View Poll Results: Norwegian Wood: Final Verdict

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  • * Waste of time. Wouldn't recommend it.

    1 8.33%
  • ** Didn't like it much.

    1 8.33%
  • *** Average.

    0 0%
  • **** It is a good book.

    3 25.00%
  • ***** Liked it very much. Would strongly recommend it.

    7 58.33%
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Thread: August / Japan Reading: Norwegian Wood

  1. #46
    Heart Strutter Brigitte's Avatar
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    I had to start late because I was dealing with summer school, but I'm about halfway through. I'm going to finish it this weekend, I hope and read through all the comments. (: Great novel so far. I'm really impressed and enjoying it a lot.
    "It is when the feet weary and hope seems vain that the heartaches and the longings arise. Know, then, that for you is neither surfeit nor content. In your rocking chair, by your window dreaming, shall you long, alone. In your rocking chair, by your window, shall you dream such happiness as you may never feel."
    -- Sister Carrie

  2. #47
    Ditsy Pixie Niamh's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Brigitte View Post
    I had to start late because I was dealing with summer school, but I'm about halfway through. I'm going to finish it this weekend, I hope and read through all the comments. (: Great novel so far. I'm really impressed and enjoying it a lot.
    Yes i thought it was very good too.
    "Come away O human child!To the waters of the wild, With a faery hand in hand, For the worlds more full of weeping than you can understand."
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  3. #48
    http://almatrafij.blogspo HerGuardian's Avatar
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    There's something that bothered me a lot which is the amount of sexual encounters in the novel. What do you think? Were they part of the novel or just to make it sell out?
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  4. #49
    Registered User mickitaz's Avatar
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    No, I don't think the sexual encounters were there to sell the book. I think they were an integral part of the author painting the picture of how emotionally detached the characters of the story were.
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  5. #50
    Ditsy Pixie Niamh's Avatar
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    I think it is a portrayal of the discovery of sex during college years. Not to forget the free- sex image that was the 60's and 70's.
    "Come away O human child!To the waters of the wild, With a faery hand in hand, For the worlds more full of weeping than you can understand."
    W.B.Yeats

    "If it looks like a Dwarf and smells like a Dwarf, then it's probably a Dwarf (or a latrine wearing dungarees)"
    Artemins Fowl and the Lost Colony by Eoin Colfer


    my poems-please comment Forum Rules

  6. #51
    Heart Strutter Brigitte's Avatar
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    I have to say my least favorite character was also Naoko. Sure depression is difficult to deal with but she never really made any attempts to get better. Or I felt she could have just tried harder to be happy. She could easily have lived with Toru and tried to make it work. Instead she let him suffer and wait for nothing considering she was going to kill herself.

    The character I would most want to have a conversation with would probably be Nagasawa. Something about the way he lived his life intrigued me. For the most part I found myself thinking "No, no... that's not how I think..." and I'd want an explanation for his way of life. Definitely I agree he was complex and even though his way of life was sort of unhealthy, he survived (as in, didn't kill himself).

    So many times I felt really bad for Midori. She was a great girl and deserved a life full of happiness. To have to stand in the back and wait for Naoko's death must have been a painful thing. She intrigued me so much, and she was so raw/real.

    I'm also a little confused by the ending. Why didn't Toru know where he was at the time? If he was so eager to start his life with Midori, why was he lost in the crowd?
    "It is when the feet weary and hope seems vain that the heartaches and the longings arise. Know, then, that for you is neither surfeit nor content. In your rocking chair, by your window dreaming, shall you long, alone. In your rocking chair, by your window, shall you dream such happiness as you may never feel."
    -- Sister Carrie

  7. #52
    Super papayahed's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Brigitte View Post
    I I'm also a little confused by the ending. Why didn't Toru know where he was at the time? If he was so eager to start his life with Midori, why was he lost in the crowd?
    I'm thinking that was a metaphor also, to get out of the confusion and grief and detachment and make it back to Midori.
    Do, or do not. There is no try. - Yoda


  8. #53
    Registered User lugdunum's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Brigitte View Post

    i'm also a little confused by the ending. Why didn't Toru know where he was at the time? If he was so eager to start his life with Midori, why was he lost in the crowd?
    Yes I was also confused by the end... (and have been by the end of every other Murakami book I've read).

    I'm not getting the metaphor though!? If you don't mind, can you explain Papayahed please? Any other ideas?

    I also felt bad for midori. She has a very strong personality and doesn'twaste time feeling sorry for herself.

  9. #54
    Super papayahed's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by lugdunum View Post
    Yes I was also confused by the end... (and have been by the end of every other Murakami book I've read).

    I'm not getting the metaphor though!? If you don't mind, can you explain Papayahed please? Any other ideas?

    I also felt bad for midori. She has a very strong personality and doesn'twaste time feeling sorry for herself.
    I've reread the ending and I'm not so sure that's exactly right either. Toru is in a place, he doesn't know where he's at, and he's calling out to Midori to help him find his way back?

    I'm having a hard time rating this story. It kept me interested and coming back to read it but overall the actual story was pretty boring.

    Wow, Wilbur you've rated the book a "Waste of time". What are your thoughts on the book?
    Do, or do not. There is no try. - Yoda


  10. #55
    Registered User tinybore's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Brigitte View Post
    I have to say my least favorite character was also Naoko. Sure depression is difficult to deal with but she never really made any attempts to get better. Or I felt she could have just tried harder to be happy. She could easily have lived with Toru and tried to make it work. Instead she let him suffer and wait for nothing considering she was going to kill herself.
    Depression is difficult to deal with indeed, that's why it's very hard for depressed people to even try to be happy. They're too depressed/tired to even bother with it. That's why they take years of therapies and medicines, and many don't ever recover from that. They just get medicines so they won't feel nothing more than numbness.
    To call such people for "selfish" is very harsh. It's really nothing they can do about.
    For us who aren't (diagnosed) depressed can't understand how it really is.

    Back to the book, it's one of my fav books. I really liked the way Haruki described emotions with words, how simple he explains difficult things. It's been a while since I've read it, but I remember it affected me very deep for a very long time. The story, the writing style, and the characters...wow.

    And sorry for brining up an old thread...
    Last edited by tinybore; 10-25-2011 at 04:15 AM.

  11. #56
    Registered User kev67's Avatar
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    I read this several months ago. Poor Toru, what a terrible choice he had to make, although it was no choice at all really. I was very choked up by the last chapter. It was no surprise, but still I was glad I wasn't reading it in the coffee shop. Some other things that struck me included:

    Late 60s Japan did not seem very different to here and now. I thought the culture would be completely alien, but it wasn't.

    There was more smut in it than I was expecting.

    There was a bit too much suicide for my liking.

    I gathered Toru was a great story teller and conversationalist, but in his reported conversations, he comes across as being a bit dull. I wondered why Midori liked him so much. I suppose he was a handsome devil.

    I wondered how much Toru was like the author. He likes cats; he likes jazz; he's good with words.

    One or two incidents seemed a bit unlikely. That story by Reiko about being seduced by an adolescent, lesbian sociopath sounded a bit tall.

    I liked the descriptions of the landscapes. I wanted to get on a plane to Japan and visit those mountains.

  12. #57
    smug & self-satisfied Atomic's Avatar
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    Like most of Murakami's narrators, Toru is wishy-washy, and lacks any real convictions. Still, a stellar work, but far from his best. The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle is a better example of Murakami's insights into the mystery and danger of female suffering.

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