I was still thinking about why Haruki Murakami's "Norwegian Wood" became a bestseller in Japan. I talked about this on a LINE group, and other members spoke about the sexual essence of this novel. Indeed, "Norwegian Wood" exactly has some deep descriptions of sexual things, but then why that novel has attracted female readers? What do the female readers who read "Norwegian Wood" seriously find in that novel? Probably, it can be beyond my imagination. These diverse ways of reading are allowed in Haruki's novels. That must be the great taste of his novels.
I also thought that why the Haruki world attracts so many people. Why am I attracted by the Haruki world? Because he uses his weird imagination and builds a very surrealistic world. But his such a great surrealistic world is also very friendly for me. Like Kafka's works are built on very rich and surrealistic imagination but also show this real-world steadily, Haruki writes his novels and they are almost the ones about 'my life'. That is the reason why I have been attracted. But what do other people think?
I accidentally read Haruki's "Pinball, 1973" and that lead me to the Haruki world. Since then, sometimes I even became a hater, but basically, I have been a resident of the world. I guess I would be so forever. As I wrote before, there must be some greater writers than Haruki. But I feel that Haruki has brought me up in this life. I will have been one of Haruki's children and committed to his world. Indeed, I might diss him as "He's still writing such a silly novel!".
On the 6th of this month, we have another Nobel Prize winner for literature. Of course, I wish Haruki would be a winner of that prize, but I say that Haruki never gets such a big prize. Maybe Houellebecq would get such a controversial prize. I believe that how are his works accepted or read by many people, and how those works influenced their life are more important than the prize itself. I say again. In this way, I believe Haruki is already a great enough writer. Luckily, Haruki doesn't have any interest in the prize (maybe he just shows such an attitude on the net only). So we can enjoy this autumn with a calm mind. By the way, I have never read Houellebecq... OH MY GOD!
