1Q84
a reading map
C o n t e n t s
2 - 3 Introduction
17 Urban fantastic
4 Taxi cab driver
18 Japanese cults 1
5 Love & mystery
19 Lunar science
6 Japanese girls
20 Love across time
7 A literary scam
21 Japanese cults 2
8 Megacity Edo
22 The private eye
9 Small demons
23 Mystery place 2
10 Japanese sex
24 Math and love
11 Multiple lives
25 Recipe Prefecture
12 Angel for hire
26 Video Prefecture
13 - 14 Two moons
27 Image Prefecture
interlude
28 Haruki Prefecture 15 Mystery Place 1 29 “We’re talking about 16 Tokyo assassin
01
the real world”
I n t r o d u c t i o n
and socially disconnected, find solace in a brief moment of hand holding at school. Their lives subsequently separate, but based upon the memory of this single act of kindness, these two lonely figures thereafter pine for each other as lovers.
“Please remember: things are not what they seem.” ______ Love, Loss, and Longing… Dislocation, Identity and Memory… Destiny, Fate and Reality… these are some of the major themes than run throughout 1Q84, but being a Haruki Murakami epic, his smorgasbord of ‘gifts’ are not always so easily discerned. Further inspection also reveals other signature ‘Murakamisms’ such as Magical Realism, Surrealism and Post-Modernism First released across three books, the combined volume (approaching 1,000 pages in length), is a slow burner, infused with episodes of foreboding and imminent dread, in which powerless and displaced characters negotiate shifting realities. This is Murakami’s default setting: characters (and readers) being left to their own devices to figure things out and make reliable interpretations of their everyday realities, with only shifting or partial information proffered. A simple story rendered complicated was a stated intention of Murakami for 1Q84. In this mega-novel, a young boy and girl, both emotionally scarred
Twenty years later, the lives of Tengo Kawana, now a rather pitifully ambitionless part-time writer and math tutor, and Masami Aomame a physical instructor and highly skilled assassin, once again intersect by a confluence of unforeseen – and deadly – circumstances, in an alternate world of labyrinthine conspiracies. While essentially a love story, 1Q84 is a love story Murakami-style, so it is set against a background of ‘realism’ vs. ‘unrealism’, of schisms rent upon ordinary people who are plucked by extraordinary circumstances into a world of shadow and light and societal oppressors. ______ “This world has a serious shortage of both logic and kindness” ______ The characters and plot of 1Q84 extend beyond classic Good vs. Evil embattlements; benevolent motivations contradict actions which initially appear violent and inexcusable, but with explanation, yield a truth that highlights the author’s intention of informing the reader that achieving balance in life is the ultimate accomplishment. This is encapsulated in the wisdom of the cult leader who explains “In this world, there is no absolute good, no absolute evil.
02
(continued)
I n t r o d u c t i o n
About this Reading Map
Indeed, balance itself is the good.” This is crucial to the story, because the primary motivation for Aomame being drawn into 1Q84 is to redress the balance and arrest the momentum of a force known as The Little People. So it is then that Tengo and Aomame become wayfarers in this strange new world, compelled to seek a reunion, clinging to a single, beautiful memory that has for twenty years firmed their resolve to love no other. It is a memory which drives them to seek a way out of the dislocated Wonderland they have been inadvertently transported into. And their love is unequivocal. Aomame, when remarked to by the Leader of the Sakigake cult that “Without your love, it’s a honky-tonk parade. Like in the song” she poignantly replies about the man she has not known for two decades “I love Tengo. This is no honky-tonk parade.” Resolutions are flimsy and not without the intimation of further trials ahead, as Aomame contemplates at the finale whether she and Tengo have indeed returned to their ‘old’ 1984, or perhaps to some other alternative. But this is a love story after all, so any potential plight for the lovers is mitigated by Aomame’s recognition that more than anything else…“at least we’re no longer alone.”
This Reading Map presents a range of resources that are all linked to the characters and themes which abound in this fascinating and inventive novel. 17 different topics have been identified, the significance of each to 1Q84 briefly introduced and accompanied by a specifically selected title which, while connected to 1Q84, offers a variant reading experience. Cumulatively, the selection builds a ‘literary universe’ around the progenitor book, although such a library of linked reads has by no means been exhausted here. There are several additional resources which aim to augment the experience for fans and their encounters with the 1Q84 world of Aomame and Tengo. Videos (especially , the documentary exploring the world of Haruki Murakami) and a recipe for Tengo’s shrimp dish (food receives its share of attention in the book) extend the original story, offering readers a banquet of further delights, after they have absorbed the culmination of Aomame’s and Tengo’s trials, and left the lovers gazing into the night seeing “nothing more than a grey paper moon, hanging in the sky.”
03
This Reading Map was produced by Paul Brown, January 2014 Paul.brown@clear.net.nz
En route to an ‘appointment’ with an unsuspecting client, and prior to descending the stairway from Metropolitan Inbound Expressway No3 to escape a traffic jam (her ‘rabbit hole’ into 1Q84), Aomame encounters a taxi cab driver with far more insight about what awaits her than is pursuant for even the most knowledgeable of his profession. His forebodings are particularly disturbing, with Murakami manufacturing a narrative opening possessing considerable ‘shock and awe’: “Things may look different to you than they did before. But don’t let appearances fool you. There’s only one reality.”
T a x i c a b d r i v e r
Carnival. A novel (2012) by Rawi Hage
“I take pride in the service I provide because I and the likes of me are the carriers of this world, the movers and the linkers.”
In a crime-ridden, apocalyptic metropolis, composed of both carnivalesque beauty and ugliness, survives a book loving taxi driver known as Fly. Carnival is a city of shadows and little light, populated by madmen, revolutionaries, magicians and prostitutes, but into this diaspora of humanity comes an opportunity for Fly to experience an uncommon romance with a passenger he picks up one night. In what has been described as a dreamlike pastiche of vignettes, Fly narrates a tour de force through Carnival for the reader, with the writing both hauntingly visceral and witty.
04
As an assignment, Aomame’s taking of The Leader’s life is far from routine, but she is informed by her victim prior to his demise that by choosing to terminate his life, she will sacrifice her own but save Tengo’s. For Aomame, and her devotion to Tengo, it is a deal worth making. Enter private investigator Toshimaru Ishikawa, recruited by the cult to track down The Leader’s murderer. Ishikawa is relentless in his allocated task, likening himself to a ‘machine’: capable, patient and unfeeling: “I’m going to get you, Miss Aomame. You are quite clever to be sure. Skilled and cautious. But I’m going to chase after you until I catch you. I’m heading your way.”
L o v e
The devotion of suspect X. A novel (2005) by Keigo Higashino
& m y s t e r y 05
“What they needed was a perfect defense based on perfect logic. Whatever you do, don’t panic, he told himself. Panicking wouldn’t help them reach a solution. And he was sure their problem had a solution. Every problem had one.”
When Yasuko Hanaoka’s ex-husband threatens her and her daughter, a murder occurs. But for Tokyo Police detective Kusanagi, the evidence he is presented with doesn’t add up, so he enlists the aid of Dr Manabu Yukawa, a brilliant physicist nicknamed ‘Detective Galileo’. However, the accused also has a benefactor, a brilliant math teacher whose devotion to the suspect means he will pursue a meticulous course of action and risk everything to baffle the police and his nemesis, Yukawa. Here, Japan’s award winning mystery writer presents a riveting cat-and-mouse game of intellectual juggernauts locked in a battle of wits; one pursuing the truth behind a crime, the other offering himself as a formidable foe to those who would harm the person to whom he is secretly devoted.
The publication of the young and beautiful Fuka-Eri’s novella, Air Chrysalis, acts as the trigger for the ensuing trials that befall Aomame and Tengo in 1Q84. Physically, Fuka-Eri embodies much of the Japanese (and international) fascination with the pop icon of that country. Alluring, yet enigmatic, Fuka-Eri is revealed as less – and more – than what she initially seems to be. As it turns out, Fuka-Eri is the Leader’s daughter, or the daughter’s replicant, possessing several characteristics that mark her uniqueness, including a total lack of affection, the inability to use rising inflections for questions, and the capacity to quote long passages of literature from memory (which she may not comprehend)..
J a p a n e s e g i r l s
Japanese schoolgirl confidential. How teenage girls made a nation cool (2010) by Brian Ashcraft with Shoko Ueda “She is the queen of cool, she’s a cold-hearted killer. She’s a popstar, an angel, a saviour. She makes men weak at the knees… She gives children hope. She’s a heroine for gamers, a muse for artists, and an inspiration to her peers. She’s a symbol of feminine mystique.”
Affirming them to be a metaphor for Japan itself, this husband and wife team explore the cultural phenomenon which are Japanese schoolgirls. Combining Western and traditional influences, they contend that this section of Japanese society exude ‘soft power’, uniting ‘gruff samurai’ characteristics with those of the demure geisha, beautiful and coquettish. The entire gambit of their contribution to music, movies, art, literature, games and consumerist trends in modern Japan is presented. Far from representing a fetishist journey into the world of these high school girls (or ‘joshi kasei’ as they are known) this heavily illustrated publication aims to provide insight into how power over a nation’s psyche has been exerted by a demographic group with a penchant for sailor’s uniforms.
06
The literary conspiracy to publish the enormously popular novella Air Chrysalis (penned by the eponymous Fuka Eri and ghost written by Tengo) triggers an unexpected chain of events. For Tengo the plot presented itself as an opportunity to further his ambitions as a writer; for his agent Komatsu the deception was aimed as retribution against the literary establishment. Unknown to either conspirator was the fact that the book was in fact a disguised dossier with the potential to expose the secret entities behind the Sakigake religious cult (an order influenced by the so called ‘Little People’) resulting in a mission by natural and supernatural forces to correct this imbalance.
A l i t e r a r y
07
s c a m
The plagiarist: A novella (2011) by Hugh Howey
“Adam glanced over the sad and empty expanse of his monitor and laughed to himself. Twenty four inches by twelve inches of pathetic nothingness. His entire social life, his entire real romantic life could be contained in a small chat window in a lonely fraction of that abyss.”
In a possible future, cybernetic simulations have become so advanced that their achievements in arts and sciences mimic, and in some situations become undistinguishable from, reality. Enter, Adam Griffey. By day he is a teacher of literature, but by night he steals it, searching for ‘the next big thing’. The plagiarist Adam prowls simulated worlds, memorizing in exact detail, word for word, material he deems worthy for his machinations. Yet, in a time where sim-environments have become so advanced, how can people be sure that they are maintaining a human separation from the digital environ? How do they exist when they fall in love with someone who does not actually exist? More thought-provoking science fiction from Howey… with haiku.
The geography of 1Q84‘s ‘Wonderland’ comprises Tokyo and its outskirts, with its locations acting as markers for significant episodes throughout the story. From Aomame’s opening journey along Tokyo’s Inbound Expressway No3 towards a hotel in Shibuya, her meeting with policewoman Ayumi in a Roppongi fake Bahamas singles bar, and the appointment with The Leader at Hotel Okura, to Tengo’s first meeting with Fuka-Eri in Nakamuraya Café (in Shinjuku), and his sighting of Aomame while sitting atop a slide in a Kōenji playground (in Tōkyō’s Suginami ward), 1Q84 is akin to a guided magical tour through this fantastical city.
M e g a c i t y E d o
Tokyo. DK Eyewitness Travel (2008)
“In little more than 400 years Tokyo has grown from being an impoverished fishing village to arguably the world’s largest metropolis. These itineraries are designed to give a broad flavor of Tokyo and illustrate how this vibrant city preserves its past while striding boldly into the future.”
For the dedicated 1Q84 fan, this travel guide book offers welcome insight into some of the places and customary habits that are intrinsic to the storyboard, and to the lives of the characters in it. The specific locations from significant episodes in the story can be found in the directories for hotels and train stations as well as from the various maps, which afford the reader to follow Aomame’s fateful journey along Inbound Metropolitan Expressway No3 from Kinuta to Shibuya. Sections on ‘The Japanese Meal’, ‘The Flavors of Japan’, and ‘Types of Restaurants and Bars’, provide additional background information, placing in context many of the details, locales and action which permeate Murakami’s novel.
08
The Little People in 1Q84 remain an underdeveloped force, fluctuating somewhere between ‘malevolent’ and ‘mischievous’, who threaten harm and exert huge influence upon The Leader of the Sakigake cult. As Murakami himself confessed, The Little People arrived involuntarily as a literary component of this novel, so it is perhaps not surprising that the characters also encountered profound difficulty explaining their presence: “Probably no one knows for sure who the Little People are… all that people are able to learn is that they exist.”
S m a l l d e m o n s 09
Don’t be afraid of the dark. Blackwood’s guide to dangerous fairies (2011) by Guillermo del Toro & Christopher Golden
“…in all of my research, this one frightful truth has shone through: while evidence suggests many fairy species may now be extinct, many of those that remain are very, very dangerous”.
From the bizarre world of Guillermo del Toro: In 1894 a young biologist, Emerson Blackwood, finds proof that a world exists in the shadows beyond known science, and fuelled with a Victorian zeal for the advancement of scientific knowledge, launches into a global adventure to catalogue these supernatural creatures. It will be a pursuit that will have the direst of consequences, as Emerson recounts in his diary. Deals will be done and humans will come to learn that their coexistence with the Otherworld comes at a price: “If this proves to be the final entry in this journal , let it serve as the gravest warning about the perils that await anyone foolish enough to indulge a fascination with dangerous fairies. They bite.”
Sexual congregations of different natures permeate 1Q84, whether it is The Leader’s violent but ‘obligatory’ congresses with the prepubescent virgins of his cult, Tengo’s ‘purification’ with Fuka Eri, or the wild and brief romps Aomame and her friend Ayumi enjoy with the strangers they ‘pick up’ in hotels. Characterising this element of the story is the fact that the emotional attributes usually associated with such acts of human connection are distinctly severed; the encounters are performed perfunctorily with little or no arousal or desire. Musing upon her friend’s death in a hotel, Aomame concludes that Ayumi’s sexual liaisons masked an emptiness, “an abyss of nothingness”.
J a p a n e s e s e x
Love hotels. The hidden fantasy rooms of Japan (2006) Photography by Misty Keasler. Essays by Rod Slemmons and Natsuo Kirino
“Fantasy castles in the air”
The apparent disconnect between the act of love and love itself is ‘the reality of Japan today’ according to Natsuo Kirino in this photographic essay of the uniquely Japanese phenomenon of ‘love hotels’. “…when Japanese have sex they need a sense of unreality accompanying it. Rather than sex itself, Japanese love the fantasies that go along with it. Which is exactly why love hotels developed.” A voyeuristic journey into the psyche of Japanese sexual fantasy, the photographs of often bizarrely themed and appointed hotel rooms will fascinate, but perhaps also sadden, the reader.
10
Tengo habitually re-imagined different versions of his life and “in all of them, Tengo would tell himself that this was not the place where he belonged. He had been mistakenly locked in a cage. Someday his real parents would find him. They would rescue him from this cramped and ugly cage…” The bizarre incidents which afflict the lives of Tengo and Aomame in the alternate world of 1Q84 – however impossible – are fated as necessary by The Leader for them to rediscover each other again; in their ‘possible’ lives of 1984 this would not have been achievable.
M u l t i p l e
11
l i v e s
The impossible lives of Greta Wells (2013) by Andrew Sean Greer
“They say there are many worlds. Each with its own logic, its own physics, moons, and stars. We cannot go there – we would not survive in most. But there are some, as I have seen, almost exactly like our own. And in those other worlds, the places you love are there, the people you love are there. So what if you found the door?”
In a story imagining ‘what if’ scenarios and the (im)possibility of what could be for all us pending the life choices we make, Greta Wells undergoes a radical treatment to alienate her depression, with the unexpected side effect of transporting her to lives she might have lived, had she been born in different times. Travelling between 1985, 1941 and 1918, Greta lives remarkably similar lives but in each makes different choices. The alternative realities come with their own loves, rewards and, of course, prices to be paid. The question is: as the final treatment looms, which ‘impossible’ life will Greta choose to remain in?
Following the suicide of a best friend, due to an abusive husband who escaped justice, Aomame “resolved in her heart to punish the man for what he had done” pledging to herself that “From now on, I will no longer be the person I was.” Her recruitment by a reclusive dowager to remove other targets who have abused women allowed Aomame to pursue a mission in which she commits acts described as “heavenly dispensation.” A super-skilled, athletic assassin who is sexually attracted to balding middle-aged men? Well, “That’s a Murakami-by-the-way-of-Tarantino male fantasy figure for you.”
A n g e l f o r h i r e
The innocent. A Vanessa Michael Munroe novel (2011) by Taylor Stevens
“She was seated. Chin on her chest, feet bound to the legs of a metal folding chair, hands secured behind it. Not by handcuffs, duct tape, or zip ties. Her mind worked. Struggled toward lucidity. Rope. Thin rope. Lots of it. Idiots.” A suspenseful thriller in which the ever resourceful assassin, Vanessa Munroe, travels to South America to infiltrate a dangerous cult, known as ‘The Chosen’ to rescue a young girl abducted into its ranks. Herself the neglected daughter of missionary parents, Vanessa is only too familiar with the kind of mind control such closed groups exert and while her past and her “kills” haunt her, any vulnerability Munroe possesses is balanced by the ruthlessness with which she despatches her victims. Coincidentally, the author is also the survivor of a cult, perhaps explaining the exuberance with which she has charged Munroe with the relentless pursuit of lethal vengeance against perpetrators of evil.
12
“It’s a Barnum and Bailey world,
Just as phoney as it can be. But it wouldn’t be make-believe, If you believed in me.”
13
14
Aomame surmised that her friend Ayumi’s promiscuity probably developed to counter the pain inflicted upon her by family when she as a child. Aomame’s own motivation – her pursuit of bald headed in hotel bars - was primarily to use sex as liberation from her flesh and the desires for Tengo which bound her to it. In 1Q84 sex is employed by Murakami as a device allowing some of its main characters to escape the shallowness and pain of their real lives, or revisit former glories; even Tengo asks his lover to dress in underwear similar to his mother’s.
M y s t e r y p l a c e 15
1
Palimpsest (2011) by Catherynne M. Valente
“Seeking travelers to the borough of Palimpsest. Unexplained, spontaneous tattoos? Bad dreams? Find me. Please, find me.”
A fable concerning the human quest to escape loneliness, this tale tells of Palimpsest, a place existing somewhere outside of our reality, but a highly desirable locale for four travellers, whose only access to the city is during the sleep that follows sex. Waking life becomes a continuous search between the characters for real world liaisons which act as passports to this magical destination, populated by grotesque and glamorous entities, neither human not animal, alive or dead. Driven along by personal compulsions to replace the loss they have experienced in their lives, these losses are re-imagined in Palimpsest, but for a significant price.
Aomame fits perfectly the stereotype of an accomplished, highly skilled killing machine, providing a service for her hirer which offers “a more far-reaching form of justice.” Her weapon of choice? A slender ice-pick. Strict discipline and meticulous planning allows Aomame to prowl Tokyo and despatch her assigned targets; “…in sending a number of men to the ‘other side’, I’ve never made a single mistake. This is why I’ve been able to survive.” And an unshakeable moral righteousness is no less an assassin’s ally: “The men that she and the dowager together dispatched to a faraway world were ones for whom there were no grounds, from any point of view, for granting them mercy.”
T o k y o a s s a s s i n
John Rain (series) by Barry Eisler
“It was good to be living in Tokyo again. The face of the city had changed, as it continually does… but the havens that mattered remained impervious to this latest infestation. There was still jazz at Body & Soul in Minami Auyama… coffee at Café de L’Ambre in Ginza… a tipple at Campbeltown Iochin Yurakucho”.
From the winner of the Gumshoe Award for Best Thriller of the Year, comes a furiously paced series featuring Japanese-American assassin John Rain. Himself a black belt at the Kodukan International Judo Centre (where his central character trains) Eisler gives Rain free reign to accept global assignment, but Rain’s heart remains in Japan and several of the stories are located there. The series begins in A Clean Kill in Tokyo, in which a hit on a politician exposes Rain to a high level conspiracy. There is a wealth of supplementary material on the author’s website too (http://www.barryeisler.com) including a Top Ten listing of Tokyo’s best bars, coffee shops, jazz clubs and restaurants.
16
Music and Time hold special places in 1Q84. Aomame and Tengo are ‘linked’ by Janacek’s ‘Sinfonietta’, while there are numerous references to different songs and musicians, ranging from classical and jazz to Michael Jackson, and Sonny and Cher. Even the book’s structure, with alternating chapters from Aomame and Tengo’s perspectives, was designed to mimic alternating keys, major and minor. Time itself is challenged and criss-crossed, with Murakami’s characters propelled forward while yearning to recapture the past; the jumbled timeline represents a fictional tool employed to reveal Time’s true nature, how it can become “deformed” and knotting itself “like a tangled string”.
U r b a n
17
f a n t a s t i c
The unconsoled (1995) by Kazuo Ishiguro
“Your wound, it's nothing special, nothing special at all. In this town alone, I know there are many people with far worse. And yet they carry on, every one of them, with far greater courage than you ever did. They go on with their lives. They become something worthwhile. But you, Leo, look at you. Always tending your wound.”
As in 1Q84, ‘Music’ and ‘Time’ are entwined in this post-modern nightmare, a fictional universe both unrecognisable yet familiar, as the day-to-day reality of a renowned pianist takes on a bizarre life of its own. Mr Charles Ryder arrives in a European city to perform in a concert but gradually becomes more and more disoriented as events become replicas of others that have already occurred in his past. Irrational shifts in time, logic and perspective mesh into a Kafkaesque dream world serving as a commentary upon the alienation of the individual from society, and from themselves.
The shadow of the Aum Shinrikyo cult looms large over 1Q84. ‘Shadow’ and ‘Light’ pervade the novel, in particular, the pursuit of a balance between the two, as evidenced during the salient discussion between Aomame and the cult’s Leader prior to the latter’s demise. This balance extends to the individual as well as the society they find themselves in. Murakami expanded upon this theme of duality in a 2009 interview: “Where there is light there must be shadow” but should someone become split from this essential part of nature then there are consequences to be suffered.
J a p a n e s e c u l t s 1
Underground. The Tokyo gas attack and the Japanese psyche (1997) by Haruki Murakami
“Some loony’s probably sprinkled pesticides or something.”
The motivations and alienations of those involved in the 1995 sarin gas attack in Tokyo’s subway system (committed by the Aum Shinrikyo cult) was Murakami’s prompt for 1Q84. “The wall separating the criminal from the innocent is thinner than we think.” In this book, the author interviews members of the doomsday cult as well as their victims. His findings throw light on the perversions that can influence otherwise average citizens to commit enormous acts of violence against the innocent. So it is then that Murakami concludes that the motivations of cultists is but a distortion of the ‘underground’ we all carry around within ourselves; such individuals and their actions may cause disgust and revulsion, but they are in fact “the mirror of us.”
18
The two moons (a yellow and a green moon side by side) represent one of the most powerful visual cues of the alternate reality of 1Q84. As P.I. Ushikawa remarks after gazing upon them, “That kind of thing can’t be there. What kind of crazy world is this?” They remain a dramatic focal point for the story and a sign that the ‘track’ between 1984 and 1Q84 had been switched ”although most people could not see the two moons and most [were] unaware that the track had been switched.” Their symbolism even extends to a representation of the shadow cast by the enigmatic FukaEri’s heart and mind (or her ‘dohta’) upon her entry into the world of 1Q84, much to the chagrin of The Little People.
L u n a r s c i e n c e 19
What if the earth had two moons? And nine other thought provoking speculations on the solar system (2010) by Neil F. Comins
“People on the side of Dimaan facing their moons can prepare a jug of their favorite libation, set up a comfy chair, and watch the first phases of the event…” which will usher in their own extinction.”
Opening with a fictional vignette of Galileo Galilei’s prosecution by the Holy Inquisition for his 2 moon ‘blasphemy’, professor of physics and astronomy Comins, postulates what life – and death – would be like on an alternative earth (called ‘Dimaan’) with two lunar bodies in orbit. With two moons, night time would be considerably brighter, humans would have developed a 7th sense (a sensitivity to gravity), quicker eclipses would exist, there would be greater rates of erosion and considerably more variance in tidal forces. But, inexorably, the two moons would be drawn closer and closer together, until a cataclysmic event would occur which would signal the destruction of our species: something the author whimsically refers to as, ‘The Kiss’.
Unable to detach themselves from their 20 year old memory of each other, Aomame and Tengo, first by chance (when they are propelled into the world of 1Q84) and then by design (once they have been informed of the other’s presence in the alternative world) pursue a highly anticipated reunion, hastened by their impending capture by the Sakigake cult. Despite warnings to the contrary, the pull to be together triumphs over rational concerns about their own personal safeties. It is ‘Happiness’ yearned for and only to be realised on their own terms that drives them in their actions: “Before the world’s rules loosen up too much, he thought, and all logic lost, I have to find Aomame.”
L o v e a c r o s s t i m e
The river of no return (2013) by Bee Ridgway
“The Guild will take care of you, educate you, give you all the money you need to build a comfortable new life. We want you to be happy.”
Lord Nicholas Falcott, Marquis of Blackdown was about to die on a Napoleonic battlefield… before he woke up in a hospital bed, transported 200 years into the future, in 21st Century London. What ensues is a love story blended with fantastical time-travelling, as Nicholas risks the wrath of his benefactors, a mysterious group called The Guild, to be reunited with the woman he loves, Julia, who has inherited the secret of how to manipulate time. It leads to a gambling of hearts and a novel that explores how our memories form us.
20
“More or less all of us want answers to the reasons why we’re living on this earth, and why we die and disappear.” Thus Murakami’s explains the motivations for individuals who become involved in organisations that act outside of society’s norms. In 1Q84 The Leader interrogates this position further: “Most people are not looking for probable truths… truth is often accompanied by intense pain, and almost no one is looking for painful truths. What people need is beautiful, comforting stories that make them feel as if their lives have some meaning.” It is against this background, that the love Aomame and Tengo share triumphs over the “painful truths’ which mark the year 1Q84.
J a p a n e s e c u l t s 21
2
Somersault (1999) by Kenzaburo Oe
“I detect here something other than an abstract debate over the existence of God. What really concerns you is whether God is actively working in your life or not.”
From 1994 Nobel Prize for Literature winner Oe, comes a cautionary tale about “the charisma of leaders, the danger of zealotry, and the mystery of faith” inspired by Japan’s Aum Shinrikyo cult. Ten years after a militant faction of their congregation leaned dangerously towards committing a cataclysmic act of violence, its leaders, known only as the Patron and Guide of Humankind, seek to resurrect the movement, only once again to be challenged by radical factions within their group. Lives fatalistically intersect while sexual melodrama and para-religious ruminations ensue in this weighty tome.
The third instalment of 1Q84 has been likened to a noirdetective novel, as it focuses heavily upon the unlikeable gumshoe detective Ushikawa painstakingly tracking down Tengo and Aomeme, an assignment he performs on behalf of the Sakigake cult. Ushikawa is a physically recognisable monster; nothing escapes him, especially his own repulsiveness. “He felt like a twisted, ugly person. So what? he thought. I really am twisted and ugly.” His mission, which threatens Aomame and Tengo’s chances of reunion make Ushikawa a strongly identifiable villain as well as a pitiful victim of poor choices and fatalism.
T h e p r i v a t e e y e
The wind-up bird chronicle (1994) by Haruki Murakami
For some reason, I couldn't just hang up on her. "OK, but no more than ten minutes.“ "Now we'll be able to understand each other," she said with quiet certainty. "I wonder," I said. "What can you understand in ten minutes?“ "Ten minutes may be longer than you think."
Marking the debut of Murakami’s much maligned P.I. from 1Q84, (Ushikawa) this is a tale which begins innocently enough for young stayat-home Toru Okada who embarks upon a search for his wife’s missing cat, but then finds himself drawn into a surrealist netherworld existing just below the placid Tokyo lifestyle he had contentedly mired himself in. Along his journey he encounters a bizarre menagerie of allies and antagonists, allowing Murakami to deliver a novel that is comedic menace, yet also a detective story, an account of a disintegrating marriage, and an expose of World War Two’s hideous past.
22
A story Tengo reads called ‘Town of Cats’ fascinates him. It concerns a man who enters a strange, abandoned place, except for its considerable number of cats. His curiosity about the town and its mysteries means that he is doomed never to escape it. So Murakami engineers a story within a story; a parable about entering a dark place and the imperativeness of ‘moving on’ before the exit becomes blocked. It is a lesson explained to Tengo with reference to his inability to sever himself from pursuing his father’s secrets; an obsession damaging his ability to seek peace with himself and ‘move on’ with his life.
M y s t e r y p l a c e 2
23
More than this (2013) by Patrick Ness
“You’re wondering if all those wonderful times really happened. If he was really there.” “He was,” Seth says. “He had to be.” “That’s what it all comes down to, doesn’t it? They have to be, or where does that leave us?”
A 16 year old boy awakes naked, thirsty and starving in an abandoned place that uncannily resembles the suburban neighbourhood where he grew up. The teen, Seth, searches to understand his predicament; and in doing so his sad childhood, awful mother, and a brief, bright school-age romance are slowly revealed. Questioning the logic of his circumstances, in his search for answers, memories appear more real than the enigmatic world around him, itself as perplexing as the situation the boy finds himself in. Finding a reason to live had been what have propelled Seth through his tumultuous life, but what could he possibly still have to discover? Especially, as just prior to awakening in the mysterious town, Seth had died.
For Tengo, mathematics had offered an escape from his perceived troublesome cage of reality, providing clarity, freedom and “infinite consistency.” A child math prodigy, he is gradually drawn away from the “utterly safe hiding place” represented by maths as he enters adolescence, especially following his literary encounters with the fiction of Dickensian worlds. It is then that Tengo realises that he will never be properly equipped to manufacture solutions for most real life problems, which was the haven math offered with its nonnegotiable accuracies.
M a t h
a n d l o v e
The housekeeper and the professor (2009) by Yoko Ogawai
“Math has proven the existence of God because it is absolute and without contradiction; but the devil must exist as well, because we cannot prove it.”
From one of Japan’s most acclaimed authors comes the tale of a brilliant, elderly math professor who is befriended by his housekeeper and her 10 year old son. The Professor’s elegant equations breathe fresh interpretations into their worlds, deeply touching the lives of his carers. However, the characters are also scarred, each carrying the burden of broken relationships, and complicated further by the fact that the professor, a victim of an accident which means his short-term memory can only recall the previous 80 minute, must be introduced to his acquaintances anew every morning.
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R e c i p e P t e f e c t u r e 25
A feature of 1Q84 is Murakami’s attention to various details of the lives of his characters, but particularly notable are the opportunities for readers to follow the food preparation techniques and dietary pretences of several principal characters. "Tengo chopped a lot of ginger to a fine consistency. Then he sliced some celery and mushrooms into nice-sized pieces. The Chinese parsley, too, he chopped up finely. He peeled the shrimp and washed them at the sink. Spreading a paper towel, he laid the shrimp out in neat rows, like troops in formation. When the edamame were finished boiling, he drained them in a colander and left them to cool. Next he warmed a large frying pan and dribbled in some sesame oil and spread it over the bottom. He slowly fried the chopped ginger over a low flame." Presented here, for Japanese cuisine enthusiasts, is the recipe for ‘Shrimp with celery, mushrooms and ginger sauce’ which features in the novel. Source http://www.harukimurakami.com/tagged/1q84
Shrimp with celery, mushrooms and ginger sauce Soy beans (in the pod) Ginger (finely chopped) Celery (chopped to nice sized pieces) Mushrooms (chopped to nice sized pieces) Shrimp (shelled and deveined) A small glass of sake Soy sauce Cilantro Sesame Oil 1 Rub the soybeans with salt; boil until tender; drain and set in a colander to cool 2 Warm a large frying pan and dribble some sesame oil into it 3 Slowly fry the ginger over a low flame
4 Put the sliced celery and mushrooms into the pan, turn the gas up to high, jog the pan lightly, stir carefully with a spatula (preferable bamboo), add a sprinkle of salt and pepper 5 When the vegetables are just beginning to cook, toss in the drained shrimp. Add another dose of salt and pepper 6 Add the small glass of sake and a dash of soy sauce, finish with a scattering of cilantro 7 When the contents of the pan are cooked, transfer them to a large platter with the soy beans 8 Serve with a cold beer
V i d e o
The 1Q84 experience can be further enhanced by viewing any of the films presented in the following video selection, offering greater familiarity with the author, the book, the critical musical symphony and the science behind the plausibility. of Earth’s celestial double partnership.
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1Q84 by Haruki Murukami (U.S. book trailer) View at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IC jVqeKw10g Running time: 0.50
4 Leoš Janáček: Sinfonietta Full recital of Janáček:’s symphony, performed by The Hallé Orchestra and conducted by Sir Mark Elder. The page includes a brief explanation of all five movements which comprise the 1926 masterpiece. View at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K LUKx6qPlXE Running time: 26.48
5 ScienceCasts: Did Earth have two moons?
P t e f e c t u r e
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Chip Kidd on designing Murukami’s 1Q84 book jacket Graphic designer, and book cover artist extraordinaire Chip Kidd talks about his design considerations for the book cover and interior design of 1Q84. View at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a UHck0FViac Running time: 3.12
A NASA preview of the 2011 GRAIL mission which explored the possibility that there were indeed once two moons in Earth’s night sky and that the surface of the far side of the moon provides evidence of this. View athttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xb Z4MlTw2JA Running time: 2.59
3 Haruki Murakami. In search of this elusive writer (documentary)
A wonderful (perhaps vital?) journey into the world of one of the great post-modern writers of the 21st Century. View athttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NI 6LyqO9i8Y Running time: 51.09
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About the author
H a r u k I P r e f e c t u r e 27
Haruki Murakami (1949 - ) is a juggernaut in his native Japan, with attendances at midnight launches of his books mirroring pop culture frenzy, and sales figures revealing that the first two volumes of 1Q84 sold more than a million copies within a month. Outside of Japan, critics are still unsure what to make of him. Touted as a perennial candidate for a Pulitzer Prize, the prejudicial default position for this literary iconoclast is that he is possibly a writer who is so popular he may in fact not be that good. Western commentators have saddled him with parallels ranging from Pynchon and Chandler to Arthur C. Clarke and Kafka As Jamie James of the New York Times stated, it represents “a roster so ill-advised as to suggest that Murakami may in fact be original” possibly deserving of his own literary genre: ‘Murakamism.”
What people talk about when they talk about Murakami “When Murakami melds fantasy and realism, mystery and epic, it’s no simple genre-bending exercise, rather, it is literary alchemy of the highest order.” [Bill Ott, Booklist]
Of the playground scene near the story’s climax “… Murakami has had the courtesy to write it with exquisite tact. It is a scene in which complete mastery of technique makes technique vanish: as perfect as any two pages might hope to be.” [The Guardian Oct 18 2011]
“The spell cast by Murakami’s fiction is formed in the tension between his grounded accounts of everyday life and the otherworldly forces that keep intruding on that life, propelling the characters into surreal adventures…” [Laura Miller, Salon]
“Murakami has established himself as the unofficial laureate of Japan – arguably its chief imaginative ambassador, in any medium, to the world”. 1Q84 is “a book that seems to want to hold all of Japan inside it…” [Sam Anderson The New York Times magazine]
“More than any author since Kafka, Murakami appreciates the genuine strangeness of our real world, and he’s not afraid to incorporate elements of surrealism or magical realism as tools to help us see ourselves for who we really are. 1Q84 is a tremendous accomplishment. It does every last blessed thing a masterpiece is supposed to…” [Andrew Ervin, The San Francisco Chronicle]
I m a g e P r e f e c t u r e
Cover page. Artist: Carlos Lerma http://www.harukimurakami.com/tagged/1q84
Page 16. Book cover for Air Chrysalis Source: http://www.harukimurakami.com/tagged/1q84
Page 3. Advertisement detail, Shibuya subway station Source: Street Graphics Tokyo (2002) by Barry Dawson
Page 17. Yin & Yang moon Source: http://weheartit.com/
Page 4. Tokyo taxi cab sign Source: Tokyo taxi by Alexander James, Merrell Publishers Ltd., London, 2012, p1. Page 5. Aomame descending expressway Source: http://www.harukimurakami.com/tagged/1q8 Page 6. Shinjuku Station, Tokyo Source: Tokyo clash. Japanese pop culture by Ralf Bahren, h.f. ullman, Konigswinter, 2010, p11 Page 7. Tengo writing Source: http://danilam.livejournal.com/233202.html Page 8. Esso tiger advertisement Source: http://abalonegraphics.com Page 9. The ‘Little People’ Source: http://www.harukimurakami.com/tagged/1q84 Page 10. Tengo and Aomame Source: http://www.harukimurakami.com/tagged/1q84 Page 11. Air Chrysalis Source: http://danilam.livejournal.com/233202.html Page 12. Two moons Source: http://digitaljournal.com/article/354127 Pages 13-14. Tokyo at night with 2 moons Source: http://www.harukimurakami.com/tagged/1q84
Page 18. Aomame and The Leader Source: http://www.harukimurakami.com/tagged/1q84 Page 19. Two moon sky (watercolour) Source: http://www.harukimurakami.com/tagged/1q84 Page 20. Playground slide in Kōenji in Tōkyō’s Suginami ward Source: http://www.harukimurakami.com/tagged/1q84 Page 21. Aomame pointing a gun to her head Source: http://www.harukimurakami.com/tagged/1q84 Page 22. P.I. Ushikawa Source: http://www.harukimurakami.com/tagged/1q84 Page 23. Tengo staring at Aomame on balcony. Source: http://www.harukimurakami.com/tagged/1q84 Page 24. Tengo and Aomame together Source: http://danilam.livejournal.com/233202.html Page 28. Haruki Murakami Source: The Wall Street Journal Article: ‘Rebel Ascendant’ by Sam Sacks (October 15, 2011) http://online.wsj.com/news/articles Page 29. Aomame and Tengo ascending the staircase to elevated Inbound Metropolitan Expressway No3 Source: http://www.harukimurakami.com/tagged/1q84
Page 15. Pianist with moon backdrop Source: image from You Tube music video for ‘Mr Moon’ by The Headless Chickens
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“According to Chekhov,” Tamaru said, rising from his chair, “once a gun appears in a story, it has to be fired?” “Meaning what?” “Meaning, don’t bring unnecessary props into a story. If a pistol appears, it has to be fired at some point. Chekhov liked to write stories that did away with all useless ornamentation.” “And that worries you – if a pistol comes on the scene, it’s sure to be fired at some point.” “In Chekhov’s view, yes.” “So you’re thinking you’d rather not hand me a pistol.” “They’re dangerous. And illegal. And Chekhov is a writer you can trust.” “But this is not a story. We’re talking about the real world.” Tamaru narrowed his eyes, and looked hard at Aomame. Then, slowly opening his mouth, he said, “Who knows?”
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