping the receiver, I raised my head and turned to see what lay beyond the telephone booth. Where was I now? I had no idea. No idea at all. Where was this place? All that flashed into my eyes were the countless shapes of people walking by to nowhere. Again and again, I called out for Midori from the dead center of this place that was no place.”
