Quotes from Haruki Murakami

Sometimes fate is like a small sandstorm that keeps changing directions. You change direction but the sandstorm chases you. You turn again, but the storm adjusts.

Reality spills through her slim fingers like the sands of an hourglass. Thus time is by no means on her side

Always remember that to argue, and win, is to break down the reality of the person you are arguing against. It is painful to lose your reality, so be kind, even if you are right.

Writing things was important, wasn't it? Nakata asked. 'Yes, it was. The process of writing was important. Even though the finished product is completely meaningless.

I find myself thinking about my ongoing existence as a human being and the path that lies ahead of me. Though of course these thoughts lead to but one place - death.

The curious thing about individuals is that their singularity always goes beyond any category or generalization in the book.

Inside him, twenty years dissolved and mixed into one complex, swirling whole. Everything that had accumulated over the years-- all he had seen, all the words he has spoken, all the values he had held-- all of it coalesced into one solid, thick pillar in his heart, the core of which was spinning like a potter's wheel. Wordlessly, Tengo observed the scene, as if watching the destruction and rebirth of a planet.

The Earth, after all, doesn't creak and groan its way around the sun just so human beings can have a good time and a bit of a laugh.

I think of myself as more the non-turn-on type. so when I do get turned on, I don't trust it, I have to investigate the source.

Because I have no sense of self. I have no personality, no brilliant color. I have nothing to offer. That's always been my problem. I feel like an empty vessel. I have a shape, I guess, as a container, but there's nothing inside. I just can't see myself as the right person for her. I think that the more time passes, and the more she knows about me, the more disappointed Sara will be, and the more she'll choose to distance herself from me.

It doesn't matter how old I get, but as long as I continue to live I'll always discover something new about myself.

Lonely metal souls in the unimpeded darkness of space, they meet, pass each other, and part, never to meet again. No words passing between them. No promises to keep.

Once you make up your mind to get rid of something, there's very little you can't discard. No – not very little. Once you put your mind to it, there's nothing you can't get rid of. And once you start tossing things out, you find yourself wanting to get rid of everything. It's as if you'd gambled away almost all your money and decided, What the hell, I'll bet what's left. Too much trouble to cling to the rest

What do I like about math? , When I've got figures in front of me, it relaxes me. Kind of like, everything fits where it belongs.

The moon had been observing the earth close-up longer than anyone. It must have witnessed all of the phenomena occurring - and all of the acts carried out - on this earth. But the moon remained silent; it told no stories.

I need to learn not just to forget but to forgive.

There're many things we don't really know. It's an illusion that we know anything at all. If a group of aliens were to stop me and ask, "Say, bud, how many miles an hour does the earth spin at the equator?" I'd be in a fix. Hell, I don't even know why Wednesday follows Tuesday. I'd be an intergalactic joke

It's basically the same in all periods of societies. If you belong to the majority, you can avoid thinking about lots of troubling things.' 'And those troubling things are all you /can/ think about when you're one of the few.' 'That's about the size of it,' she said mournfully. 'But maybe, if you're in a situation like that, you learn to think for yourself.' 'Yes, but maybe what you end up thinking for yourself /about/ is all those troubling things.

I'm not afraid to die. What I'm afraid of is having reality get the better of me, of having reality leave me behind.

I often dream about the Dolphin Hotel.

I like the sky. You can look at it forever and never get tired of it, and when you don't want to look at it anymore, you stop.

It's basically impossible for everybody's justice to prevail or everybody's happiness to triumph, so chaos takes over.

At any rate, that's how I started running. Thirty three—that's how old I was then. Still young enough, though no longer a young man. The age that Jesus Christ died. The age that Scott Fitzgerald started to go downhill. That age may be a kind of crossroads in life. That was the age when I began my life as a runner, and it was my belated, but real, starting point as a novelist.

I'm not going to get involved in a debate with you. Just remember this: the gods give, and the gods take away. Even if you are not aware of having been granted what you posses, the gods remember what they gave you. They don't forget a thing. You should use the abilities you have been granted with the utmost care.