Haruki Murakami: 'My lifetime dream is to be sitting at the bottom of a well'

The Japanese author talked writing, heroes, domestic life, dreams and how his life informs his novels at a Guardian book club at the Edinburgh international book festival and he answered some of your questions

When you start reading Murakami novels, life starts being like them. Thats their special magic. So said Guardian book club host John Mullan, introducing this months guest, the revered and multi-selling Japanese writer, at Edinburgh international book festival

Mullan told of having that very experience as he ordered a coffee on the train to Edinburgh. You like Haruki Murakami! exclaimed the waitress, noticing his copy of The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle. So do I, what a coincidence! You and 27 million other people, he was tempted to say but instead he couldnt help but mention that he would meet the author later the same day.

I wrote my first novel in 1979. Since then, Ive written every novel in the first person. I tried a couple of times to do the third person (it took me 20 years: the first was Kafka on the Shore) and every time, I feel uncomfortable, like Im looking down from above. I wanted to stand at the same level as my characters. Its democratic!

Toru Okada [the protagonist of The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle] is my hero. When I was younger I wanted to be like him. I just wanted to be a quiet person and live a quiet life. Its not so quiet anymore! Life is strange.

When I write a novel, it takes one or two years and I write day after day I get tired! I have to open up the window to get fresh air. I write another line of the story to get entertained I hope the readers will be entertained as well! Also, I write in the first person, so I need something else [to develop these storylines]: letters, or somebodys story.

I was so scared when I was writing it! All the translators complained to me, saying it was scary. But writing it was much scarier! / I have to do that. The violence and sex abuse are a kind of stimulation for the story. I dont like to write them but I have to for the storys sake.

Its my lifetime dream to be sitting at the bottom of a well. Its a dream come true. [Not a nightmare? asks John Mullan. No! Why not? I dont know.] I thought: its fun to write a novel, you can be anything! So I thought: I can sit at the bottom of a well, isolated Wonderful!

Given much of his storytelling relies on nuance and subtlety, Id like to know what he thinks readers who experience his novels in translation lose by not reading in the original Japanese language.

I can read the books in English. Not in French, Russian, German or others. But when an English translation is complete, they send me the manuscript. When I read it, its fine for me! I dont know whats going to happen next! My point is that if I enjoyed it, the translation is good. So you can relax! . Sometimes I find mistakes and I call the translator. But three or four things in a book, maybe.

Is each book you write fully formed in your mind before you start to write or is it a journey for you as the writer as it is for us as readers?

I dont have any idea at all, when I start writing, of what is to come. For instance, for The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, the first thing I had was the call of the bird, because I heard a bird in my back yard (it was the first time I heard that kind of sound and I never have since then. I felt like it was predicting something. So I wanted to write about it). The next thing was cooking spaghetti these are things that happen to me! I was cooking spaghetti, and somebody call. So I had just these two things at the start. Two years I kept on writing. Its fun! I dont know whats going to happen next, every day. I get up, go to the desk, switch on the computer, etc. and say to myself: so whats going to happen today?Its fun!

Im obsessed with the well. And the elephant. The refrigerator. The cat. And the ironing. I cant explain it.

Dickenss books are full of coincidences; so are Raymond Chandlers: Philip Marlowe encounters numerous dead bodies in the City of Angels. Its unrealistic even in LA! But nobody complains about it, as without it, how could the story happen? Thats my point. / And so many coincidences happen in my real life. Many strange coincidences have happened in many junctures in my life.

It comes naturally. When writing fiction, I need something musical, and the songs come automatically to me. I have learned so many things from music harmony, rhythm, improvisation. Rhythm is important to me you need it to get the readers to keep writing. Usually I listen to music when Im writing, and thats where the songs in the books tend to come from.

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