LoT Book CLub - Book 2 - Wind Up Bird Chronicle by Haruki Murakami

[Ghoulish Delight]

Okay I'm done. And since it's officially 4 weeks, shall we dispense with spoiler tags?

Regarding his passiveness, I'll concede that he's passive. But not in a "Oh well, what can I do?" kind of way. He never gives up on anything. It's more that he sits, fully analyzes a situation, and comes to the conclusion that the best course of action is inaction. He may not be doing much, but he does just enough to affect the flow of how things happen to him. He knows he can't change the course of the river, but if he puts a rock in the right place, it will alter the currents enough to suit his needs.

I don't know that I suspected that the "give me 10 minutes" woman was a manifestation of Kumiko, but I did suspect very early on that she was part of some sort of dream world. At least once, Toru had soemone in the house (Creta, if memory serves) when the phone rang. He let it ring, but Creta gave no indication of having heard it.

There are some very interesting simliarities between this and Hardboiled Wonderland. Certain particulars and parallels that cropped up in both. Definitely makes me want to read another to see if the trend continues.

[Alex]

For me, the key to Toru's behavior (in the last half of the book) is summarized in one sentence from when his uncle visits after learning of Kumiko's disappearance:

Originally Posted by Page 328

You ought to train yourself to look at things with your own eyes until something comes clear.

While this immediately gives rise to him sitting and watching faces in Shinjuku, it also is what he does for the rest of the book. He moves along with the forces in his life and just watches. He spends a couple months going down to the bottom of the well every day and just seeing what happens.

And during this time nothing new is really revealed to him or the reader about what is going on and yet through this process, when the moment of truth comes he has come to understand exactly what is going on and does what is necessary.


Another part that intrigues is from Kumiko's computer conversation with Toru.

Originally Posted by Page 492

"Going bad" is something that happens over a longer period of time.

I find the sentence interesting but does anything in the book really bear this out. Every instance of life changes I can find in the book happen with a sudden change of direction rather than a gradual one. Events so orbit each other exerting a gradual gravitational pull but rather carom about immediately and drastically changing things.

May has her motorcycle accident that puts her on one path and then her interacting with Toru in the well shifts her off into another direction.

Lt. Mamiya's life is completely changed in a single incident.

Creta lives live one way and then is knocked 90-degrees off with her suicide attempt and then again with her defilement by Noboru Wataya.

Nutmeg's life shifted with the brutal murder of her husband. Cinnamon after his encounter with the wind-up bird.