After Dark (novel)
 First edition (Japanese) | |
| Author | Haruki Murakami |
|---|---|
| Original title | アフターダーク Afutā Dāku |
| Translator | Jay Rubin |
| Language | Japanese |
| Publisher | Kodansha (Japan) Harvill Press (UK) Alfred A. Knopf (US) |
Publication date | 2004 |
| Publication place | Japan |
Published in English | May 2007 |
| Media type | Print (Hardcover) |
| Pages | 208 |
| ISBN | 0-307-26583-8 (US) 1-84655-047-5 (UK) |
| OCLC | 81861840 |
After Dark (アフターダーク, Afutā Dāku) is a 2004 novel by Japanese author Haruki Murakami.[1]
Plot summary
[edit]Set in metropolitan Tokyo over the course of one night, characters include Mari Asai, a 19-year-old student, who is spending the night reading in a Denny's. There she meets Takahashi Tetsuya, a trombone-playing student who loves the rendition of Benny Golson's composition "Five Spot After Dark" that appears on jazz trombonist Curtis Fuller's album Blues-ette. Takahashi was once interested in Mari's sister Eri, and insists that the three of them have hung out before. Meanwhile, Eri has been in a strange deep sleep for over two months.
Mari crosses paths with a retired female wrestler, Kaoru, now working as a manager in a love hotel called "Alphaville". Kaoru needs Mari to talk to a Chinese prostitute who had just been beaten in the love hotel by an office worker, Shirakawa. The group then tries to track down Shirakawa, and includes the Chinese Mafia group that 'owns' the prostitute.
In the love hotel Mari also hears stories from some of the staff working there and takes a glance at the other world hidden below the one we are aware of.
Parts of the story take place in a world between reality and dream, and each chapter begins with an image of a clock depicting the passage of time throughout the night.
Characters
[edit]- Mari Asai, a 19-year-old student learning Chinese philology. As a child she went to a school for Chinese children. Mari is reserved when talking to strangers, but is keen on "making everything right".
- Tetsuya Takahashi, a trombone-playing student who wants to stop practising music and start learning law. He is optimistic and wants to live a humble life.
- Kaoru, a retired female wrestler now working as a manager in the love hotel, "Alphaville". She is trustworthy, honest and always seeking justice.
- Shirakawa, an office worker who beat a Chinese prostitute in "Alphaville".
Reception
[edit]Walter Kirn, for The New York Times, lauded Murakami's ability to take a birds-eye view of his nightly world: "Standing sentry above the common gloom, Murakami detects phosphorescence everywhere, but chiefly in the auras around people, which glow brightest at night and when combined but fade at dawn, when we go our separate ways."[2]
Steven Poole, in The Guardian, appreciated the book's style: "After Dark is perhaps the closest Murakami has yet come to composing a pure tone-poem ... Exposition is set to the minimum, while the mood-colouring is virtuosic."[3]
References
[edit]- ^ The New York Times review
- ^ Kirn, Walter (2007-06-03). "In the Wee Small Hours". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2024-07-29.
- ^ Poole, Steven (2007-06-09). "Night of the living dead". The Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077. Retrieved 2024-07-29.
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