Kafka en la Orilla – Haruki Murakami

Casi todos los libros que he escrito en este blog son de este autor; Haruki Murakami. Por un tiempo creí que había encontrado a alguien a quién llamar «mi favorito» pero después de leer Kafka en la orilla puedo decir que aunque seguiré leyendo a Murakami porque sí me gusta, no puedo llamarlo mi favorito. Los últimos dos libros que he leído de él me han costado demasiado terminarlos y meterme en ellos. Éste en especial.

Kafka en la Orilla puede llegar a ser tedioso, al principio sí me atrapó y quería seguir leyendo para responder preguntas que al final no logras responder por completo. Pero llega un momento en el que leía y leía y no le encontraba ni pies ni cabeza. Kafta en la Orilla te invita a pasar a un mundo surreal y en el que los protagonistas pareciera que viven en mundos paralelos, todos tratando de abrir y cerrar puertas. Tal vez lo que se debe de hacer al leer un libro como éste es, seguir leyendo y -como dijo Hoshino, personaje de la novela- ver que «Es una pérdida de tiempo intentar encontrarle un sentido a las cosas que no lo tienen.» Cuando uno lee a Murakami debe de estar consciente que un mundo onírico siempre puede llegar a ser real o, al menos, intercalarse.

Me gustaron sus personajes, creo que eso es algo que más me gusta de Murakami, su manera de crear personas amenas a uno. Personas con las que por más distintas que sean a ti, logras identificarte con ellos.

Aquí algunas de las -pocas- frases que marqué en mi libro (están en inglés):

You are going to have ti get a lot tougher if you want to make it.

Things you never could imagine.

Sometimes fates is like a small sandstorm that keeps changing directions.

The facts and techniques or whatever they tech you in class isn’t going to be very useful in the real world.

I felt utterly alone, like I was the last person alive on Earth. I can’t describe that feeling of total loneliness. I just wanted to disappear into thin air and not think about anything.

For all I know maybe she’s not so wild about her own looks, but she seems comfortable with who she is, and that’s the important thing.

In traveling, a companion, in life, compassion.

That chance encounters are what keep us going.

We’re coming from somewhere, heading somewhere else.

Even chance meetings… are the result of karma.

That thing in life are fated by our previous lives. That even in the smallest events there’s no such thing as coincidence.

Like the clouds floating across the sky, I’m all by myself, totally free.

I’ve got to bend some rules myself if I want to survive.

Solitude comes in different varieties.

I yank off my headphones and listen. I discover, is something you can actually hear.

Closing your eyes isn’t going to change anything. Nothing’s going to disappear just because you can’t see what’s going on.

Just a few steps is all it takes for everything associated with it to lose all sense of reality.

It felt pretty good to be walking around wherever he wanted in a place he’d never been before.

People are born in order to live, right? But the longer I’ve lived, the more I’ve lost what’s inside me- and ended up empty.

I don’t know what to do anymore. I don’t even know what direction I’m facing in. What’s right, what’s wrong – whether I should keep on going ahead or turn around. I’m totally lost.

Pointless thinking is worse than no thinking at all.

I’m not afraid anymore. That’s why I  chose to be totally defenseless.

I don’t know what it means to live.

Don’t forget what I told you about bayonets… when you stab the enemy, you’ve got to twist and slash, to cut his guts open. Otherwise he’ll do it to you. That’s the way the world is outside.

Fate is one strange thing, man.

I’m the one who chose this path, and I’ve got to see it through to the end.

People are mostly a product of where they were born and raised.

The world is a metaphor.

I want you to remember me… if you remember me, then I don’t care if anyone else forgets.

But I still don’t know anything about life.

You finally fall asleep. And when you wake up, it’s true. You are part of a brand-new world.