Tag: Haruki Murakami

  • Short Story Review: “Life with Spider” by Patrick Langley

    (The short story “Life with Spider” by Patrick Langley appeared in the February 5th, 2024 issue of The New Yorker.)

    Photo illustration by Hana Mendel for The New Yorker

    First of all, when I read a story that has to do with a grown man and a large insect, I can’t help but think of “The Metamorphosis” by Kafka. And I have run into more stories than I can count about men and bugs. (Kafka created a secret literary genre that no one talks about.) It’s unfair to Patrick Langley that I immediately made that comparison when I started reading “Life with Spider,” but when I finished the story, I think Langley was counting on me to do that, so he could mess with my head.

    “Life with Spider” is a story about Fletcher Hardy and his bug-like creature called Spider, even though it is not a spider. We are told off the bat that Hardy, not his real name, has given permission to the narrator to tell the story, provided that we aren’t able to figure out who the “real” Hardy is. It’s an interesting framing of the story as everything that Fletcher says and does, in essence, is told to us second hand. Several specific details are given about Hardy; who his family is, where they live, what he does, and what they do, and so on. It made me wonder if the narrator was lying to “throw me off.”

    Either way, we learn that Hardy is being visited by a six-legged insect like creature, which will not leave him alone. Hardy convinces his friend, the narrator, to help get rid of the creature. I don’t want to give away too many details, leave a few surprises, but I am sure you can surmise that Hardy and the narrator survive, as they are telling this story.

    I enjoyed this story even though it did befuddle me. I mentioned the one above about the details and if the narrator was reliable. But the big question for me about this story was, what was Spider? Did it represent something specific? Was it death? Since the two main characters were young men transitioning into adulthood, was Spider a metaphor for their transition? Possibly, Spider was a manifietation of their friendship? Was I supposed to think about Kafka? Am I thinking too hard about Kafka? And the story had a “Dead Chick in the Basket*” ending, which maybe made sense? Or maybe it wasn’t supposed to make sense?

    What “Life with Spider” reminded me of was some of the more fantastical stories from The Elephant Vanishes by Haruki Murakami. Both had a sense of play, humor, and the humans in the stories react with a relative sense rationalism to their extreme situations. I didn’t need “Life with Spider” to make sense or tie up all the loose ends neatly, because the enjoyment was trying to figure out a mystery that would never get completely solved.

    *  “Dead Chick in the Basket” refers to a clichéd writing device where the final paragraph of a short story contains new information about a character which is meant to make the reader view the actions, statements, or feelings of that character in a different light. The first known use of this device was in J.D. Salinger’s short story “Just Before the War with the Eskimos.”

  • Personal Review: “Norwegian Wood” by Haruki Murakami

    I first heard of Haruki Murakami somewhere in 1995 or 1996, when I read a translated short story of his in The New Yorker. I’m pretty sure it was “The Zoo Attack,” and I think it was all tied into the article about the upcoming publication of his novel, “The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle.” The short story made enough of an impression on me that I went to the local bookstore, and found a copy of his short story collection, “The Elephant Vanishes.” I mean I read it almost 25 years ago, but I remember that the collection was great; funny, surreal, and feeling very honest. Murakami does a great job on creating these fantastical stories where the characters reactions to this unreal situations land true and authentic. (Other surreal short story writers could learn a great deal from this man.) He is a great talent, truly a world talent.

    And there was one novel of his that for a long time, you couldn’t get in English; “Norwegian Wood.” Being a huge Beatles fan, the title of the novel always stuck with me, clearly, because it’s one of their more famous songs. Published in 1987, this was the novel that made Haruki Murakami a famous author and household name in Japan. Whenever anything was written about him, “Norwegian Wood” was always mentioned as his best novel. Sadly, being that there wasn’t an English translation until 2000 of the novel, in the late 90’s, it fell off my radar as a novel I had to read. Every now and then, I would see the title show up on reading lists of writers, and friends, and I would think, I need to read that book.

    Then back in April, when I took the kid with me down to The Strand to go book hunting, I found a huge stack of paperback copies of “Norwegian Wood” sitting on a cart that I am sure had yet to be shelved. Looking at the cover, I thought it’s time for me to read it. And when September rolled around, I finally got around to it.

    I liked the novel, but I wasn’t as impressed as I thought I would be. I had read that this book was a “normal” and “straight-forward” story, and not at all in the surreal vein of his earlier stories, and that was very true. It was a memory story, and used that formula. Toru, the narrator, is on a flight and he hears the song, “Norwegian Wood” as the plane is taxing to the gate in Hamburg, Germany. This song causes him to remember the time in his life where he had just started college, and first fell in love. Thus sets in motion the story, and Toru tells us that though he hasn’t thought of these events in years, the memories come back to him in vivid detail. It was a little caveat trick that Murakami used to give agency as to why the narrator is so detailed in his memories, and also to signal to us that what we are about to hear from the narrator is the truth.

    The setting is 1969 Tokyo, and all the cultural changes that come with it. I liked learning that the upheavals that hit universities in the US and France during this period, also hit Japan as well, but Toru seems to exist just adjacent of all of this turmoil. It is a lonely life this very normal young man lives; living in a dorm, going to class, working a part-time job. Soon he reconnects with the Naoko, who had been the girlfriend of his best friend, Kizuki, in high school. We learn that Kizuki had committed suicide their senior year, and this tragic loss still hangs over both of their lives. Though they come together, they both handle the death in different ways, and with different compounding struggles.

    The novel is more complicated, and there is a theme of loyalty, duty, and commitment as well. But also, the desire to go into the world and experience and discover. I can see why the “coming of age” moniker would get thrown on this story, but I feel that is more used for marketing that an actual description of what the novel is. The characters didn’t feel like they were coming into their own, but discovering how the death of a loved one can change the prism of their world, and viewpoint; some felt guilt, some felt relief, some had a rebirth.

    But as I write all of this, and I just finished reading it yesterday, I have this feeling in the back of my head that I need more time with the novel kicking around in my head. Let it marinate, and see where it takes me. Though it wasn’t as profound as I thought it would be, it hasn’t shaken my opinion of Haruki Murakami’s talent or status as an author.

    (And, since you are still here. Please be kind, and give a like, a share, a comment, or follow this blog. It drives the traffic engine that keeps the whole world running.)