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People soon get tired of things that aren’t boring, but not of what is boring. What’s that all about. For me, I might have the leisure to be bored, but not to grow tired of something. Most people can’t distinguish between the two.”
“I never ask the impossible. That’s a colossal waste of time, don’t you agree?”
“You have to look!” Johnnie Walker commanded. “That’s another one of our rules. Closing your eyes isn’t going to change anything. Nothing’s going to disappear just because you can’t see what’s going on. In fact, things will be even worse the next time you open your eyes. That’s the kind of world we live in, Mr Nakata. Keep your eyes wide open. Only a coward closes his eyes. Closing your eyes and plugging up your ears won’t make time stand still.”
“In theory it’s not impossible to live like that, and of course there are people who do. But nature is actually unnatural, in a way. And relaxation can be threatening. It takes experience and preparation to really live with those contradictions. So we’re going back to the city for the time being. Back to civilisation.”
“Gays, lesbians, straights, feminists, fascist pigs, communists, Hare Krishnas – none of those bother me. I don’t care what banner they raise. But what I can’t stand are hollow people. When I’m with them I can’t bear it, and end up saying things I shouldn’t.
“You could put it that way, I suppose. There’s always going to be a connection between you, Mr Nakata, and the things you deal with. Just like there’s a connection between eel and rice bowls. And as the web of these connections spreads out, a relationship between you, Mr Nakata, and capitalists and the proletariat naturally develops.”
“The world of the grotesque is the darkness within us. Well before Freud and Jung shone a light on the workings of the subconscious, this correlation between darkness and our subconscious, these two forms of darkness, was obvious to people. It wasn’t a metaphor, even. If you trace it back further, it wasn’t even a correlation. Until Edison invented the electric light, most of the world was covered in darkness. The physical darkness outside and the inner darkness of the soul were mixed together, with no boundary separating the two.
