Quotes from Haruki Murakami

They dig holes from time to time,' the Colonel explains. 'It is probably for them what chess is for me. It has no special meaning, does not transport them anywhere. All of us dig at our own pure holes. We have nothing to achieve by our activities, nowhere to get to. Is there not something marvelous about this? We hurt no one and no one gets hurt. No victory, no defeat.

I am endowed with the capacity to believe. I believe in all honesty that something will appear to guide me through the darkest and narrowest tunnel, or across the most desolate plain.

With Naoko gone, I went to sleep on the sofa. I hadn't intended to do so, but I fell into the kind of deep sleep I had not in a long time, filled with a sense of Naoko's presence. In the kitchen were the dishes Naoko ate from, in the bathroom was the toothbrush Naoko used, and in the bedroom was the bed in which Naoko slept. Sleeping soundly in this apartment of hers, I wrung the fatigue from every cell of my body, drop by drop. I dreamed of a butterfly dancing in the half-light.

Compared to the complexity of the universe, this world of ours is like the brain of a worm.

Vacations and friends are the two best things in life.

Don't let the bad elves get you.

All he could do was wait like this, patiently, until it grew light out and the birds awoke and began their day. All he could do was trust in the birds, in all the birds, with their wings and beaks.

It was the first time he had seen her smile. It was the faintest of smiles, yet he felt the tides start to shift all over the world. He knew it was happening.

I'm not going to die with you just because you made lunch for me. Of course, if it had been dinner...

Everything was intertwined, with the complexity of a three-dimensional puzzle, a puzzle in which truth was not necessarily fact and fact not necessarily truth.

It might not be perfect, but the fundamental stance I adopted with regard to my home was to accept it, problems and all, because it was something I myself had chosen. If it had problems, these were almost certainly problems that had originated within me.

All my books are weird love stories. I love weird love stories.

pulled into my convenient neighborhood fast food restaurant. I ordered shrimp salad, onion rings, and a beer. The shrimp were straight out of the freezer, the onion rings soggy. Looking around the place, though, I failed to spot a single customer banging on a tray or complaining to a waitress. So I shut up and finished my food. Expect nothing, get nothing.

Nobody likes being alone. I just hate to be disappointed.

These guys are fakes. All they've got on their minds is impressing the new girls with the big words they're so proud of, while sticking their hanse up their skirts. And when they graduate,they cut their hair short and march off to work for Mitsubishi or IBM or Fuji Bank. They marry pretty wives who've never read Marx and have kids they give fancy names to that are enough to make you puke. Smash what educational-industrial complex? Don't make me laugh!

What's important is being attentive. Staying calm, being alert to things around you.

Have you ever had that feeling? That you'd like to go to a whole different place and become a whole different self?

She came to her own private conclusion, which she tucked away in a drawer, and silently went back to her meal.

Some people get a kick out of reading railway timetables and that's all they do all day. Some people make huge model boats out of matchsticks. So what's wrong if there happens to be one guy in the world who enjoys trying to understand you? Kind of like a hobby? she said, amused. Yeah I guess you could call it a hobby. Most normal people would call it friendship or love or something, but if you want to call it a hobby, that's OK too.

El mundo no se pone patas arriba tan fácilmente. Las que están patas arribas son las personas.

Just because there's an end doesn't mean existence has meaning. An end point is simply set up as a temporary marker or perhaps as an indirect metaphor for the fleeting nature of existence.

mediocrity is a constant, as one Russian writer put it. Russians have a way with aphorisms. They probably spend all winter thinking them up.

Most people, they're trying to escape from boredom, but I'm trying to get into the thick of boredom. That's why I'm not complaining when I say my life is boring. It was enough to make my wife bail out, though.

Everything ended in silence. The beasts and spirits heaved a deep breath, broke up their encirclement, and returned to the depths of a forest that had lost its heart.