Return to What One Imagines to Be There: Masculinity and Racial Otherness in Haruki Murakami's Writings about China

Novel: A Forum on Fiction, Summer 2004 by Lo, Kwai-Cheung

Murakami's shift to Japan's historical reality in his writing is undoubtedly related to the rediscovery as well as reconstruction of the masculine national self. But is the "irrational violence" an expression of masculinity rooted in imperialist Japan? Does China rigidly designate the inerasable memories of the Japanese empire to the postwar democratic nation-state? In Murakami's view, an imperialist capitalist country that has developed into a so-called democratic state could never easily get rid of its own apparition. Japan's violent history is still alive inside Tôru Okada, the protagonist of The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, although he is a very apolitical person and is uninterested in history. Murakami expresses his fear that the end of imperialism does not necessarily reduce the level of violence. Rather, Japan could still be haunted by the return of barbarism. No matter how strongly he abhors Japaneseness and how hard he strives to avoid it in his early writings, Murakami is aware that he is still part of that culture. The shadow of the Nomonhan battle has never vanished and it continues to haunt Japan-just as his father's past will not let go of Murakami-even though Japanese modernity may suggest that the nation has already crossed the threshold and become an open, democratic country, and even though Murakami's work has successfully left the traditional Japanese world behind and merged itself into the global literature. However, the trip to China and the visit to the Nomonhan battlefield enable Murakami to experience for himself the horror to which the postwar "peace-loving" Japan is still vulnerable.16

In his description of the trip, the realities in China are always far more extreme than anything he can imagine. Confronting the unimaginable and inscrutable things in the somewhat "pre-modern," un-Westernized China, Murakami finds himself powerless and even a bit emasculated. Unlike other challenging trips that somehow heighten Murakami's sense of manliness, the Chinese otherness he comes across in the journey seems to subdue his masculine energy. He is hurt when dust gets into his eyes on a Chinese train; he is glared at and scolded by a middle-aged Chinese woman doctor when he is treated in the hospital; and he is scared by the size of the tiger cub when he has his picture taken with it at the Chinese zoo. All these incidents belie the "tough guy" image he has presented in many of his travel writings. The "emasculation" at the beginning of the journey provides the perfect background for his encounter with the cruel machismo of the abandoned battlefield. The closer he travels to the Mongolian plain, the stronger his depictions of toughness and aggressiveness in the hot temper of the local residents and in the rough landscape of the place. However, the re-emergence of the coarse masculinity of the battlefield could be very intimidating if the meaning of manliness is based on aggression and violence. He witnesses the increasingly violent behaviors of the inhabitants in northeast China and Mongolia. The experiences make him more aware of the violent instincts in his blood and in the Japanese culture to which he belongs. But the travel also temporarily releases him from being an integral part of that masculine culture. He chooses to place himself in a more vulnerable position so that he can maintain a reflective distance from the masculine violence. Nevertheless, the objective distance ultimately falls apart.