Haruki Murakami on Just About Everything
Back in January, surrealist Japanese novelist Haruki Murakami announced his intention to start an advice column on his website that would allow him to correspond directly with readers, and possibly help them solve their life's problems. Since then, your quirky uncle Haruki has done just that, answering more than 5,000 questions about everything from love to food to pop culture.
Here's a small, disorganized selection of what Murakami had to say on various topics, translated with the help of Google's best robots. It might not repair everything in your broken life, but it's a start.
On breakfast: Bread and coffee. Murakami drinks a lot of coffee.
On the best food in America: Fried catfish and grits.
On his ringtone: The Magnificent Seven theme, composed by Elmer Bernstein.
On fast fashion: Murakami hasn't yet bought anything from Uniqlo, although he's not ruling it out. He's a fan of "casual American" brands, and also Comme des Garçons.
On Lost: "It is amazing." Also, Murakami stayed in a Honolulu house that appeared on the show, but when they asked to use it again, he said no, because he was busy working. As you do.
On his favorite Japanese novels: Natsume Soseki's Sanshiro and The Miner.
On healing a broken heart:"I think it's best to concentrate on work."
On his sex scenes: Call them "sexual," not "erotic," because "erotic" makes him feel like a pervy uncle. Also, they're not based directly on his own experience, which is "really modest, but rich in its own way."
On motivating one's kids: "When a parent's expectations for children are large, it becomes a burden for children."
On the Super Bowl: Unfortunately, as a former resident of Boston, Murakami was rooting for the Cheatriots.
On accepting that you're going bald: Although he's not bald himself, Murakami was convinced by Breaking Bad that bald is cool. After all, Walter White lost his hair and became a badass. (Murakami is careful to point out to his balding young reader that becoming a badass is optional.)
On the mysteries of Kafka on the Shore: He's not going to tell you who Johnnie Walker is, or whether he's even a real person. "All I can give you is just a story. And you have the right to think, to suspect, and to imagine. No public answers. You will have to find your own theory. Try."
On a sequel to 1Q84: Probably not. He doesn't like to write anything that would require as much pre-planning as a sequel.
On losing weight: "It's very simple: 1) Eat the appropriate amount of food. 2) Get moderate exercise daily. 3) Love. Please do your best."
On what he's listening to now: Robert Randolph & the Family Band's Lickety Split. Especially their cover of "Love Rollercoaster." (Murakami is a big Red Hot Chili Peppers fan.)
On social networking: Don't use Facebook and Twitter if you don't want to. "It is not the only way to fit society," and you should find a place to express yourself at your own pace.
On socializing when you're not sociable: You can't really change yourself, but you can learn to act, a least for a short time. Murakami says this exhausts him after a couple of hours, like a smartphone, then he needs to find a power outlet and recharge.
On hip-hop: He doesn't know it well enough to mention any specific artists, but he listens to the Black Eyed Peas while driving. LOL.
On the best movies he saw in 2014: Michael Fassbender in Frank and Philip Seymour Hoffman in A Most Wanted Man.
"Mr. Murakami's Place" is still running on Murakami's website. It was originally billed as a two-week experiment, but he's now been answering questions for more than a month.
