Any Murakami fans on Veeky Forums?

Underground is great, it's a shame it doesn't seem to be as widely read as his fiction.

I'm not that guy, I actually liked After Dark, but I have the impression that it was, to some extent, targeted toward young women, high school or college or maybe middle school. It seems like kind of a warning to them about the way female sexuality is treated in japan and the danger of abuse, or just the danger of going with the norm that your looks are what matter most if you're female, as embodied by the girls older sister in the coma or whatever.

My point is that since it seems to be written for teenage girls, it might not appeal to readers who like his other novels like Wind-up Bird, etc.

I also think sputnik sweetheart was targeted toward middle age women, but I'm not sure.

I've read all of his stuff (all that's been translated into English) except the Running memoir.

Should I read the Running memoir?

And I read Sputnik Sweetheart but started skimming toward the end cuz I got bored. Is it actually good and I just missed something? I might try it again, it has been several years since I read it last, and I like literally every other novel of his a lot, so I should probably take a second look. Like maybe I was just in a bad mood when I read it before.

Holy shit that's some quality growth, I want to kiss that experimental physicist

Hard-boiled Wonderland is his masterpiece, and if it was written by someone other than Murakami it would be vastly more popular and critically acclaimed than it is now.

A Personal Matter first and foremost, but also A Silent Cry, Thirteen and J, and Teach Us to Outgrow Our Madness.

If you really like him "A Personal Matter" kicks off a long cycle of novels that includes A Silent Cry that's basically different reworkings of his autobiography. It's really interesting.

I don't see much of an influence there desu. Read Akutagawa and Soseki instead, as far as Japanese novelists go Murakami seems more influenced by them.

It's the anxiety of influence. Oe is the literary father Murakami had to escape. Murakami has stated in interview that he was a strong early influence. Trust me, read A Personal Matter and then a Murakami novel back to back.

Also his criticism drove Murakami to write Wind Up.

I decided to read kafka on the shore because it gets shilled on Veeky Forums quite a bit. It's fucking middlebrow shit. YA "intellectual" literature. The style is easy to read and entertaining but that's it.

I think they used reactive ion etch to carve them from a flat wafer, but I'm not sure.

It's even more impressive if they did grow them.

I have read Oe. And I don't believe in the anxiety of influence, too nebulous.

So many of his "young people in love" novels blue together for me but I think out of all of those my favorite is south of the border. The beginning sucks but it morphs into something special by the end

Wind up is my favorite overall.

Blur*

awful, awful author

Favorite: Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki
Least favorite: Pinball

Pinball was awful. I really liked the follow up tho

Hear the wind sing/Pinball, 1973 is like slice of life literature. No one can really do those surreal cozy solipsistic narratives like Murakami.

Favorite: IQ84
Despite the deserved criticism, I got lost in the day-to-day monotony of that hellish, alternate Tokyo dream. Leaving it felt like leaving a part of myself behind

Least: Colorless
Still decent, but it felt like a story meant for the length of Wind-up Bird that was compressed and edited to Norwegian Wood length

My favorite was Norwegian Wood, though the more I think about Colorless the more it grows on me. After Dark was my least favorite but that isn't saying much because I still enjoyed it. Men Without Women is also up there.

I loved IQ84. It drags a bit in the middle but by the end I was completely invested in that world. Did most people not like it?

>implying there are any of his books better than Norwegian Wood

awful, awful troll

Why should I read Murakami as opposed to Ishiguro? I heard his novels were bland shit. Can someone give me a ranking of his novels and why they should be read?

Murakami and Ishiguro aren’t really comparable

Murakami is a Japanese man with a bit of a Western obsession, Ishiguro is unabashedly British

Is not he an overrated fraud? I haven't read the guy, I want to listen some opinions

>he takes Veeky Forums memes seriously
Of course Murakami is worth reading, but why take my word for it when you could decide for yourself

He's a pop-fiction visionary but middle brow aesthetes on Veeky Forums hate him. Read him for yourself and decide.

Favorite: Kafka on the shore
Least: Hear the wing sing, but not because it's bad but because those 2 are the only 2 novels of his that I've read so far. It's a comfy slice of life episode but can't compare to Kafka on the shore masterpiece

Favorite: Wind Up Bird

Least: Sputnik Sweetheart

He's very hit and miss for me, the first four or five books of his I read felt really great but since then I've only had the occasional one hit me well.

Should I get into 1Q84 straight after finishing Norwegian Wood if Norwegian Wood would be the first Murakami I finished? I heard 1Q84 isn't as good as his other works but I figured I'd get it out of the way first so I don't get disappointed with 1Q84 after some of his much greater works.

where to start with oe?

Anyone?

>Least favorite: Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki
reading it atm, it's slow indeed

Do you intend to read his entire ouvreu? If so, then go ahead. Otherwise I would just read The Windup Bird Chronicle next

It's more of a love it or hate it type of book. Read Men Without Women, not sure why I never seen it praised on here.

Favorite: A Wild Sheep Chase or Dance Dance Dance (not sure)
Least favorite: Elephant Vanishes, I guess (though I liked it).

best
Norwegian wood

worst
strange library

"silent cry" for some hardcore shit.
"nip the buds, shoot the kids" for some less hardcore but still hardcore shit
"a quiet life" for some sentimental shit (his brother in-law juzo itami made a film of it that's fantastic)

"a personal matter" is good ...and although it's a popular work by him I thought it was really solid...but maybe not the best first book to read by oe.

try reading his short story "the catch" (aka "prize stock" in teach us to outgrow our madness). one of the best short stories ever.

also I just finished "a healing family" for a second time. love his son hikari's music. simple but really pretty stuff.

I read Wind-Up Bird, Kafka on the Shore, and South of the Border, West of the Sun as an adolescent, I remember being quite absorbed but there's nothing particularly interesting about them anymore to me.

That being said, Wind-Up Bird was my favourite of the ones I've read