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What I Talk About When I Talk About Running

A Memoir

Part of Vintage International

Author Haruki Murakami
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$17.00 US
Knopf | Vintage
On sale Aug 11, 2009 | 192 Pages | 978-0-307-38983-1
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  • English > Comparative Literature: Asian > Japanese
  • Interdisciplinary Studies > Race and Ethnic Studies > Asian Literature and Drama
  • Health and Kinesiology > Kinesiology > Fitness and Wellness
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An intimate look at writing, running, and the incredible way they intersect, What I Talk About When I Talk About Running is an illuminating glimpse into the solitary passions of one of our greatest artists.

While training for the New York City Marathon, Haruki Murakami decided to keep a journal of his progress. The result is a memoir about his intertwined obsessions with running and writing, full of vivid recollections and insights, including the eureka moment when he decided to become a writer. By turns funny and sobering, playful and philosophical, here is a rich and revelatory work that elevates the human need for motion to an art form.

"[What I Talk About When I Talk About Running is] a graceful explanation of Mr. Murakami's intertwining obsessions, conveyed with his characteristic ability to draw unexpected connections. Running may be a matter of placing one foot in front of the other on the ground, but, as is so often the case with Mr. Murakami, terrestrial objects have a tendency to take flight." –Chloë Schama, New York Sun

"Murakami constructs this piecemeal narrative with the same masterful, accessible prose marked by humor and streaks of magic which has made him a household name, the same staggering insights, the same fascinating connections . . . this is exactly what makes Murakami so special: his ability to render everything a part of everything else, and to end with monumental poignancy. . . . In an extremely personal, candid and moving way, the book makes one want to read and run at the same time." –Reynard Seifert, Austin Fit Magazine

"[Murakami's] descriptive eye is as acute as ever. . . . Fascinating. . . . A glimpse into the creative process of one of the world's great writers." –Dan Pope, The Hartford Courant

"Enthralling. . . . Throughout this quirky, brilliant gem, Murakami's life lessons unfold with plainspoken power that should prove valuable to a broad readership–even those who have no ambitions to write elaborate novels or run grueling races." –Hank Shteamer, Time Out New York

"A felicitous, casual series of reflections and anecdotes. . . . [Murakami] has a Warholian way of tinting the mundane with mystery and restrained humor. . . .Do still waters run deep? This paean to a runner's life keeps us, pleasurably, wondering." –Joel Rice, The Tennessean

"In What I Talk About When I Talk About Running, [Murakami] has turned something seemingly mundane–his running journals–into a brilliant meditation on how his running and writing nurture and sustain each other. . . . With spare, engaging prose...Murakami shares his runner's high." –Farrell Evans, Sports Illustrated

"[What I Talk About When I Talk About Running] provides a fascinating portrait of Murakami's working mind and how he works his magic on the page . . . [a] charming, sober little book." – John Freeman, Newark Star-Ledger

"A genuine memoir, filled with gentle minutiae that truly communicates the rhythm of Murakami's daily life and work. . . . Murakami actually offers himself whole." –Jesse Jarnow, Paste Magazine

"Highly recommended. . . . Practical philosophy from a man whose insight into his own character, and how running both suits and shapes that character, is revelatory and can provide tools for readers to examine and improve their own lives." –Library Journal

“If we all ran like brilliant Japanese novelist Murakami, would we write as well as he does?” —Library Journal
AUGUST 5, 2005 . KAUAI, HAWAIIWho's Going to Laugh at Mick Jagger?I'm on Kauai, in Hawaii, today, Friday, August 5, 2005. It's unbelievably clear and sunny, not a cloud in the sky. As if the concept clouds doesn't even exist. I came here at the end of July and, as always, we rented a condo. During the mornings, when it's cool, I sit at my desk, writing all sorts of things. Like now: I'm writing this, a piece on running that I can pretty much compose as I wish. It's summer, so naturally it's hot. Hawaii's been called the island of eternal summer, but since it's in the Northern Hemisphere there are, arguably, four seasons of a sort. Summer is somewhat hotter than winter. I spend a lot of time in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and compared to Cambridge--so muggy and hot with all its bricks and concrete it's like a form of torture--summer in Hawaii is a veritable paradise. No need for an air conditioner here--just leave the window open, and a refreshing breeze blows in. People in Cambridge are always surprised when they hear I'm spending August in Hawaii. "Why would you want to spend summer in a hot place like that?" they invariably ask. But they don't know what it's like. How the constant trade winds from the northeast make summers cool. How happy life is here, where we can enjoy lounging around, reading a book in the shade of trees, or, if the notion strikes us, go down, just as we are, for a dip in the inlet.Since I arrived in Hawaii I've run about an hour every day, six days a week. It's two and a half months now since I resumed my old lifestyle in which, unless it's totally unavoidable, I run every single day. Today I ran for an hour and ten minutes, listening on my Walkman to two albums by the Lovin' Spoonful--Daydream and Hums of the Lovin' Spoonful--which I'd recorded on an MD disc.Right now I'm aiming at increasing the distance I run, so speed is less of an issue. As long as I can run a certain distance, that's all I care about. Sometimes I run fast when I feel like it, but if I increase the pace I shorten the amount of time I run, the point being to let the exhilaration I feel at the end of each run carry over to the next day. This is the same sort of tack I find necessary when writing a novel. I stop every day right at the point where I feel I can write more. Do that, and the next day's work goes surprisingly smoothly. I think Ernest Hemingway did something like that. To keep on going, you have to keep up the rhythm. This is the important thing for long-term projects. Once you set the pace, the rest will follow. The problem is getting the flywheel to spin at a set speed--and to get to that point takes as much concentration and effort as you can manage.It rained for a short time while I was running, but it was a cooling rain that felt good. A thick cloud blew in from the ocean right over me, and a gentle rain fell for a while, but then, as if it had remembered, "Oh, I've got to do some errands!," it whisked itself away without so much as a glance back. And then the merciless sun was back, scorching the ground. It's a very easy-to-understand weather pattern. Nothing abstruse or ambivalent about it, not a speck of the metaphor or the symbolic. On the way I passed a few other joggers, about an equal number of men and women. The energetic ones were zipping down the road, slicing through the air like they had robbers at their heels. Others, overweight, huffed and puffed, their eyes half closed, their shoulders slumped like this was the last thing in the world they wanted to be doing. They looked like maybe a week ago their doctors had told them they have diabetes and warned them they had to start exercising. I'm somewhere in the middle.I love listening to the Lovin' Spoonful. Their music is sort of laid-back and never pretentious. Listening to this soothing music brings back a lot of memories of the 1960s. Nothing really special, though. If they were to make a movie about my life (just the thought of which scares me), these would be the scenes they'd leave on the cutting-room floor. "We can leave this episode out," the editor would explain. "It's not bad, but it's sort of ordinary and doesn't amount to much." Those kinds of memories--unpretentious, commonplace. But for me, they're all meaningful and valuable. As each of these memories flits across my mind, I'm sure I unconsciously smile, or give a slight frown. Commonplace they might be, but the accumulation of these memories has led to one result: me. Me here and now, on the north shore of Kauai. Sometimes when I think of life, I feel like a piece of driftwood washed up on shore.As I run, the trade winds blowing in from the direction of the lighthouse rustle the leaves of the eucalyptus over my head.I began living in Cambridge, Massachusetts, at the end of May of this year, and running has once again been the mainstay of my daily routine ever since. I'm seriously running now. By seriously I mean thirty-six miles a week. In other words, six miles a day, six days a week. It would be better if I ran seven days, but I have to factor in rainy days, and days when work keeps me too busy. There are some days, too, when frankly I just feel too tired to run. Taking all this into account, I leave one day a week as a day off. So, at thirty-six miles per week, I cover 156 miles every month, which for me is my standard for serious running.In June I followed this plan exactly, running 156 miles on the nose. In July I increased the distance and covered 186 miles. I averaged six miles every day, without taking a single day off. I don't mean I covered precisely six miles every day. If I ran nine miles one day, the next day I'd do only three. (At a jogging pace I generally can cover six miles in an hour.) For me this is most definitely running at a serious level. And since I came to Hawaii I've kept up this pace. It had been far too long since I'd been able to run these distances and keep up this kind of fixed schedule.There are several reasons why, at a certain point in my life, I stopped running seriously. First of all, my life has been getting busier, and free time is increasingly at a premium. When I was younger it wasn't as if I had as much free time as I wanted, but at least I didn't have as many miscellaneous chores as I do now. I don't know why, but the older you get, the busier you become. Another reason is that I've gotten more interested in triathlons, rather than marathons. Triathlons, of course, involve swimming and cycling in addition to running. The running part isn't a problem for me, but in order to master the other two legs of the event I had to devote a great deal of time to training in swimming and biking. I had to start over from scratch with swimming, relearning the correct form, learning the right biking techniques, and training the necessary muscles. All of this took time and effort, and as a result I had less time to devote to running.Probably the main reason, though, was that at a certain point I'd simply grown tired of it. I started running in the fall of 1982 and have been running since then for nearly twenty-three years. Over this period I've jogged almost every day, run in at least one marathon every year--twenty-three up till now--and participated in more long-distance races all around the world than I care to count. Long-distance running suits my personality, though, and of all the habits I've acquired over my lifetime I'd have to say this one has been the most helpful, the most meaningful. Running without a break for more than two decades has also made me stronger, both physically and emotionally.The thing is, I'm not much for team sports. That's just the way I am. Whenever I play soccer or baseball--actually, since becoming an adult this is almost never--I never feel comfortable. Maybe it's because I don't have any brothers, but I could never get into the kind of games you play with others. I'm also not very good at-one-on-one sports like tennis. I enjoy squash, but generally when it comes to a game against someone, the competitive aspect makes me uncomfortable. And when it comes to martial arts, too, you can count me out.Don't misunderstand me--I'm not totally uncompetitive. It's just that for some reason I never cared all that much whether I beat others or lost to them. This sentiment remained pretty much unchanged after I grew up. It doesn't matter what field you're talking about--beating somebody else just doesn't do it for me. I'm much more interested in whether I reach the goals that I set for myself, so in this sense long-distance running is the perfect fit for a mindset like mine.Marathon runners will understand what I mean. We don't really care whether we beat any other particular runner. World-class runners, of course, want to outdo their closest rivals, but for your average, everyday runner, individual rivalry isn't a major issue. I'm sure there are garden-variety runners whose desire to beat a particular rival spurs them on to train harder. But what happens if their rival, for whatever reason, drops out of the competition? Their motivation for running would disappear or at least diminish, and it'd be hard for them to remain runners for long.Most ordinary runners are motivated by an individual goal, more than anything: namely, a time they want to beat. As long as he can beat that time, a runner will feel he's accomplished what he set out to do, and if he can't, then he'll feel he hasn't. Even if he doesn't break the time he'd hoped for, as long as he has the sense of satisfaction at having done his very best--and, possibly, having made some significant discovery about himself in the process--then that in itself is an accomplishment, a positive feeling he can carry over to the next race.The same can be said about my profession. In the novelist's profession, as far as I'm concerned, there's no such thing as winning or losing. Maybe numbers of copies sold, awards won, and critics' praise serve as outward standards for accomplishment in literature, but none of them really matter. What's crucial is whether your writing attains the standards you've set for yourself. Failure to reach that bar is not something you can easily explain away. When it comes to other people, you can always come up with a reasonable explanation, but you can't fool yourself. In this sense, writing novels and running full marathons are very much alike. Basically a writer has a quiet, inner motivation, and doesn't seek validation in the outwardly visible.For me, running is both exercise and a metaphor. Running day after day, piling up the races, bit by bit I raise the bar, and by clearing each level I elevate myself. At least that's why I've put in the effort day after day: to raise my own level. I'm no great runner, by any means. I'm at an ordinary--or perhaps more like mediocre--level. But that's not the point. The point is whether or not I improved over yesterday. In long-distance running the only opponent you have to beat is yourself, the way you used to be.Since my forties, though, this system of self-assessment has gradually changed. Simply put, I am no longer able to improve my time. I guess it's inevitable, considering my age. At a certain age everybody reaches their physical peak. There are individual differences, but for the most part swimmers hit that watershed in their early twenties, boxers in their late twenties, and baseball players in their mid-thirties. It's something everyone has to go through. Once I asked an ophthalmologist if anyone's ever avoided getting farsighted when they got older. He laughed and said, "I've never met one yet." It's the same thing. (Fortunately, the peak for artists varies considerably. Dostoyevsky, for instance, wrote two of his most profound novels, The Possessed and The Brothers Karamazov, in the last few years of his life before his death at age sixty. Domenico Scarlatti wrote 555 piano sonatas during his lifetime, most of them when he was between the ages of fifty-seven and sixty-two.)My peak as a runner came in my late forties. Before then I'd aimed at running a full marathon in three and a half hours, a pace of exactly one kilometer in five minutes, or one mile in eight. Sometimes I broke three and a half hours, sometimes not (more often not). Either way, I was able to steadily run a marathon in more or less that amount of time. Even when I thought I'd totally blown it, I'd still be in under three hours and forty minutes. Even if I hadn't trained so much or wasn't in the best of shape, exceeding four hours was inconceivable. Things continued at that stable plateau for a while, but before long they started to change. I'd train as much as before but found it increasingly hard to break three hours and forty minutes. It was taking me five and a half minutes to run one kilometer, and I was inching closer to the four-hour mark to finish a marathon. Frankly, this was a bit of a shock. What was going on here? I didn't think it was because I was aging. In everyday life I never felt like I was getting physically weaker. But no matter how much I might deny it or try to ignore it, the numbers were retreating, step by step.Besides, as I said earlier, I'd become more interested in other sports such as triathlons and squash. Just running all the time couldn't be good for me, I'd figured, deciding it would be better to add variety to my routine and develop a more all-around physical regimen. I hired a private swimming coach who started me off with the basics, and I learned how to swim faster and more smoothly than before. My muscles reacted to the new environment, and my physique began noticeably changing. Meanwhile, like the tide going out, my marathon times slowly but surely continued to slow. And I found I didn't enjoy running as much as I used to. A steady fatigue opened up between me and the very notion of running.
Copyright © 2008 by Haruki Murakami. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
© Elena Seibert
HARUKI MURAKAMI was born in Kyoto in 1949 and now lives near Tokyo. His work has been translated into more than fifty languages, and the most recent of his many international honors is the Jerusalem Prize, whose previous recipients include J. M. Coetzee, Milan Kundera, and V. S. Naipaul. Translated by Philip Gabriel and Ted Goossen.

harukimurakami.com View titles by Haruki Murakami

About

An intimate look at writing, running, and the incredible way they intersect, What I Talk About When I Talk About Running is an illuminating glimpse into the solitary passions of one of our greatest artists.

While training for the New York City Marathon, Haruki Murakami decided to keep a journal of his progress. The result is a memoir about his intertwined obsessions with running and writing, full of vivid recollections and insights, including the eureka moment when he decided to become a writer. By turns funny and sobering, playful and philosophical, here is a rich and revelatory work that elevates the human need for motion to an art form.

"[What I Talk About When I Talk About Running is] a graceful explanation of Mr. Murakami's intertwining obsessions, conveyed with his characteristic ability to draw unexpected connections. Running may be a matter of placing one foot in front of the other on the ground, but, as is so often the case with Mr. Murakami, terrestrial objects have a tendency to take flight." –Chloë Schama, New York Sun

"Murakami constructs this piecemeal narrative with the same masterful, accessible prose marked by humor and streaks of magic which has made him a household name, the same staggering insights, the same fascinating connections . . . this is exactly what makes Murakami so special: his ability to render everything a part of everything else, and to end with monumental poignancy. . . . In an extremely personal, candid and moving way, the book makes one want to read and run at the same time." –Reynard Seifert, Austin Fit Magazine

"[Murakami's] descriptive eye is as acute as ever. . . . Fascinating. . . . A glimpse into the creative process of one of the world's great writers." –Dan Pope, The Hartford Courant

"Enthralling. . . . Throughout this quirky, brilliant gem, Murakami's life lessons unfold with plainspoken power that should prove valuable to a broad readership–even those who have no ambitions to write elaborate novels or run grueling races." –Hank Shteamer, Time Out New York

"A felicitous, casual series of reflections and anecdotes. . . . [Murakami] has a Warholian way of tinting the mundane with mystery and restrained humor. . . .Do still waters run deep? This paean to a runner's life keeps us, pleasurably, wondering." –Joel Rice, The Tennessean

"In What I Talk About When I Talk About Running, [Murakami] has turned something seemingly mundane–his running journals–into a brilliant meditation on how his running and writing nurture and sustain each other. . . . With spare, engaging prose...Murakami shares his runner's high." –Farrell Evans, Sports Illustrated

"[What I Talk About When I Talk About Running] provides a fascinating portrait of Murakami's working mind and how he works his magic on the page . . . [a] charming, sober little book." – John Freeman, Newark Star-Ledger

"A genuine memoir, filled with gentle minutiae that truly communicates the rhythm of Murakami's daily life and work. . . . Murakami actually offers himself whole." –Jesse Jarnow, Paste Magazine

"Highly recommended. . . . Practical philosophy from a man whose insight into his own character, and how running both suits and shapes that character, is revelatory and can provide tools for readers to examine and improve their own lives." –Library Journal

“If we all ran like brilliant Japanese novelist Murakami, would we write as well as he does?” —Library Journal

Excerpt

AUGUST 5, 2005 . KAUAI, HAWAIIWho's Going to Laugh at Mick Jagger?I'm on Kauai, in Hawaii, today, Friday, August 5, 2005. It's unbelievably clear and sunny, not a cloud in the sky. As if the concept clouds doesn't even exist. I came here at the end of July and, as always, we rented a condo. During the mornings, when it's cool, I sit at my desk, writing all sorts of things. Like now: I'm writing this, a piece on running that I can pretty much compose as I wish. It's summer, so naturally it's hot. Hawaii's been called the island of eternal summer, but since it's in the Northern Hemisphere there are, arguably, four seasons of a sort. Summer is somewhat hotter than winter. I spend a lot of time in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and compared to Cambridge--so muggy and hot with all its bricks and concrete it's like a form of torture--summer in Hawaii is a veritable paradise. No need for an air conditioner here--just leave the window open, and a refreshing breeze blows in. People in Cambridge are always surprised when they hear I'm spending August in Hawaii. "Why would you want to spend summer in a hot place like that?" they invariably ask. But they don't know what it's like. How the constant trade winds from the northeast make summers cool. How happy life is here, where we can enjoy lounging around, reading a book in the shade of trees, or, if the notion strikes us, go down, just as we are, for a dip in the inlet.Since I arrived in Hawaii I've run about an hour every day, six days a week. It's two and a half months now since I resumed my old lifestyle in which, unless it's totally unavoidable, I run every single day. Today I ran for an hour and ten minutes, listening on my Walkman to two albums by the Lovin' Spoonful--Daydream and Hums of the Lovin' Spoonful--which I'd recorded on an MD disc.Right now I'm aiming at increasing the distance I run, so speed is less of an issue. As long as I can run a certain distance, that's all I care about. Sometimes I run fast when I feel like it, but if I increase the pace I shorten the amount of time I run, the point being to let the exhilaration I feel at the end of each run carry over to the next day. This is the same sort of tack I find necessary when writing a novel. I stop every day right at the point where I feel I can write more. Do that, and the next day's work goes surprisingly smoothly. I think Ernest Hemingway did something like that. To keep on going, you have to keep up the rhythm. This is the important thing for long-term projects. Once you set the pace, the rest will follow. The problem is getting the flywheel to spin at a set speed--and to get to that point takes as much concentration and effort as you can manage.It rained for a short time while I was running, but it was a cooling rain that felt good. A thick cloud blew in from the ocean right over me, and a gentle rain fell for a while, but then, as if it had remembered, "Oh, I've got to do some errands!," it whisked itself away without so much as a glance back. And then the merciless sun was back, scorching the ground. It's a very easy-to-understand weather pattern. Nothing abstruse or ambivalent about it, not a speck of the metaphor or the symbolic. On the way I passed a few other joggers, about an equal number of men and women. The energetic ones were zipping down the road, slicing through the air like they had robbers at their heels. Others, overweight, huffed and puffed, their eyes half closed, their shoulders slumped like this was the last thing in the world they wanted to be doing. They looked like maybe a week ago their doctors had told them they have diabetes and warned them they had to start exercising. I'm somewhere in the middle.I love listening to the Lovin' Spoonful. Their music is sort of laid-back and never pretentious. Listening to this soothing music brings back a lot of memories of the 1960s. Nothing really special, though. If they were to make a movie about my life (just the thought of which scares me), these would be the scenes they'd leave on the cutting-room floor. "We can leave this episode out," the editor would explain. "It's not bad, but it's sort of ordinary and doesn't amount to much." Those kinds of memories--unpretentious, commonplace. But for me, they're all meaningful and valuable. As each of these memories flits across my mind, I'm sure I unconsciously smile, or give a slight frown. Commonplace they might be, but the accumulation of these memories has led to one result: me. Me here and now, on the north shore of Kauai. Sometimes when I think of life, I feel like a piece of driftwood washed up on shore.As I run, the trade winds blowing in from the direction of the lighthouse rustle the leaves of the eucalyptus over my head.I began living in Cambridge, Massachusetts, at the end of May of this year, and running has once again been the mainstay of my daily routine ever since. I'm seriously running now. By seriously I mean thirty-six miles a week. In other words, six miles a day, six days a week. It would be better if I ran seven days, but I have to factor in rainy days, and days when work keeps me too busy. There are some days, too, when frankly I just feel too tired to run. Taking all this into account, I leave one day a week as a day off. So, at thirty-six miles per week, I cover 156 miles every month, which for me is my standard for serious running.In June I followed this plan exactly, running 156 miles on the nose. In July I increased the distance and covered 186 miles. I averaged six miles every day, without taking a single day off. I don't mean I covered precisely six miles every day. If I ran nine miles one day, the next day I'd do only three. (At a jogging pace I generally can cover six miles in an hour.) For me this is most definitely running at a serious level. And since I came to Hawaii I've kept up this pace. It had been far too long since I'd been able to run these distances and keep up this kind of fixed schedule.There are several reasons why, at a certain point in my life, I stopped running seriously. First of all, my life has been getting busier, and free time is increasingly at a premium. When I was younger it wasn't as if I had as much free time as I wanted, but at least I didn't have as many miscellaneous chores as I do now. I don't know why, but the older you get, the busier you become. Another reason is that I've gotten more interested in triathlons, rather than marathons. Triathlons, of course, involve swimming and cycling in addition to running. The running part isn't a problem for me, but in order to master the other two legs of the event I had to devote a great deal of time to training in swimming and biking. I had to start over from scratch with swimming, relearning the correct form, learning the right biking techniques, and training the necessary muscles. All of this took time and effort, and as a result I had less time to devote to running.Probably the main reason, though, was that at a certain point I'd simply grown tired of it. I started running in the fall of 1982 and have been running since then for nearly twenty-three years. Over this period I've jogged almost every day, run in at least one marathon every year--twenty-three up till now--and participated in more long-distance races all around the world than I care to count. Long-distance running suits my personality, though, and of all the habits I've acquired over my lifetime I'd have to say this one has been the most helpful, the most meaningful. Running without a break for more than two decades has also made me stronger, both physically and emotionally.The thing is, I'm not much for team sports. That's just the way I am. Whenever I play soccer or baseball--actually, since becoming an adult this is almost never--I never feel comfortable. Maybe it's because I don't have any brothers, but I could never get into the kind of games you play with others. I'm also not very good at-one-on-one sports like tennis. I enjoy squash, but generally when it comes to a game against someone, the competitive aspect makes me uncomfortable. And when it comes to martial arts, too, you can count me out.Don't misunderstand me--I'm not totally uncompetitive. It's just that for some reason I never cared all that much whether I beat others or lost to them. This sentiment remained pretty much unchanged after I grew up. It doesn't matter what field you're talking about--beating somebody else just doesn't do it for me. I'm much more interested in whether I reach the goals that I set for myself, so in this sense long-distance running is the perfect fit for a mindset like mine.Marathon runners will understand what I mean. We don't really care whether we beat any other particular runner. World-class runners, of course, want to outdo their closest rivals, but for your average, everyday runner, individual rivalry isn't a major issue. I'm sure there are garden-variety runners whose desire to beat a particular rival spurs them on to train harder. But what happens if their rival, for whatever reason, drops out of the competition? Their motivation for running would disappear or at least diminish, and it'd be hard for them to remain runners for long.Most ordinary runners are motivated by an individual goal, more than anything: namely, a time they want to beat. As long as he can beat that time, a runner will feel he's accomplished what he set out to do, and if he can't, then he'll feel he hasn't. Even if he doesn't break the time he'd hoped for, as long as he has the sense of satisfaction at having done his very best--and, possibly, having made some significant discovery about himself in the process--then that in itself is an accomplishment, a positive feeling he can carry over to the next race.The same can be said about my profession. In the novelist's profession, as far as I'm concerned, there's no such thing as winning or losing. Maybe numbers of copies sold, awards won, and critics' praise serve as outward standards for accomplishment in literature, but none of them really matter. What's crucial is whether your writing attains the standards you've set for yourself. Failure to reach that bar is not something you can easily explain away. When it comes to other people, you can always come up with a reasonable explanation, but you can't fool yourself. In this sense, writing novels and running full marathons are very much alike. Basically a writer has a quiet, inner motivation, and doesn't seek validation in the outwardly visible.For me, running is both exercise and a metaphor. Running day after day, piling up the races, bit by bit I raise the bar, and by clearing each level I elevate myself. At least that's why I've put in the effort day after day: to raise my own level. I'm no great runner, by any means. I'm at an ordinary--or perhaps more like mediocre--level. But that's not the point. The point is whether or not I improved over yesterday. In long-distance running the only opponent you have to beat is yourself, the way you used to be.Since my forties, though, this system of self-assessment has gradually changed. Simply put, I am no longer able to improve my time. I guess it's inevitable, considering my age. At a certain age everybody reaches their physical peak. There are individual differences, but for the most part swimmers hit that watershed in their early twenties, boxers in their late twenties, and baseball players in their mid-thirties. It's something everyone has to go through. Once I asked an ophthalmologist if anyone's ever avoided getting farsighted when they got older. He laughed and said, "I've never met one yet." It's the same thing. (Fortunately, the peak for artists varies considerably. Dostoyevsky, for instance, wrote two of his most profound novels, The Possessed and The Brothers Karamazov, in the last few years of his life before his death at age sixty. Domenico Scarlatti wrote 555 piano sonatas during his lifetime, most of them when he was between the ages of fifty-seven and sixty-two.)My peak as a runner came in my late forties. Before then I'd aimed at running a full marathon in three and a half hours, a pace of exactly one kilometer in five minutes, or one mile in eight. Sometimes I broke three and a half hours, sometimes not (more often not). Either way, I was able to steadily run a marathon in more or less that amount of time. Even when I thought I'd totally blown it, I'd still be in under three hours and forty minutes. Even if I hadn't trained so much or wasn't in the best of shape, exceeding four hours was inconceivable. Things continued at that stable plateau for a while, but before long they started to change. I'd train as much as before but found it increasingly hard to break three hours and forty minutes. It was taking me five and a half minutes to run one kilometer, and I was inching closer to the four-hour mark to finish a marathon. Frankly, this was a bit of a shock. What was going on here? I didn't think it was because I was aging. In everyday life I never felt like I was getting physically weaker. But no matter how much I might deny it or try to ignore it, the numbers were retreating, step by step.Besides, as I said earlier, I'd become more interested in other sports such as triathlons and squash. Just running all the time couldn't be good for me, I'd figured, deciding it would be better to add variety to my routine and develop a more all-around physical regimen. I hired a private swimming coach who started me off with the basics, and I learned how to swim faster and more smoothly than before. My muscles reacted to the new environment, and my physique began noticeably changing. Meanwhile, like the tide going out, my marathon times slowly but surely continued to slow. And I found I didn't enjoy running as much as I used to. A steady fatigue opened up between me and the very notion of running.
Copyright © 2008 by Haruki Murakami. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.

Author

© Elena Seibert
HARUKI MURAKAMI was born in Kyoto in 1949 and now lives near Tokyo. His work has been translated into more than fifty languages, and the most recent of his many international honors is the Jerusalem Prize, whose previous recipients include J. M. Coetzee, Milan Kundera, and V. S. Naipaul. Translated by Philip Gabriel and Ted Goossen.

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  • What I Talk About When I Talk About Running
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    978-0-593-31171-4
    $18.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Feb 22, 2022
  • Let Me Tell You What I Mean
    Let Me Tell You What I Mean
    Joan Didion
    978-0-593-31219-3
    $16.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Jan 25, 2022
  • Palimpsest
    Palimpsest
    A Memoir
    Gore Vidal
    978-0-593-31439-5
    $18.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Nov 16, 2021
  • Season of Anomy
    Season of Anomy
    Wole Soyinka
    978-0-593-46719-0
    $16.95 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Sep 14, 2021
  • The Interpreters
    The Interpreters
    Wole Soyinka
    978-0-593-46721-3
    $16.95 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Sep 14, 2021
  • Here We Are
    Here We Are
    A novel
    Graham Swift
    978-1-9848-9952-1
    $16.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Aug 10, 2021
  • Juneteenth (Revised)
    Juneteenth (Revised)
    Ralph Ellison
    978-0-593-31461-6
    $17.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    May 18, 2021
  • Think, Write, Speak
    Think, Write, Speak
    Uncollected Essays, Reviews, Interviews, and Letters to the Editor
    Brian Boyd, Vladimir Nabokov Literary Trust
    978-1-101-87370-0
    $18.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Feb 09, 2021
  • The Wapshot Chronicle
    The Wapshot Chronicle
    John Cheever
    978-0-593-08177-8
    $16.95 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Feb 02, 2021
  • The Wapshot Scandal
    The Wapshot Scandal
    John Cheever
    978-0-593-31289-6
    $16.95 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Feb 02, 2021
  • Love in the Time of Cholera (Illustrated Edition)
    Love in the Time of Cholera (Illustrated Edition)
    Gabriel García Márquez
    978-0-593-31085-4
    $25.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Oct 27, 2020
  • The Scandal of the Century
    The Scandal of the Century
    And Other Writings
    Gabriel García Márquez
    978-0-525-56680-9
    $16.95 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Sep 15, 2020
  • Personal Writings
    Personal Writings
    Albert Camus
    978-0-525-56721-9
    $16.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Aug 04, 2020
  • Berta Isla
    Berta Isla
    A novel
    Javier Marías
    978-0-525-56312-9
    $17.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Jul 07, 2020
  • Life for Sale
    Life for Sale
    Yukio Mishima
    978-0-525-56514-7
    $17.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Apr 07, 2020
  • The Source of Self-Regard
    The Source of Self-Regard
    Selected Essays, Speeches, and Meditations
    Toni Morrison
    978-0-525-56279-5
    $16.95 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Jan 14, 2020
  • Love Is Blind
    Love Is Blind
    A novel
    William Boyd
    978-0-525-56444-7
    $16.95 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Sep 24, 2019
  • So Much Life Left Over
    So Much Life Left Over
    A Novel
    Louis de Bernieres
    978-0-525-56441-6
    $16.95 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Jul 09, 2019
  • Myra Breckinridge
    Myra Breckinridge
    Gore Vidal
    978-0-525-56650-2
    $18.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    May 21, 2019
  • Warlight
    Warlight
    Michael Ondaatje
    978-0-525-56296-2
    $16.95 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Apr 02, 2019
  • First Person
    First Person
    Richard Flanagan
    978-0-525-43577-8
    $17.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Mar 05, 2019
  • The Only Story
    The Only Story
    A novel
    Julian Barnes
    978-0-525-56306-8
    $16.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Mar 05, 2019
  • A Long Way from Home
    A Long Way from Home
    Peter Carey
    978-0-525-43599-0
    $16.95 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Feb 05, 2019
  • The Rub of Time
    The Rub of Time
    Bellow, Nabokov, Hitchens, Travolta, Trump: Essays and Reportage, 1994-2017
    Martin Amis
    978-1-4000-9599-5
    $16.95 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Jan 22, 2019
  • I'm Not Here to Give a Speech
    I'm Not Here to Give a Speech
    Gabriel García Márquez
    978-1-101-91118-1
    $14.95 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Jan 08, 2019
  • The Frolic of the Beasts
    The Frolic of the Beasts
    Yukio Mishima
    978-0-525-43415-3
    $15.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Nov 27, 2018
  • The Myth of Sisyphus
    The Myth of Sisyphus
    Albert Camus
    978-0-525-56445-4
    $15.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Nov 06, 2018
  • Dinner at the Center of the Earth
    Dinner at the Center of the Earth
    Nathan Englander
    978-0-525-43404-7
    $16.95 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Sep 04, 2018
  • Between Eternities
    Between Eternities
    And Other Writings
    Javier Marías
    978-1-101-97211-3
    $15.95 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Aug 28, 2018
  • A Boy in Winter
    A Boy in Winter
    A Novel
    Rachel Seiffert
    978-0-8041-6880-9
    $16.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Jul 10, 2018
  • The Red-Haired Woman
    The Red-Haired Woman
    Orhan Pamuk
    978-1-101-97423-0
    $16.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Jul 10, 2018
  • Men Without Women
    Men Without Women
    Stories
    Haruki Murakami
    978-1-101-97452-0
    $16.95 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    May 01, 2018
  • The Golden Legend
    The Golden Legend
    A novel
    Nadeem Aslam
    978-1-101-97338-7
    $17.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Apr 24, 2018
  • The Woman on the Stairs
    The Woman on the Stairs
    A Novel
    Bernhard Schlink
    978-1-101-91234-8
    $16.95 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Feb 20, 2018
  • A Horse Walks Into a Bar
    A Horse Walks Into a Bar
    A novel
    David Grossman
    978-1-101-97349-3
    $15.95 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Jan 16, 2018
  • South and West
    South and West
    From a Notebook
    Joan Didion
    978-0-525-43419-1
    $16.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Jan 02, 2018
  • Letters to Véra
    Letters to Véra
    Vladimir Nabokov
    978-0-307-47658-6
    $24.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Dec 12, 2017
  • House of the Sleeping Beauties and Other Stories
    House of the Sleeping Beauties and Other Stories
    Yasunari Kawabata
    978-0-525-43414-6
    $9.99 US
    Ebook
    Vintage
    Dec 12, 2017
  • The Boat Rocker
    The Boat Rocker
    A Novel
    Ha Jin
    978-0-8041-7037-6
    $16.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Oct 17, 2017
  • Absolutely on Music
    Absolutely on Music
    Conversations
    Haruki Murakami, Seiji Ozawa
    978-0-8041-7372-8
    $18.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Oct 03, 2017
  • The Spy
    The Spy
    A Novel of Mata Hari
    Paulo Coelho
    978-0-525-43279-1
    $16.95 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Jun 27, 2017
  • Keeping an Eye Open
    Keeping an Eye Open
    Essays on Art
    Julian Barnes
    978-1-101-87337-3
    $20.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Jun 13, 2017
  • The Noise of Time
    The Noise of Time
    A Novel
    Julian Barnes
    978-1-101-97118-5
    $17.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Jun 13, 2017
  • I Am Not Your Negro
    I Am Not Your Negro
    A Companion Edition to the Documentary Film Directed by Raoul Peck
    James Baldwin, Raoul Peck
    978-0-525-43469-6
    $16.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Feb 07, 2017
  • A Decent Ride
    A Decent Ride
    Irvine Welsh
    978-1-101-97084-3
    $16.95 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Jan 10, 2017
  • Mothering Sunday
    Mothering Sunday
    A Romance
    Graham Swift
    978-1-101-97172-7
    $15.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Jan 10, 2017
  • Julieta (Movie Tie-in Edition)
    Julieta (Movie Tie-in Edition)
    Three Stories That Inspired the Movie
    Alice Munro
    978-0-525-43426-9
    $7.99 US
    Ebook
    Vintage
    Dec 13, 2016
  • Notwithstanding
    Notwithstanding
    Louis de Bernieres
    978-1-101-96987-8
    $16.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Oct 18, 2016
  • A Strangeness in My Mind
    A Strangeness in My Mind
    A novel
    Orhan Pamuk
    978-0-307-74484-5
    $17.95 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Sep 20, 2016
  • The Blue Guitar
    The Blue Guitar
    John Banville
    978-0-8041-7361-2
    $17.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Aug 09, 2016
  • The Dust That Falls from Dreams
    The Dust That Falls from Dreams
    A Novel
    Louis de Bernieres
    978-1-101-97000-3
    $17.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Jul 26, 2016
  • Wind/Pinball
    Wind/Pinball
    Hear the Wind Sing and Pinball, 1973 (Two Novels)
    Haruki Murakami
    978-0-8041-7014-7
    $17.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    May 03, 2016
  • England and Other Stories
    England and Other Stories
    Graham Swift
    978-1-101-87238-3
    $16.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Apr 19, 2016
  • Odysseus Abroad
    Odysseus Abroad
    A novel
    Amit Chaudhuri
    978-1-101-97145-1
    $16.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Feb 09, 2016
  • God Help the Child
    God Help the Child
    Toni Morrison
    978-0-307-74092-2
    $16.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Jan 26, 2016
  • The Sex Lives of Siamese Twins
    The Sex Lives of Siamese Twins
    Irvine Welsh
    978-0-8041-7321-6
    $16.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Jan 12, 2016
  • The Buried Giant
    The Buried Giant
    Kazuo Ishiguro
    978-0-307-45579-6
    $17.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Jan 05, 2016
  • Amnesia
    Amnesia
    Peter Carey
    978-0-8041-7132-8
    $15.95 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Dec 08, 2015
  • Family Furnishings
    Family Furnishings
    Selected Stories, 1995-2014
    Alice Munro
    978-1-101-87235-2
    $18.95 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Sep 15, 2015
  • A Wilderness Station
    A Wilderness Station
    Selected Stories, 1968-1994
    Alice Munro
    978-1-101-97036-2
    $19.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Sep 15, 2015
  • The Prophet
    The Prophet
    Kahlil Gibran
    978-1-101-97078-2
    $9.95 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Jul 21, 2015
  • A Map of Betrayal
    A Map of Betrayal
    A Novel
    Ha Jin
    978-0-8041-7036-9
    $15.95 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Jul 07, 2015
  • The Zone of Interest
    The Zone of Interest
    Martin Amis
    978-0-8041-7289-9
    $15.95 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Jul 07, 2015
  • The Walk Home
    The Walk Home
    A Novel
    Rachel Seiffert
    978-1-101-87343-4
    $16.95 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Jun 23, 2015
  • Adultery
    Adultery
    Paulo Coelho
    978-1-101-87224-6
    $17.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    May 26, 2015
  • Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage
    Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage
    Haruki Murakami
    978-0-8041-7012-3
    $16.95 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    May 05, 2015
  • The Narrow Road to the Deep North
    The Narrow Road to the Deep North
    Richard Flanagan
    978-0-8041-7147-2
    $16.95 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Apr 14, 2015
  • The Fires of Autumn
    The Fires of Autumn
    Irene Nemirovsky
    978-1-101-87227-7
    $15.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Mar 17, 2015
  • The News: A User's Manual
    The News: A User's Manual
    Alain De Botton
    978-0-307-47683-8
    $17.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Dec 02, 2014
  • Falling Out of Time
    Falling Out of Time
    David Grossman
    978-0-345-80585-0
    $16.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Dec 02, 2014
  • The Man of Feeling
    The Man of Feeling
    Javier Marías
    978-0-8041-7259-2
    $16.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Oct 07, 2014
  • Levels of Life
    Levels of Life
    Julian Barnes
    978-0-345-80658-1
    $15.95 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Jul 01, 2014
  • Beer in the Snooker Club
    Beer in the Snooker Club
    Waguih Ghali
    978-0-8041-7074-1
    $16.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Jun 10, 2014
  • Subtle Bodies
    Subtle Bodies
    Norman Rush
    978-1-4000-7713-7
    $15.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Jun 03, 2014
  • Going Home Again
    Going Home Again
    Dennis Bock
    978-1-4000-9610-7
    $15.95 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    May 06, 2014
  • The Infatuations
    The Infatuations
    Javier Marías
    978-0-307-95073-4
    $15.95 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Apr 22, 2014
  • Vintage Munro
    Vintage Munro
    Nobel Prize Edition
    Alice Munro
    978-0-8041-7356-8
    $12.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Apr 22, 2014
  • Bombay Stories
    Bombay Stories
    Saadat Hasan Manto
    978-0-8041-7060-4
    $16.95 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Mar 25, 2014
  • Paradise
    Paradise
    Toni Morrison
    978-0-8041-6988-2
    $17.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Mar 11, 2014
  • The Blind Man's Garden
    The Blind Man's Garden
    Nadeem Aslam
    978-0-345-80285-9
    $16.95 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Jan 28, 2014

Other Books by this Author

  • Novelist as a Vocation
    Novelist as a Vocation
    Haruki Murakami
    978-0-593-66357-8
    $30.00 US
    Large Print
    Random House Large Print
    Nov 08, 2022
  • First Person Singular
    First Person Singular
    Stories
    Haruki Murakami
    978-0-593-31118-9
    $17.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Apr 12, 2022
  • Murakami T
    Murakami T
    The T-Shirts I Love
    Haruki Murakami
    978-0-593-32042-6
    $25.00 US
    Hardcover
    Knopf
    Nov 23, 2021
  • Killing Commendatore
    Killing Commendatore
    A novel
    Haruki Murakami
    978-0-525-43576-1
    $18.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Oct 01, 2019
  • Hear the Wind Sing
    Hear the Wind Sing
    Haruki Murakami
    978-0-8041-6677-5
    $10.00 US
    Audiobook Download
    Random House Audio
    Aug 04, 2015
  • Pinball, 1973
    Pinball, 1973
    Haruki Murakami
    978-0-8041-9024-4
    $10.00 US
    Audiobook Download
    Random House Audio
    Aug 04, 2015
  • The Strange Library
    The Strange Library
    Haruki Murakami
    978-0-385-35430-1
    $26.00 US
    Paperback
    Knopf
    Dec 02, 2014
  • 1Q84
    1Q84
    Haruki Murakami
    978-0-307-47646-3
    $20.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Jan 22, 2013
  • After Dark
    After Dark
    Haruki Murakami
    978-0-307-27873-9
    $17.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Apr 29, 2008
  • Vintage Murakami
    Vintage Murakami
    Haruki Murakami
    978-0-307-43001-4
    $5.99 US
    Ebook
    Vintage
    Dec 18, 2007
  • Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman
    Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman
    Haruki Murakami
    978-1-4000-9608-4
    $17.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Oct 09, 2007
  • Kafka on the Shore
    Kafka on the Shore
    Haruki Murakami
    978-1-4000-7927-8
    $18.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Jan 03, 2006
  • After the Quake
    After the Quake
    Stories
    Haruki Murakami
    978-0-375-71327-9
    $16.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    May 13, 2003
  • A Wild Sheep Chase
    A Wild Sheep Chase
    A Novel
    Haruki Murakami
    978-0-375-71894-6
    $17.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Apr 09, 2002
  • Sputnik Sweetheart
    Sputnik Sweetheart
    Haruki Murakami
    978-0-375-72605-7
    $17.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Apr 09, 2002
  • Underground
    Underground
    The Tokyo Gas Attack and the Japanese Psyche
    Haruki Murakami
    978-0-375-72580-7
    $18.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Apr 10, 2001
  • Norwegian Wood
    Norwegian Wood
    Haruki Murakami
    978-0-375-70402-4
    $17.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Sep 12, 2000
  • South of the Border, West of the Sun
    South of the Border, West of the Sun
    A Novel
    Haruki Murakami
    978-0-679-76739-8
    $17.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Mar 14, 2000
  • The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle
    The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle
    A Novel
    Haruki Murakami
    978-0-679-77543-0
    $19.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Sep 01, 1998
  • Dance Dance Dance
    Dance Dance Dance
    Haruki Murakami
    978-0-679-75379-7
    $18.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Jan 31, 1995
  • The Elephant Vanishes
    The Elephant Vanishes
    Stories
    Haruki Murakami
    978-0-679-75053-6
    $17.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Jun 28, 1994
  • Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World
    Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World
    Haruki Murakami
    978-0-679-74346-0
    $18.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Mar 02, 1993
  • Novelist as a Vocation
    Novelist as a Vocation
    Haruki Murakami
    978-0-593-66357-8
    $30.00 US
    Large Print
    Random House Large Print
    Nov 08, 2022
  • First Person Singular
    First Person Singular
    Stories
    Haruki Murakami
    978-0-593-31118-9
    $17.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Apr 12, 2022
  • Murakami T
    Murakami T
    The T-Shirts I Love
    Haruki Murakami
    978-0-593-32042-6
    $25.00 US
    Hardcover
    Knopf
    Nov 23, 2021
  • Killing Commendatore
    Killing Commendatore
    A novel
    Haruki Murakami
    978-0-525-43576-1
    $18.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Oct 01, 2019
  • Hear the Wind Sing
    Hear the Wind Sing
    Haruki Murakami
    978-0-8041-6677-5
    $10.00 US
    Audiobook Download
    Random House Audio
    Aug 04, 2015
  • Pinball, 1973
    Pinball, 1973
    Haruki Murakami
    978-0-8041-9024-4
    $10.00 US
    Audiobook Download
    Random House Audio
    Aug 04, 2015
  • The Strange Library
    The Strange Library
    Haruki Murakami
    978-0-385-35430-1
    $26.00 US
    Paperback
    Knopf
    Dec 02, 2014
  • 1Q84
    1Q84
    Haruki Murakami
    978-0-307-47646-3
    $20.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Jan 22, 2013
  • After Dark
    After Dark
    Haruki Murakami
    978-0-307-27873-9
    $17.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Apr 29, 2008
  • Vintage Murakami
    Vintage Murakami
    Haruki Murakami
    978-0-307-43001-4
    $5.99 US
    Ebook
    Vintage
    Dec 18, 2007
  • Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman
    Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman
    Haruki Murakami
    978-1-4000-9608-4
    $17.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Oct 09, 2007
  • Kafka on the Shore
    Kafka on the Shore
    Haruki Murakami
    978-1-4000-7927-8
    $18.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Jan 03, 2006
  • After the Quake
    After the Quake
    Stories
    Haruki Murakami
    978-0-375-71327-9
    $16.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    May 13, 2003
  • A Wild Sheep Chase
    A Wild Sheep Chase
    A Novel
    Haruki Murakami
    978-0-375-71894-6
    $17.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Apr 09, 2002
  • Sputnik Sweetheart
    Sputnik Sweetheart
    Haruki Murakami
    978-0-375-72605-7
    $17.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Apr 09, 2002
  • Underground
    Underground
    The Tokyo Gas Attack and the Japanese Psyche
    Haruki Murakami
    978-0-375-72580-7
    $18.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Apr 10, 2001
  • Norwegian Wood
    Norwegian Wood
    Haruki Murakami
    978-0-375-70402-4
    $17.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Sep 12, 2000
  • South of the Border, West of the Sun
    South of the Border, West of the Sun
    A Novel
    Haruki Murakami
    978-0-679-76739-8
    $17.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Mar 14, 2000
  • The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle
    The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle
    A Novel
    Haruki Murakami
    978-0-679-77543-0
    $19.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Sep 01, 1998
  • Dance Dance Dance
    Dance Dance Dance
    Haruki Murakami
    978-0-679-75379-7
    $18.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Jan 31, 1995
  • The Elephant Vanishes
    The Elephant Vanishes
    Stories
    Haruki Murakami
    978-0-679-75053-6
    $17.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Jun 28, 1994
  • Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World
    Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World
    Haruki Murakami
    978-0-679-74346-0
    $18.00 US
    Paperback
    Vintage
    Mar 02, 1993
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