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e6312d0
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I'm the kind of person who likes to be by himself. To put a finer point on it, I'm the type of person who doesn't find it painful to be alone
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Haruki Murakami |
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1663537
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Of what value is a civilization that can't toast a piece of bread as ordered?
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Haruki Murakami |
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1b868a7
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I do need that time, though, for Naoko's face to appear. And as the years have passed, the time has grown longer. The sad truth is that what I could recall in five seconds all too needed ten, then thirty, then a full minute-like shadows lengthening at dusk. Someday, I suppose, the shadows will be swallowed up in darkness. There is no way around it: my memory is growing ever more distant from the spot where Naoko used to stand-ever more dist..
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norwegian-wood
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Haruki Murakami |
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bcdc28e
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How can the mind be so imperfect?" she says with a smile. I look at my hands. Bathed in the moonlight, they seem like statues, proportioned to no purpose. "It may well be imperfect," I say, "but it leaves traces. And we can follow those traces, like footsteps in the snow." "Where do the lead?" "To oneself," I answer. "That's where the mind is. Without the mind, nothing leads anywhere." I look up. The winter moon is brilliant, over the Town,..
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Haruki Murakami |
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d6e8eed
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The truth sometimes reminds me of a city buried in sand. As time passes, the sand piles up even thicker, and occasionally it's blown away and what's below is revealed.
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Haruki Murakami |
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879258f
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In traveling, a companion, in life, compassion.
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Haruki Murakami |
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d53b4cf
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One of these days they'll be making a film where the whole human race gets wiped out in a nuclear war, but everything works out in the end.
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Haruki Murakami |
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bec2777
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The ocean was one of the greatest things he had ever seen in his life--bigger and deeper than anything he had imagined. It changed its color and shape and expression according to time and place and weather. It aroused a deep sadness in his heart, and at the same time it brought his heart peace and comfort.
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vastness
moving
moody
life-changing
ocean
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Haruki Murakami |
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48c4d0e
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And so they parted, she to the east, and he to the west. The test they had agreed upon, however, was utterly unnecessary. They should never have undertaken it, because they really and truly were each other's 100% perfect lovers, and it was a miracle that they had ever met. But it was impossible for them to know this, young as they were. The cold, indifferent waves of fate proceeded to toss them unmercifully.
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Haruki Murakami |
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dbf75b5
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But if you knew you might not be able to see it again tomorrow, everything would suddenly become special and precious, wouldn't it?
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murakami
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Haruki Murakami |
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67a0812
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What I feel for her is a wholly different emotion. It stands and walks on its own, living and breathing and throbbing and shaking me to the roots of my being.
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love
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Haruki Murakami |
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40eeb25
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Shakespeare said it best,' Tamaru said quietly as he gazed at that lumpish, misshapen head. 'Something along these lines: if we die today, we do not have to die tomorrow, so let us look to the best in each other
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Haruki Murakami |
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f46d6a1
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You can have tons of talent, but it won't necessarily keep you fed. If you have sharp instincts, through, you'll never go hungry.
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murakami
talent
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Haruki Murakami |
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74a3434
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A person's destiny is something you look back at afterwards, not something to be known in advance.
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fate
life
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Haruki Murakami |
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2f5cd5e
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How many times have you said, 'This is it. I've finally found my one true love'? And how many times has the reality turned out differently? Paperback romances and fairy tales promote an ideal of a first and only love, but few of us can claim to have had such uncomplicated good fortune. For most people, the process of finding the perfect partner is one trial and error: breakups, makeups, missed opportunities and misunderstandings. Human love..
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Haruki Murakami |
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9c4f2bd
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Sometimes you're just the sweetest thing. Like Christmas, summer vacation, and a brand-new puppy rolled into one.
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Haruki Murakami |
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b36e9ad
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The real world is in a much darker and deeper place than this, and most of it is occupied by jellyfish and things. We just happen to to forget all that. Don't you agree? Two-thirds of earth's surface is ocean, and all we can see with the naked eye is the surface: the skin.
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earth
jellyfish
surfaces
deep
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Haruki Murakami |
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04d5993
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Strong and independent? I'm neither. I'm just being pushed along by reality, whether I like it or not.
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Haruki Murakami |
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4c928b5
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Strange and mysterious things, though, aren't they - earthquakes? We take it for granted that the earth beneath our feet is solid and stationary. We even talk about people being 'down to earth' or having their feet firmly planted on the ground. But suddenly one day we see that it isn't true. The earth, the boulders, that are supposed to be solid, all of a sudden turn as mushy as liquid - From the short story "Thailand"
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Haruki Murakami |
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f2add59
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The pillow smells like the sunlight, a precious smell.
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Haruki Murakami |
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50297cc
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The silence is so deep it hurts our ears.
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Haruki Murakami |
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6f2b966
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But like a boat with a twisted rudder, I kept coming back to the same place. I wasn't going anywhere. I was myself, waiting on the shore for me to return. Was that so depressing? Who knows? Maybe that was 'despair.' What Turgenev called 'disillusionment.' Or Dostoyevsky, 'hell.' Or Somerset Maugham, 'reality.' Whatever the label, I figured it was me.
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reality
dostoyevsky
disillusionment
maugham
self
hell
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Haruki Murakami |
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7027003
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I'm just sad. You were so nice to me when I was having my problems, but now that you're having yours, it seems there's not a thing I can do for you. You're all locked up in that little world of yours, and when I try knocking on the door, you just sort of look up for a second and go right back inside.
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Haruki Murakami |
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f9420d3
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That's gotta be one of the principles behind reality. Accepting things that are hard to comprehend, and leaving them that way.
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thoughts-on-life
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Haruki Murakami |
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8bcc874
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I'm an average person. Is just that I like reading.
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Haruki Murakami |
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1d357f9
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The world in books seemed so much more alive to me than anything outside. I could see things I'd never seen before. Books and music were my best friends. I had a couple of good friends at school, but never met anyone I could really speak my heart to.
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Haruki Murakami |
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90f3c67
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One impossible day, of an impossible month, of an impossible year.
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Haruki Murakami |
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3d40a56
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You can't look too far ahead. Do that and you'll lose sight of what you're doing and stumble. I'm not saying you should focus solely on the details right in front of you, mind you. You've got to look ahead a bit or else you'll bump into something. You've got to conform to the proper order and at the same time keep an eye out for what's ahead. That's critical, no matter what you're doing.
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Haruki Murakami |
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8c54c96
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In his own way, he's lived life with all the intensity he could muster.
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Haruki Murakami |
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f9a9912
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People need routines. It's like a theme in music. But it also restricts your thoughts and actions and limits your freedom. It structures your priorities and in some cases distorts your logic.
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Haruki Murakami |
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a85f51e
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Ordinary imperfect people, always choose similarly imperfect people as friends.
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ordinary-people
imperfection
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Haruki Murakami |
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16f00a9
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You can hide memories, but you can't erase the history that produced them." Sara looked directly into his eyes. "If nothing else, you need to remember that. You can't erase history, or change it. It would be like destroying yourself."
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Haruki Murakami |
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3c4cc99
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From the moment of my birth, I lived with pain at the center of my life. My only purpose in life was to find a way to coexist with intense pain.
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pain
existence
life
coexist
find-a-way
haruki-murakam
the-wind-up-bird-chronicle
murakami
intense
center
japanese
painful
japan
exist
purpose
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Haruki Murakami |
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8e616a7
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So in the end maybe that's the challenge: to look inside your own heart as perceptively and seriously as you can, and to make peace with what you find there. If we hope to truly see another person, we have to start by looking within ourselves." Takatsuki"
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Haruki Murakami |
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5e78152
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Things that have form will all disappear. But certain feelings stay with us forever.
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Haruki Murakami |
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40c3462
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It's just like Yeats said. In dreams begin responsibilities. Flip this around and you could say that where there's no power to imagine, no responsibility can arise.
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Haruki Murakami |
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eef284a
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The only opponent you have to beat is yourself, the way you used to be.
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Haruki Murakami |
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bf0f8e2
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The tricky thing about mazes is that you don't know if you've chosen the right path until the very end. If it turns out you were wrong, it's usually too late to go back and start again. That's the problem with mazes.
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Haruki Murakami |
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4fbfaa9
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Listen. I may not be much, but I'm all I've got. Maybe you need a magnifying glass to find my face in my high school graduation photo. Maybe I haven't got any family or friends. Yes, yes, I know all that. But, strange as it might seem, I'm not entirely dissatisfied with life... I feel pretty much at home with what I am. I don't want to go anywhere. I don't want any unicorns behind fences.
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Haruki Murakami |
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98b8914
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Sometimes when I'm with you, I remember things I lost when I was your age. Like I remember the sound of the rain and the smell of the wind.
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Haruki Murakami |
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4100703
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I'm me, and at the same time not me. That's what it felt like. A very still, quiet feeling.
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Haruki Murakami |
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904556a
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The song is over. But the melody lingers on.
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Haruki Murakami |
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d74f8d4
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Human beings are ultimately nothing but carriers-passageways- for genes. They ride us into the ground like racehorses from generation to generation. Genes don't think about what constitutes good or evil. They don't care whether we are happy or unhappy. We're just means to an end for them. The only thing they think about is what is most efficient for them.
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humanity
science
heredity
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Haruki Murakami |
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cb71df5
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We couldn't bear to be apart. So if Kizuki had lived, I'm sure we would have been together, loving each other, and gradually growing unhappy." Unhappy? Why's that?" With her fingers, Naoko combed her hair back several times. She had taken her barrette off, which made the hair fall over her face when she dropped her head forward. Because we would have had to pay the world back what we owed it," she said, raising her eyes to mine. "The pain o..
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norwegian-wood
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Haruki Murakami |