Since his novel “Norwegian Wood,” Haruki Murakami’s novels and short stories have been written for the youthful at heart. His brand of magical realism follows loner-like protagonists on archetypal journeys of self-discovery through modern dive bars, Beatles songs, talking cats and seedy hotels.
Murakami has never confined himself to the limitations of reality. His latest novel, “After Dark,” is cinematic in scope but returns to the subject matter of “Norwegian Wood”: Young adults who find themselves, even if they’re too depressed at the time to realize it.
The first sentence of the novel, “Eyes mark the shape of the city,” immediately shows the book’s perspective that people define their own experience.
Murakami knows that kids these days don’t see themselves in terms of novels; they see themselves in terms of film. That’s why much of “After Dark” reads like a screenplay. The beginnings of chapters are written in the second person with Murakami introducing settings just as a screenwriter creates scenes.
In “After Dark” the main characters are Mari, a depressed but intelligent 19-year-old girl who wanders the streets of Tokyo at night; a young trombonist who plays mediocre jazz in a building basement; a female wrestler turned brothel matron; and a nocturnal computer programmer with spells of abusive anger.
In the novel the only lights illuminating the scenes are artificial, phosphorescent and uncomfortably bright. The characters are nocturnal creatures all haphazardly on some journey they can’t comfortably navigate. They are like damaged goods incapable of putting their best face forward, so they wander at night in search of some idiosyncratic experience that will give them meaning.
Godard’s “Alphaville” is the film most referenced in the novel, and it is appropriate. “Alphaville” depicts a futuristic city at night, lit only by neon signs, where strangers divulge their secrets in terse sentences brimming with meaning and nobody works a 9-to-5 job.
The metaphors in the text revolve around the idea of looking without seeing. When trombonist Takahashi looks at Mari as she’s speaking, the lines of her face crinkle in motion. Murakami narrates, “He could be looking at ripples spreading on the surface of a small pond.”
Murakami slowly peels away at Mari’s personality. This is a college student who feels so alienated from herself she seeks refuge in a Denny’s with a pack of cigarettes, a textbook-sized novel and a half-eaten sandwich at 1 in the morning.
Mari is a girl who is struggling to accept that she will never have a role model and that she will simply have to keep guiding herself.
It’s a slightly predictable theme, but it makes a whole lot of sense.
““ Natalie Edwards
E-mail Edwards at nedwards@media.ucla.edu.