[Response] What’s So Great About Norwegian Wood?

[Response] What’s So Great About Norwegian Wood?

Sitting on the sofa beside my small desk, I poured myself a glass of sparkling wine. Outside the window, the sun was setting, and the last ray of light fell across the balcony. The buildings around me had begun to flicker with lights. I opened the door, stepped onto the balcony, and leaned against the railing. This city is never quiet; opening a door or window always lets in noise. Usually that is irritating, but in that moment, it made me feel grounded and at peace. It intensified my sense of the world operating like a vast machine—and that was exactly what I urgently needed.

Just a few minutes earlier, I had finished listening to the audiobook of Norwegian Wood. I had never imagined I could get through more than thirteen hours of audio, especially in English. And yet from the very first minute, I was completely captivated, fully absorbed. Every word was crystal clear, as if seamlessly translated into my own language. The narrator’s voice felt like a melody I had long known by heart.

In fact, over the past twenty-five years, I have read this book many times—probably five to ten times. My familiarity with the story allowed every sentence to sketch vivid scenes in my mind, strengthening the force of the narration.

Time passed without my noticing. I went deep into the world of the story, much like the walks I have taken through forests over the years. Every visit to a forest brings a different feeling, shaped by the season and by my age. This time was very different. Perhaps it was because I had never listened to an audiobook like this before, or perhaps because I had never read an entire book in English. I had to concentrate and follow the narrator step by step, which felt completely different from reading on my own. I noticed details I might once have overlooked and discovered new elements in a familiar landscape.

This audiobook journey reminded me of my first long-distance drive. Before that trip of more than 1,300 kilometers, I had never imagined driving alone for more than 200. Afterward, my perception of distance changed; now a journey of 500 to 800 kilometers feels short. I believe that after these thirteen hours of audiobook listening, my definition of long audio has changed as well.

My sense of time has changed too. Like that long trip, when I was younger I could hardly imagine plans for the coming years. Living in the present was my only concern, though I looked forward to summer and winter holidays, and to replies to letters. Back then, I could not picture what my future life would be like. Now, twenty-five years after my first encounter with Norwegian Wood, my view of time has been completely transformed. I can barely remember when exactly I read Norwegian Wood so many times over those years, yet those moments certainly happened, merging into my other memories. As I grow older, memories become flatter in my mind; their order grows blurry, and it becomes harder to distinguish memory from dreams and imagination. But that does not matter. They exist in my mind anyway, and no one else knows or cares. No matter how much I think about the truth or timing of past events, I cannot go back—not even for a second. I only need to live, with deliberate blank spaces left in place.

And yet some scenes remain vivid in my memory, more vivid than my personal recollections. I remember Aureliano Buendía facing the firing squad. I remember the moment an old woman in the entrance hall of a public place was approached by a man. I remember an old man who had had 622 love affairs telling an old woman that he had been waiting for her for fifty-one years, nine months, and four days. I also remember a boy of twelve or thirteen declaring that the girl who had come to his house for the first time as his cousin was someone he had met somewhere before. Among all these scenes, what I most want to highlight is the forest and meadow where Watanabe and Naoko walked, the Boeing 747 landing at Berlin airport, the night of Naoko’s birthday, and Midori, with nowhere to call. Norwegian Wood has had a profound impact on my life—on the way I make friends, on my writing, on my love, and on how I see the world.

Looking back on my life from the age of thirty-seven once seemed unimaginably far away when I first read Norwegian Wood. It was hard to imagine that I would one day reach that age. But now, thirty-seven is already long past, and there is no going back. Only in stories do people move from seventeen to twenty and then return to seventeen. Only in stories does a thirty-seven-year-old man keep looking back on his youth without growing old. But in the real world, time never stops.

Over the past week, I listened to that audiobook whenever I had time, and it ended far too quickly. Then suddenly I had an epiphany: a voice told me I had stayed in the forest too long, and it was time to leave. And indeed, I abruptly realized this truth. Yes, I have been lost in Norwegian Wood for far too long. Although I have read all of Haruki Murakami’s other novels, none has affected me as deeply as this one. I read books mentioned in Norwegian Wood, such as The Magic Mountain and The Great Gatsby. I listened to the music mentioned in it and fell in love with some of those pieces. I wanted to help everyone I cared about, seeing them as victims like Naoko. But most people are quite normal, and neither need nor understand this strange idea of help.

It seems I have been trapped in the world of Norwegian Wood, and yes, it is time to leave—just as Watanabe decides to go on living bravely without Naoko. This realization moved me once again. As long as I keep thinking this way, perhaps I may never leave. But that does not matter. This is not a real forest, after all; I can decide for myself whether to stay or go. Once again, like the metaphor of the well in the forest in the book, it does not matter whether it is real.

The audiobook chapters finally came to an end, and with them my journey through the forest. Once I finish this drink, I will go to bed, hoping for a good night’s sleep. After all, tomorrow is another day.