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Kafka on the Shore (Paperback)

by Haruki Murakami (Author)

4.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (7 customer reviews)

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Product Details

Paperback: 480 pages
Publisher: Vintage; Reprint edition (Jan 3 2006)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1400079276
ISBN-13: 978-1400079278
Product Dimensions: 20.1 x 13.2 x 3.3 cm
Shipping Weight: 409 g

Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (7 customer reviews)

Amazon.ca Sales Rank: #3,196 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Product Description

From Publishers Weekly

Starred Review. Previous books such as The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle and Norwegian Wood have established Murakami as a true original, a fearless writer possessed of a wildly uninhibited imagination and a legion of fiercely devoted fans. In this latest addition to the author's incomparable oeuvre, 15-year-old Kafka Tamura runs away from home, both to escape his father's oedipal prophecy and to find his long-lost mother and sister. As Kafka flees, so too does Nakata, an elderly simpleton whose quiet life has been upset by a gruesome murder. (A wonderfully endearing character, Nakata has never recovered from the effects of a mysterious World War II incident that left him unable to read or comprehend much, but did give him the power to speak with cats.) What follows is a kind of double odyssey, as Kafka and Nakata are drawn inexorably along their separate but somehow linked paths, groping to understand the roles fate has in store for them. Murakami likes to blur the boundary between the real and the surreal—we are treated to such oddities as fish raining from the sky; a forest-dwelling pair of Imperial Army soldiers who haven't aged since WWII; and a hilarious cameo by fried chicken king Colonel Sanders—but he also writes touchingly about love, loneliness and friendship. Occasionally, the writing drifts too far into metaphysical musings—mind-bending talk of parallel worlds, events occurring outside of time—and things swirl a bit at the end as the author tries, perhaps too hard, to make sense of things. But by this point, his readers, like his characters, will go just about anywhere Murakami wants them to, whether they "get" it or not.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From AudioFile

The art of audio narration has rarely been better served than in Haruki Murakami's brilliant tale featuring two seekers of truth. Sean Barrett and Oliver Le Sueur recount the odysseys of Nakata, an old man who was left simpleminded (but able to speak with cats) by a mysterious WWII event, and Kafka Tamura, a stoic, self-disciplined 15-year-old who runs away from home to escape an Oedipal prophecy. Barrett and Le Sueur turn in superb performances. Their rich characterizations keep this blend of the real and surreal totally engrossing. Philip Gabriel's excellent translation offers a contemporary feel to Murakami's lyrical language and magical incidents. Additional kudos must go to Naxos AudioBooks for gorgeous packaging, including an enclosure listing the entire cast with bios. This is must listening. S.J.H. Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award © AudioFile 2006, Portland, Maine-- Copyright © AudioFile, Portland, Maine --This text refers to the Audio CD edition.

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Customer Reviews

7 Reviews

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
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4.0 out of 5 stars (7 customer reviews)

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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Disappointing, Jun 5 2009

By	J. Tobin Garrett (Vancouver, BC) - See all my reviews (TOP 50 REVIEWER) (REAL NAME)

After "The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle" I was eager to read another Murakami, and chose this one based on popularity and recommendations from friends. However, I found the novel to be a big disappointment.

The novel just seemed far too random for me to get into and enjoy. I love when magical and strange things happen in books; that's why I enjoyed his other novel so much. But I don't like when they happen for no apparent reason. There are plot lines that are started and never picked up again or explained. Character actions that are never delved into. A few of these things wouldn't bother me so much, but an entire novel filled with them was irritating and made the story feel more like a cop out than something fully realized and thought out.

I don't need my novels to be linear and easily interpreted (in fact, usually I enjoy the opposite), but I do need to feel as though the author crafted something rather than jotting down everything that came into his head and then leaving it there.

I found the characters stilted and one-dimensional, and the dialogue similarly uninspired. Although perhaps part of the uninspired feeling comes from the fact that it's a translation, so I can look past that.

The plot lacks any real driving force, other than the characters simply stumbling on what to do next and then taking it from there. Instead of this being like I was on the discovery with them, it was just boring.

The experience hasn't soured me at all on reading more Murakami. If anything, it has made me want to read his other novels more so as to see if this was an anomaly or the standard.

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4.0 out of 5 stars An odd adventure that leaves you perplexed, Dec 18 2009

By	SH (Toronto, Ontario) - See all my reviews

"The world is a metaphor..." (465)

Kafka on the Shore by Haruki Murakami is a difficult novel to understand, and the ending is not detailed. This is one of those novels that Murakami suggested should be read more than once to fully comprehend.

I thoroughly enjoyed the references to Greek tragedies and philosophy. And the translation of his prose was magnificent. As always, it seemed as though you were reading poetry because the words fit so well together.

The story itself seems to be inspired by Greek tragedy, mainly Oedipus Rex. Nothing was told about how the oedipal prophecy came to be, but with the hints given through out the narrative, and with the aide of Johnnie Walker, one can suspect the origins. I believe that this is a story about fate, and how it has the power to bring people together.

If you do not like the story, than at least you can appreciate the ingenious way the story is plotted and the way that the characters' dialogues were crafted. Through some of the dialogues, it seems as though Murakami is trying to let the world know about his tastes in music and literature. The journey of the characters is quite an adventure, that when looked back it, seems odd yet remarkable. The most interesting character, I found, was Oshima, the one with who Kafka had intellectual conversations with regarding literature and told many of his theories to.

"Waves of consciousness roll in, roll out, leave some writing, and just as quickly new waves roll in and erase it. I try to quickly read what's written there, between one wave and the next, but it's hard. Before I can read it the next wave's washed it away. All that's left are puzzling fragments." This seems to be what the title and the story are about. Kafka goes into the world of his conscious and subconscious mind, but can never fully put into words what he learns from the experience. Thus, you must attempt to decipher it yourself. Near the end, we learn that the other world that the characters experienced was in fact the same place.

Like Murakami's `Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World,' this novel consists of two stories running parallel to one another. The odd numbered chapters are of Kafka, which are written in first-person and in present tense, and the even numbered chapters are about Nakata, which are written in third-person in past tense.

Throughout the entire story, Murakami tries to demonstrate that "Things outside you are projections of what's inside you, and what's inside you is a projection of what's outside." (352) Oshima says that human intestines were the prototype of a labyrinth for the ancient Mesopotamians. "So when you step into the labyrinth outside you, at the same time you're stepping into the labyrinth inside." (352) With this in mind, you will notice that throughout the story, dreams are as real as reality.

Read the prologue after completing the novel.

DISCRIPTION:

Kafka Tamura, in the beginning, is seen talking to "the boy named Crow," which seems to be in inner voice, about running away on his fifteenth birthday. And he does run away, from his father, from the terrible prophecy that his father used to mention to Kafka, telling him that there was no way he could avoid it. Kafka was prophesied to kill his father, and be with his mother and sister.

Kafka finally understood what the prophecy meant when he was older. However, his mother had taken left him when he was a child, taking his sister with her, and he could not remember how the two looked like.

Kafka goes on an odd adventure, where he meets Sakura, who he suspects to be his sister. And visits a private library, where he meets distinct characters, such as Oshima, the desk clerk who Kafka often asks for advice, and Miss Seiki, the head of the library, who seems to be living in the past. Kafka even stays in a cabin surrounded by a forest alone, reflecting on his life. Can Kafka escape the prophecy and change his fate? Or, like in Oedipus Rex, is fate's tug too strong for a mortal man?

In the concurrent story, Satoru Nakata, an old man, who when he was a child had lost his memory in odd circumstances. He lives alone, he is illiterate, but he can talk to cats. Cats, we learn, do not remember things as humans do because they have no sense of time. And like cats, Nakata lives in the present and accepts things as they are.

While searching for a cat that someone asked him to, Nakata goes on an unexpected adventure, meeting the cat killer, Johnnie Walker, and is led by fate to where he must go. Where he must go is what he does not know until the time comes. What mission much Nakata accomplish? Why does he only have half a shadow - a shadow that is lighter than a regular person's? Will an illiterate man be successful in accomplishing his mission?

QUOTES:

"Silence, I discover, is something you can actually hear." (138)

"There's only one kind of happiness, but misfortune comes in all shapes and sizes. It's like Tolstoy said. Happiness is an allegory, unhappiness a story." (157)

"`The pure present is an ungraspable advance of the past devouring the future. In truth, all sensation is already memory.'" (273, quoted from Henri Bergson's Matter and Memory)

"`At the same time that `I' am the content of a relation, `I' am also that which does the relating.'" (274, quoted from Hegel)

"But beyond any of those details of the real, there are dreams. And everyone's living in them." (300)

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3.0 out of 5 stars Strong, but not vintage stuff, May 26 2008

By	Tommy Tom Tom (toronto canada) - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER)

Except for his non-fiction, and Sputnik Sweetheart, I think I've read everything by Murakami, and he's one of my favourite writers.

Kafka is pretty typical Murakami - that unique type of magical realism that he invented and which always seems more personal and gripping than the magical realism of the latin americans and salman rushdie. However, I don't think that Kafka was a) as powerful as Wind Up Bird Chronicle, or b) as much fun as early stuff like Dance Dance Dance, Hard Boiled Wonderland, Wild Sheep Chase etc.

Although all the characters are strong, and you're emotionally attached to them, something about the "magical" (for lack of a better word) elements is what is holding me back from really loving this book. Johnnie Walker, Colonel Sanders, the entrance stone, the being which, at the end, tries to escape from Nakata, none of these things are explained well enough to give us an idea of what forces are at work in this book. For example, who/what is Colonel Sanders, and is he good or evil?

I also think that Murakami does a poor job of convincing us that Kafka and Miss Saeki are "lynch-pin" characters who deserve to be at the center of some undefined mystical battle.

Anyway - average Murakami is still better than most other fiction, but this isn't his best.

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