Haruki Murakami
In Japan they prefer the realistic style. They like answers and conclusions, but my stories have none. I want to leave them wide open to every possibility. I think my readers understand that openness.
It is hard to be an individual in Japan.
As a novelist, you could say that I am dreaming while I am awake, and every day I can continue with yesterday's dream. Because it is a dream, there are so many contradictions and I have to adjust them to make the story work. But, in principle, the original dream does not change.
I'm not intelligent. I'm not arrogant. I'm just like the people who read my books. I used to have a jazz club, and I made the cocktails and I made the sandwiches. I didn't want to become a writer - it just happened.
Every day I go to my study and sit at my desk and put the computer on. At that moment, I have to open the door. It's a big, heavy door. You have to go into the Other Room. Metaphorically, of course. And you have to come back to this side of the room. And you have to shut the door.
Before I became a writer, I was running a jazz bar in the center of Tokyo, which means that I worked in filthy air all the time late into the night. I was very excited when I started making a living out of my writing, and I decided, 'I will live in nothing but an absolutely healthy way.'
I don't want to express my opinion about actual politics, because if I do, I have to be responsible for my decision.
I don't get bored.
I am 55 years old now. It takes three years to write one book. I don't know how many books I will be able to write before I die. It is like a countdown. So with each book I am praying - please let me live until I am finished.
If you cannot concentrate, you are not so happy.
It's physical. If you keep on writing for three years, every day, you should be strong. Of course you have to be strong mentally, also. But in the first place you have to be strong physically. That is a very important thing. Physically and mentally you have to be strong.
Writing is fun - at least mostly. I write for four hours every day. After that I go running. As a rule, 10 kilometers (6.2 miles). That's easy to manage.
A fortunate author can write maybe twelve novels in his lifetime.
I don't know how many good books I still have in me; I hope there are another four or five.
Most near-future fictions are boring. It's always dark and always raining, and people are so unhappy.
I just wanted to write something about running, but I realized that to write about my running is to write about my writing. It's a parallel thing in me.
Many people, especially young people, would like to be more independent and on their own. But it is very difficult and they suffer from feelings of isolation. I think that is one reason why young readers support my work.
In my younger days, I was trying to write sophisticated prose and fantastic stories.
My priority is my books, at least at this point. What I have to do is write the narrative of this time.
Every writer has his writing technique - what he can and can't do to describe something like war or history. I'm not good at writing about those things, but I try because I feel it is necessary to write that kind of thing.
My father belongs to the generation that fought the war in the 1940s. When I was a kid my father told me stories - not so many, but it meant a lot to me. I wanted to know what happened then, to my father's generation. It's a kind of inheritance, the memory of it.
I myself have been on my own and utterly independent since I graduated. I haven't belonged to any company or any system. It isn't easy to live like this in Japan.
For me, writing a novel is like having a dream. Writing a novel lets me intentionally dream while I'm still awake. I can continue yesterday's dream today, something you can't normally do in everyday life.
I have no models in Japanese literature. I created my own style, my own way.
I'm a writer, not a professional runner. It's fun and it helps me write. I need powerful concentration.
Many people tell me that they don 't know what to feel when they finish one of my books because the story was dark, or complicated, or strange. But while they were reading it, they were inside my world and they were happy. That's good.
I could have been a cult writer if I'd kept writing surrealistic novels. But I wanted to break into the mainstream, so I had to prove that I could write a realistic book.
I started writing at the kitchen table after midnight. It took ten months to finish that first book; I sent it to a publisher and I got some kind of prize, so it was like a dream - I was surprised to find it happening.
George Orwell is half journalist, half fiction writer. I'm 100 percent fiction writer... I don't want to write messages. I want to write good stories. I think of myself as a political person, but I don't state my political messages to anybody.
If you keep on writing for three years, every day, you should be strong. Of course, you have to be strong mentally, also. But in the first place, you have to be strong physically. That is a very important thing. Physically and mentally you have to be strong.
Sometimes I wonder why I'm a novelist right now. There is no definite career reason why I became a writer. Something happened, and I became a writer. And now I'm a successful writer.
As long as possible, I would really like to complete one marathon per year. Though my time has been slowing down as I get older, it has become a very important part of my life.
I was enjoying myself writing, because I don't know what's going to happen when I take a ride around that corner. You don't know at all what you're going to find there. That can be thrilling when you read a book, especially when you're a kid and you're reading stories.
Say it before you run out of time. Say it before it's too late. Say what you're feeling. Waiting is a mistake.Collection: Running
The world is full of ways and means to waste time.Collection: Mean
Passion can’t sustain itself forever.Collection: Passion
When you are used to the kind of life -of never getting anything you want- you stop knowing what it is you want.Collection: Knowing
But if something did happen, it happened. Whether it's right or wrong. I accept everything that happens, and that's how I became the person I am now.Collection: Accepting
And once the storm is over, you won’t remember how you made it through, how you managed to survive. You won’t even be sure, whether the storm is really over. But one thing is certain. When you come out of the storm, you won’t be the same person who walked in. That’s what this storm’s all about.Collection: Inspirational
Sometimes it's not the people who change, it's the mask that falls off.Collection: Fake People
Spend your money on the things money can buy. Spend your time on the things money can’t buy.Collection: Life
Some things in life are too complicated to explain in any language.Collection: Things In Life
Unclose your mind. You are not a prisoner. You are a bird in flight, searching the skies for dreams.Collection: Dream
But if you knew you might not be able to see it again tomorrow, everything would suddenly become special and precious, wouldn’t it?Collection: Special
As long as you have the courage to admit mistakes, things can be turned around.Collection: Mistake
Pain is inevitable. Suffering is optional.Collection: Inspirational
Knowledge and ability were tools, not things to show off.Collection: Life
Deep rivers run quiet.Collection: Running
Even chance meetings are the result of karma… Things in life are fated by our previous lives. That even in the smallest events there’s no such thing as coincidence.Collection: Karma