As a Japanese, why can Haruki Murakami write a country story with China characteristics?

Haruki Murakami's new book "Assassination of Knight Leader" sells like hot cakes these days. According to the editor of translation agency, this novel has been sold almost every two seconds since it was put on the shelves, and the number of the first print is 350,000 without any pressure. It seems that Haruki Murakami is the only novelist who can make such amazing sales.

The reason why Haruki Murakami's novel can become a literary phenomenon has a lot to do with the charm of this bestseller. It is no exaggeration to say that Murakami has defined bestsellers. Most bestsellers are short-lived and have great opportunities, especially those writers who are pure literature. Enough for them to write bestsellers for life. But Murakami is different. Almost all his novels are bestsellers, and Murakami's writing, like his long-distance running, has never stopped for more than 30 years. His novels meet the emotional needs of countless young artists and the middle class. His storytelling techniques are novel and changeable, and he shuttles freely between realism and magic. The middle-class life he admired was dull but not boring, exquisite but not vulgar. Although there are always moments of emotional breakdown in novels, people can always find the direction of life at critical moments and rejoin the normal life. This is probably the greatest charm of his novels.

The popularity of The Assassination of Knight Leader in China is probably related to a period of history. An important figure in the novel is the famous painter Tian Yu Juyan. It was he who created the painting "Assassination of Knight Leader", which made our protagonist stumble upon and triggered a series of suspense and grotesque stories. When Tian Yu You was studying in Vienna, it was the time when Hitler planned to annex Austria. Tian Yu Youyan is a witness of that history. He participated in the assassination of senior Nazi officials. After the action was exposed, he was sent back to China and his Jewish girlfriend was sent to a concentration camp. At this time, his younger brother Tian Yu Ji Yan, a college student studying music, was recruited and sent to China to participate in and witness the Nanjing Massacre. After the war, Tian Yu Ji Yan was deeply stimulated by the war trauma and committed suicide by cutting his wrist. Tian Yu Juyan, who deeply loved his younger brother, suffered a double blow and began to concentrate on the painting "Assassination of Knight Leader". Through this painting, his resentment of history and his dislike of war maniacs were vented.

It is hard for China readers not to notice the history of the Nanjing Massacre written by Murakami in his novels. When Murakami published a new book in Japan, he was attacked by many people because he wrote this history in the novel. Although novelists pursue fictional brushwork, it does not mean that they can tamper with history at will. A novelist's respect for history reflects what values he pursues.

Murakami made no secret of this history in his novels. "The Japanese army occupied the downtown area of Nanjing after fierce fighting, and killed many people there ... As for the exact death toll, historians also argued about the details, but in any case, it is hard to deny that countless citizens died in the battle. Some people say that the death toll in China is 400,000, while others say it is100,000. However, what is the difference between 400,000 people and100,000 people? " At the back of the novel, Tian Yu Ji Yan's suicide note also recorded the murder scene in detail. "The superior officer handed a Japanese knife and ordered to cut off the captive's head. Although he is a prisoner, he is not wearing a military uniform or carrying a weapon. He is very old. I said I'm not a soldier. Is to arrest men in that area, tie them up and kill them. "

In The Assassination of Knight Leader, the history of the Nanjing Massacre is not the key point, but Murakami just wants to use this history as the background of this painting, which leads us to discuss the intertextuality between painting and history. However, it is such a little narrative that has caused an uproar. Our sensitivity to history is shown through a fictional work.

Murakami's practice in the novel reminds me of another Nobel Prize-winning writer Pamuk. In an interview with the media in Switzerland in 2005, Pamuk said that/kloc-0.0 million Armenians and 30,000 Kurds were killed in Turkey. When this remark came out, public opinion was in an uproar. Turkish ultra-nationalists invoked the newly promulgated criminal law to take Pamuk to court for "insulting Turkish national character". It is said that according to this law, the defendant can be sentenced to a maximum of three years in prison. In the end, the case was convicted by the Istanbul Civil Court, and Pamuk had to pay 1 1,000 Turkish new lira (about RMB 42 17 yuan) to each of the six plaintiffs for his remarks about killing Armenians and Kurds in Turkey.

When analyzing this incident, Pamuk said that a novelist's political views have nothing to do with the society, political parties and groups to which he belongs. "The novelist's political views come from his imagination and his ability to imagine himself as others. This ability enabled him to explore the truth about human beings that no one had noticed before. This makes him a spokesperson for those who cannot express their interests, are angry and incomprehensible, and their voices are suppressed. " By the same token, Haruki Murakami, as a Japanese novelist, is probably not a responsible novelist if he ignores this history or is vague about it. This is probably one reason why Haruki Murakami is liked by many readers in China.