Attention Haruki Murakami obsessives: literary blog The Millions has the first paragraph of his highly anticipated, 928-page novel, 1Q84. The new book, published in three volumes in Japan, will be released October 25th and translated by both of Murakami’s regular translators, Jay Rubin and Philip Gabriel.
The opening paragraph isn’t terribly exciting, except that it totally is.
I’ll post the (stolen) excerpt after the jump because I know how SENSITIVE people can get about this sort of thing. In the meantime, you can check out these Murakami-inspired pin-up drawings. Notably absent is Creta Kano, the psychic prostitute from The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle.
Psst. There’s a cover image for the new book as well.
Here is your opening paragraph, as translated by Jay Rubin:
The taxiโs radio was tuned to a classical FM broadcast. Janรกฤekโs Sinfoniettaโprobably not the ideal music to hear in a taxi caught in traffic. The middle-aged driver didnโt seem to be listening very closely, either. With his mouth clamped shut, he stared straight ahead at the endless line of cars stretching out on the elevated expressway, like a veteran fisherman standing in the bow of his boat, reading the ominous confluence of two currents. Aomame settled into the broad back seat, closed her eyes, and listened to the music.
It’s true! I really much prefer the Glagolitic Mass when I’m in a taxi caught in traffic.
Yeah, right.
I’ll pay someone else to do my translating for me, thank you.
And I’ll miss some nuances. OK.
Kotoshi juu niha kono hon yomitai desu.
O kagesama de, genki desi arnaz.
朝の間の私のバット肉ほとんどのシュートの悪臭!
Why am I taking this goddamn trollbait? Oh, fuck it…
Reading Japanese is quite difficult. I lived in Japan for two and a half years, and while I learned to speak the language well enough to get around on a day-to-day basis, I was never able to get past a grade school reading level. There are 1,945 “official” Kanji, all with differing connotations and pronunciations, and numerous other more obscure characters that do show up in literary works like Murakami. Busting my ass every day for over two years while living in the country brought me up to the level where I could read Dragon Ball and One Piece and mostly know what was going on. Reading a surrealist like Murakami would take lots, lots more effort. Years more. It’s a really effing difficult written language.
That said, Jay Rubin is a badass. I’ve read Murakami translated by others, and it is not as good. Rubin’s great because he’s not just good with Japanese, he’s good with language in general. He knows how to wrangle an idiom from one language to another and have it keep most of it’s meaning and poetry. He did some translations of Akutagawa (the Rashoman guy) and they are similarly nifty. I will gladly pay a dude of his talent to do my translation for me.