The first two times I talked about "Norwegian Forest", about Murakami and "Norwegian Forest", and this time about the reader and "Norwegian Forest", the last lecture in this series. After all, you can't grind endlessly on the same topic, "all kinds of things" matter.
Checking the yellowed newspaper clippings at hand, I found that the first reader's review of Norwegian Forest came from Shanghai. On January 6, 1990, Wenhui Reading Weekly published an article signed by Zheng Yiwen entitled "Half is sighing, half is a bitter smile": "Borrowed a copy of "Norwegian Forest" from a friend, read it hard at night, and closed the novel when the morning light was slightly dewy, but there was no sense of relaxation. It was the first time that the repression and helplessness of urban people could be truly understood from words; it was also the first time that the sadness of the novel was soaked through the whole body at such a loss. The bottom line is that the deep coolness doesn't easily lead to tears. Although the people in the book have tearfully and misty eyes and returned to the same way to find their home, the smile left at the time of farewell is a reminder of the sorrows of the past, and you are not allowed to comment on whether they are cowardly or not. The earliest publishing house publicity should be that on February 9, 1990, the "Book Herald" published Wang Zhengqiu's article "Japan's Super Event - The Norwegian Forest" Rush": "Its success is reminiscent of Fitzgerald's youthful sentimental masterpiece "The Great Gatsby", which is still loved by readers. ”
The first literary critic to pay attention to "Norwegian Forest" should be Mr. Bai Ye of the Institute of Literature of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences. He wrote that "Norwegian Woods" focuses on the dual pursuit of innocent love and individuality in the complex modern life of young boys and girls "in documentary and poetic language"... It goes beyond the clichés of ordinary love descriptions and has a deeper meaning in life." When we met in Qingdao more than a decade ago, he told me that he had read "Norwegian Forest" shortly after its publication, saying that he was in a state of mental distress at that time, and this book gave him great comfort.
In the mid-to-late 1990s, writers such as Xu Kun, Su Su, Peng Yi, Lu Xinzhi, and Li Xiuwen either wrote book reviews for Norwegian Forest or recommended and commented on them in their creations. Among them, Susu believes that "Haruki Murakami's thinking is sensual and profound", and in her novel "Aqua Blue Tears", Murakami's projection can be said to be everywhere.
The earliest books to talk about and review Norwegian Woods from the perspective of a pure reader should be "Meet 100% haruki Murakami" (edited by Scarecrow), published by Contemporary World Press in 2001. One of the passages reads: "Norwegian Woods" gives us a strange space, and the understated fragments of daily life evoke a living atmosphere that resonates with us. More importantly, they use the background of the 60s to tell the voice of young people in the 90s and even generations: young confusion and helplessness, young rebellion, boldness and frankness, young changes and disappearances...
In 2005, Huaxia Publishing House also published a collection of reviews, "Meet the Norwegian Forest - The World of Haruki Murakami" (edited by Lei Shiwen), which is quite weighty and has 320,000 words. Most of the authors are master's and doctoral students who are currently studying or graduating from Peking University. One of them, titled "Epitaph to Youth", uses Zhang Ailing's "Red Rose and White Rose" to compare Luzi to red roses and Naoko to white roses: Whether you get white roses or red roses, it always means loss for men. Thus the love between "me" and Naoko, between "I" and Midoriko, is warm and sad, with no unforgivable mistakes, only irreparable losses. The "100%" love story ferments a quiet, sad and fleeting sense of atmosphere. It can not only attract young people and be labeled as "youth novels", but also middle-aged people who have experienced absurd youth or "red and white rose wars" are more likely to be moved, as if touching the sore spots that have long been healed by scabs, and how many youth memories are coming to the face. The middle-aged Watanabe who wept and sighed on the plane listening to the Beatles' "Norwegian Forest" was their shadow. I believe that a large part of Watanabe in the book is Murakami himself, otherwise he would definitely not have been able to draw his state of mind so clearly. The age at which the book was written was no coincidence, and the thirty-seven-year-old Murakami wrote a thirty-seven-year-old Watanabe, and the two had a dream together. Or, this is a dream that all men make! In short, the bottle of wine that thirty-seven-year-old Watanabe opened in the sky carries the breath of youth and the hidden pain of middle-aged people.
Coincidentally, a Nanjing reader named Fearless did not regard "Norwegian Forest" as a simple youth novel in his letter: I never thought that Murakami's books were young adult novels, and I had seen from a young man in his twenties that he was almost confused. That inexplicable love often springs up the moment I open the refrigerator and see an unfinished beer or a cat in the grass, and the details of another world described by another person are precisely reflected in front of my eyes. After sighing, there is always some relief: after all, such a existence is also perceived, recorded in wonderful words, and read and thought by more and more people.
However, in general, most of the letters from readers are young people, and most of the young people are college students and high school students. A few years ago, a high school senior in Zhejiang expressed her feelings about reading "Norwegian Forest": she finished reading it near midnight. What's it like to watch it? It was like something came to an abrupt end, and my life ended. Reading carefully, eating, walking, sleeping, it seems that I was born to watch "Norwegian Forest"... When you are most desperate, you always want everything to end. But they kept telling me that nothing was over. Whether it's Watanabe, Midoriko, reiko, we're all alive, "what we have to think about is how to survive." Norwegian Woods took me out of one trough after another. The last few words of this lovely high school girl's letter made me feel genuinely relieved and excited for a while. Forgive me for not understanding that modesty is a virtue, and those few sentences are like this: "Read it one by one, and suddenly realize that we like not only Murakami, but also Mr. You, but more precisely, what we really like is the combination of Mr. and Murakami." ”
However, the following letter should be written by a senior high school boy, from Tianjin. He said that the last paragraph of "Norwegian Woods" he finished reading was at sunset. "I didn't dare to speak or breathe, for fear that what I was going to pour out would escape from my ears, nose, and mouth. I felt that my environment was very strange, and I wanted to hide in a book and not come out. Or like Watanabe, I travel alone, I don't eat or drink, I don't ask, where do I go and where I sleep, and I don't want others to find me..." As a feeling after reading, it's quite weird, right? In fact, my post-translation feeling is almost like this.
Finally, I introduced a letter from a junior girl from Shandong Normal University, which was quite funny to say. Once, a blogger posted that she mentioned "Norwegian Woods" in her love story sharing one day. She said she regretted not having come across the book when she was younger. At the time I thought, well, this book must be read. The first time you read it, it wasn't your translation, plus the first time you read it, you didn't feel an impact. When I came to the school library for the first time this week, I went straight to find Norwegian Forest. Starting with the translation sequence, I read it word for word... After reading it, I sent a microblog that read: I am Midoriko, but not Midoriko Watanabe. Probably because I, like Midoriko, want to find "someone who loves me 100% all year round", I think watanabe's scummy boy is not worthy of Midoriko's fun, not worthy of her freshness.
By the way, 7 years ago, in December 2014, I did a "micro-survey" through Weibo: As the ideal marriage partner, who do you choose in "Norwegian Forest"? Options include Naoko, Midoriko, Reiko, Hatsumi and Watanabe, Kizuki, Nagasawa, and Daredevil. The number of "comments" soon reached 148, of which 122 made clear statements. Among the 122 people, the male group selected 70 midoriko, 11 selected Chumi, 8 naoko, and 6 reiko. The women's group selected 12 Nagasawa, 8 Watanabe, 4 Kizuki, and 3 "death squads". Midoriko is far ahead. As a translator or as a man, I'm not surprised by that. Rather surprisingly, the women's choice: Nagasawa actually surpassed Watanabe's votes. You must know that Yongze is a person with personality and moral stains! So what do the girls like about him? To sum up, A likes "his attitude toward his career"; B likes his "life to understand"; C likes his famous quote: "Don't sympathize with yourself, sympathize with yourself for the work of a despicable coward." Some people even used this phrase to encourage themselves through the difficult stages of life.
In contrast, the reasons for liking Midoriko are much richer and more interesting. For example, it is frank, enthusiastic, and full of vitality, "it is like jumping into the world in the morning light of spring." Another example is, "lively and cute and capable, the key is still very beautiful" "with all the optimistic, curious, naughty vitality of a young girl" "This lively and cute girl lit me up in a boring life" Some said it so emotionally that people could almost see his smiling face: "Choose a green child, such a warm girl!" However, there are also boys who are relatively rational: "The state of midorri, if placed on people after thirty, is not appropriate, a bit two hundred and five." The cruelty of being in your twenties lies in having to face the dark reality of life, and no one can avoid it. Midoriko's freedom depends on her strong sexual desire, abundant physical strength and the courage not to be afraid of death. Watanabe is precocious, and he has seen clearly that youth will be squandered sooner or later, so he enters the state of contemplation of middle-aged people in advance. "Oh, is this boy about to become Jun Watanabe?" As a teacher, I felt as if such boys were right next to me—oddly enough, there must be two or three such boys in each grade. They are steady, contemplative, like to be alone, tend to read "idle books" such as history, philosophy, literature, etc., usually silent and taciturn, and talk when asked. I saw him, and I was always moved by it, secretly wishing that a girl who liked him would go far with him, and I didn't want him to really become Jun Watanabe in "Norwegian Forest".
Published on March 4, 2021, Jiefang Daily Chaohua Weekly