Brian ’s Reviews > Kafka on the Shore > Status Update

"These past ten days there's been a lot of bizarre stuff going on. Leeches falling from the sky, Colonel Sanders popping out of thin air, hot sex with a drop-dead-gorgeous philosophy major, swiping the entrance stone from that shrine....A lifetime of weird stuff packed into ten days. Like we've been doing test runs on a roller coaster or something."

Better than I imagined him to be.

This line about the shore brought tears to my eyes and stirred my heart. I think it's an old guy thing (I'm 38): "It's changed completely,' Miss Saeki replies. 'That was forty years ago, after all. Things change. A lot of things affect the shoreline - waves, wind, typhoons. Sand gets washed away, they truck more in. But this is definitely the spot. I remember what occurred there very well.'

"Miss Saeki looks up, surprised, and after a moments hesitation lays her hand on mine. 'At any rate-you and your theory-are throwing a stone at a target that's very far away. Do you understand that?
I nod. 'I know. But metaphors can reduce the distance.'

"She looks at me for awhile, quietly concentrating like she's looking at the painting, and a thought hits me--the axis of time. Somewhere I don't know about, something weird is happening to time. Reality and dreams are all mixed up, like seawater and river water flowing together. I struggle to find the meaning behind it all, but nothing makes any sense."

"A shy nineteen-year-old girl from a provincial town writes lyrics about her boyfriend far away, sits down at the piano and sets it to music, then unhesitantly sings her creation. She didn't write the song for others to hear, but for herself, to warm her own heart, if even a little. And her self-absorption strikes a subtle but powerful chord in her listeners' hearts."

"A shy nineteen-year-old girl from a provincial town writes lyrics about her boyfriend far away, sits down at the piano and sets it to music, then u hesitantly sings her creation. She didn't write the song for others to hear, but for herself, to warm her own heart, if even a little. And her self-absorption strikes a subtle but powerful chord in her listeners' hearts."

'Kafka, in everybody's life there's a point of no return. And in a very few cases, a point where you can't go forward anymore. And when we reach that point, all we can do is quietly accept the fact. That's how we survive." First time a quote in a fiction novel has spoken a direct and specific message of wisdom and direction into my life.

'It doesn't matter whose dream it started out as, you have the same dream. So you're responsible for whatever happens in the dream. That dream crept inside you, right down the dark corridor of your soul.'

Two cats (one a Siamese named Mimi) and a slow man (Nakata): "Now pay attention, you brainless dimwit! You stinky good-for-nothing!' Mimi hissed, then turned to Nakata. 'You've got to show him who's in charge up front or you'll never get anywhere. Otherwise he'll go all spacey on you, and all you get is drivel. It's not his fault he's this way, and I do feel sorry for him, but what are you going to do?'