In 1969, britain, the Beatles and rolling stones climaxed; Paris, de Gaulle stepped down; Vietnam, the war continued; domestically, the next successor was announced; Tokyo, Todai stopped entrance exams; high school girls began to use sanitary napkins instead of cotton balls; high school boys, who were seventeen years old murakami and his classmates that year.
In the recent fire of the Korean drama "Squid Game", under the mask of money and power, the obese middle-aged white man said that this is his favorite number, leaving aside other meanings, 69 does have a kind of artistic rotational symmetry of beauty, but it echoes the rebellious and absurd youth of seventeen-year-olds.
A small Japanese town in 1969
This year, European and American culture has gradually immersed into the world of young people, rock, poetry, novels, movies, Bob Dylan, Arthur Rimbaud, Camus, Jean Luc Godard, etc. have become the talk of high school students after dinner, students spontaneously formed soft school (focusing on women, tobacco, alcohol, fighting, etc.), rock school (also known as art school), political school, etc., to open a new student era. But the embers after the defeat have not yet been extinguished, teachers and parents are still deeply affected generation, many teachers do not have any cultural level, some even like to slap students, punish students to kneel, parents of their children's discipline is also stereotyped and severe. Lao Mei is still using Japanese ports to attack Vietnam, and some girls of the same level are no longer studying, and wear heavy makeup to hold black soldiers in and out. At that time, Japanese society was probably in a period of drastic changes and violent collisions in values, social backgrounds, internal and external structures.
17 years of youth
In the book, Sword and his two sworn enemies, Adama and Iwase, are uneasy about the bland preparation for the college entrance examination, and always want to do something maverick. The sword, that is, I, the mastermind of everything, first instigated two high school sophomores to complete the campus blockade activity together, that is, on the day of the graduation ceremony before the summer vacation, a group of people sneaked into the school and sprayed paint: Lackeys of power, self-criticism, Comrades, take up arms and other satirical teachers, left a lump of on the principal's desk, pulled up a banner Imagination seizes power, and blocked the roof with a table and chair iron net. Later, he continued his previous goal of holding a grand literary and artistic festival, including filming, arranging dramas, band performances, etc., ostensibly to set off an artistic wave, but in fact, like the core of the previous activities, it was still to attract the attention of girls. How many years of reckless impulses and mavericks are because of the restlessness of hormones, the territory of youth has friends, angels, and absurd behaviors, which seem so happy and complete.
Some people ask this question: "Maybe Japanese society hasn't changed much since around 1969?" Murakami has always been skeptical about this, but in the eyes of domestic readers, the youth of Japan more than forty years ago has not become obsolete, and some things may not happen in our high school to this day, Hitomi Kanahara wrote in the article to "69": "High school students, let it go!" To learn about the world unscrupulously in a happy way is something that young teenagers can enjoy. Youth is invincible, youth is sinless, youth has no purpose, youth will not expire!