Customer Reviews

Intertwined Lives
This was my first Murakami novel and perhaps my awe with his style and craftsmanship are reflected in the five stars I'm giving it. It's not that there's any question in my mind that this novel deserves five stars, but it seems regular Murakami readers regard this book as a weak effort and if that is so, then I have quite a treat ahead of me.

On the surface this is a retelling of Oedipus, with Kafka playing the role of the son destined to unwittingly kill his father and marry his mother fulfilling the curse of prophecy. More deeply the book is an homage to Franz Kafka, playing masterfully with surrealist dreams and decaying realities. This is the story of the odd chapters, of Kafka the runaway, a fifteen year old in body but a wise older man within. On the even chapters Murakami tells the magic-realism story of Mr. Nakata, an older man who'd been in a strange accident when he was fifteen that left him without the intellectual ability to read or write. It left him as a simpleton with the unique ability to communicate with cats. Nakata, man in body - boy in mind, is Kafka's polar opposite, and their lives and destiny must intertwine throughout the tale.

Murakami analyzing the pointlessness of political positions on the liberal and conservative side of the aisle, first through a rebuttal of the feminist priorities toward a small private library where Kafka has found home and employment, and later through the voices of two Japanese soldiers who had deserted rather than fight in a war where they'd have to kill men they felt no animosity toward. The author shows the futility of forcing people to do what they don't want to do, all in the context of a story about a boy fulfilling a prophecy that he abhors.

Of particular note in the novel was his use of music as a metaphor for the actions and abilities of people. From the Beatles to Beethoven he deconstructs musical elements and parallels them to Kafka's moral failings and coming of age redemption. Just the sheer beauty of his musical descriptions was enough to awe me with the prose as poetic as any author I can recall reading.

It may not be Murakami's best, but it's worthy of five stars as it stands.

- CV Rick

Garbage or Greatness? You Decide!
If you don't like avant-garde-ish stuff, don't read this book. If you think postmodernism is of the Devil (or just very lazy messed-up minds), don't even bother opening this book. If you think philosophy is a waste of time, don't even go near Murakami.

Because he has characters quoting things like:

"The pure present is an ungraspable advance of the past devouring the future. In truth, all sensation is already memory." (Henri Bergson)

"At the same time that 'I' am the content of a relation, 'I' am also that which does the relating." (Hegel). The girl proceeds to expound the phrase: "Hegel believed that a person is not merely conscious of self and object as separate entities, but through the projection of the self via the mediation of the object is volitionally able to gain a deeper understanding of the self. All of which constitutes self-consciousness."

A page later, a guy who's the embodiment of Colonel Sanders (a'la KFC) chides a truck-driver:

"A revelation leaps over the borders of the everyday. A life without revelation is no life at all. What you need to do is move from reason that observes to reason that acts. That's what's critical. Do you have any idea what I'm talking about, you gold-plated whale of a dunce?"

Now get this. The Bergson and Hegel quotes/remarks are smack in the middle of a love scene and made by a college girl prostituting herself for tuition money. Her client was the truck-driver. Colonel Sanders was the pimp.

I'll be honest: I DIDN'T 'GET' THIS BOOK! I'm not aware of any conventional-sounding reason for Murakami writing this. Like sound bytes which sound good (if a little awkward), it's like one big collection of provocations, 'mysteries', pseudo-connections - and just too bad for coherency.

I enjoyed SOME parts of it and Murakami has a way of drawing you in, enticing you to read more. But in the end, I'll be honest, I felt a little cheated. I felt like that whale cum dunce. And I likely won't think of KFC the same way again.

got it right
5 star for his insight into life and what makes people tick--great translation--must be read slowly to savor and get it all--great imagination in presentation of content. dick jones

Send me to real Asia with someone older next time
Kafka on the Shore was my first Murakami story. I must say that it was somewhat of a split experience. The storyline was pleasant, especially in the first half, though weaker in the second. I found myself much more interested in the sub-characters, Oshima as well as Nakata and Hoshino, than the 15 year old, central figure, Kafka. The story supposedly takes place in Japan. However, multiple instances of American food, music, dialogue and other western cultural cues kept giving me the impression that the characters were not situated in Japan, but, were conducting their lives in some remote part of California. The author attempts to mix narrative styles, but this didn't work for me, and I would have preferred that he would have stayed with a third person narrative. The split, first person narrative, made Kafka's musings and reflections, sound like the content that one would read in a 14-16 year old boy's Myspace blog.

I really didn't tire of Nakata and looked forward to his predicaments. His magical umbrella, his dialogue with cats, his quest to open and close mystical doors kept the story moving along. His friend, Hoshino's, personal growth was much more evident than Kafka's (though I expected the reverse). The notion that an "empty" person can so effectively calm and heal another's troubled soul was also intriguing. Late in the story, I was lured into thinking that I must fear for Kafka's welfare (although the lurid, evil characters that I imagined would emerge never materialized). I was prompted to laugh at the end of the novel, imagining that if I were a cat, advising Hoshino on appropriate weaponry for killing the evil presence, that I'd strongly recommend a 10% solution of benzoyl peroxide. Those of you who have read the book need only consider the metaphorical comparison between the problem and the solution.

I might give this author another try, but I would aim for his best book as a starting point.

like Dali
Reading Kafka on the Shore was like seeing Dali paintings. He is powerful and has an incredibly vast imagination.