One of the most influential modern Asian authors, Haruki Murakami, has created countless works that have taken us to exciting places. The Japanese writer has reeled us in with his beautiful prose and magical realism in The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, Kafka on the Shore, and Norwegian Wood. But perhaps one of Murakami’s most adored books is 1Q84, completed in April of 2010. To celebrate its timeless impact on literature, we have chosen five quotes that have stuck with us these past twelve years!
5. “If you can love someone with your whole heart, even one person, then there’s salvation in life. Even if you can’t get together with that person.”
4. “That’s what the world is, after all: an endless battle of contrasting memories.”
3. “I’m tired of living unable to love anyone. I don’t have a single friend – not one. And, worst of all, I can’t even love myself. Why is that? Why can’t I love myself? It’s because I can’t love anyone else. A person learns how to love himself through the simple acts of loving and being loved by someone else. Do you understand what I am saying? A person who is incapable of loving another cannot properly love himself.”
2. “As I see it, you are living with something that you keep hidden deep inside. Something heavy. I felt it from the first time I met you. You have a strong gaze, as if you have made up your mind about something. To tell you the truth, I myself carry such things around inside. Heavy things. That is how I can see it in you.”
1. “They sat on a park bench, held hands, and told each other their stories hour after hour. They were not lonely anymore. They had found and been found by their 100% perfect other. What a wonderful thing it is to find and be found by your 100% perfect other. It’s a miracle, a cosmic miracle.”
We can’t wait to see what else Murakami offers to the literary world!
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