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Haruki Murakami

Haruki Murakami has published more than a dozen novels, including “Norwegian Wood,” “Kafka on the Shore,” “1Q84,” and “Killing Commendatore,” and several short-story collections and works of nonfiction, all of which have been translated from their original Japanese into English and many other languages. In his mysterious and haunting stories—which have been published in The New Yorker since 1990—he often contemplates what-ifs: What if a monkey stole your name? What if a beetle woke up as Gregor Samsa? What if you had to deliver an empty box and it changed your life? “When I’m writing novels, reality and unreality just naturally get mixed together,” he said in an interview. “It’s not as if that was my plan and I’m following it as I write, but the more I try to write about reality in a realistic way, the more the unreal world invariably emerges.” Inquisitive and exploratory, Murakami’s fiction often takes you somewhere new and then forces you to find a way home.

Selected Stories

With the Beatles

“Had she vanished, like smoke? Or, on that early-autumn afternoon, had I seen not a real person but a vision of some kind?”
A close up of a macaque's face

A Shinagawa Monkey

“A life without a name, she felt, was like a dream you never wake up from.”
Two red cockroach silhouettes pinned in the shape of a heart.

Samsa in Love

“Samsa had no idea where he was, or what he should do. All he knew was that he was now a human whose name was Gregor Samsa. And how did he know that?”
The kitchen of a damaged home in Kobe Japan after the 7.3magnitude earthquake there in 1995.

U.F.O. in Kushiro

“When he woke, he thought about his wife again. Why had she followed the earthquake reports with such intensity, from morning to night?”

All Fiction

“My Cheesecake-Shaped Poverty”

We picked this place to live in for one simple reason: it was dirt cheap.

The Kingdom That Failed

“The more sincerely he tried to explain things, the more a fog of insincerity came to hang over everything.”

Confessions of a Shinagawa Monkey

“Sharing a beer and chatting with a monkey was a pretty unusual experience in and of itself.”

With the Beatles

“Had she vanished, like smoke? Or, on that early-autumn afternoon, had I seen not a real person but a vision of some kind?”

Cream

“ ‘There’s nothing worth getting in this world that you can get easily,’ the old man had said, with unshakable conviction, like Pythagoras explaining his theorem.”

The Wind Cave

“If my little sister really did disappear in the hole, never to return to this world, how would I ever explain that to my parents?”

Kino

“There was something about him that stirred up the dark side in other people.”

Scheherazade

“Each time they had sex, she told Habara a strange and gripping story afterward.”

All Fiction

“My Cheesecake-Shaped Poverty”

We picked this place to live in for one simple reason: it was dirt cheap.

The Kingdom That Failed

“The more sincerely he tried to explain things, the more a fog of insincerity came to hang over everything.”

Confessions of a Shinagawa Monkey

“Sharing a beer and chatting with a monkey was a pretty unusual experience in and of itself.”

With the Beatles

“Had she vanished, like smoke? Or, on that early-autumn afternoon, had I seen not a real person but a vision of some kind?”

Cream

“ ‘There’s nothing worth getting in this world that you can get easily,’ the old man had said, with unshakable conviction, like Pythagoras explaining his theorem.”

The Wind Cave

“If my little sister really did disappear in the hole, never to return to this world, how would I ever explain that to my parents?”

Kino

“There was something about him that stirred up the dark side in other people.”

Scheherazade

“Each time they had sex, she told Habara a strange and gripping story afterward.”

About the Author

Becoming Japanese

Haruki Murakami was said to be Tokyo’s Bret Easton Ellis—loved by the kids, hated by the grownups. And then he had a revelation.

The Underground Worlds of Haruki Murakami

The writer on his style, his process, and the strange, dark places he encounters on the page.

The Running Novelist

Learning how to go the distance.

About the Author

Becoming Japanese

Haruki Murakami was said to be Tokyo’s Bret Easton Ellis—loved by the kids, hated by the grownups. And then he had a revelation.

The Underground Worlds of Haruki Murakami

The writer on his style, his process, and the strange, dark places he encounters on the page.

The Running Novelist

Learning how to go the distance.

More by the Author

An Accidental Collection

How I amassed more T-shirts than I can store.

Abandoning a Cat

More by the Author

An Accidental Collection

How I amassed more T-shirts than I can store.

Abandoning a Cat

New Yorker Podcasts

Rebecca Curtis Reads Haruki Murakami

The author joins Deborah Treisman to read and discuss “Confessions of a Shinagawa Monkey,” by Haruki Murakami, which was published in a 2020 issue of the magazine.

Bryan Washington Reads Haruki Murakami

The author joins Deborah Treisman to read and discuss “U.F.O. in Kushiro,” by Haruki Murakami, from a 2001 issue of the magazine.

Andrea Lee Reads Haruki Murakami

The author joins Deborah Treisman to read and discuss “Barn Burning,” by Haruki Murakami, from a 1992 issue of the magazine.