Tag: japanese literature

• 

  “"I don’t know how to express this very well,” she said, “but when you work up a sweat dancing, it’s as if all the bad things, all the bad thoughts, pour out of you. You can almost see them evaporating. You know the big mirrors they have in dance studios? When I’d watch myself in the mirror after mastering a new pas, a new step, I’d feel, well, purified. To see that I was able to some extent to become one with something so beautiful, with this graceful image I had in my head, was…Well, I can’t explain it. But it helped me forget my troubles, and I think that’s how I managed to overcome it all.”“

  ‘Audition’ by Ryo Murakami

  May 31, 2012

  audition, japanese literature, ryo murakami

  ---

• 

  “It was as if he’d abandoned himself to his despair, but in fact, Aoyama knew, he was fervently searching for something. Something that, once found, would keep him from having to feel the pain of his wound. To just entrust oneself to time was to exterminate oneself, to temporarily accept a kind of death. Children aren’t capable of that sort of detachment. For Shige it wasn’t a question of whether he could find what he was searching for or not: the very act of searching served to create a distance from the wound. Obviously Aoyama’s own quest to bring the legendary pipe organist to Japan had served a similar purpose. If Ryoko’s death hadn’t occurred, he would never have undertaken the project. And if it weren’t for that project, the person he was now would never have come into existence.”

  ‘Audition’ by Ryu Murakami

  May 31, 2012

  audition, japanese literature, ryu murakami

  ---