Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World

by Haruki Murakami

you can tell a lot about a person’s character from his choice of sofa.

As Shakespeare said, die this year and you don’t have to die the next.

Let your body work until it is spent, but keep your mind for yourself.”

Many are the women who can take their clothes off seductively, but women who can charm as they dress?

Once again, life had a lesson to teach me: It takes years to build up, it takes moments to destroy.

“A fetishist’s someone who’s got a fixation on one thing only.

Not that the alcohol actually reduced the pain; it just gave the pain a life of its own, apart from mine.

I may not be much, but I’m all I’ve got.

But the absence of fighting or hatred or desire also means the opposites do not exist either. No joy, no communion, no love. Only where there is disillusionment and depression and sorrow does happiness arise; without the despair of loss, there is no hope.

Most human activities are predicated on the assumption that life goes on. If you take that premise away, what is there left?

Two people can sleep in the same bed and still be alone when they close their eyes, if you know what I mean.”

Maybe no one finds it, or even misses it, but fairness is like love. What is given has nothing to do with what we seek.