The famous Japanese writer Haruki Murakami has won the love of readers around the world with his unique narrative style, profound philosophical thinking, and delicate depiction of the real world.
As his first collection of short stories, "A Boat to China" undoubtedly opens a door to Murakami's literary world.
In this work, Murakami tells a series of stories about humanity, loneliness, friendship, love and society from his unique perspective.
These stories are short and concise, but full of deep meaning, showing Haruki Murakami's deep and humorous literary style.
Because the book has a "China" in its title, it is also very attractive to Chinese readers. Not long ago, I finally read this book that I have admired for a long time, so let's talk about it.
The opening work "A Boat to China" doesn't actually write anything about "A Boat to China", but just quotes a ballad at the beginning.
In this novel, several Chinese people the narrator knows and what happened to them. In general, it was relatively uneventful, and one of the Chinese girls got on the train in the opposite direction because of his mistake, and the result was very tragic, and he accidentally lost the matchbox that remembered the phone number of the Chinese girl, and then lost contact.
By the way, although Haruki Murakami has a large number of fans in China, it can be seen from his articles that his attitude towards China is not very friendly, at best neutral.
In "The Story of a Poor Aunt", Murakami reveals the cruelty and injustice of social reality in an absurd and humorous way.
Through his portrayal of the fictional character of the poor aunt, he allows us to see the life difficulties of the people at the bottom of society, as well as their helplessness and struggle in the face of difficulties.
This narrative technique of interweaving absurdity and reality not only makes readers feel the bitterness of life in laughter, but also makes us admire Murakami's literary talent.
"The Tragedy of the Coal Mines in New York" is an allegorical exploration of the complexity and selfishness of human nature. In this story, the protagonist's friends die one after another. He even met a lady at a party and told him about his murder, the veracity of which is debatable.
At the end of the story, he uses the coal mine accident as a metaphor for his own situation, as if he has been sealed in a collapsed coal mine, waiting for the air to dry up.
"Kangaroo Newsletter" seems to me to be a very boring story, with a record store staff writing back to a customer's complaint letter, and talking a lot, including kangaroos, which is the origin of the title, and in short, babbling and babbling.
"The Last Lawn in the Afternoon" is a work-study college student who encountered something about cutting the lawn on odd jobs, and when he was mowing the lawn for the last time, he met a lady and invited him to sit at home after a break, and had a conversation.
The plot of this story is a bit bland and there are no reversals.
"Her Buried Puppy in the Soil" tells the story of a man who met a woman on a solo trip after breaking up with his girlfriend, and listened to her tell a sad story about the past, she had a dog when she was a child, and then died, and she buried it in the soil, but because of one thing, she had to dig it out......
The story is progressing to an interesting point, but it comes to an abrupt end.
In "Sydney's Green Street", the protagonist is a private detective, and the supporting role is a sheep man who later appeared in novels such as "The Adventure of Sheep Hunting", and the detective's task is to help the sheep man retrieve his screwed off ear from Dr. Sheep.
Obviously, this is a fairy tale and fantasy story, but it feels relatively shallow and lacks a little bit of intriguing.
It is worth mentioning that although these stories in "A Boat to China" seem to be independent, they invisibly constitute an initial complete Murakami's literary world.
They echo and complement each other, and together they show Haruki Murakami's deep thinking about human nature, society, and culture.
This kind of wholeness and coherence not only makes this work more artistic, but also allows us to understand Murakami's literary style and ideological connotation more deeply.
As Haruki Murakami's first collection of short stories, "Boat to China" is undoubtedly a milestone in his literary creation.
It has won the love and respect of readers around the world for its deep and humorous narrative style, deep thinking about human nature and society, and unique understanding of cross-culture.
This work opens the door to the world of Murakami's literature, and if you want to systematically understand Haruki Murakami's literary works, this collection of short stories is worth reading.