Haruki Murakami

Japanese writer (born 1949)

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Born 1949 · age 77Japan

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Wikipedia
97 languages
Cross-language footprint
Age
77
Born 1949
Awards
20
recognised works

Summary

Updated 2026-08-17

He ran a jazz bar for seven years before publishing his first novel, then built a body of work that's been translated into 50 languages and sold millions of copies while dividing critics and readers in roughly equal measure.

Biography

About

Haruki Murakami grew up in Ashiya, near Kobe, moved to Tokyo for Waseda University, and published Hear the Wind Sing in 1979 after spending seven years owning a small jazz bar. Norwegian Wood arrived in 1987, followed by The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle in the mid-nineties, Kafka on the Shore in 2002, and 1Q84 in 2009–10 — the last ranked by the Asahi Shimbun as the best work of Japan's Heisei era. His fiction moves through science fiction, fantasy, crime, and magical realism, drawing on inspirations like Raymond Chandler and Kurt Vonnegut, while his non-fiction includes Underground, an oral history…

Voice

In their own words

Sourced, dated quotes from Haruki Murakami

Haruki Murakami

said1999

Why do people have to be this lonely? What's the point of it all?

— Sputnik Sweetheart (1999)

Haruki Murakami

said1999

You are a beautiful person, Doctor. Clearheaded. Strong. But you seem always to be dragging your heart along the ground.

— "Thailand", from After the Quake (1999)

Haruki Murakami

said1993

You burn barns. I don't burn barns.

— "Barn Burning"(short story) in The Elephant Vanishes (1993)

Haruki Murakami

said1992

But I didn't understand then. That I could hurt somebody so badly she would never recover. That a person can, just by living, damage another human being beyond repair.

— South of the Border, West of the Sun (1992)

Haruki Murakami

said1988