Talk:Haruki Murakami
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[edit] Name Order
Shouldn't this be at Haruki Murakami? That naming order gets more hits. WhisperToMe 06:23, 12 Sep 2004 (UTC)
- He's published in English under the name "Haruki Murakami", so yes. Pyrop 18:19, Sep 14, 2004 (UTC)
[edit] Teaching in America
Shouldn't it be mentioned that he spent some of his time in America teaching at Princeton and Tufts university? Owen Jones 13:18, Sep 24, 2004 (UTC)
[edit] After Dark
After Dark won't be translated until 2010? That's a long time from now ... what's the source for that? CES 19:19, 1 Nov 2004 (UTC)
- The novel is only just released in Japan and it took three years for Kafka on the Shore. Also, it is considered to be of minor importance compared to his other work and there are rumours of a new collection of short stories to be released inbetween. It would be nice if someone could confirm this with a decent source and edit the article accordingly. Sciere 13:39, Dec 19, 2004 (CET)
- 2004 + 3 = 2010?
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- even if the maths did work, that is still idle speculation. -- Jon Dowland 14:39, 12 March 2006 (UTC)
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The publication date (of the English translation) is briefly discussed on the network54.com Murakami forum. 2010 and 2007 are the two quoted dates.
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- It was released in Dutch in February 2006, and book sites now have the English translation scheduled for January 2007 (Sciere 18:31, 29 April 2006 (UTC)). I added this information to the article (Machina82 13.48, 01 Augustus 2006 (UTC)).
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- Is information about the Dutch translation of interest to English language readers? I'm tempted to delete that addition to the article, unless this translation is otherwise notable. CES 13:12, 3 August 2006 (UTC)
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- i added it because it appeared before the english translation which is kind of unusual (Machina82 12:22 8 August 2006 (UTC)
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[edit] Trilogy of the Rat
Which novels form the "Trilogy of the Rat"? The Rat appears in "A Wild Sheep's Chase" and "Dance, Dance, Dance", but the latter isn't mentioned here.
- Those are the second and third books in the trilogy. The first novel in the trilogy (and his first published novel) is Hear the Wind Sing. It hasn't been translated into English. Owen Jones 13:25, 1 Jan 2005 (UTC)
- Hmm ... what about Pinball 1973? It seems like the Rat appears in it but I don't remember. CES 01:16, 2 Jan 2005 (UTC)
- Actually, "Hear the Wind Sing" is published in English by Kodansha (a Japanese publisher). It was translated by Alfred Birnbaum -- Amazon.com link. Most bookstores in Japan carry this book; it seems to be something for those wishing to practice their English because there are English to Japanese vocab word lists in the back of the book. -- wulong 02:53, 5 Jan 2005 (UTC)
- I have heard, unconfirmed, that Murakami does not want Hear the Wind Sing or Pinball, 1973 published in the United States, for whatever reason. Copies also show up on eBay frequently for around $20 plus shipping if you are looking for a copy.
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- The 'Trilogy of the Rat' includes "Hear the Wind Sing", "Pinball, 1973" and "A Wild Sheep Chase". "Dance, Dance, Dance" is a sequel to these books but is not considered part of the trilogy, mainly because the Rat doesn't play a profound role in this book and is only mentioned a few times. Inuki 08:04, 4 Feb 2005 (UTC)
[edit] Dance,Dance,Dance
Murakami wrote "First of all, the title for "Dance,Dance,Dance" had been decided before it began to write. A true origin is an old tune of the black band named The Dells though seem to be thought that this title was taken from Beach Boys's tune. " in his essay"A Faraway Drumbeat"
The Dells' "dance dance dance" is composed by Vern Allison(member of The Dells) The beach boys' "dance dance dance" is composedby Brian Wilson/Carl Wilson
http://www.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&token=&sql=17:331559
[edit] to be added to article:
Tony Takitani - new movie based on Murakami story. --Yonkie 00:33, 7 May 2005 (UTC) Tuesday's Women - new short film based on Murakami story.
Isn't Dance Dance Dance a *sequel* rather than a *prequel* to the Trilogy of The Rat? The Sheep Man is a character that develops in A Wild Sheep Chase and then is reacquainted with the narrator.
[edit] 東京奇譚集
I added Murakami's most recent collection of short stories to the body of the article but was a little unsure of how to best translate 奇譚集 into English. If anyone has any better ideas than "Urban Legends", please edit and improve. For now I wanted to at least get the information out there. CES 01:37, 20 September 2005 (UTC)
- After thinking about it more, "Mysteries of Tokyo" sounded a little more natural. Please note that this is still not an official translation of the title. CES 20:18, 8 November 2005 (UTC)
- my japanese-japanese dictionary (kojien) has roughly this description for kitan: unusual and/or amusing story or legend
so, seeing as how these are modern-day stories, the phrase "urban legends" might not be so far off the mark. these stories lack the element of wide public recognition, however, so it's probably still not the best possible solution.
- Talk about a coincidence, we posted at the same time. I thought "Mysteries of Tokyo" was a little more neutral than "Tokyo Urban Legends" so I made the change. It will be interesting to see how they officially translate the phrase. CES 20:21, 8 November 2005 (UTC)
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- i went and checked the oficial japanese publisher's site (http://www.shinchosha.co.jp/murakami/main.html), in the slim hope that a prefered english title might be published on the japanese original book (as was the case with kafka on the shore, for instance), but no such luck. guess we'll have to wait and see.
[edit] Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman
A short story collection called "Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman" is due to be published next year. As of 1 January 2006, Amazon gives publication dates of 6 July 2006 (Amazon UK, Publisher: The Harvill Press, ISBN: 1843432692), and 29 August 2006 (Amazon US, Publisher: Knopf, ISBN: 1400044618). Davebook 12:08, 1 January 2006 (UTC)
This report from Mr Yoshio Osakabe, gives a list of 25 short stories that apparently form the "Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman" collection": the last 5 of these stories were included in 東京奇譚集. If this is the case, surely this brings into question whether there will be an English translation of 東京奇譚集?
- Yes, see also Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman for the same list and some information on this rather eclectic collection of short stories. As all 5 short stories in 東京奇譚集 are included in BWSW, it does indeed seem doubtful that it would be translated separately. It also brings into question how the bibliography is arranged, as The Elephant Vanishes also does not correspond with any original Japanese publication, while there are some Japanese publications included that either have not or will not be published in English, at least not in the original form (as mentioned, 東京奇譚集 has been lumped into BWSW, After Dark has not been translated, neither has やがて哀しき外国語 to the best of my knowledge). Perhaps a complete bibliography of original works should be followed by a bibliography of works translated into English? CES 05:51, 16 July 2006 (UTC)
[edit] elephant vanishes
a book with said title is mentioned in the bibliography. is this the collection of short stories in english? if so, shouldn't this be clearly stated? my quible is with the japanese transliteration following it, in my opinion it may be deceiving. to my knowledge, a book with that title only just recently appeared an the japanese market, and may (or may not, i haven't checked) be the japanese equivalent of the (original) english collection. the actual short story (the elephant vanishes) was first published in 1985 (august edition of bungakukai magazine)/1986 (pan'ya saishugeki, short story collection) (source for dates of publishing: yuriika magazine special edition, murakami haruki no sekai /in japanese/)
- edit. at the official publisher's site mentioned above (http://www.shinchosha.co.jp/murakami/elephant/index.html), i also doublechecked for the japanese edition of the elephant vanishes. the book was published in 2005 and is in fact a japanese counterpart of the english book. it's promoted as "the stories new york chose". go figure.
[edit] Recurring themes
I'm just now reading my third Murakami book in a row, having read 3 or 4 previously, and I'm noticing some trends that I'd like to collect:
- Buildings with randomly numbered rooms: Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World, The Wind-up Bird Chronicle
- Cat with bent tail and no name is named after a type of fish: A Wild Sheep Chase, The Wind-up Bird Chronicle
- Character who speaks without making sound: Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World, The Wind-up Bird Chronicle, Kafka on the Shore
- Teenage female friend of protagonist: Dance, Dance, Dance, The Wind-up Bird Chronicle, Kafka on the Shore
- Wells: Norwegian Wood, The Wind-up Bird Chronicle
- Whiskey, often Cutty Sark
- Cats are definetly a recurring theme in Murakami's work. See also Kafka on the Shore. Though it may be a bit general, I think the fairly constant references to music (popular and classical) and other literature in dialogue, which often work as analogies, are worthy of mention, too. BigglesTh9 00:39, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
Johnny says: also, don't forget music! often classical music, but in norwegian wood also beatles and other 60' music.
[edit] Film and Theatre
Perhaps we could separate out the film bit and add something about Murakami related theatre productions: last year, I went to see a production of "The Elephant Vanishes" at the Barbican, London, which was three short stories from the collection of the same name (Sleep, The Second Bakery Attack and The Elephant Vanishes). It was a collaboration between Setagaya Public Theatre and Complicité after a successful run in Japan the year before (if I recall correctly). At any rate, it was really rather good. I also heard there's another production (of another story) going on in the US at the moment, but I don't know that much about it. zenpea 07:15, 29 March 2006 (UTC)
- I agree that it would be nice to have a separate heading for "Film and Theatre," or for "Adaptations in Other Media," perhaps, or just "Adaptations." I was also lucky enough to see The Elephant Vanishes, on this side of the pond at the Lincoln Center Festival in New York in 2004. It played for just five performances, a typically limited festival run, but I thought it was just awesome. They brought it back to the States briefly (a year ago?) to play at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, and a friend of mine, who had already seen it in New York, drove all the way from Chicago in order to watch it again. I haven't heard about this other Murakami production, but I will keep an eye out for it. In the meantime, I've added a couple of paragraphs about the Complicite adaptation to The Elephant Vanishes article. I'll go ahead and add a couple of lines to this article as well.76.168.253.250 23:42, 16 January 2007 (UTC)Frank
[edit] broke bio into section
I found the biography section to be overly long and hard to follow, so I broke it into sections. I'm not completely happy with it yet, but it's a start. --Mr Wind-Up Bird ✈ 17:30, 27 April 2006 (UTC)
[edit] Bibliography
The bibliography was a hodge-podge of works that had and had not been translated into English, of varying genres ... I changed the format to a table that will hopefully make it a little clearer what Murakami originally wrote and when, as Japanese and English release dates/formats differ rather dramatically. I did not include the dates of when the works were translated into English nor the translator, but that would certainly be a worthwhile addition. There are also more works that could be mentioned, but for now, I think I got just about everything that's been translated into English. I'm sure there are mistakes here and there (hopefully nothing major) but hopefully this is a good start. CES 02:21, 7 August 2006 (UTC)
[edit] Split off short stories?
The short stories section is quite long. I would recommend splitting it off into a new article which would also list the collections that have been published along with all the short stories. Please discuss (here) your feelings about this. Skumarla 05:06, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
- I agree that it's long, but if the new article would only be this same list of stories and nothing else, I say keep them here. The list is at the very end of the article and makes for a handy one-stop reference. CES 23:24, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
Why not make a seperate article for both short stories and novels written by Haruki Murakami, and seperate the two there? --70.240.204.170 04:48, 24 November 2006 (UTC)
I'd rather have it at the same place. The article is not too long and there is more about is writing than Murakami's biography.
- Should the titles of the short stories appear in quotation marks, rather than italics, to distinguish them from his novels? This seems more in keeping with most Manuals of Style [1] as well as the precedent set by other Wikipedia articles like Nine Stories (Salinger).76.168.253.250 23:45, 16 January 2007 (UTC)Frank
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- I agree that they should be in quotes - that is the recommendation here – Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style_(titles) Skumarla 07:09, 17 January 2007 (UTC)
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- I'll go ahead and make that change to the "Selected Short Stories" section. ("Selected Non-Fiction" I will leave as it is, since both Underground and The Place That Was Promised were published as individual complete works in Japan prior to being collected in a single volume in the UK.)76.168.253.250 20:15, 19 January 2007 (UTC)Frank
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