Murakami Haruki
Biography
- Murakami, Haruki (1949)
- Born: 12 January 1949, Kyoto
- Graduated from Waseda University
- Additional career: Translator (English literature to Japanese)
- Awards: Franz Kafka Prize for his novel Umibe no Kafka (Kafka on the Shore)
Most important works
- 1982 A Wild Sheep Chase
- 1985 Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World
- 1987 Norwegian Wood
- 1988 Dance Dance Dance
- 1992 South of the Border, West of the Sun
- 1992-1995 The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle
- 1997 Underground (non fiction)
- 1999 Sputnik Sweetheart
- 2002 Kafka on the Shore
- 2006 Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman (Collection of Murakami's short stories)
Here is a list of his novels (the years are the time of Japanese edition's publication)
- 1979 Hear the Wind Sing
- 1980 Pinball, 1973
- 1982 A Wild Sheep Chase
- 1985 Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World
- 1987 Norwegian Wood
- 1988 Dance Dance Dance
- 1992 South of the Border, West of the Sun
- 1992-1995 The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle
- 1997 Underground (non fiction)
- 1998 The Place That Was Promised (Sequel to Underground) (non fiction)
- 1999 Sputnik Sweetheard
- 2002 Kafka on the Shore
- 2004 After Dark (English version due to 2007)
- 2006 Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman (Collection of Murakami's short stories)
Modern fiction
From the 1960s onward, writers have sought to synthesize various approaches to fiction or to experiment with new modes of representation.
Oe Kenzaburo
Oe Kenzaburo, who received the Nobel Prize for literature in 1994, has been a prodigiously inventive force in contemporary fiction, continuously experimenting with form and mode of presentation in dealing with both political and personal issues in such novels as Kojinteki na taiken (1964; tr A Personal Matter, 1968) and Man'en gannen no futtoboru (1967; tr The Silent Cry, 1974).
Kono Taeko
Kono Taeko has examined the repressed psychology of women in Fui no koe (1968, Sudden Voice) and other works, while Tsushima Yuko, the daughter of Dazai Osamu, has explored the lives of women who are single parents in Choji (1978; tr Child of Fortune, 1983).
Murakami Ryu
Finally, the generation raised on the international culture of the last decades has found its voice in writers such as Murakami Ryu, author of Kagirinaku tomei ni chikai burn (1976; Almost Transparent Blue), and Murakami Haruki, whose Noruue no mori (1987; Norwegian Wood) sold more than three million copies.
Yoshimoto Banana
Yoshimoto Banana, who was born in 1964, portrays the lives of people in desperately isolated situations in Kitchin (1987; Kitchen).
young readers
These writers have been immensely popular with young readers both in Japan and abroad.
バイリンガル日本事典 p.274~275
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