Haruki Murakami
Japan's most internationally acclaimed living novelist
Most quoted
"Sometimes fate is like a small sandstorm that keeps changing directions. You change direction but the sandstorm chases you. You turn again, but the storm adjusts itself to your movement. Again and again. Until at last, you and the storm stop trying to outrun each other. This is because the storm isn't something that has nothing to do with you, something that's blowing from far away. The storm is you. Something inside of you. So all you can do is give in to it, step right inside the storm, closing your eyes and plugging up your ears so the sand doesn't get in, and walk through it, step by step."
— from Kafka on the Shore, 2002
"Sometimes fate is like a small sandstorm that keeps changing directions. You change direction but the sandstorm chases you. You turn again, but the storm adjusts. Over and over you play this out, like some ominous dance with death just before dawn. Why? Because this storm isn't something that blew in from far away, something that has nothing to do with you. This storm is you. Something inside of you. So all you can do is give in to it, step right inside the storm, closing your eyes and plugging up your ears so the sand doesn't get in, and walk through it, step by step."
— from Kafka on the Shore, 2002
"Sometimes fate is like a small sandstorm that keeps changing directions. You change direction but the sandstorm chases you. You turn again, but the storm adjusts. Again and again you play this game, like a hapless dancer with Death. Because the storm isn't something that blew in from far away, something that has nothing to do with you. This storm is you. Something inside you. So all you can do is give in to it, step right inside the storm, closing your eyes and plugging up your ears so the sand doesn't get in, and walk through it, step by step."
— from Kafka on the Shore, 2002
All quotes by Haruki Murakami (395)
For a while is a phrase whose length can't be measured. At least by the person who's waiting.
No matter how far you travel, you can never get away from yourself.
Time weighs down on you like an old, ambiguous dream. You keep on swimming in the pond, noting every little detail, but what you see is only the perspective of the surface of water.
I'm not trying to repeat myself or write the same book over and over. I want to explore new things.
The answer is dreams. Dreaming on and on. Entering the world of dreams and never coming out. Living in dreams for the rest of time.
Letters are just pieces of paper. Burn them, and what stays in your heart will stay; keep them, and what vanishes will vanish.
I have this strange feeling that I'm not myself anymore. It's hard to put into words, but I guess it's like I was fast asleep, and someone came, disassembled me, and hurriedly put me back together again.
Running is both exercise and a metaphor. Running will save our physical bodies. But socially, politically, culturally, it is the metaphor of freedom.
Even chance meetings are the result of karma, things in motion set in motion long before.
If you can't understand it without an explanation, you can't understand it with an explanation.
The world is full of ways and means to waste time.
I want to write about people who dream and wait for the night to end, who long for the light so they can hold the ones they love.
A short, happy life is better than a long, unhappy one.
Don't feel sorry for yourself. Only assholes do that.
Everyone, deep in their hearts, is waiting for the end of the world to come.
The heart is an organ of fire.
I don't go out of my way to make friends, but when I love someone, I love them completely.
Whiskey, like a beautiful woman, demands appreciation. You gaze first, then it's time to drink.
Life is a lot like jazz... it's best when you improvise.
Beyond the window, the night was thick with stars.
Contemporaries of Haruki Murakami
Other Literatures born within 50 years of Haruki Murakami (1949).