The Elephant Vanishes

Published in 1993, this collection of short stories encapsulates most of Murakami’s classic writing tropes and favourite recurring themes. Like many anthologies, some of the stories felt a little slow and were an effort to finish, whereas others read like a cool beer on a hot afternoon. Overall I did really enjoy the collection, but it wouldn’t make the favourites list by this prolific author.

In too-perfect summation of the overall oeuvre of the book, this quote from TV People really says it all -

Cause has effect by the tail and is about to swallow it whole. I get up and go to the kitchen. I open the refrigerator, take a deep breath, reach for a can of beer, and go back to the sofa.

It seems that Murakami is a bit of a marmite writer (you either love him or you hate him), and in-betweeners tend to get frustrated with his total disregard for reality or his tendency to head in a vaguely erotic direction with as much apathy as possible. However for me, Murakami’s talent to add unreality to the most mundane scenarios has always been his biggest appeal. I loved Hard-Boiled Wonderland and Killing Commendatore, two novels where the reader really has time to invest in the meandering revelation of odd character developments and the simple pleasures easily overlooked in contemporary Japanese living. Squeezing the same formula into seventeen short stories was moderately successful (for the most part).

There is a delightful recurrence of objects, character traits and themes throughout the collection - classic vinyls, early morning coffee with a ham sandwich, sunday afternoons, beer, kid sisters, hamburgers, unfulfilled men, long stretches of time, unabashed sex, curious incidents unnoticed by others. He has a tendency to eroticise women in a way that - after reading a couple of his books - gets a little boring and two-dimensional. However, he also has a fantastic ability to take something as ordinary as mowing a lawn, and throw on a layer of gold dust that makes reading about it both tangible and incredibly satisfying.

“From the dance hall, yellow light spilled out onto its immediate surroundings like so much pollen, and one of the orchestras was playing a jump tune. The wind was soft, and the moonlight seemed to drench her hair.”

My least favourite story is the first one, which is unfortunate. The Wind-Up Bird and Tuesday’s Women features a self-absorbed almost-lawyer whose cat goes missing. He spends an afternoon looking for it, hangs out with a bikini-clad 15 year old girl, then goes home to his wife who is also the breadwinner. I didn’t like the characters and nothing particularly interesting happened. It felt like Murakami was dipping his toe into the fictional world of The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, a full length novel that he released the following year, and which was really very good.

My favourite stories were Sleep - because the ending was unexpected, the female characterisation believable and there was a strong literary theme which I’m always keen for. The Dancing Dwarf because it’s set in a strange sort-of dystopian world with a dark twist, and follows exactly the kind of completely bizarre plot line only Murakami could come up with. Finally, I loved The Last Lawn of the Afternoon, for exactly the opposite reasons. It’s melancholy and contemplative, sunny and warm with room for creaky floorboards and freshly mown grass. Each story is different, and though they share themes and references, they vary in style. I would recommend that if you do pick it up, stick with the whole thing - if you don’t like one one story, you may find yourself resonating with another.