Haruki Murakami

Tengo could hardly believe it-- that in this frantic, labyrinth-like world, two people's hearts-- a boy's and a girl's-- could be connected, unchanged, even though they hadn't seen each other for twenty years.

If you think about it, an unfair society is a society that makes it possible for you to exploit your abilities to the limit.

If I have left a wound inside you, it is not just your wound but mine as well.

You can’t look too far ahead. Do that and you’ll lose sight of what you’re doing and stumble. I’m not saying you should focus solely on the details right in front of you, mind you. You’ve got to look ahead a bit or else you’ll bump into something. You’ve got to conform to the proper order and at the same time keep an eye out for what’s ahead. That’s critical, no matter what you’re doing.

He appeared before me and departed. We were not able to speak to or touch each other. But in that short interval, he transformed many things inside me. He literally stirred my mind and body the way a spoon stirs a cup of cocoa, down to the depths of my internal organs and my womb.

sometimes I think I've got this hard kernel in my heart, and nothing much can get inside it. I doubt if I can really love anybody.

Everybody feels safe belonging not to the excluded minority but to the excluding majority. You think, Oh, I’m glad that’s not me. It’s basically the same in all periods in all societies. If you belong to the majority, you can avoid thinking about lots of troubling things.

As I see it, you are living with something that you keep hidden deep inside. Something heavy. I felt it from the first time I met you. You have a strong gaze, as if you have made up your mind about something. To tell you the truth, I myself carry such things around inside. Heavy things. That is how I can see it in you.

Reality was utterly coolheaded and utterly lonely.

You can keep as quiet as you like, but one of these days somebody is going to find you.

This place is too calm, too natural--too complete. I don't deserve it. At least not yet.

We were young, and we had no need for prophecies. Just living was itself an act of prophecy.

When you fall in love, the natural thing to do is give yourself to it.

I don't want our relationship to end like this. You're one of the very few friends I have, and it hurts not being able to see you. When am I going to be able to talk to you? I want you to tell me that much, at least.

My father always told me: 'Give somebody a hand and he'll take an arm.

ice contains no future , just the past, sealed away. As if they're alive, everything in the world is sealed up inside, clear and distinct. Ice can preserve all kinds of things that way- cleanly, clearly. That's the essence of ice, the role it plays.

Time really is one big continuous cloth, no? We habitually cut out pieces of time to fit us, so we tend to fool ourselves into thinking that time is our size, but it really goes on and on.

No matter where i go, i still end up me. What's missing never changes. The scenery may change, but i'm still the same incomplete person. The same missing elements torture me with a hunger that i can never satisfy. I think that lack itself is as close as i'll come to defining myself.

I began to draw an invisible boundary between myself and other people. No matter who I was dealing with. I maintained a set distance, carefully monitoring the person’s attitude so that they wouldn’t get any closer. I didn’t easily swallow what other people told me. My only passions were books and music

This may be the most important proposition revealed by history: At the time, no one knew what was coming.

One listless day followed another, with nothing to distinguish one from the next. You could have changed the order and no one would have noticed.