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Where There Is Light, There Must Be Shadow, Where There Is Shadow There Must Be Light. There Is No Shadow Without Light And No Light Without Shadow.... We Do Not Know If The So-called Little People Are Good Or Evil. This Is, In A Sense, Something That Surpasses Our Understanding And Our Definitions. We Have Lived With Them Since Long, Long Ago-- From A Time Before Good And Evil Even Existed, When People's Minds Were Still Benighted.

-Haruki Murakami

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Where There Is Light,

Haruki Murakami

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Where There Is Light, There Must Be Shadow, Where There Is Shadow There Must Be Light. There Is No Shadow Without Light And No Light Without Shadow.... We Do Not Know If The So-called Little People Are Good Or Evil. This Is, In A Sense, Something That Surpasses Our Understanding And Our Definitions. We Have Lived With Them Since Long, Long Ago-- From A Time Before Good And Evil Even Existed, When People's Minds Were Still Benighted.

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I'm Not Human. I'm A Piece Of Machinery. I Don't Need To Feel A Thing. Just Forge On Ahead.

Most Everything You Think You Know About Me Is Nothing More Than Memories.

But Still," Ayumi Said, "it Seems To Me That This World Has A Serious Shortage Of Both Logic And Kindness." "you May Be Right," Aomame Said, "but It's Too Late To Trade It In For Another One.

Before I Became A Writer, I Was Running A Jazz Bar In The Center Of Tokyo, Which Means That I Worked In Filthy Air All The Time Late Into The Night. I Was Very Excited When I Started Making A Living Out Of My Writing, And I Decided, 'i Will Live In Nothing But An Absolutely Healthy Way.'

The Sense Of Tragedy - According To Aristotle - Comes, Ironically Enough, Not From The Protagonist's Weak Points But From His Good Qualities. Do You Know What I'm Getting At? People Are Drawn Deeper Into Tragedy Not By Their Defects But By Their Virtues. ... [but] We Accept Irony Through A Device Called Metaphor. And Through That We Grow And Become Deeper Human Beings.

I Keep To This Routine Every Day Without Variation. The Repetition Itself Becomes The Important Thing; It's A Form Of Mesmerism. I Mesmerize Myself To Reach A Deeper State Of Mind.

My Very Existence, My Life In The World, Seemed Like A Hallucination. A Strong Wind Would Make Me Think My Body Was About To Be Blown To The End Of The Earth, To Some Land I Had Never Seen Or Heard Of, Where My Mind And Body Would Separate Forever. “hold Tight,” I Would Tell Myself, But There Was Nothing For Me To Hold On To.

At Any Rate, That’s How I Started Running. Thirty Three—that’s How Old I Was Then. Still Young Enough, Though No Longer A Young Man. The Age That Jesus Christ Died. The Age That Scott Fitzgerald Started To Go Downhill. That Age May Be A Kind Of Crossroads In Life. That Was The Age When I Began My Life As A Runner, And It Was My Belated, But Real, Starting Point As A Novelist.

Now All You Can Do Is Wait. It Must Be Hard For You, But There Is A Right Time For Everything. Like The Ebb And Flow Of Tides. No One Can Do Anything To Change Them. When It Is Time To Wait, You Must Wait.

When There's Nothing To Do, You Do Nothing Slowly And Intently.

Properly Speaking, Should Any Individual Ever Have Exact, Clear Knowledge Of His Own Core Consciousness?" "i Wouldn't Know," I Said. "nor Would We," Said The Scientists.

If We Reverse The Outer Shell And The Essence--in Other Words, Consider The Outer Shell The Essence And The Essence Only The Shell--our Lives Might Be A Whole Lot Easier To Understand.

But Intolerant,narrow Minds With No Imagination Are Like Parasites That Transform The Host,change Form,and Continue To Thrive. They're A Lost Cause, And I Don't Want Anyone Like That Coming In Here.

Something In Her Small Eyes Caught The Sunlight And Glistened, Like A Glacier On The Faraway Face Of A Mountain.

Even If There Were Two Of Me, I Still Couldn't Do All That Has To Be Done. No Matter What, Though, I Keep Up My Running. Running Every Day Is A Kind Of Lifeline For Me, So I'm Not Going To Lay Off Or Quit Just Because I'm Busy. If I Used Being Busy As An Excuse Not To Run, I'd Never Run Again. I Have Only A Few Reasons To Keep On Running, And A Truckload Of Them To Quit. All I Can Do Is Keep Those Few Reasons Nicely Polished.

In Any Case, Suffice It To Say I Enjoyed Hearing About Faraway Places. I Had Stocked Up A Whole Store Of These Places, Like A Bear Getting Ready For Hibernation. I'd Close My Eyes, And Streets Would Materialize, Rows Of Houses Take Shape. I Could Hear People's Voices, Feel The Gentle, Steady Rhythm Of Their Lives, Those People So Distant, Whom I'd Probably Never Know.

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.

That Was The Rule. Break One Of My Rules Once, And I’m Bound To Break Many More.

A Poet Might Die At Twenty-one, A Revolutionary Or A Rock Star At Twenty Four. But After That You Assume Everything’s Going To Be All Right. You’ve Made It Past Dead Man’s Curve And You’re Out Of The Tunnel, Cruising Straight For Your Destination Down A Six Lane Highway Whether You Want It Or Not.

Probably." "again With The Probablys." "a World Full Of Probablys," She Said.

These Days I Just Can't Seem To Say What I Mean [...]. I Just Can't. Every Time I Try To Say Something, It Misses The Point. Either That Or I End Up Saying The Opposite Of What I Mean. The More I Try To Get It Right The More Mixed Up It Gets. Sometimes I Can't Even Remember What I Was Trying To Say In The First Place. It's Like My Body's Split In Two And One Of Me Is Chasing The Other Me Around A Big Pillar. We're Running Circles Around It. The Other Me Has The Right Words, But I Can Never Catch Her.

No One Could Say How Long That Life Would Last. Whatever Has Form Can Disappear In An Instant.

In Dreams Begins Responsiblities.

The Silence Grew Deeper, So Deep That If You Listened Carefully You Might Very Well Catch The Sound Of The Earth Revolving On Its Axis.

I Think Of Rivers, Of Tides. Forests And Water Gushing Out. Rain And Lightning. Rocks And Shadows. All Of These Are In Me.

Stories Lie Deep In Our Souls. Stories Lie So Deep At The Bottom Of Our Hearts That They Can Bring People Together On The Deepest Level. When I Write A Novel, I Go Into Such Depths.

I’ve Had That Kind Of Experience Myself: I’m Looking At A Map And I See Someplace That Makes Me Think, ‘i Absolutely Have To Go To This Place, No Matter What’. And Most Of The Time, For Some Reason, The Place Is Far Away And Hard To Get To. I Feel This Overwhelming Desire To Know What Kind Of Scenery The Place Has, Or What People Are Doing There. It’s Like Measles - You Can’t Show Other People Exactly Where The Passion Comes From. It’s Curiosity In The Purest Sense. An Inexplicable Inspiration.

I'm Not Afraid To Die. What I'm Afraid Of Is Having Reality Get The Better Of Me, Of Having Reality Leave Me Behind.

I Think You Still Love Me, But We Can’t Escape The Fact That I’m Not Enough For You. I Knew This Was Going To Happen. So I’m Not Blaming You For Falling In Love With Another Woman. I’m Not Angry, Either. I Should Be, But I’m Not. I Just Feel Pain. A Lot Of Pain. I Thought I Could Imagine How Much This Would Hurt, But I Was Wrong.

Time Really Is One Big Continuous Cloth, No? We Habitually Cut Out Pieces Of Time To Fit Us, So We Tend To Fool Ourselves Into Thinking That Time Is Our Size, But It Really Goes On And On.

Why Do I Act Like This, Agreeing When I Really Disagree, Letting People Force Me To Do Things I Don't Want To Do?

Pointless Thinking Is Worse Than No Thinking At All.

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Each Day The Sun Would Rise And Set, The Flag Would Be Raised And Lowered. Each Sunday I Would Have A Date With My Dead Friend’s Girl. I Had No Idea What I Was Doing Or What I Was Going To Do.

It Is Not That The Meaning Cannot Be Explained. But There Are Certain Meanings That Are Lost Forever The Moment They Are Explained In Words.

Become Like A Sheet Of Blotting Paper And Soak It All In. Later On You Can Figure Out What To Keep And What To Unload.

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It Was A Short One-paragraph Item In The Morning Edition.

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No Matter What Form The Relationship Might Take, He Was The Only Person She Could Picture Sharing Her Life With.

It's Easy To Forget Things You Don't Need Anymore.

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The Morning Air Of The Pasture Turned Steadily Cooler. Day By Day, The Bright Golden Leaves Of The Birches Turned More Spotted As The First Winds Of Winter Slipped Between The Withered Branches And Across The Highlands Toward The Southeast. Stopping In The Center Of The Pasture, I Could Hear The Winds Clearly. No Turning Back, They Pronounced. The Brief Autumn Was Gone.

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The Honour Of Physical Decline Is Waiting, And You Have To Get Used To That Reality.

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I Wrote My First Two Long Novels And An Anthology Of Short Narratives, When I Was A Manager Of My Own Jazz Bar. There Was Not Enough Time To Write And I Didn't Know How To Write Novels. Therefore, I Made Written Collages Of Aphorisms And Rags.

Have You Ever Had That Feeling—that You’d Like To Go To A Whole Different Place And Become A Whole Different Self?

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Everything. Things You Lost. Things You’re Gonna Lose. Everything. Here’s Where It All Ties Together.

Her Smile Steps Offstage For A Moment, Then Does An Encore, All While I'm Dealing With My Blushing Face.

One Listless Day Followed Another, With Nothing To Distinguish One From The Next. You Could Have Changed The Order And No One Would Have Noticed.

Our Hearts Are Not Stones. A Stone May Disintegrate In Time And Lose Its Outward Form. But Hearts Never Disintegrate. They Have No Outward Form, And Whether Good Or Evil, We Can Always Communicate Them To One Another.

Spend Your Money On The Things Money Can Buy. Spend Your Time On The Things Money Can’t Buy.

You Like To Write. It's The Single Most Important Quality For Someone Who Wants To Be A Writer. But Not In Itself Enough.

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In His Own Way, He's Lived Life With All The Intensity He Could Muster.

Unclose Your Mind. You Are Not A Prisoner. You Are A Bird In Flight, Searching The Skies For Dreams.

Even When I Ran My Bar I Followed The Same Policy. A Lot Of Customers Came To The Bar. If One In Ten Enjoyed The Place And Said He'd Come Again, That Was Enough. If One Out Of Ten Was A Repeat Customer, Then The Business Would Survive. To Put It Another Way, It Didn't Matter If Nine Out Of Ten Didn't Like My Bar. This Realization Lifted A Weight Off My Shoulders. Still, I Had To Make Sure That The One Person Who Did Like The Place.

I Don't Want Our Relationship To End Like This. You're One Of The Very Few Friends I Have, And It Hurts Not Being Able To See You. When Am I Going To Be Able To Talk To You? I Want You To Tell Me That Much, At Least.

No Matter Where I Go, I Still End Up Me. What's Missing Never Changes. The Scenery May Change, But I'm Still The Same Incomplete Person. The Same Missing Elements Torture Me With A Hunger That I Can Never Satisfy. I Think That Lack Itself Is As Close As I'll Come To Defining Myself.

The Better You Were Able To Imagine What You Wanted To Imagine, The Farther You Could Flee From Reality.

Kumiko And I Felt Something For Each Other From The Beginning. It Was Not One Of Those Strong, Impulsive Feelings That Can Hit Two People Like An Electric Shock When They First Meet, But Something Quieter And Gentler, Like Two Tiny Lights Traveling In Tandem Through A Vast Darkness And Drawing Imperceptibly Closer To Each Other As They Go. As Our Meetings Grew More Frequent, I Felt Not So Much That I Had Met Someone New As That I Had Chanced Upon A Dear Old Friend.

Our Responsibility Begins With Our Imagination.

The World Would Be A Pretty Dull Place If It Were Made Up Only Of The First-rate, Right?

No, I Don't Want Your Money. The World Moves Less By Money Than By What You Owe People And What They Owe You. I Don't Like To Owe Anybody Anything, So I Keep To Myself As Much On The Lending Side As I Can.

No Matter How Long You Stand There Examining Yourself Naked Before A Mirror, You'll Never See Reflected What's Inside.

What’s More, You’re Loads Better Than You Think You Are.” “so Why Is It I Get To Thinking That Way?” I Puzzled. “that’s Because You’re Only Half-living.” She Said Briskly. “the Other Half Is Still Untapped Somewhere.

Every One Of Us Is Losing Something Precious To Us. Lost Opportunities, Lost Possibilities, Feelings We Can Never Get Back Again. That’s Part Of What It Means To Be Alive.

Silence. How Long It Lasted, I Couldn't Tell. It Might Have Been Five Seconds, It Might Have Been A Minute. Time Wasn't Fixed. It Wavered, Stretched, Shrank. Or Was It Me That Wavered, Stretched, And Shrank In The Silence? I Was Warped In The Folds Of Time, Like A Reflection In A Fun House Mirror.

If I Have Left A Wound Inside You, It Is Not Just Your Wound But Mine As Well.

And When You Come Back To Japan Next Summer, Let's Have That Date Or Whatever You Want To Call It. We Can Go To The Zoo Or The Botanical Garden Or The Aquarium, And Then We'll Have The Most Politically Correct And Scrumptious Omelets We Can Find.

If I Choose To Write About Sheep, It's Just Because I Happened To Write About Sheep. There Is No Deep Significance.

Sex Is An Extremely Subtle Undertaking, Unlike Going To The Department Store On A Sunday To Buy A Thermos.

Time Flows In A Strange Way On Sundays.

I Write My Novels Personally, Desperately And Non-negligently. When I Write My Novels, I Think About My Novels Only, And Never Do Other Works.

Life Is A Lot More Fragile Than We Think. So You Should Treat Others In A Way That Leaves No Regrets. Fairly, And If Possible, Sincerely.

Let Me Just Tell You This, Watanabe," Said Midori, Pressing Her Cheek Against My Neck. "i'm A Real, Live Girl, With Real, Live Blood Gushing Through My Veins. You're Holding Me In Your Arms And I'm Telling You That I Love You. I'm Ready To Do Anything You Tell Me To Do. I May Be A Little Bit Mad, But I'm A Good Girl, And Honest, And I Work Hard, I'm Kind Of Cute, I Have Nice Boobs, I'm A Good Cook, And My Father Left Me A Trust Fund. I Mean, I'm A Real Bargain, Don't You Think? If You Don't Take Me, I'll End Up Going Somewhere Else.

She Was A Keen Observer, A Precise User Of Language, Sharp-tongued And Funny. She Could Stir Your Emotions. Yes, Really, That's What She Was So Good At - Stirring People's Emotions, Moving You. And She Knew She Had This Power...i Only Realized Later. At The Time, I Had No Idea What She Was Doing To Me.

Each Of Us Possesses A Tangible Living Soul. The System Has No Such Thing. We Must Not Allow The System To Exploit Us.

No Matter How Clear Things Might Become In The Forest Of Story, There Was Never A Clear-cut Solution, As There Was In Math. The Role Of A Story Was, In The Broadest Terms, To Transpose A Problem Into Another Form. Depending On The Nature And The Direction Of The Problem, A Solution Might Be Suggested In The Narrative. Tengo Would Return To The Real World With That Solution In Hand. It Was Like A Piece Of Paper Bearing The Indecipherable Text Of A Magic Spell. It Served No Immediate Practical Purpose, But It Contained A Possibility.

Does G Get Angry Because It Follows F In The Alphabet? Does Page 68 In A Book Start A Revolution Because It Follows 67?

It's A Dark, Cool, Quiet Place. A Basement In Your Soul. And That Place Can Sometimes Be Dangerous To The Human Mind. I Can Open The Door And Enter That Darkness, But I Have To Be Very Careful. I Can Find My Story There. Then I Bring That Thing To The Surface, Into The Real World.

So What’s Wrong If There Happens To Be One Guy In The World Who Enjoys Trying To Understand You?

There Are Ways Of Dying That Don't End In Funerals. Types Of Death You Can't Smell.

You Know What I Should Do?" Hoshino Asked Excited. "of Course," The Cat Said. "what'd I Tell You? Cats Know Everything. Not Like Dogs.

Even Chance Meetings Are The Result Of Karma… Things In Life Are Fated By Our Previous Lives. That Even In The Smallest Events There’s No Such Thing As Coincidence.

Is This What It Means To Go Back To Square One? Most Likely. He Had Nothing Left To Lose, Other Than His Life.

You Always Look So Cool, Like No Matter What Happens, It’s Got Nothing To Do With You, But You’re Not Really Like That. In Your Own Way, You’re Out There Fighting As Hard As You Can, Even If Other People Can’t Tell By Looking At You.

An Empty Shell. Those Were The First Words That Sprang To Mind. .... Something Incredibly Important - .. - Had Disappeared From Miu For Good. Leaving Behind Not Life, But Its Absence

Like Flowers Scattered In A Storm, A Man's Life Is A Long Farewell.

That's What The World Is , After All: An Endless Battle Of Contrasting Memories.

There's A Special Feeling You Get On A Veranda That You Just Can't Get Anywhere Else.

Listen Up—there’s No War That Will End All Wars,’ Crow Tells Me. ‘war Breeds War. Lapping Up The Blood Shed By Violence, Feeding On Wounded Flesh. War Is A Perfect, Self-contained Being. You Need To Know That.

If You Think About It, An Unfair Society Is A Society That Makes It Possible For You To Exploit Your Abilities To The Limit.

The Things She Most Wanted To Tell Him Would Lose Their Meaning The Moment She Put Them Into Words.

The Whole Terrible Fight Occured In The Area Of Imagination. That Is The Precise Location Of Our Battlefield. It Is There, That We Experience Our Victories And Defeats.

Victory And Defeat

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.

Time Moves In It Special Way In The Middle Of The Night.

If You Listen To The Radio For A Whole Hour There's Maybe One Decent Song. The Rest Is Mass-produced Garbage

For Example, The Wind Has Its Reasons. We Just Don't Notice As We Go About Our Lives. But Then, At Some Point, We Are Made To Notice. The Wind Envelops You With A Certain Purpose In Mind, And It Rocks You. The Wind Knows Everything That's Inside You. And Not Just The Wind. Everything, Including A Stone. They All Know Us Very Well. From Top To Bottom. It Only Occurs To Us At Certain Times. And All We Can Do Is Go With Those Things. As We Take Them In, We Survive, And Deepen.

They Were Each Like A Mirror For The Other, Reflecting The Changes In Themselves.

Only People Who Have Been Discriminated Against Can Really Know How Much It Hurts. Each Person Feels The Pain In His Own Way, Each Has His Own Scars. So I Think I'm As Concerned About Fairness And Justice As Anybody. But What Disgusts Me Even More Are People Who Have No Imagination. The Kind T. S. Elliot Calls 'hollow Men'. People Who Fill Up That Lack Of Imagination With Heartless Bits Of Straw, Not Even Aware Of What They're Doing. Callous People Who Throw A Lot Of Empty Words At You, Trying To Force You To Do What You Don't Want To.

Even Castles In The Sky Can Do With A Fresh Coat Of Paint.

What Makes Us The Most Normal," Said Reiko, "is Knowing That We're Not Normal.

Although I Didn't Think So At The Time, Things Were A Lot Simpler In 1969. All You Had To Do To Express Yourself Was Throw Rocks At Riot Police. But With Today's Sophistication, Who's In A Position To Throw Rocks? Who's Going To Brave What Tear Gas? C'mon, That's The Way It Is. Everything Is Rigged, Tied Into That Massive Capital Web, And Beyond This Web There's Another Web. Nobody's Going Anywhere. You Throw A Rock And It'll Come Right Back At You.

Let Me Tell You Something, Mari. The Ground We Stand On Looks Solid Enough, But If Something Happens It Can Drop Right Out From Under You. And Once That Happens, You've Had It: Things'll Never Be The Same. All You Can Do Is Go On, Living Alone Down There In The Darkness.

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. We'd Just Make Small Talk, Play Soccer Together. When Something Bothered Me, I Didn't Talk With Anyone About It. I Thought It Over All By Myself, Came To A Conclusion, And Took Action Alone. Not That I Really Felt Lonely. I Thought That's Just The Way Things Are. Human Beings, In The Final Analysis, Have To Survive On Their Own.

I'd Be Smiling And Chatting Away, And My Mind Would Be Floating Around Somewhere Else, Like A Balloon With A Broken String.

Don't Tell Me Anymore. You Should Have Your Dream, As The Old Woman Told You To. I Understand How You Feel, But If You Put Those Feelings Into Words They Will Turn Into Lies. (from Thailand)

The Problem Was, I Think, That The Places I Fit In Were Always Falling Behind The Rimes.

Who Can Really Distinguish Between The Sea And What's Reflected In It? Or Tell The Difference Between The Falling Rain And Loneliness?

Sometimes I Wonder Why I'm A Novelist Right Now. There Is No Definite Career Reason Why I Became A Writer. Something Happened, And I Became A Writer. And Now I'm A Successful Writer.

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No Matter How Much Suffering You Went Through, You Never Wanted To Let Go Of Those Memories.

And Once The Storm Is Over, You Won’t Remember How You Made It Through, How You Managed To Survive. You Won’t Even Be Sure, Whether The Storm Is Really Over. But One Thing Is Certain. When You Come Out Of The Storm, You Won’t Be The Same Person Who Walked In. That’s What This Storm’s All About.

I Stare At This Ceaseless, Rushing Crowd And Imagine A Time A Hundred Years From Now. In A Hundred Years Everybody Here-me Included-will Have Disappeared From The Face Of The Earth And Turned Into Ashes Or Dust. A Weird Thought, But Everything In Front Of Me Starts To Seem Unreal, Like A Gust Of Wind Could Blow It All Away.

This Was Something Sure To Be Crammed Full Of Warm Secrets, Like An Antique Clock Built When Peace Filled The World.

She Was Beautiful And Seemingly Quite Intelligent, What With Her Pentameter Search System. There Wasn't A Reason In The World Not To Find Her Appealing.

I Don't Go Out Of My Way To Make Friends, That's All.

You Have To Wait Until Tomorrow To Find Out What Tomorrow Will Bring.

Some Things Are Forgotten, Some Things Disappear, Some Things Die.

As We Go Through Life We Gradually Discover Who We Are, But The More We Discover, The More We Lose Ourselves.

I Was Feeling Lonely Without Her, But The Fact That I Could Feel Lonely At All Was Consolation. Loneliness Wasn't Such A Bad Feeling. It Was Like The Stillness Of The Pin Oak After The Little Birds Had Flown Off.

Love Can Rebuild The World, They Say, So Everything's Possible When It Comes To Love.

Tengo Could Hardly Believe It-- That In This Frantic, Labyrinth-like World, Two People's Hearts-- A Boy's And A Girl's-- Could Be Connected, Unchanged, Even Though They Hadn't Seen Each Other For Twenty Years.

You Said That The Mind Is Like The Wind But Perhaps It Is We Who Are Like The Wind Knowing Nothing, Simply Blowing Through. Never Aging, Never Dying.

Knowing Nothing

The Best Thing Would Be To Break Your Neck, But You'd Probably Just Break Your Leg And Then You Couldn't Do A Thing. You'd Yell At The Top Of Your Lungs, But Nobody;d Hear You, And You Couldn't Expect Anybody To Find You, And You'd Have Centipedes And Spiders Crawling All Over You, And The Bones Of The Ones Who Died Before Are Scattered All Around You, And It's Dark And Soggy, And Way Overhead There's This Tiny, Tiny Circle Of Light Like A Winter Moon. You Die There In This Place, Little By Little, All By Yourself.

Of Course It Hurt That We Could Never Love Each Other In A Physical Way. We Would Have Been Far More Happy If We Had. But That Was Like The Tides, The Change Of Seasons--something Immutable, An Immovable Destiny We Could Never Alter. No Matter How Cleverly We Might Shelter It, Our Delicate Friendship Wasn't Going To Last Forever. We Were Bound To Reach A Dead End. That Was Painfully Clear.

I Write Weird Stories. I Don't Know Why I Like Weirdness So Much ... But When I Write, I Write Weird. That's Very Strange. When I'm Getting More And More Serious, I'm Getting More And More Weird.

Having An Object That Symbolizes Freedom Might Make A Person Happier Than Actually Getting The Freedom It Represents.

I'm Not A Fast Reader. I Like To Linger Over Each Sentence, Enjoying The Style. If I Don't Enjoy The Writing, I Stop.

My Heroes Don't Have Anything Special. They Have Something To Tell Other People But They Don't Know How, So They Talk To Themselves.

Strong And Independent? I’m Neither. I’m Just Being Pushed Along By Reality, Whether I Like It Or Not.

Was The Earth Put Here Just To Nourish Human Loneliness?

The Best Musicians Transpose Consciousness Into Sound; Painters Do The Same For Color And Shape.

I Wrote A Huge Number Of Letters That Spring: One A Week To Naoko, Several To Reiko, And Several More To Midori. I Wrote Letters In The Classroom, I Wrote Letters At My Desk At Home With Seagull In My Lap, I Wrote Letters At Empty Tables During My Breaks At The Italian Restaurant. It Was As If I Were Writing Letters To Hold Together The Pieces Of My Crumbling Life.

You Can Hide As Cleverly As You Like, But In The Final Analysis Mimicry Is Deception, Pure And Simple. It Doesn't Solve A Thing.

If I Stayed Here, Something Inside Me Would Be Lost Forever—something I Couldn't Afford To Lose. It Was Like A Vague Dream, A Burning, Unfulfilled Desire. The Kind Of Dream People Have Only When They're Seventeen.

There Is Nothing So Cruel In This World As The Desolation Of Having Nothing To Hope For.

Sometimes It's Not The People Who Change, It's The Mask That Falls Off.

I'm Not So Weird To Me.

There's No War That Will End All Wars.

All Over The World People Have Developed Their Own Ideas About What's Right And Wrong In Life, But So Long As You Aren't Harming Others Or The Earth, It's Your Choice When You Decide How You Want To Live Your Life - Yours And Yours Alone. Life's No Piece Of Cake, Mind You, But The Recipe's My Own To Fool With.

If You Never Noticed, It Never Happened.

Everything Just Blows Me Away.

The Sad Truth Is That Certain Types Of Things Can't Go Backward. Once They Start Going Forward, No Matter What You Do, They Can't Go Back The Way They Were. If Even One Little Thing Goes Awry, Then That's How It Will Stay Forever.

Writers Have To Keep On Writing If They Want To Mature, Like Caterpillars Endlessly Chewing On Leaves.

I Dream. Sometimes I Think That’s The Only Right Thing To Do. To Dream, To Live In The World Of Dreams. But It Doesn’t Last Forever. Wakefulness Always Comes To Take Me Back.

Deep Rivers Run Quiet.

I'm Still Not Sure I Made The Right Choice When I Told My Wife About The Bakery Attack.but Then,it Might Not Have Been A Question Of Right Or Wrong. Which Is To Say That Wrong Choices Can Produce Right Results, And Vice Versa. I Myself Have Adopted The Position That,in Fact, We Never Choose Anything At All. Things Happen. Or Not.

Anyone Who Falls In Love Is Searching For The Missing Pieces Of Themselves. So Anyone Who's In Love Gets Sad When They Think Of Their Lover. It's Like Stepping Back Inside A Room You Have Fond Memories Of, One You Haven't Seen In A Long Time.

Even If You Managed To Escape From One Cage, Weren't You Just In Another, Larger One?

I Don't Know A Whole Lot About Symbolism. There Seems To Me To Be A Potential Danger In Symbolism. I Feel More Comfortable With Metaphors And Similes.

Everything Passes. Nobody Gets Anything For Keeps. And That's How We've Got To Live.

It Is However, Difficult To Make Your Narratives Relative By Yourself. A Novelists' Work Is To Provide Models To Make Your Narratives Relative. If You Read My Novels Then You May Feel, "i Have The Same Experience As This Narrative", Or "i Have The Same Idea As This Novel". It Means That Your Narrative And Mine Sympathize, Concord And Resonate Together.

Will You Wait For Me Forever?

All Right, Then, I Thought: Here I Am In The Bottom Of A Well.

I've Been Running A Full Marathon Every Year For More Than 20 Years, And My Record Is Getting Worse. Getting Older, Getting Worse. It's Natural.

Waiting For Your Answer Is One Of The Most Painful Things I Have Ever Been Through. At Least Let Me Know Whether Or Not I Hurt You.

People Need Routines. It's Like A Theme In Music. But It Also Restrictsyour Thoughts And Actions And Limits Your Freedom. It Structures Your Priorities And In Some Cases Distorts Your Logic.

Whenever I Get Into Something, I Shut Out Everything Else.

All Of Us Are Imperfect Human Beings Living In An Imperfect World.

Imperfect World

Maybe It's Just Hiding Somewhere. Or Gone On A Trip To Come Home. But Falling In Love Is Always A Pretty Crazy Thing. It Might Appear Out Of The Blue And Just Grab You. Who Knows — Maybe Even Tomorrow.

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. I Find Spending An Hour Or Two Every Day Running Alone, Not Speaking To Anyone, As Well As Four Or Five Hours Alone At My Desk, To Be Neither Difficult Nor Boring. I’ve Had This Tendency Ever Since I Was Young, When, Given A Choice, I Much Preferred Reading Books On My Own Or Concentrating On Listening To Music Over Being With Someone Else. I Could Always Think Of Things To Do By Myself.

I've Always Liked Libraries. They're Quiet And Full Of Books And Full Of Knowledge.

And Everywhere, Infinite Options, Infinite Possibilities. An Infinity, And At The Same Time, Zero. We Try To Scoop It All Up In Our Hands, And What We Get Is A Handful Of Zero. That's The City

When Microorganisms Die, They Make Oil; When Huge Timbers Fall, They Make Coal. But Everything Here Was Pure, Unadulterated Rubbish That Didn't Make Anything. Where Does A Busted Videodeck Get You?

I Think People Who Share My Dreams Can Enjoy Reading My Novels. And That's A Wonderful Thing. I Said That Myths Are Like A Reservoir Of Stories, And If I Can Act As A Similar Kind Of "reservoir," Albeit A Modest One, That Would Make Me Very Happy.

Where I Went In My Travels, It's Impossible For Me To Recall. I Remember The Sights And Sounds And Smells Clearly Enough, But The Names Of The Towns Are Gone, As Well As Any Sense Of The Order In Which I Traveled From Place To Place.

A Strange, Terrific Force Unlike Anything I've Ever Experienced Is Sprouting In My Heart, Taking Root There, Growing. Shut Up Behind My Rib Cage, My Warm Heart Expands And Contracts Independent Of My Will--over And Over.

I Am 55 Years Old Now. It Takes Three Years To Write One Book. I Don't Know How Many Books I Will Be Able To Write Before I Die. It Is Like A Countdown. So With Each Book I Am Praying - Please Let Me Live Until I Am Finished.

I Didn't Read So Much Japanese Literature. Because My Father Was A Teacher Of Japanese Literature, I Just Wanted To Do Something Else.

The Rain That Fell On The City Runs Down The Dark Gutters And Empties Into The Sea Without Even Soaking The Ground

And It Was The Kind Of Thing That Loses The Most Important Nuances When Reduced To Words. He Had Never Told Anyone About It, And He Probably Never Would.

Gays, Lesbians, Straights, Feminists, Fascist Pigs, Communists, Hare Krishnas - None Of Them Bother Me. I Don't Care What Banner They Raise. But What I Can't Stand Are Hollow People. When I'm With Them I Just Can't Bare It, And Wind Up Saying Things I Shouldn't.

And, Well, Mine Are Kind Of On The Heavy Side Anyway. The First Day Or Two, I Don't Want To Do Anything. Make Sure You Keep Away From Me Then.' I'd Like To, But How Can I Tell?' I Asked. O.k., I'll Wear A Hat For A Couple Of Days After My Period Starts. A Red One. That Should Work,' She Said With A Laugh. 'if You See Me On The Street And I'm Wearing A Red Hat, Don't Talk To Me, Just Run Away.

I Closed My Eyes And Tried To Sleep. But It Was Not Until Much Later That I Was Able To Get Any Real Sleep. In A Place Far Away From Anyone Or Anywhere, I Drifted Off For A Moment.

I Don't Care What You Do To Me, But I Don't Want You To Hurt Me. I've Had Enough Hurt Already In My Life. More Than Enough. Now I Want To Be Happy.

The Years Nineteen And Twenty Are A Crucial Stage In The Maturation Of Character, And If You Allow Yourself To Become Warped When You're That Age, It Will Cause You Pain When You're Older.

Beyond The Edge Of The World There’s A Space Where Emptiness And Substance Neatly Overlap, Where Past And Future Form A Continuous, Endless Loop. And, Hovering About, There Are Signs No One Has Ever Read, Chords No One Has Ever Heard.

Nobody Likes Being Alone That Much. I Don't Go Out Of My Way To Make Friends, That's All. It Just Leads To Disappointment.

If You're In Pitch Blackness, All You Can Do Is Sit Tight Until Your Eyes Get Used To The Dark.

What Gave Money Its True Meaning Was Its Dark-night Namelessness, Its Breathtaking Interchangeability.

Don't You Think It Would Be Wonderful To Get Rid Of Everything And Everybody And Just Go Some Place Where You Don't Know A Soul?

He Felt As If His Heart Had Dried Up. I Needed Her He Thought. I Needed Someone Like Her To Fill The Void Inside Me. But I Wasn’t Able To Fill The Void Inside Her. Until The Bitter End, The Emptiness Inside Her Was Hers Alone.

But I Didn't Walk A Single Step. I Stopped A Lot To Stretch, But I Never Walked. I Didn't Come Here To Walk. I Came To Run. That's The Reason-the Only Reason-i Flew All The Way To The Northern Tip Of Japan. No Matter How Slow I Might Run, I Wasn't About To Walk. That Was The Rule.

Beyond The Window, Some Kind Of Small, Black Thing Shot Across The Sky. A Bird, Possibly. Or It Might Have Been Someone's Soul Being Blown To The Far Side Of The World.

If A Person Remains Tense For A Long Time He Might Not Notice It Himself, But It’s Like His Nerves Are A Piece Of Rubber That Has Been Stretched Out. It’s Hard To Go Back To The Original Shape.

Suicides? Heart Attacks? The Papers Didn't Seem Interested. The World Was Full Of Ways To Die, Too Many To Cover. Newsworthy Deaths Had To Be Exceptional. Most People Go Unobserved.

It Was A Strange Feeling, Like Touching A Void.

Say It Before You Run Out Of Time. Say It Before It's Too Late. Say What You're Feeling. Waiting Is A Mistake.

Don't Feel Sorry For Yourself. Only Arseholes Do That.

Most People Are Not Looking For Provable Truths. As You Said, Truth Is Often Accompanied By Intense Pain, And Almost No One Is Looking For Painful Truths. What People Need Is Beautiful, Comforting Stories That Make Them Feel As If Their Lives Have Some Meaning. Which Is Where Religion Comes From.

We Were, The Two Of Us, Still Fragmentary Beings, Just Beginning To Sense The Presence Of An Unexpected, To Be-aquired Reality That Would Fill Us And Make Us Whole.

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Esa-Pekka Salonen

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