There are certain ‘big questions’, questions on purpose and meaning, questions on life and death, that constantly hang over humanity. Some people go on with their day to day lives either blissfully unaware or choosing to hide in naivety. But for others, these questions can become a consuming struggle, something that drives their every moment. Murakami, in After the Quake, writes stories about the second kind of people. These questions that Murakami has his characters struggle with are hard to tackle in such brief, condensed works as short stories, but by giving the elements of the story several layers of meaning and interpretation he is able to unpack the idea more fully and set the reader on the right track to begin unpacking the stories …show more content…
for themselves. In his collection of short stories, After the Quake, Haruki Murakami uses duplicity of objects and occurrences to increase understanding and enhance the complexity of the internal struggles faced by the stories’ characters. Murakami introduces this idea to his readers by uses physical objects to represent emotions. Trying to directly explain the complex depth of layers of emotions within Murakami’s stories would be nearly unattainable within the structure of a short story. In order to combat this, Murakami has the tangible stand in for the intangible. In “Landscape with Flatiron”, the bonfire motif is an integral instance of duplicity within in the story, but even more so is the driftwood that makes up the bonfire itself. The introduction to the character of Miyake is an image of him “in his usual spot on the beach, collecting driftwood of all shapes and sizes” (27 Murakami). In contrast to the significance of the bonfires, and the suggestions of Miyakes own interpersonal turmoil, the driftwood can be interpreted as standing in for Miyake’s problems as he tries to “collect” and fix them, trying to make a “neat pile” and organize the chaos inside himself (27). But another interpretation of this same scene would be that the driftwood is a metaphor for Junko, and she is the one that is lost and being collected. Neither interpretation is more right than than the other, nor are they mutually exclusive. This shows that the duplicity should not, and is not supposed to be, understood in black and white terms. Similarly, in “All God’s Children”, centerfield of the baseball field where “bare ground showed through like a scar” stands for the emotional scars and emptiness felt by Yoshiya from growing up without a father (62). Baseball and the importance of the field to Yoshiya in that moment have several meanings but Murakami uses that one tangible thing to incapsulate all the multifaceted layers. Murakami also uses physical sensations as a way to elaborate on intangible ideas. In “All God’s Children Can Dance,” the story opens with the line “Yoshiya woke with the worst possible hangover.” (47) Immediately, the reader connects with the sensation the character Yoshiya is feeling physically. But, it becomes clear this physical feeling really represents the internal feelings of Yoshiya. This is similar to Komura’s “several failed attempts to have sex with Shimao” in “UFO in Kushiro” (20). His sudden impotence is a physical manifestation of his internal emptiness and mental distraction. All of the typical feelings associated with these physical sensations are still happening to the character, but they also hold double meanings as well that reflect emotional sensations. This technique gives the readers the ability to genuinely feel and better understand the emotional state of the characters. Murakami also uses duplicity to create a sense of instability.
He does this primarily by blurring the line between reality and fantastic. Often, the same tangible thing that stands for an intangible emotion, also suggests a magical interpretation. In “Landscape with Flatiron,” Miyake’s comment that “Premonitions can stand for something else sometimes. And the thing they stand for can be a lot more intense that reality,” invites the question of what he really means by premonitions (42). This first suggestion in “Landscape with Flatiron” of a possible element of magical realism shifts the readers perspective of the events and elements. In “UFO in Kushiro,” Komura has a sudden realization: “I was supposed to be holding this when I got off the plane. That’s how they were going to recognize me. How did they know who I was?” (11). This also suggest a sense of fantastic happening, but doesn’t confirm it. There are reasonable explanations but it invites the interpretation of something unrealistic happening as well. The line is so frequently blurred in After the Quake, that when Murakami does truly cross over into magical realism he blatantly states it. This is seen in “Superfrog Saves Tokyo”, where Frog tells Katagiri that he is “a product neither of metaphor nor allusion” (94). This blurring of reality can be seen as a form of duplicity itself. Things that are real stand in for things that are not, and vice versa. Constantly having to be alert to shifts in reality creates a sense of instability within the
stories. The weaving of duplicity throughout the story also conditions the reader to question. Murakami’s stories can only be understood when approached with an open mind. Each instance, each object, serves multiple specific purposes but it is the responsibility of the reader to question what those are. The more clear cut instances of duplicity are there to prepare the reader for how to look at all the other elements within the stories. In “UFO in Kushiro”, Shimao directly says to Komura that “the box contains the something that was inside you” (22). And even though she quickly counters with “just kidding”, the idea is still placed in the readers mind, encouraging the reader to look for instances of duplicity other than just the box in the place of a soul (23). It is also important to note that Murakami opens the collection with “UFO in Kushiro”, so having a clear instance of duplicity in that story gives the reader a guide for how to read and interpret the rest of the stories. Without doing this, a reader would run the risk of not interpreting further meaning behind the fire in “Landscape with Flatiron” or the baseball diamond in “All God’s Children Can Dance”. Understanding that nothing should be taken at face value is essential to understanding Murakami’s stories. This ‘nothing-at-face-value’ idea allows Murakami to show his readers a much deeper, more complex place within in his characters internal struggles than could normally be done within the space given in a short story. Objects for emotions, double meanings, a blurred line between reality and fantastic, are all tools to provide the depth required, in as few words as possible, to explore the big complex questions Murakami has his characters tackle. Murakami’s world, within After the Quake, is ruled by duplicity. But so is the real world. The only way to begin to tackle the ‘big questions’ in life, is to not take anything for face value, to question constantly, and to look to find the duplicity.
The author wrote this story in response to a magazine company, and eventually published it into a book. He used many styles and techniques to describe the life and death of McCandless. The mood throughout the novel constantly varies with the excitement of McCandless’s adventures and the emotions caused by his disappearance. Krakauer’s ability to engage multiple senses of a reader truly makes his novel special.
An important theme in Potiki is the enduring idea that creating and sharing stories as a central part of being human is important. It is a significant theme because the novel is heavily imbued with Maori culture, in which the stories and spoken teachings are given prominence, and also because it is a popular belief that people need narratives to give meaning, structure and value to their lives. This theme is displayed resolutely and poignantly in Potiki’s plot, characters, setting and symbolism, as the people of a small rural New Zealand community rediscover themselves through stories spoken and found in Maori carvings. The idea that humans need narratives is the core theme in Potiki, and it is used also to link other themes and aspects of the novel; it is in this way that we know the idea of storytelling is an intrinsic part of the novel’s structure.
On the night of April 18, 1906, the whole town was woken by erratic shaking. Although the earthquake lasted under a measly minute, it caused significant damage. Many fires started all throughout the city; San Francisco burned in turmoil.
...lly, however, he begins to fight back against this loss of identity and struggles to regain himself, realizing that “stealing memories was stealing time... forget the end of the world, I was ready to reclaim my whole self.” (Murakami, 239) As he sits back in his car and waits for his world to end he gives himself the tools to fight this loss of identity, telling himself t“Now I can reclaim all I’d lost. What’s lost never perishes.” (Murakami, 396) Although his identity has crumbled almost past recognition, the Narrator and the Dreamreader hold the key to retrieving it– memories and the unrelenting search for identity. Even though the identity of the Japanese culture has been undermined by globalization and internationalization, Murakami believes that it will be found again when the culture receives the proper stimulus– when they begin to read the dreams of unicorns.
Much about Kogawa's novel makes it difficult not only to read but also to classify or categorize. First, Obasan blurs the line between nonfiction and fiction. Kogawa draws from actual letters and newspaper accounts, autobiographical details, and historical facts throughout the novel, but she artistically incorporates this material into a clearly fictional work. In addition, Kogawa's narrative operates on multiple levels, from the individual and familial to the communal, national, political, and spiritual. Stylistically, the novel moves easily between the language of documentary reportage and a richly metaphorical language, and between straightforward narrative and stream-ofconsciousness exposition. This astonishing variety in Kogawa's novel can, at times, become bewildering and unsettling to the reader. But as many readers and critics have noted, Kogawa's style and method in Obasan also constitute the novel's unique strength. Kogawa writes in such a way that ambiguity, uncertainty, irony, and paradox do not weaken her story but instead paradoxically become the keys to understanding it.
The characters in Things Fall Apart are not black and white: they are flawed, redeemed, frustrated, assertive, violent, reasonable, and genuine. These traits are determined by perspective, and the a...
The complexity of the plot starts when the reader is introduced to a man lost in a cave and his source of light goes out and continues when the man realizes that “starving would prove [his] ultimate fate” (1). Readers get a sense of hopelessness the man is feeling, and this is where the tensions begins to build. Alt...
Hazards pose risk to everyone. Our acceptance of the risks associated with hazards dictates where and how we live. As humans, we accept a certain amount of risk when choosing to live our daily lives. From time to time, a hazard becomes an emergent situation. Tornadoes in the Midwest, hurricanes along the Gulf Coast or earthquakes in California are all hazards that residents in those regions accept and live with. This paper will examine one hazard that caused a disaster requiring a response from emergency management personnel. Specifically, the hazard more closely examined here is an earthquake. With the recent twenty year anniversary covered by many media outlets, the January 17, 1994, Northridge, California earthquake to date is the most expensive earthquake in American history.
The effects caused by earthquakes are devastating. They cause loss of human life and have effects on infrastructure and economy. Earthquakes can happen at any time anywhere. In January 12, 2010 an earthquake of a magnitude of 7.0 hit the nation of Haiti. An estimation of 316,000 people were killed, and more than 1.3 million Haitians were left homeless (Earthquake Information for 2010). Haiti was in a terrified chaos. After the earthquake, families were separated because many of the members were killed. Homes, schools, and hospitals were demolished. People lost their most valuable belongings. It will take time for the country to recover from this terrible disaster. The long damages are economic issues, health-state, and environmental issues that effect in the beautiful island of Haiti.
“The story employs a dramatic point of view that emphasizes the fragility of human relationships. It shows understanding and agreemen...
When trying to understand these particular characters’ experiences, it is very important to consider their worldviews, which promote “[th...
The conditions of the earthquake depicts an image of hell. The images of collapsing buildings and the chaos of destruction associates with the fires and chaos of hell. Jeronomo’s experience of the earthquake represents the earthquake as creating hell on earth by the amount of casualties. For example, “there the flame, flashing in clouds of smoke curled out, of every gable and drove him, terrified, into another street” (Kleist, 124). The image of flames and clouds of smoke in this piece relates to the image of the fires of hell in apocalyptic literature. The flames from the earthquake presents this sense of the end of the world. Jeronimo's experience of the obstacles of smoke and fire illustrates a common perception of fires association wi...
Beyond the shield of civilization and into the depths of a primitive, untamed frontier lies the true face of the human soul. It is in the midst of this savagery and unrelenting danger that mankind confronts the brooding nature of his inner self.
Arundhati Roy’s novel, titled The God of Small Things, can be deemed as what Roy would describe as a “great story,” one in which does not “deceive you with thrills and trick endings,” where “you know how they end, yet you listen as though they don’t”(Roy 218). Though this definition of a “great story” is true, it fails to include that every “great story” should feature a learning opportunity for the reader. In The God of Small Things, the trauma of Sophie Mol’s death is hinted at throughout the novel, and finally introduced at the end. It can be seen, by examining Elizabeth Outka’s article titled Trauma and Temporal Hybridity in Arundhati Roy’s The God of Small Things and Sarah Winter’s article titled Disembodied Liberalism, Embodied Human Rights, that Roy structures her novel in a way that educates the audience on the effects of trauma by recreating the memories that Estha and Rahel possess and placing them into the book. By describing the memories in the way that the twins remember the event, Roy invites the reader to experience the trauma of Sophie Mol’s death as though they were living through the trauma.
It was a beautiful day like any other with the clear blue sky and the