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Murakami's new novel: 1Q84
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1Q84 is the name of Murakami's new novel which will soon be published in Japan. Evidently the title is an homage to Orwell. 1Q84 could be Murakami's 'biggest and most ambitious' novel and it might take a couple years to get it translated into English.
http://www.complete-review.com/saloon/ar...
Exactly. I am still waiting for Natsuo Kirino's Grosteque to be translated into English. But the wait will hopefully make us appreciate the book even more when we do get to read it, or the wait might prove to be a disappointment later on when you set up mental high standards. But either way you look at it, it is still very exciting to know that Murakami's is still writing masterpieces! :)
Thanks for sharing the news Allycks. I am excited that there will be something to look forward to after I have read all the other Murakami novels which have already been translated.
Amy wrote: "Exactly. I am still waiting for Natsuo Kirino's Grosteque to be translated into English. But the wait will hopefully make us appreciate the book even more when we do get to read it, or the wait mig..."http://www.amazon.co.uk/Grotesque-Natsuo... it already has been :)
she's fabulous isnt she!!!
Allycks wrote: "1Q84 is the name of Murakami's new novel which will soon be published in Japan. Evidently the title is an homage to Orwell. 1Q84 could be Murakami's 'biggest and most ambitious' novel and it migh..."
thanks for the news and the links :) always good to know a Murakami is on its way some day :)
Amy wrote: "Exactly. I am still waiting for Natsuo Kirino's Grosteque to be translated into English. But the wait will hopefully make us appreciate the book even more when we do get to read it, or the wait mig..."Grotesque has been translated, m'dear. It's been a good 6 months at least. I enjoyed it quite a bit.
Oh that's fabulous! Hmm ...now that I know Grotesque is out I am going on another library hunt again! But seriously, Out is really one of the best Japanese crime fiction based novel I have ever read so far. I couldn't help going back to it after a dull day.
Christina Stind wrote: "Sounds intriguing. Annoying that we have to wait till it gets translated."
Annoying that I never made better use of my time to learn Japanese!
Shinchosha Publishing announced that they would publish Murakami's new novel titled 1Q84 in Japan in the early summer of 2009. 1Q84 is pronounced as 'ichi kyū hachi yon', the same as 1984, as 9 is also pronounced as 'kyū' in Japanese.[24:]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haruki_Mura...
I'm excited to see a new offering, as I've only known him for about a year now, so I can see his latest thoughts on the modern world and such. But this means I need to pick up on my effort to finish the others.
You guys think this'll be Murakami's take on Orwells 1984? (Perhaps he'll have a contradicting perception of both the era and the idea of the novel, or one or the other). Or that he's using the title as a reference to the 80s in general? I think Murakami will be giving us misfits trying to cope with the dystopia of the modern world - or society in general - despite its perceived normality and functionability.
Lindsey wrote: "does anyone know when it might be released in English here in the States? any rumors?"
I've heard that 1Q84 is going to weigh in at a whopping 1,600 pages. It should take a couple years to get it all translated. But the situation isn't very cut-and-dry for a couple of reasons. One, if Murakami gets involved in the translation as he supposedly did with Kafka on the Shore, it could easily cut the time needed to translate in half. In that case we could be reading 1Q84 this time next year. But the second issue is that Murakami's other behemoth, Wind-Up Bird, was ruthlessly chopped up by the English publisher who had set an incredibly imbecilic word limit for the English language version. Let's pray that the same thing doesn't happen with 1Q84 and that we'll be able to read the entire book as the author intended, no matter how long it takes.
Allycks wrote: "But the second issue is that Murakami's other behemoth, Wind-Up Bird, was ruthlessly chopped up by the English publisher who had set an incredibly imbecilic word limit for the English language version."
Do we know who the publisher will be for 1Q84? Maybe we should start a letter-writing campaign for preserving every page. (not to mention another letter-writing campaign for getting an unabridged translation of wind-up-bird... *drools*)
How to Japonese, an American-in-Japan blog, is gonna do an hour-by-hour live blog next Friday dedicated to the official release of 1Q84.
http://howtojaponese.com/2009/05/22/one-...
Street date broken, pictures, initial thoughts: http://howtojaponese.com/2009/05/27/q-te... (from the same blog linked above).
More than likely translation has been underway since HM completed the final manuscript. Although no word on who is translating it. What would be nice is if overly large books were published the same way as in Japan: in volumes. Fewer things more uncomfortable than trying to read a book over 300 or 500 pages…
As happened with _After Dark_, the German translation came out nearly a year before the US/UK editions. So those that "can't wait" may wish to learn to read Japanese and/or German...
Currently reading 1Q84. (I'm Japanese in San Francisco.) I'd just say... it's amazing. Mr. Murakami wishes readers to get into the story from totally neutral point without any information about it, so the publisher didn't advertise anything other than the title and the author's name. I'm glad being out of Japan kept me from getting any info about the story even though I got the book a half month later since it was published.
Well, I know it sounds very cruel, but just be patient and wait. It's definitely worth to do so.
@Sftakashi - I've bought an import copy to practise my (extremely basic) Japanese reading. Mind if I email you to see if I'm getting any of the gist right??
@Suttola - Good for you! I'd be more than happy to help you on technical part of the language (I used to teach Japanese...). Sorry it took so long to reply; I should check here more frequently. :-)@Ardita - Thanks! I've read the book twice already... I hope the translation will come out soon!
