Review: Norwegian Wood

 I will confess to having bounced off prior attempts to read Haruki Murakami books, but hope springs eternal, so somehow Norwegian Wood found its way into my library queue and this time I actually read it.

Of all the Japanese novels I've read, this one feels the least Japanese. Other novels, I've read, for instance, would make references to Japanese books not available in English translation, but darn near every music/pop culture reference to this book refers to English music or American music, and nearly every book reference is steeped in English or American literature.

The book revolves around a young man who starts college a couple of years after one of his best friends commits suicide. The book has a lot of people committing suicide, making me wonder how come Japan's subways were so packed in the 1970s. Besides the aboved mentioned best friend, the best friend's girlfriend, the protagnist's new best friend's girlfriend and quite possibly another person I'd forgotten about also commit suicide.

The book's theme isn't suicide, however. It's about relationships. Again, the point of view character lives a pretty unbelievable life, but maybe college was cheap in the 1960s. Apparently despite being from a family that's not rich, he pays for his expenses solely with a part time job at a record store, and never has to be accountable to his parents, so he would skip out on classes and go on trips, etc., and still has plenty of money to go on dates, buy drinks and bullet train tickets, etc. I guess when you write fiction you don't have to be realistic.

In any case, the point of view character makes all the dumb mistakes a young adult male can make. I won't fault the author for those --- as a former young adult male I made many of the same mistakes, though not with the same wild profligarate spending (not being rich) and not having the kind of major that would have no consequences if I skipped out on them for weeks at a time.

In the end, the author makes the correct decision, but not before making a lot of questionable ones. I'm not sure I learned a lot about Japanese culture from this novel, but the novel must have rung a lot of resonances because it was apparently very popular both in Japan and elsewhere.