Haruki Murakami, 1Q84

This passage is adapted from Haruki Murakami, 1Q84.

©2009 by Haruki Murakami. Translation by Jay Rubin and 

Philip Gabriel. ©2011 by Haruki Murakami. Tengo, a writer, 

has just completed a project of editing another author’s 

book, Air Chrysalis, for his publisher Komatsu.

Tengo had spent ten days reworking Air Chrysalis

before handing it over to Komatsu as a newly 

finished work, following which he was visited by a 

string of calm, tranquil days. He taught three days a 

week. The rest of his time he spent doing housework, 

taking walks, and writing his own novel. April passed 

like this. The cherry blossoms scattered, new buds 

appeared on the trees, the magnolias reached full 

bloom, and the seasons moved along in stages. The 

days flowed by smoothly, regularly, uneventfully. 

This was the life that Tengo most wanted, each week 

linking automatically and seamlessly with the next.

Amid all the sameness, however, one change 

became evident. A good change. Tengo was aware 

that, as he went on writing his novel, a new 

wellspring was forming inside him. Not that its water 

was gushing forth: it was more like a tiny spring 

among the rocks. The flow may have been limited, 

but it was continuous, welling up drop by drop. He 

was in no hurry. He felt no pressure. All he had to do 

was wait patiently for the water to collect in the rocky 

basin until he could scoop it up. Then he would sit at 

his desk, turning what he had scooped into words, 

and the story would advance quite naturally.

The concentrated work of rewriting Air Chrysalis

might have dislodged a rock that had been blocking 

his wellspring until now. Tengo had no idea why that 

should be so, but he had a definite sense that a heavy 

lid had finally come off. He felt as though his body 

had become lighter, that he had emerged from a 

cramped space and could now stretch his arms and 

legs freely. Air Chrysalis had probably stimulated 

something that had been deep inside him all along.

Tengo sensed, too, that something very like desire 

was growing inside him. This was the first time in his 

life he had ever experienced such a feeling. All 

through high school and college, his judo coach and 

older teammates would often say to him, “You have 

the talent and the strength, and you practice enough, 

but you just don’t have the desire.” They were 

probably right. He lacked that drive to win at all 

costs, which is why he would often make it to the 

semifinals and the finals but lose the all-important 

championship match. He exhibited these tendencies 

in everything, not just judo. He was more placid than 

determined. It was the same with his fiction. He 

could write with some style and make up reasonably 

interesting stories, but his work lacked the strength

to grab the reader by the throat. Something was 

missing. And so he would always make it to the short 

list but never take the new writers’ prize, as Komatsu 

had said.

After he finished rewriting Air Chrysalis, however, 

Tengo was truly chagrined for the first time in his 

life. While engaged in the rewrite, he had been totally 

absorbed in the process, moving his hands without 

thinking. Once he had completed the work and

handed it to Komatsu, however, Tengo was assaulted 

by a profound sense of powerlessness. Once the 

powerlessness began to abate, a kind of rage surged 

up from deep inside him. The rage was directed at 

Tengo himself. I used another person’s story to create 

a rewrite that amounts to a literary fraud, and I did it 

with far more passion than I bring to my own work. 

Isn’t a writer someone who finds the story hidden 

inside and uses the proper words to express it? Aren’t 

you ashamed of yourself? You should be able to write 

something as good as Air Chrysalis if you make up 

your mind to do it. Isn’t that true?

But he had to prove it to himself.

Tengo decided to discard the manuscript he had 

written thus far and start a brand-new story from 

scratch. He closed his eyes and, for a long time, 

listened closely to the dripping of the little spring 

inside him. Eventually the words began to come 

naturally to him. Little by little, taking all the time he 

needed, he began to form them into sentences.