21st Century Literature discussion

For discussion of book one.

Is Aomame the Japanese Lisbeth Salander? The intelligent, highly sexual bisexual woman with an uncertain past bent on exacting revenge upon men who abuse women. (I'm on Chapter 12 or so at present)

The same thought has occurred to me!

I haven't finished book 1 yet but did just finish chapter 13 and the incident at the end of that chapter, which coincides (perhaps causes) the beginning of Aomame's sexual interest in men is interesting to say the least.

I read this book in January and was taken with the imagery and descriptiveness of the text. While I found the plot intriguing and compelling, especially with the "hooks" that Murukami gives in Book I, I felt at sea. I couldn't find a context for the book and couldn't "see" how it was developing. Someone much wiser than I suggested that I brush up on my Jung. Having done so made reading the book much more enjoyable, so I am posting this link. It gives a very short but accessible summary of Jung's theories and also provides a bibliography for anyone wanting to read more deeply: http://muskingum.edu/~psych/psycweb/h....

What's interesting about Aomame is how comfortable she is with the strong duality of her violent/normal sides. Most of the time, she is genuinely at home in the cultural mainstream, and doesn't seem to be any more or less "true" to herself when she's being fairly conventional than when she's killing an abusive man or blowing off stress by having one-night stands. While her violent side, quirky worldviews, and weirdly disciplined mind look a lot like Lisbeth, Aomame doesn't seem to have any trouble conforming to social norms when it suits her, or abandoning them without thinking twice when it does not.

Mrandrebb wrote: "...Aomame doesn't seem to have any trouble conforming to social norms when it suits her..."

I think this "conforming" can be attributed to her relationship with Tamaki Otsuka who helped Anomame to overcome her awkwardness in social circumstances and in everyday functioning. Tamaki appears to have been a mentor/friend.

Jason wrote: "...the incident at the end of that chapter, which coincides (perhaps causes) the beginning of Aomame's sexual interest in men is interesting to say the least."

I agree. Also at the end of chapter 13 we may be privy to the key that link Tengo and Anomame because this is when Anomame recites the prayer.

Cyn wrote: "Mrandrebb wrote: "...Aomame doesn't seem to have any trouble conforming to social norms when it suits her..."

I think this "conforming" can be attributed to her relationship with Tamaki Otsuka who..."

Great point.

These references are from chapters 1-15. (my pages may be a bit off since I am reading on my Nook Tablet)

Are both Fuka-Eri and the dowager talking about the same "little people?"

p. 65 Fuka-Eri referring to the characters in her book: "The Little People really exist. Just like you and me."

p. 99 Dowager referring to a butterfly: "This little person thinks of me as a friend."

p. 99 Dowager referring to the butterflies: "These people are your nameless friends for just a little while."

Cyn wrote: "...I think this "conforming" can be attributed to her relationship with Tamaki Otsuka who..."

In addition...

Tamaki Otsuka is to Anomame as Azami is to Fuka-Eri

Both Anomame and Fuka-Eri have their mentors who assist them through real life situations.

After reading the first book I listened to the Sinfonietta of Janacek. After this powerful work(Mackerras and the Wiener Philharmoniker) I started with the second book.

Mrandrebb wrote: "What's interesting about Aomame is how comfortable she is with the strong duality of her violent/normal sides. Most of the time, she is genuinely at home in the cultural mainstream, and doesn't see..."

I think that may also be partly attributable to the fact that Anomame was not herself a victim of abuse. The same cannot be said for Salander. Salander could function in social circumstances when she she so desired (i.e. in the islands).

Cyn wrote: "These references are from chapters 1-15. (my pages may be a bit off since I am reading on my Nook Tablet)

Are both Fuka-Eri and the dowager talking about the same "little people?"

p. 65 Fuka-Eri ..."

This is an interesting catch that slipped by me when I was listening to it. As I approach, the end of Book 1, I am wondering if the connection will hold. The behavior of the butterfly "little people" seems far different than the behavior of the little people in other sections of Book 1. There are certainly linkages between Anomame, Tengo, and Sakigake. I am still trying to figure out how it all fits together.

I've bounced around the idea that Anomame and Tengo are little people because little people can apparently grow in size. That doesn't seem right, however, because both Anomame and Tengo have recollections of their childhood, just not the violent confrontation of three years prior.

Speculations?

Can I also say that the policewoman is the Jar-Jar Binks of this story? The dialogue between her and Anomame is pretty terrible. Cringe-worthy in places, like a (S)Cinemax movie. That subplot is doing very little for me at the moment and it seems unlikely that someone who has committed murder would open up so freely to a person with a career in law enforcement. Anomame is a bit of a loner, so it seems even less likely that she would so quickly become BFFs with a random woman that she met in the bar. At this point, I think that subtracting that character would have strengthened the story further.

Adam wrote: ...both Anomame and Tengo have recollections of their childhood..."

And strong recollections they are!

I think that Anomame is the little girl who Tengo saw while he was with his father on Sundays. The little girl was with her mother who was handing out "After the Flood" pamphlets and she is also the girl who held Tengo's hand. Anomame refers to being still in love with the little boy who she held hands with and she repeated the same "pray" when she found Tamaki as the little girl recited before lunch.

I think that the dialog in the book is fairly realistic, including that with Ayumi. People don't speak in long, amazing, wordy phrases too much...at least not the people I'm forced to speak to regularly.

I think that the relationship between the two is sensible when you take the sexualized nature of it into consideration, the feelings of loneliness they share, the common abusive backgrounds they share (yes, the forms of abuse differ greatly, I know) and the clearly lesbian attraction Ayumi has towards her (if you disagree with that last statement, then I can only counter that perhaps you don't know enough lesbians in your life)

I think that we won't have to search too hard amongst the words to find linkages and we won't have to ponder the repetitions for hidden messages...I suspect it will be fairly obvious.

Regarding the repetition...it's a very Asian/Japanese thing to use repetition to signify the importance of something. It's not a very Japanese thing to come out and be blunt about something. So repetition is a cue that something is important. There were many things in the story that I read, but didn't realize the significance of until it was repeated a few times. Then I went back and often reread.

Interesting thing, the novel 1984 by George Orwell also begins in April, 1984. Opening line, "It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking 13." (1984 begins on April 4, 1984. Which is a particularly inauspicious day in Japanese culture.)

After I posted my complaint about the dialog with Ayumi, I considered that the narration might be contributing to my annoyance. I am listening to it on audiobook because the text version was wait-listed at the library. If I were reading it, I might imagine the intonation of the voices (etc) differently and it may not have been as bothersome. That said, I still find it improbable that an assassin would associate that freely with someone carrying a badge.

Nice hypothesis Cyn, it will be interesting to see how things play out in the remaining 2/3 of the book.

@Adam - sure, but she's not REALLY an assassin. That's..well, call it a hobby? Plus, she frequently addresses how unwise and improbable associating with her is.

Shay wrote: "Regarding the repetition...it's a very Asian/Japanese thing to use repetition to signify the importance of something. It's not a very Japanese thing to come out and be blunt about something. So rep..."

Thank you for mentioning this fact about the repetition, Shay. I've been a little bothered by it (some of the expository dialogue as well)and this puts things into a better perspective.

A few commonalities between Aomame and Tengo:
1. They both have something wrong with an ear. This kind of solitary imperfection is referred to as "wabi sabi". The finding of beauty because of imperfection. (Sort of, partially.)
2. They both seem to enter into dreamlike, fugue states where they have vivid sensory daydreams.
3. Both are distant from family.

An interesting thing- when Aomame was going down the stairs she had a vision of paper with dates fluttering. (Again, this is not something I picked up on until it was mentioned again by the author.) One was 1954 (when she was born) and one was 1984(current year). Would be interesting to look up other dates. The paper is significant in that the Japanese word for paper is kami. There are two dates that are directly related to Aomame. Interestingly, the Japanese word for spirit, soul, etc. is also kami.

The number 4: it is the death number. Having the same root word as death (shi). The old archaic word for the number for is shi, white is shiroi. So, both are "unlucky". So much so that the accepted way to say the number 4 is now "yon". The number 4 appears a few times: 1954 (the year she was born), the current time in the book (April, 1984, 2 fours so especially inauspicious), Aomame goes to room 426. A lot of religious ceremonies are postponed or moved forward if they fall in April or in years ending with the number 4.

Further about the numbers, a few Japanese numbers have alternative forms. Like the number 9- kyu/ku. If you really look at the text, the author is very specific about numbers. What floor, what room number, etc. Anyone want to hazard a guess as to why this is important?

Thanks for pointing out some of the uniquely Japanese elements of their numerology. There's no good way to tell how much significance any specific instance holds, but certainly we could agree there is some.

Some of the obvious similarities between the two characters is simply their childhoods.

Again, regarding the repetition, since so many have commented on it both in the group, and in their personal reviews, I think it's somewhat less a cultural thing than the nature of the book itself. Repetition like a musical fugue subject, being answered by a closely related counter-subject.

Hey, i hope someone still wants to talk about this.
But so far I agree aomame's soulmate must be Tengo!!
Oh and did anyone find Tengo's reenactment of his childhood memory strange? I'm still trying to figure out how this will develop...
Anyway, im I big fan of the girl with thedragon tattoo and for some reason did not make the connection. They have similarities but the two characters are quite different, in my opinion. Aomame isn't afraid of the relationships salander experienced. She has a boundary and she knows how to toe the line. Just consider how she never went back to her condo. She went to the safe house. Even her experience with her murders is evident of her sense of awareness. She is cocky with
invincibility but also cautious. All in all, I don't find aomame's openness with the ticket officer odd.

yeah, I don't really see the connection with the dragon tattoo either...but then again, I'm really not a fan of that.

I made the comment sort of flippantly early on in the reading. I expected the stories to follow somewhat different arcs as the reading progressed, but saw some very generalized similarities in the early Aomame chapters. The comparison becomes increasingly poor as Aomame's character and the story as a whole develop. Ultimately, I wished that she would have been a bit more Salander-esque, but that would have fundamentally changed the narrative and is clearly not the story that the author set out to write-so no complaints. Many of my early speculations proved to be off base. Things became much clearer for me by the start of Book III.

I for one refuse the idea that a woman must be strong by being somehow transformed or damaged by the world. You can say her childhood had an impact, but it's not similar to the Salander archetype. For the most part, Aomame is a self-made woman, and I prefer that to causality of a strong woman created by an abusive past.

Will wrote: "I for one refuse the idea that a woman must be strong by being somehow transformed or damaged by the world..."
I'm not sure if you are suggesting that Stieg Larsson or I embrace this idea. If directed at Larsson, I would argue that the character of Berger undercuts your assertion that he believes a female character "must" be made strong by being "somehow transformed" by abuse or trauma. If directed at me, then I frankly find it to be an unsubstantiated and offensive statement.

In the context of Aomame and 1Q84, I don't think that you can look at Aomame's motives for killing abusive men and not ascribe them to the emotional trauma that she experienced witnessing the suffering of her best friend in an abusive relationship. Murakami makes that connection pretty clear. Aomame is not defined by the trauma that she experienced as a young woman, but it is nonetheless central to her character. The same arguably holds true for another prominent female character.

The vagueness in explaining why my appreciation of Aomame diminished as the story progressed in my previous comment was purposeful. It has to do with elements of Aomame's character that become more pronounced in Book II and III. Therefore, it would be inappropriate for me to mention the reasons in the Book I forum. My preference for the character of Salander has nothing to do with her being hardened by an abusive past or damaged by the world.

I've just finished Book I and came looking for the comments here. Thx, all! Especially appreciated the comments on repetition and the number 4. Will watch for that now and understand it better.

So far this book has seemed a different Murakami than others I have read.

The relationship of Aomame and Ayumi has me on edge -- what will happen?

I am one of the readers who related Aomame to Lisbeth Salander, even though these are very different stories and characters, at least partly because I know Murakami's penchant for picking up and using high profile current marketplace/popular imagery.

The possible little people connection with the dowager's butterflies I completely missed. But Cyn @15 posited a couple of my present hypotheses about connections to be revealed. I also appreciate the fleshing out of the 1984 linkages. Thx, too, for the Jung link. I'll go read it. @5

One more comment -- I am trying to think of a female writer that I would "equate" with Murakami and Larsson (and Thackeray) on writing characters of the ilk of Aomame, Lisbeth Salander, and Becky Sharp. Since parallels exist between Scarlett O'Hara and Becky Sharp, the one that comes to mind at the moment is Margaret Mitchell. Certainly there must be more current ones. The Munro characters I recall don't seem quite up-front strong in the same way. (Maybe Jeannette Walls? I've only read The Glass Castle. Does she attract male readers?)