Novelist as a Vocation by Haruki Murakami
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
I found “Novelist as a Vocation” by Haruki Murakami encouraging and honest. I’ve read several books on writing fiction by famous authors, and Stephen King’s excellent “On Writing” was my favorite before reading this.
Jonathan Franzen once commented that when people ask him about his writing process, what they’re really asking is “Am I normal?” And of course there’s no normal way to write a novel. It’s a weird activity. You do whatever works for you.
Murakami’s book cured me of my remaining pretensions as an author. He believes that anyone can write a novel if they just stick with it, and I would agree. It doesn’t require training, beyond reading lots of novels. To his thinking, they don’t even need to be good novels. The trashy sci-fi and adventure books he bought as a young man (in English, at used bookstore near a US Navy base) were just as educational as the classics, for him.
I know it’s a form of vanity, but I can’t help but think we’d be friends (though maybe not, as he doesn’t hang out with other writers). We’ve had similar educational experiences, lack of personal focus, and love of jazz (specifically Art Blakey). He says that he’s lazy about most things but works hard at things he cares about, and I would say that’s me, too. I think we’ve also developed similar attitudes about the purpose of writing (it’s supposed to be fun) and our duty to our readers (we hope there are some people who like our stuff, but we’re not adjusting what we write to appeal to anyone). We’ve even had similar experiments with first- and third-person writing.
Who is this book for? I’d say it’s for him, the same audience for his fiction.
The audiobook is read by Japanese actor Kotaro Watanabe, whose accent and style give the essays an authentic feel. I appreciate that. I typically buy the Kindle ebook and Audible audiobook together, as there’s a discount. The files synchronize, so after listening to a chapter on my phone during a walk, when I open the ebook it jumps to where the audiobook left off.
I recommend this book for any author who’s feeling inadequate (which I think is most of us). Murakami will cure you of that.
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