Book Of The Month July, 2007
Kafka On The ShoreHaruki Murakami
Kafka on the Shore follows the fortunes of two remarkable characters. Kafka Tamura runs away from home at fifteen, under the shadow of his father’s dark prophesy. The aging Nakata, tracker of lost cats, who never recovered from a bizarre childhood affliction, finds his pleasantly simplified life suddenly turned upside down. Their parallel odysseys are enriched throughout by vivid accomplices and mesmerising dramas. Cats converse with people; fish tumble from the sky; a ghostlike pimp deploys a Hegel-spouting girl of the night; a forest harbours soldiers apparently un-aged since WWII. There is a savage killing, but the identity of both victim and killer is a riddle. Murakami’s new novel is at once a classic tale of quest, but it is also a bold exploration of mythic and contemporary taboos, of patricide, of mother-love, of sister-love. Above all it is an entertainment of a very high order.
What We Think
The Random House Group Marketing on Kafka on the Shore:
With his unique brand of surrealism and use of magical realism, Haruki Murakami’s fiction is perfect for reading groups. Enter a world populated by people who can communicate with cats, vanishing elephants and a manic-depressive in a sheep costume.
The Oedipus motif and labyrinthine plot of Murakami’s latest novel Kafka on the Shore will make for a lively discussion.
‘How does Murakami manage to make poetry while writing of contemporary life and emotions? I am weak-kneed with admiration’
Independent on Sunday