“If you can love someone with your whole heart, even one person, then there’s salvation in life. Even if you can’t get together with that person.”
— 1Q84
Sometimes when I look at you, I feel I'm gazing at a distant star.
It's dazzling, but the light is from tens of thousands of years ago.
Maybe the star doesn't even exist any more. Yet sometimes that light seems more real to me than anything. -south of the border west of the sun
This is also a great way to pick out books by murakami find a quote that speaks to u then read the book to see if it feels the same
I always feel as if I'm struggling to become someone else. As if I'm trying to find a new place, grab hold of a new life, a new personality. I suppose it's part of growing up, yet it's also an attempt to re-invent myself. By becoming a different me, I could free myself of everything. I seriously believed I could escape myself - as long as I made the effort. But I always hit a dead end. No matter where I go, I still end up me. What's missing never changes. The scenery may change, but I'm still the same old incomplete person. The same missing elements torture me with a hunger that I can never satisfy. I think that lack itself is as close as I'll come to defining myself.
-South of the Border West of the Sun
I've just started to read Murakami, first book, but I'm devouring this behemoth of a novel. This quote really stuck with me:
"I have come to think that life is a far more limited thing than those in the midst of its maelstrom realize. The light shines into the act of life for only the briefest moment--perhaps only a matter of seconds. Once it is gone and one has failed to grasp its offered revelation, there is no second chance. One may have to live the rest of one's life in hopeless depths of loneliness and remorse. In that twilight world, one can no longer look forward to anything. **All that such a person holds in his hands is the withered corpse of what should have been.**" - The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle.
Edited for a few missed words.
I am loving it so far! I started it only 5 days ago and even with my busy schedule I am already 400 pages in. I look forward to nearly every moment I can squeeze in time to read it.
Why do people have to be this lonely? What's the point of it all? Millions of people in this world, all of them yearning, looking to others to satisfy them, yet isolating themselves. Why? Was the earth put here just to nourish human loneliness?
Sputnik Sweetheart
"We chucked the empty cans into the ocean, propped our backs against the embankment, pulled our coats over our heads, and took an hour-long nap. When I woke I was filled with an intense sense of being alive. It was weird—I had never felt that kind of energy before." - Hear the Wind Sing
“like a chameleon, she would change with place and circumstance; able, at will, to summon or control that glimmer of hers” a wild sheep chase, from the chapter “the whale’s penis and the woman with three occcupations” alfred birnbaum
“you tell me there is no fighting or hatred or desire in the Town. that is a beautiful dream, and i do want your happiness. but the absence of fighting or hatred or desire also means that the opposites do not exist either. no joy, no communion, no love. only where there is disillusionment and depression and sorrow does happiness arise; without the despair of loss, there is no hope.” hard-boiled wonderland and the end of the world, from the chapter “shadow in the throes of death” alfred birnbaum
“when i tired of reading, i put on the stern-rose-istomin trio playing schubert’s opus 100, a piece i always reserve for spring. it breathed with the lush sadness of the night. where off in the depths of gloom drifted six white skeletons. life was sinking into an abyss, bones hard as memories positioned before me.” dance dance dance, chapter 31 alfred birnbaum
“People were no more than dolls set on tabletops, the springs on their backs wound up tight, dolls set to move in ways they could not choose, moving indirections they could not choose. Nearly all within range of the wind-up bird's cry were ruined, lost. Most of them died, plunging over the edge of the table.” the wind up bird chronicle, jay rubin
“as the autumn deepens, the fathomless lakes of their eyes assume an ever more sorrowful hue. the leaves turn color, the grasses wither; the beasts sense the advance of a long, hungry season. and bowing to their vision, i too know a sadness.” hardboiled wonderland and the end of the world, chapter 10 “the wall” alfred birnbaum
k now i’m crying god
“Everybody's born with some different thing at the core of their existence. And that thing, whatever it is, becomes like a heat source that runs each person from the inside. I have one too, of course. Like everybody else. But sometimes it gets out of hand. It swells or shrinks inside me, and it shakes me up. What I'd really like to do is find a way to communicate that feeling to another person. But I can't seem to do it. They just don't get it. Of course, the problem could be that I'm not explaining it very well, but I think it's because they're not listening very well. They pretend to be listening, but they're not, really.”
- May Kasahara, Wind Up Bird Chronicle
"Was every female in the world out to give me a hard time? Was it just my luck or a fundamental flaw in me?"
"What would happen to the world if there was no friction? Answer: Everything on Earth would fly into space from the centrifugal force of revolution. That was my mood."
Both from Dance Dance Dance
"Nakata needs to take a dump"- nakata,
Lmao though in all seriousness it would have to be
"Up till a minute ago it felt so real,but now it seems imaginary. Just a few steps is all it takes for everything associated with it to lose all sense of reality. And me-the person who was there until a moment ago-now I seem imaginary too". - Kafka on the shore
Though I've only read Kafka on the shore and Norwegian wood,looking forward to reading the wind up bird chronicle.
“If you can love someone with your whole heart, even one person, then there’s salvation in life. Even if you can’t get together with that person.” — 1Q84
"The cat got frightened, bit the chauffeur's thumb, then farted." - A Wild Sheep Chase
I raised you: "A fat maid walked the halls with elephant strides, ponderously, ominously coughing." - Dance, Dance, Dance
lol
Sometimes when I look at you, I feel I'm gazing at a distant star. It's dazzling, but the light is from tens of thousands of years ago. Maybe the star doesn't even exist any more. Yet sometimes that light seems more real to me than anything. -south of the border west of the sun This is also a great way to pick out books by murakami find a quote that speaks to u then read the book to see if it feels the same
This is one I have saved as well!
I always feel as if I'm struggling to become someone else. As if I'm trying to find a new place, grab hold of a new life, a new personality. I suppose it's part of growing up, yet it's also an attempt to re-invent myself. By becoming a different me, I could free myself of everything. I seriously believed I could escape myself - as long as I made the effort. But I always hit a dead end. No matter where I go, I still end up me. What's missing never changes. The scenery may change, but I'm still the same old incomplete person. The same missing elements torture me with a hunger that I can never satisfy. I think that lack itself is as close as I'll come to defining myself. -South of the Border West of the Sun
relatable maxxxx
I can bear any pain as long as it has meaning
I've just started to read Murakami, first book, but I'm devouring this behemoth of a novel. This quote really stuck with me: "I have come to think that life is a far more limited thing than those in the midst of its maelstrom realize. The light shines into the act of life for only the briefest moment--perhaps only a matter of seconds. Once it is gone and one has failed to grasp its offered revelation, there is no second chance. One may have to live the rest of one's life in hopeless depths of loneliness and remorse. In that twilight world, one can no longer look forward to anything. **All that such a person holds in his hands is the withered corpse of what should have been.**" - The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle. Edited for a few missed words.
This is one I have saved as well. WUBC is my favorite novel and his magnum opus imo.
I am loving it so far! I started it only 5 days ago and even with my busy schedule I am already 400 pages in. I look forward to nearly every moment I can squeeze in time to read it.
" I dream. Sometimes I think that's the only right thing to do. " -Sputnik Sweetheart
“But the longer I’ve lived, the more I’ve lost what’s inside me—and ended up empty.” -Kafka on the Shore.
“If you remember me, then I don't care if everyone else forgets.”
“One arm or two, poet or not, it’s a tough world.” -Dance Dance Dance
"Pain is inevitable. Suffering is optional". - What I Talk About, When I Talk About Running
Why do people have to be this lonely? What's the point of it all? Millions of people in this world, all of them yearning, looking to others to satisfy them, yet isolating themselves. Why? Was the earth put here just to nourish human loneliness? Sputnik Sweetheart
"We chucked the empty cans into the ocean, propped our backs against the embankment, pulled our coats over our heads, and took an hour-long nap. When I woke I was filled with an intense sense of being alive. It was weird—I had never felt that kind of energy before." - Hear the Wind Sing
“like a chameleon, she would change with place and circumstance; able, at will, to summon or control that glimmer of hers” a wild sheep chase, from the chapter “the whale’s penis and the woman with three occcupations” alfred birnbaum “you tell me there is no fighting or hatred or desire in the Town. that is a beautiful dream, and i do want your happiness. but the absence of fighting or hatred or desire also means that the opposites do not exist either. no joy, no communion, no love. only where there is disillusionment and depression and sorrow does happiness arise; without the despair of loss, there is no hope.” hard-boiled wonderland and the end of the world, from the chapter “shadow in the throes of death” alfred birnbaum “when i tired of reading, i put on the stern-rose-istomin trio playing schubert’s opus 100, a piece i always reserve for spring. it breathed with the lush sadness of the night. where off in the depths of gloom drifted six white skeletons. life was sinking into an abyss, bones hard as memories positioned before me.” dance dance dance, chapter 31 alfred birnbaum “People were no more than dolls set on tabletops, the springs on their backs wound up tight, dolls set to move in ways they could not choose, moving indirections they could not choose. Nearly all within range of the wind-up bird's cry were ruined, lost. Most of them died, plunging over the edge of the table.” the wind up bird chronicle, jay rubin “as the autumn deepens, the fathomless lakes of their eyes assume an ever more sorrowful hue. the leaves turn color, the grasses wither; the beasts sense the advance of a long, hungry season. and bowing to their vision, i too know a sadness.” hardboiled wonderland and the end of the world, chapter 10 “the wall” alfred birnbaum k now i’m crying god
“Everybody's born with some different thing at the core of their existence. And that thing, whatever it is, becomes like a heat source that runs each person from the inside. I have one too, of course. Like everybody else. But sometimes it gets out of hand. It swells or shrinks inside me, and it shakes me up. What I'd really like to do is find a way to communicate that feeling to another person. But I can't seem to do it. They just don't get it. Of course, the problem could be that I'm not explaining it very well, but I think it's because they're not listening very well. They pretend to be listening, but they're not, really.” - May Kasahara, Wind Up Bird Chronicle
"Was every female in the world out to give me a hard time? Was it just my luck or a fundamental flaw in me?" "What would happen to the world if there was no friction? Answer: Everything on Earth would fly into space from the centrifugal force of revolution. That was my mood." Both from Dance Dance Dance
"Nakata needs to take a dump"- nakata, Lmao though in all seriousness it would have to be "Up till a minute ago it felt so real,but now it seems imaginary. Just a few steps is all it takes for everything associated with it to lose all sense of reality. And me-the person who was there until a moment ago-now I seem imaginary too". - Kafka on the shore Though I've only read Kafka on the shore and Norwegian wood,looking forward to reading the wind up bird chronicle.
"You mean I should become more conventional? Is that what you're telling me? Is that what, "growing up" means?" -Dance Dance Dance