Translated from the Japanese by Philip Gabriel
Harvill Secker (2021)
Ruminating about the power of literary writing American novelist F. Scott Fitzgerald once said, "That is part of the beauty of all literature. You discover that your longings are universal longings, that you’re not lonely and isolated from anyone. You belong.” Every time I get to read a work of fiction by Haruki Murakami a related, though quite dissimilar, thought comes to my mind. "Whoa, what striking commonalities between the author's longings and my own!", I keep wondering while reading.
The newest Murakami book is an anthology of eight strangely beguiling short stories, all narrated by the author in 'first person singular'. The protagonists are all middle-aged male narrators showing a sustained sense of existential nostalgia. Music is the recurring theme of the stories that includes classical, jazz and, of course, The Beatles. The nostalgia within the stories is marked by the reminiscences of youthful love, some times of an erotic nature.
For my own part though, I have no interest in western classical; I'm not into jazz either. The Beatles is nevertheless a strong common thread between me and Murakami. And his youthful sensibilities, as also yearnings, appear so strikingly similar to my own adolescent longings that story after story the writer really looks like the reader's alter ego.
All eight stories in the book are about love and longing and laced with the signature Murakami twist. My three top picks however are: Charlie Parker Plays Bossa Nova, With the Beatles, and Confessions of a Shinagawa Monkey. As a college student the first person narrator writes a review of a fictional album by legendary jazz saxophonist Charlie Parker titled Charlie Parker Plays Bossa Nova. The album was recorded in 1963, though Parker had died in 1955 itself. The editor of a literary journal publishes the piece as a serious review, and the narrator goes on to discover his imagined album in a record store.
The narrator reminisces about his high school years in 'With the Beatles'. He recalls a vivid memory of a girl walking down a school hallway clutching the LP of the album With the Beatles to her chest. The narrator then recalls his first girlfriend.
Murakami is at his whimsical romantic best in Confessions of a Shinagawa Monkey where he recounts the story an elderly monkey living in a Japanese-style inn in a hot springs town. The monkey talks like humans and has their longings too. The narrator invites the monkey to his room where the monkey confesses how he came to love human females and how he would later steal the names of the women he fell for.
The book is a must read for all Murakami admirers; it's certain to keep them glued till the last page.
(The reviewer Ajay Kumar Singh is a Joint Secretary rank Officer in the Government of Jharkhand.)