Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World

by Haruki Murakami

So it was I lost the light of day.

“I suppose,” I say. “Still, I have the impression that elsewhere we may all have lived totally other lives, and that somehow we have forgotten that time. Have you ever felt that way?” “No,” she says. “Perhaps it is because you are a Dreamreader. The Dreamreader thinks very differently from ordinary people.”

I cannot believe her. “Or do you know where this was?” “I wish I could remember,” I say. “There was a place, and you were there.”

The clock face was covered over so I couldn’t read it. Time gets in the way of tabulations.

Sofa sermon

Doing different tabulation jobs, I’ve slept on a lot of sofas, and let me tell you, the comfortable ones are few and far between. Typically, they’re cheap deadweight. Even the most luxurious-looking sofas are a disappointment when you actually try to sleep on them. I never understand how people can be lax about choosing sofas.

I always say—a prejudice on my part, I’m sure—you can tell a lot about a person’s character from his choice of sofa.

There are people who drive luxury cars, but have only second- or third-rate sofas in their homes. I put little trust in such people. An expensive automobile may well be worth its price, but it’s only an expensive automobile. If you have the money, you can buy it, anyone can buy it. Procuring a good sofa, on the other hand, requires style and experience and philosophy. It takes money, yes, but you also need a vision of the superior sofa. That sofa among sofas.