Murakami speaks about self in rare lecture / Author's 1st
public event in 18 years
http://the-japan-news.com/news/article/0000201816
The Yomiuri Shimbun
KYOTO--In an extremely rare
public appearance, best-selling author Haruki Murakami opened up about himself
and the worlds of his novels in a lecture at Kyoto University
on Monday.
"My profession
is writing. So I'd rather not get involved with things [other than
writing]," Murakami, 64, said when asked about his reclusive nature.
"I'd really
appreciate if you treated me like an endangered Iriomote wild cat. So even if
you spot me, I want you to observe me from a distance," the writer joked
with an audience of about 500 people.
Fans from across the
nation gathered for his lecture at the university's Clock Tower Centennial
Hall. Titled "Tamashii o Miru, Tamashii o Kaku" (Observing a soul,
writing a soul), the interview-style event was held to commemorate the
establishment of literary prizes named after clinical psychologist Hayao Kawai.
Murakami, who was
close to Kawai, also spoke about his memories with the late psychologist and
his latest book, "Shikisai o Motanai Tazaki Tsukuru to Kare no Junrei no
Toshi" (Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage).
Monday's lecture was
the first event in which Murakami spoke in front of an audience in Japan in 18
years. He last appeared at a book reading held after the 1995 Great Hanshin
Earthquake.
Murakami appeared at
the venue casually dressed in a jacket, sneakers and reddish-brown trousers.
Filming and recording were strictly prohibited.
Murakami said he met
Kawai, who died in 2007, in the United
States while living there.
Although the two men
worked in different fields, the writer said: "I, as a novelist, and Dr.
Kawai, as a clinician, explored the depths [of the mind]. I think we both understood
what that's like."
"Dr. Kawai was
the only person who wholly accepted in a truly precise manner what I see when I
use the word 'narrative,'" the writer added.
Tracing his journey
since his debut as an author, Murakami also talked about his latest book, which
has already sold more than 1 million copies.
The book tells the story of protagonist Tsukuru Tazaki and
his four high school friends who decide to end their friendships with him
during university.
"Initially, it
was meant to be a novella," he said.
However, Murakami
said as he continued writing, he was tempted to explain the reasons behind the
four students' actions.
Murakami began
writing the novel in February last year and finished the first draft in August.
He then polished the book through a number of rewrites.
"I've also
experienced something similar, though not as bad as the episode [described in
the book]," Murakami recalled. "When people get really hurt, they
just want to hide their feelings and let go of them, but it's not that easy.
After we're emotionally scarred, we close ourselves off from others. Then
gradually as time goes by, we open ourselves up little by little. And we repeat
it, and I believe that's what we do. I guess at the end of the day, I wanted to
write a story just like that."
At the end of his
lecture, Murakami left the audience, saying: "Sometimes I hear people
saying, 'I cried a lot' when they read my books. But I'd be happier if they
told me they couldn't stop laughing. Sorrow causes you to turn inward, but
laughter broadens your mind."
Haruki Murakami
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haruki_Murakami
photos
http://www.google.hr/search?q=haruki+murakami&client=opera&hs=Eos&channel=suggest&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ei=UcWKUYPIGdS0hAfRjYHgCQ&ved=0CEIQsAQ&biw=991&bih=651
Haruki Murakami – As an Unrealistic Dreamer : Catalunya
International Prize speech : 10 June…..
http://www.senrinomichi.com/?p=2541
The translation below was produced as part of the
Collaborative Translation project entitled Planting Seeds Together – inspired
by Haruki Murakami’s acceptance speech for the Catalunya International Prize,
2011.
As an Unrealistic Dreamer
Haruki Murakami’s acceptance speech on receiving the
Catalunya International Prize 2011
The last time I visited Barcelona was in spring two years ago. I took
part in a book-signing event, and was surprised at how many readers queued up
for my autograph. It took more than one and a half hours to sign for all of
them, because many of my female readers wanted to kiss me. It all took quite
some time.
I’ve taken part in book-signing events in many other cities
throughout the world, but only in Barcelona
were there women who wanted to kiss me. If only for this reason, it struck me
that Barcelona
was a quite extraordinary place. I’m very glad to be back here in this
beautiful city, which has such a rich history and wonderful culture.
But I’m sorry to say that today, I must talk about something
more serious than kisses.
As you surely know, at 2:46 pm on March 11, a massive
earthquake struck the northeast area of Japan. The force of this quake was
so great that the earth spun faster on its axis, and the day was shortened by
1.8 millionth of a second.
The damage caused by the earthquake itself was quite
extensive, but the tsunami triggered by the earthquake caused much greater
devastation. In some places, the tsunami wave reached a height of 39 metres. In
the face of such an enormous wave, even the tenth storey of normal buildings
would not provide refuge for those caught in its path. People living near the
coast had no time to escape, and about 24,000 people lost their lives — some
9,000 of whom are still reported missing. The great wave that broke the
barriers carried them away, and we’ve not yet been able to find their bodies.
Many were most likely lost in the depths of the icy sea. When I stop to think
about this and imagine that I too could suffer such a terrible fate, my chest
tightens. Many survivors lost their families, friends, houses, properties,
communities and the very foundations of their lives. Entire villages were
destroyed completely. Many people have lost all hope for living.
I think that being Japanese means living with natural
disasters. From summer to autumn, typhoons pass through much of Japan. Every
year they cause extensive damage, and many lives are lost. There are many
active volcanoes in every region. And of course, there are many earthquakes. Japan sits
precariously on the four tectonic plates at the eastern extremity of the Asian
continent. It is as if we are living on a very nest of earthquakes.
We can predict the timing and route of typhoons to a greater
or lesser extent, but we can’t predict when and where an earthquake will occur.
All that we do know is that this was not the last great earthquake, and that
another will surely happen in the near future. Many specialists predict that a
magnitude 8 earthquake will strike the Tokyo
area within the next twenty or thirty years. It may happen in ten years time,
or it may strike tomorrow afternoon. No one can predict with any certitude the
extent of the damage that would follow if an inland earthquake were to strike
such a densely populated city as Tokyo.
Despite this fact, there are 13 million people living
“ordinary” lives in the Tokyo
area alone. They take crowded commuter trains to go to their offices, and they
work in skyscrapers. Even after this earthquake, I haven’t heard that the
population of Tokyo
is on the decline.
Why? You might ask. How can so many people go about their
daily lives in such a terrible place? Don’t they go out of their minds with
fear?
In Japanese, we have the word “mujō (無常)”. It
means that everything is ephemeral. Everything born into this world changes,
and will ultimately disappear. There is nothing that can be considered eternal
or immutable. This view of the world was derived from Buddhism, but the idea of
“mujo” was burned into the spirit of Japanese people beyond the strictly
religious context, taking root in the common ethnic consciousness from ancient
times.
The idea that all things are transient is an expression of
resignation. We believe that it serves no purpose to go against nature. On the
contrary, Japanese people have found positive expressions of beauty in this
resignation.
If we think about nature, for example, we cherish the cherry
blossoms of spring, the fireflies of summer and the red leaves of autumn. For
us, it is natural to observe them passionately, collectively and as a
tradition. It can be difficult to find a
hotel room near the best known sites of cherry blossoms, fireflies and red
leaves in their respective seasons, as such places are invariably milling with
visitors.
Why is this so?
The answer may be found in the fact that cherry blossoms,
fireflies and red leaves all lose their beauty within a very short space of
time. We travel from afar to witness this glorious moment. And we are somehow
relieved to confirm that they are not merely beautiful, but are already
beginning to fall to the ground, to lose their small lights or their vivid
beauty. We find peace of mind in the fact that the peak of beauty has been
reached and is already starting to fade.
I don’t know if natural disasters have affected such a
mentality. I’m sure, however, that in some sense we have been able to
collectively overcome successive natural disasters and to accept the
unavoidable by virtue of this mentality. Perhaps such experiences have also
shaped our notion of the aesthetic.
The overwhelming majority of Japanese people were deeply
shocked by this earthquake. While we may be accustomed to earthquakes, we still
have not been able to come to terms with the scale of the destruction. We feel
helpless, and are anxious about the future of our country.
Ultimately, we’ll summon up the necessary mental energy,
pick ourselves up and rebuild. In this regard, I have no particular worries.
This is how we have survived throughout our long history.
This time as well, we certainly will not remain frozen and in a state of shock
forever. Broken houses can be rebuilt, and broken roads can be restored.
You might say that we are living as uninvited guests on
planet earth. Planet earth never asked us to live here. If she shakes a little,
we can’t complain, because shaking from time to time is just one of the earth’s
natural behaviours. Whether we like it or not, we must live with nature.
What I want to talk about here isn’t something like
buildings or roads, which can be rebuilt; but rather about things which can’t
be reconstructed easily, such as ethics and values. Such things are not
physically tangible. Once they are broken, it’s difficult to restore them, as
this cannot be achieved with machines, labour and materials.
What I’m talking about concretely is the Fukushima nuclear power plant.
As you probably know, at least three of the six nuclear
reactors damaged by the earthquake and tsunami have not yet been restored, and
continue to leak radiation around them. Meltdowns occurred, and the surrounding
soil has been contaminated. Water that probably contains high levels of
radioactivity has been dispersed in the surrounding ocean, and the wind is
carrying radiation to more distant areas.
Hundreds of thousands of people have had to evacuate their
homes. Farms, ranches, factories, commercial centres and ports are now
deserted, having been completely abandoned. Those who lived there may not ever
be able to return. It also grieves me to say that the damage from this accident
is not limited to Japan,
but will spread to neighbouring countries as well.
The reason why such a tragic accident occurred is more or
less clear. The people who built these nuclear plants had not imagined that
such a large tsunami would strike them. Some experts pointed out that tsunami
of similar scale had struck these regions previously, and insisted that the
safety standards should be revised. The electrical power companies, however,
ignored them. As commercial ventures, these companies did not want to invest
massively in preparing for a tsunami which may occur only once every few
hundred years.
It seems to me that the government, which is supposed to
ensure the strictest possible safety and security measures for nuclear plants,
downgraded these safety standards in order to promote nuclear power generation.
We should investigate this situation, and if mistakes are
found they should be rectified. Hundreds of thousands of people have been
forced to leave their land, and have seen their lives turned upside down. We
are angry about this; such anger is only natural.
For some reason, Japanese people seldom get angry. We know
how to be patient, but aren’t very good at showing our anger. We are surely
different from the people of Barcelona
in this respect. But this time, even the Japanese people have become seriously
angry.
At the same time, we must be critical of ourselves for
having tolerated and allowed these corrupted systems to exist until now.
This accident cannot be dissociated from our ethics and
values.
As you know, we, the Japanese people, are unique in having
experienced nuclear attacks. In August 1945, US military aircraft dropped
atomic bombs on the two major cities of Hiroshima
and Nagasaki,
resulting in the deaths of more than two hundred thousand people. Most of the
victims were unarmed, ordinary people. Now, however, is not the moment for me
to consider the rights and wrongs of this.
What I want to point out here is not only that two hundred
thousand people died in the immediate aftermath of the nuclear bombing, but
also that many survivors would subsequently die from the effects of radiation
over a prolonged period of time. It was the suffering of these victims that
showed us the terrible destruction that radioactivity has brought to the world
and to the lives of ordinary people.
We had two fundamental policies after World War II. One was
economic recovery; the other was the renunciation of war. We would forego the
use of armed force, we would grow more prosperous, and we would pursue peace.
These ideas became the new policies of post-war Japan.
The following words are carved on the memorial for the
victims of the atomic bomb in Hiroshima:
“Let all the souls here rest in peace, for we shall not
repeat the evil.”
These are lofty words indeed, which recognise that we are in
fact both victims and perpetrators at the same time. This is true where nuclear
power is concerned as well. Insofar as we are threatened by the force of
nuclear power, we are all victims. Moreover, since we unleashed this power and
were then unable to prevent ourselves from using it, we are also all
perpetrators.
Sixty-six years after the nuclear bombings, the Fukushima Dai-ichi
nuclear reactors have now been spreading radioactivity for three months,
contaminating the soil, the ocean and the air around them. No one knows how and
when we can stop this. This is the second source of devastation caused by
nuclear power in Japan,
but this time nobody dropped an atomic bomb. We, the Japanese people, paved our
own way for this tragedy, making grave errors and contributing to the destruction
of our own lands and lives.
Why did this occur? What happened to our rejection of
nuclear power after World War II? What was it that corrupted our goal of a
peaceful and prosperous society, which we had been pursuing so diligently?
The reason is simple. The reason is “efficiency”.
The electrical power companies insisted that nuclear plants
offered an efficient power generation system. In other words, it was a system
from which they could derive profit. For its part, the Japanese government
doubted the stability of petroleum supplies, particularly since the oil crisis,
and promoted nuclear power generation as national policy. The electrical power
companies spent huge amounts of money on advertisements, thereby bribing the
media to indoctrinate the Japanese people with the illusion that nuclear power
generation was completely safe.
Before we knew it, 30 percent of electricity generation was
being supplied by nuclear power. Japan, a small island nation
frequently struck by earthquakes, thus became the third leading nuclear
power-generating country, without the Japanese people even realizing what was
happening.
We had gone beyond the point of no return. The deed was
done. Those who doubted nuclear power generation were now asked the
intimidating question, “Would you be in favour of power shortages?” Japanese
people had come to believe that reliance on nuclear power was inevitable.
Living without air conditioning during a hot and humid Japanese summer is
almost akin to torture. Consequently, those who harbour doubts about nuclear
power generation came to be labelled as “unrealistic dreamers”.
And so we arrived where we are today. Nuclear power plants,
which were supposed to be efficient, instead offer us a vision of hell. This is
the reality.
The so-called “reality” that has been proclaimed by those
who promote nuclear power however, isn’t reality at all. It is nothing more
than superficial “convenience”, which their flawed logic confused with reality
itself.
This situation marked the collapse of the myth regarding Japan’s
technological prowess, of which the Japanese people had been so proud. In
addition, allowing this distorted logic represented the defeat of existing
Japanese ethics and values. We now blame the electrical companies and Japanese
government, which is right and necessary. At the same time however, we must
also point the finger at ourselves. We are at once victims and perpetrators,
and we must consider this fact seriously. If we fail to do so, we will make the
same mistake again.
“Let all the souls here rest in peace, for we shall not
repeat the evil.”
We must take these words to our hearts.
Dr Robert Oppenheimer, who was the primary architect of the
development of the atomic bomb, was appalled by the devastation inflicted upon Hiroshima and Nagasaki
by the nuclear attacks. He once said to President Truman, “Mr President, there
is blood on my hands”.
Truman took a clean and neat white handkerchief from his
pocket and said, “Go ahead and wipe them.”
Of course, there is no clean handkerchief in the world large
enough to wipe away so much blood.
We, the Japanese, should have been unrelenting in saying
“No” to nuclear power. This is what I believe.
We should have been working to develop alternative energy
sources to replace nuclear power at a national level, by harvesting all
existing technologies, wisdom and social capital. Even if people throughout the
world had mocked us, saying, “Nuclear power is the most effective power
generation system, and Japanese people are really stupid not to use it”, we
should have retained the aversion to nuclear power that was triggered by our
experience of nuclear weapons.
We should have made the development of non-nuclear power
generation the cornerstone of our policy after World War II. This should have
been the way to assume our collective responsibility for the victims of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
In Japan,
we needed strong ethics, strong values, and a strong social message. This would
have been a chance for the Japanese people to make a real contribution to the
world. We neglected to take that important road, however, preferring to pursue
the fast track of “efficiency” in support of our rapid economic development.
As I mentioned earlier, we can overcome the damage caused by
natural disasters, however dreadful and extensive they might be. And sometimes
our spirits may grow stronger and more profound through the process of
overcoming. This is most certainly something that we can achieve.
It is the job of experts to rebuild broken roads and
buildings, but it is the duty of each of us to restore our damaged ethics and
values. We can start by mourning those who died, by taking care of the victims
of this disaster, and by nurturing our natural desire not to let their pain and
injuries have been in vain. This will take the form of a carefully crafted,
silent and painstaking endeavour. We must join forces to this end, in the
manner of the entire population of a village that goes out together to
cultivate the fields and plant seeds on a sunny spring morning. Everyone doing
what they can do, all hearts together.
We, professional writers, who are versed in the use of
words, also have a positive contribution to make toward this large-scale
collective mission. We must connect new ethics and values to new words, thereby
creating and building new, vibrant stories. We will then be able to share these
stories. They will have a rhythm that can encourage people, just like the songs
which villagers sing while planting their seeds. We rebuilt Japan, which
had been completely destroyed by World War II. We must now return to this same
starting point once again.
As I mentioned at the beginning of this speech, we are
living in a changing and transient “mujō (無常)”
world. Every life will change and ultimately fade away. Human beings are
powerless in the face of the greater forces of nature. The recognition of the
ephemeral is one of the basic concepts of Japanese culture. While we respect
the fact that all things are transient and understand that we live in a fragile
and precarious world, at the same time we are imbued both with a silent will to
live and with positive minds.
I am proud that my works are highly regarded by the Catalan
people, and to have been awarded such a prestigious prize. We live a long way
from each other and speak different languages. We have different cultures. But
at the same time we are citizens of the world, who share the same problems, joy
and sadness. That’s why stories written by a Japanese author have been
translated into the Catalan language and Catalan people have embraced them. I’m
glad to share the same stories with you. Dreaming is the day job of novelists,
but sharing our dreams is a still more important task for us. We cannot be
novelists without this sense of sharing something.
I know that the Catalan people have overcome many hardships,
while living life to the fullest and retaining a rich culture through your
history. I believe that we have many things to share.
How wonderful it would be if we, in Japan and Catalonia,
could build a house of “unrealistic dreamers” and forge a “community of spirit”
that would transcend both country and culture. I believe this would be the
starting point for our rebirth, as we have both experienced many natural
disasters and wanton acts of terrorism in recent times. We must not be afraid
to dream. We should never allow the crazed dogs named “efficiency” and
“convenience” to catch up with us. We must be “unrealistic dreamers”, who
stride forward vigorously. Human beings will die and disappear, but humanity
will prevail and will be constantly regenerated. Above all, we must believe in
this force.
In closing, I will donate this prize money to the victims of
the earthquake and the accident at the nuclear plant. I am deeply grateful to
the Catalan people and to the Generalitat de Cataluña for offering me this
award and this opportunity. I would also like to express my deepest sympathies
to the victims of the recent earthquake in Lorca.
Haruki Murakami
http://bookriot.com/2013/01/12/if-you-only-read-the-books-that-everyone-else-is-reading-you-can-only-think-what-everyone-else-is-thinking-happy-birthday-haruki-murakami/
“If you only read the
books that everyone else is reading, you can only think what everyone else is
thinking.” Haruki Murakami.