Buy this book from Amazon.comIt was Sunday evening when the TV People showed up.
My first exposure to the works of Haruki Murakami came from a collection of Japanese short fiction I’d found on the “to be returned” shelf at the main branch of the Free Library of Philadelphia. The collection was called Monkey Brain Sushi, and they were pretty much all dull, save for one…
The season, spring. At least, I think it was spring. In any case, it wasn’t particularly hot as seasons go, not particularly chilly.
To be honest, the season’s not so important. What matters is that it’s a Sunday evening.
“TV People” is classic Murakami, a slow, controlled decent into surrealism, where a perfectly ordinary situation is thrown deeper and deeper into absurdity and surrealitly. Murakami’s most famous novel, The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, works in a similar way. A man searching for a lost cat suddenly finds himself in a bizarre underworld where his brother-in-law exerts psychological control over others.[1] “TV People,” by it’s form, is a much quicker decent, but just as controlled. Only Murakami could have a character talk about Sunday evenings devolve into written sound descriptions: “KRRSPUMK DUWB KRRSPUMK DUWB KRRSPUMK DUWB,” in four paragraphs.
Murakami loves to leave the reader guessing. A number of moments occur where the reader has to question the narrator’s own account of the events, such as the TV People entering a meeting room with a Sony TV, and walking back out without being noticed. The narrator is afraid to even broach the subject with his co-workers. His wife doesn’t notice the TV placed in their living room, knocking magazines and bric-a-brac out of place. The reader can never be sure of just what’s fact and fantasy, which the narrator shares in the climax, watching the TV People on his television, putting together an “airplane.”
In stories like this, Murakami can leave the reader stifled, gasping for air, some connection with reality, as they fall deeper into his well[2]. The important thing is to relax, and let him guide you where he wants to take you. You won’t be abandoned, but you’ll certainly need some time to think about what’s happened to you. The ultimate strength of Murakami’s works lies in his ability to ferry the reader, safely, through dark, strange, and fantastic situations without leaving you utterly lost. The reader cannot explain, but they do not feel as if someone’s played a trick on them. If you need to start reading Murakami, and everyone does, The Elephant Vanishes is a great starting place; not just for “TV People.”