村上春树和他的想象世界.doc

1、1村上春树和他的想象世界村上坚持认为自己不写作时是个地地道道的普通人他说他的创造力是个“黑匣子” ，无法在有意识的状态下进入。他经常躲避媒体，当读者在大街上要和他握手时，他总是感到很意外。他说他更喜欢听别人说话。 That first visit to Murakami took place on a muggy midmorning， midweek， in the middle of a summer. I had come to speak with Murakami， Japans leading novelist， about the translation into English

2、 of his massive 1Q84a book that has already sold millions of copies across Asia. At age 62， three decades into his career， Murakami has established himself as the unofficial laureate of Japanarguably its chief imaginative ambassador， in any medium， to the world： the primary source， for many millions

3、 of readers， of the texture and shape of his native country. This， no doubt， comes as an enormous surprise to everyone involved. Murakami has always considered himself an outsider in his own country. He was born into one of the strangest sociopolitical environments in history： Kyoto in 1949the forme

4、r imperial capital of Japan in the middle of Americas 2postwar occupation. “It would be difficult to find another cross-cultural moment， ” the historian John W. Dower has written of late-1940s Japan， “more intense， unpredictable， ambiguous， confusing， and electric than this one.” Substitute “fiction

5、” for “moment” in that sentence and you have a perfect description of Murakamis work. The basic structure of his storiesordinary life lodged between incompatible worldsis also the basic structure of his first life experience. Murakamis Career as a Writer Murakami grew up， mostly， in the suburbs surr

6、ounding Kobe， an international port defined by the din1） of many languages. As a teenager， he immersed himself in American culture， especially hard-boiled detective novels2） and jazz. He internalized their attitude of cool rebellion， and in his early 20s， instead of joining the ranks of a large corp

7、oration， Murakami grew out his hair and his beard， married against his parents wishes， took out a loan and opened a jazz club in Tokyo called Peter Cat. He spent nearly 10 years absorbed in the day-to-day operations of the club. His career as a writer began in classic Murakami style： out of nowhere，

8、 in the most ordinary possible setting， a 3mystical truth suddenly descended upon him and changed his life forever. Murakami， age 29， was sitting in the outfield at his local baseball stadium， drinking a beer， when a batteran American transplant named Dave Hiltonhit a double. It was a normal-enough

9、play， but as the ball flew through the air， an epiphany3） struck Murakami. He realized， suddenly， that he could write a novel. He had never felt a serious desire to do so before， but now it was overwhelming. And so he did： after the game， he went to a bookstore， bought a pen and some paper and over

10、the next couple of months produced Hear the Wind Sing， a slim， elliptical4） tale of a nameless 21-year-old narrator， his friend called the Rat and a four-fingered woman. Nothing much happens， but the Murakami voice is there from the start： a strange broth of ennui5） and exoticism. In just 130 pages，

11、 the book manages to reference a thorough cross-section of Western culture and contains not a single reference to a work of Japanese art in any medium. Murakami submitted Hear the Wind Sing for a prestigious new writers prize and won. After another year and another novel， Murakami sold his jazz club

12、 in order to devote himself， full time， to writing. For 30 years now， he has lived a monkishly6） regimented7） life， each facet of which has been precisely 4engineered to help him produce his work. He runs or swims long distances almost every day， eats a healthful diet， goes to bed around 9 p.m. and

13、wakes up， without an alarm， around 4 a.m.at which point he goes straight to his desk for five to six hours of concentrated writing. “Concentration is one of the happiest things in my life， ” he said. “If you cannot concentrate， you are not so happy. Im not a fast thinker， but once I am interested in

14、 something， I am doing it for many years. I dont get bored. Im kind of a big kettle. It takes time to get boiled， but then Im always hot.” That daily boiling has produced， over time， one of the worlds most distinctive bodies of work： three decades of addictive weirdness that falls into an oddly fasc

15、inating hole between genres （sci-fi， fantasy， realist， hard-boiled） and cultures （ Japan， America） ， a hole that no writer has ever explored before， or at least nowhere near this deep. Over the years， Murakamis novels have tended to grow longer and more seriousthe sitcom8） references have given way，

16、 for the most part， to symphoniesand now， after a particularly furious and sustained boil， he has produced his longest， strangest， most serious book yet. 51Q84： a Strange “Comprehensive Novel” According to Murakami， 1Q84 is just an amplification of one of his most popular short stories， On Seeing th

17、e 100% Perfect Girl One Beautiful April Morning， which is several pages long. “Basically， its the same， ” he told me. “A boy meets a girl. They have separated and are looking for each other. Its a simple story. I just made it long.” 1Q84 is not， actually， a simple story. Its plot may not even be ful

18、ly summarizableat least not in the space of a magazine article. For decades now， Murakami has been talking about working himself up to write what he calls a “comprehensive novel”something on the scale of The Brothers Karamazov9）. This seems to be what he has attempted with 1Q84： a grand， third-perso

19、n， all-encompassing meganovel. It is a book full of anger and violence and disaster and weird sex and strange new realities， a book that seems to want to hold all of Japan inside of ita book that， even despite its occasional awkwardness， makes you marvel， reading it， at all the strange folds a singl

20、e human brain can hold. I told Murakami that I was surprised to discover， after so many surprising books， that he managed to surprise me again. As 6usual， he took no credit， claiming to be just a boring old vessel for his imagination. Murakamis Work： Shuttling from One World to Another Murakamis fic

21、tion has a special way of leaking into reality. He often hears from readers who have “discovered” his inventions in the real world： a restaurant or a shop that he thought he made up， they report， actually exists in Tokyo. After publishing 1Q84， Murakami received a letter from a family with the surna

22、me “Aomame， ” a name so improbable he thought he invented it. He sent them a signed copy of the book. The kicker is that all of thisfiction leaking into reality， reality leaking into fictionis what most of Murakamis fiction is all about. He is always shuttling us back and forth between worlds. This

23、calls to mind the act of translationshuttling from one world to anotherwhich is in many ways the key to understanding Murakamis work. He has consistently denied being influenced by Japanese writers； he even spoke， early in his career， about escaping “the curse of Japanese.” Instead， he formed his li

24、terary sensibilities as a teenager by obsessively reading Western novelists： the classic Europeans （Dostoyevsky， Stendhal10） ， Dickens） but especially a 7cluster of 20th-century Americans whom he has read over and over throughout his lifeRaymond Chandler11） ， Truman Capote12） ， F. Scott Fitzgerald13

25、） ， Richard Brautigan14） ， Kurt Vonnegut15）. When Murakami sat down to write his first novel， he struggled until he came up with an unorthodox solution： he wrote the books opening in English， then translated it back into Japanese. This， he says， is how he found his voice. You could even say that tra

26、nslation is the organizing principle of Murakamis work： that his stories are not only translated but about translation. The signature pleasure of a Murakami plot is watching a very ordinary situation turn suddenly extraordinarywatching a character， in other words， being dropped from a position of ex

27、istential fluency into something completely foreign and then being forced to mediate， awkwardly， between those two realities. A Murakami character is always， in a sense， translating between radically different worlds： mundane16） and bizarre， natural and supernatural， country and city， male and femal

28、e， overground and underground. His entire oeuvre17） ， in other words， is the act of translation dramatized. Murakami： 99 Percent a Fiction Writer and 1 Percent a Citizen 8The title of 1Q84 is a joke： an Orwell18） reference that hinges on19） a multilingual pun20）. （In Japanese， the number 9 is pronou

29、nced like the English letter Q.） I asked him if he felt any kinship with Orwell. “I guess we have a common feeling against the system， ” Murakami said. “George Orwell is half journalist， half fiction writer. Im 100 percent fiction writer. I dont want to write messages. I want to write good stories.

30、I think of myself as a political person， but I dont state my political messages to anybody.” And yet Murakami has， uncharacteristically， stated his political messages very loudly over the last couple of years. In 2009， he made a controversial visit to Israel to accept the prestigious Jerusalem Prize

31、21） and used the occasion to speak out about Israel and Palestine. Last summer， he used an awards ceremony in Barcelona as a platform to criticize Japans nuclear industry. He called Fukushima Daiichi22） the second nuclear disaster in the history of Japan， but the first that was entirely self-inflict

32、ed. When I asked him about his Barcelona speech， he modified his percentages slightly. “I am 99 percent a fiction writer and 1 percent a 9citizen， ” he said. “As a citizen I have things to say， and when I have to do it， I do it clearly. At that point， nobody said no against nuclear-power plants. So

33、I think I should do it. Its my responsibility.” The defining disasters of modern Japanthe subway sarin-gas attack23） ， the Kobe earthquake24） ， the recent tsunamiare， to an amazing extent， Murakami disasters. He is notoriously obsessed with metaphors of depth： characters climbing down empty wells to

34、 enter secret worlds or encountering dark creatures underneath Tokyos subway tunnels. He imagines his own creativity in terms of depth as well. Every morning at his desk， during his trance of total focus， Murakami becomes a Murakami character： an ordinary man who spelunks25） the caverns of his creat

35、ive unconscious and faithfully reports what he finds. “I live in Tokyo， ” he told me， “a kind of civilized world. If you want to find a magical situation， magical things， you have to go deep inside yourself. So that is what I do. People say its magic realismbut in the depths of my soul， its just rea

36、lism. Not magical. While Im writing， its very natural， very logical， very realistic and reasonable.” 10Murakami insists that， when hes not writing， he is an absolutely ordinary manhis creativity， he says， is a “black box” to which he has no conscious access. He tends to shy away from the media and i

37、s always surprised when a reader wants to shake his hand on the street. He says he much prefers to listen to other people talk. At the end of our time together， Murakami took me for a run. He is a member of a running club in Hawaii， by far the oldest in the group， he says. He runs， as he writes， eve

38、ry day. “Most of what I know about writing， ” he has written， “Ive learned through running.” His running style is an extension of his personality： easy， steady， matter of fact. “I like to read books. I like to listen to music， ” he told me as we run. “I collect records. And cats. I dont have any cats right now. But if I see a cat while running or taking a walk， Im happy.” 第一次拜访村上春树是在一个闷热而潮湿的日子，恰逢上午刚刚过半、一周刚刚过半、夏天也刚刚过半的时候。我来找村上这位日本重要小说家是为了洽谈将他的长篇巨著1Q84译成英语的事宜这部小说在亚洲已经有了数百万册的销量。在从事文学创作 30 年之后，62 岁高龄的村上确立了自己作为日本民间桂冠作家的地位。或许，无论以何种媒介而言，他都是日本在全世界富于想象力的首席代言人：对上千万的