Literature in Translation Essay The Windup Bird Chronicle - Literature Essay Samples

Haruki Murakami, Japanese author of The Wind Up Bird Chronicles, has many characters who all have influential aspects on the protagonist Toru Okada. But one particular character, May Kasahara, is one minor character who has a critical effect on the unfolding of the protagonist throughout his journey. This enigmatic character is unknown and although she takes part in helping Toru find himself, a part of May being the one to aid him, is because she needed to find herself as well. Although May Kasahara has major influence on Toru’s life, Toru indirectly has more of a major influence in May’s life. Toru and May Kasaharas first encounter with each other was very strange. As Toru was searching for his cat, she arrives and begins asking question after question. During their first encounter, they did not catch each others names, yet they sat down together and waited for Noboru Wataya, the cat, talking as if they have already known each other before. Murakami makes that connection between the two character’s and right from the start he creates a close bond with the characters within this scene. As they sit, May begins wandering off, rambling about the most strangest things; however, the reader may notice that this is a genuine part of her personality as one continues reading the novel, she genuinely talks about a lot of off topic things at once. Surprisingly, the passive character Toru is, he was not at all bothered by her rambling and yet sat there and listened to this stranger ask him about whether he would marry a woman with 6 fingers or 4 breast. From the start, readers a re introduced to this enigmatic, weird, and strange character who Toru immediately is connected to. Murakami does this to foreshadow their relationship through the rest of the novel. Their first encounter was also a very strange encounter. As they sit down together, she convinces him to close his eyes as she talks about countless things. However, it was very strange because she felt comfortable around this stranger to talk about death, touch him, and even whisper in his ear. Why was she whispering in his ear? May had began to talk about the feeling of dying and as she is doing this, she is holding Toru’s wrist and whispering to him. It seems as if she was doing hypnosis on him. She puts her finger on his wrist and draws symbols. May Kasahara may have been the start of Toru having the tendency to go into deep thinking about situations. When they were sitting together, she told him to keep his eyes shut and listen to her talk. As she talks, she says she thinks very deeply about things. â€Å"When you dont have anything to, your thoughts get really far out- so far out you cant follow them all the way to the end† (21)What does this mean? This statement is very significant because as Toru goes through his journey, Toru’s thoughts become deeper and deeper to the point where he is in a world of magical realism; he has never experienced any of this before until after he meets May Kasahara. May Kasahara is significant because she immediately question Toru’s passive nature and immediately has him taking a turn on his passive nature, immediately starting his journey to find himself. She asks Toru on whether he has â€Å"guts.† Before, Toru was a guy who â€Å"goes with the flow† he could not recall anytime where he had â€Å"guts†. One may notice that after that talk about â€Å"guts and curiosity†, Toru begins to, slowly but surely, gain guts through his curiosity. â€Å"Where there’s guts there’s curiosity, and where there’s curiosity, there guts† (65) â€Å"Curiosity can bring guts out of hiding.† (65) Toru says he was â€Å"never the one for guts† (65) but as his journey progresses, he gains it from his curiosity; curiosity of why Kumiko left him; curiosity of who is the real Noboru Wataya; and he gains â€Å"guts† by going down into an empty well and being trapped and when he stands u p to Noboru Wataya during his meeting, where he tells the story of the â€Å"Shitty Island.† One may see that May Kasahara may have indirectly influenced Torus Journey in some ways, as such. Murakami also foreshadows Toru’s events through May Kasahara. One very significant matter is that Toru was introduced to the â€Å"Well† by May Kasahara. â€Å"Tell me Mr. Windup Bird, would you like to see the Well?† (65) As Toru recalls the words Mr. Honda said to him â€Å"When youre suppose to go down, find the deepest well and go down to the bottom† (66) He now had a well if necessary, and May Kasahara was the one to provide him with it. Although May Kasahara has a significant influence on Toru’s life, Toru was oblivious that he had a significant influence on May Kasahara’s life. Although May Kasahara is a minor character, throughout the novel, she experiences her own journey. Through May Kasahara’s letters, the reader is able to see why she did certain things when she was with Toru, and what actually goes on inside of her mind. In her letters she explains that she felt like she was trapped in the world of â€Å"Mr. Windup Bird† and needed to break free. This is why she leaves her home and goes to a place far away. When she was home, readers can see that May Kasahara in some ways depended on â€Å"Mr. Windup Bird† such as when he went into the well and left a note on his kitchen table saying he will be back but he never returned. She felt very upset about that and when she found him in the well she sought a sense of revenge on him, because she was looking forward to seeing him. Another encounter is when Toru was hugging Kumiko in his house and May Kasahara saw through the window. When she confronted Toru, she seemed as if she was jealous or envied Kumiko; as if â€Å"Mr. Windup Bird† was hers and she did not want to share him with another woman. May further explains within her letters that she would have delusions of Toru raping her when they were alone at his house and she confesses that that is the reason she trapped him in the well. When reading the novel, it seemed as if they completely ignored the age difference between them two, but May Kasahara did not ignore it and she had already knew what she was getting into, but she never shared it with him until the letters. Murakami may have done this to create a separate climax within the world of May Kasahara. May Kasahara was going through her own plots and journey and the readers were not aware of this until later on within the Novel; another technique and stylistic concept Murakami used in order to show the life and chronicles of May Kasahara. May Kasahara was a very daring girl who was bold and risky in the beginning having this bad girl image, riding on back of motorcycles, not following up with school, abandoning Toru for hours in the Well, but within her letters, it would seem as if it was all an act from who she really is and what she really feels like, she actually is sentimental and she cares, she is attracted to Toru and wants him in her life. Toru and May share this strong bond. They really depend on each other. They guide each other the way suits them best. There has been moments where May needed Toru to talk to and that is why she wrote the letters to him; and there has been times when Toru needed May, just a sense to step away from the rough life he was dealing with, chasing Kumiko. Toru imagined May Kasahara telling him right from wrong, and they both missed that from each other. They both depended on each other, from the minute they met, one can see that they both became a piece of each others life that they would need to complete themselves, regardless of the side circumstances they had been through. May had said within one of her letters that sometimes she felt like she was Kumiko, that she was Mrs. Okada, and as a reader, one could see where she is coming from,thinking back to all of the times they would sit on the chairs and just talk for hours letting each other in. It can be depicted that Murakami was actually opening the reader’s eyes to who truly should be in Toru’s life, and who Toru was chasing after, during his journey to find himself, was right not who he should have been chasing after because the one who would fit best in his life was there beside him all along. May Kasahara may have seen that she was the perfect one for Toru, but Toru could not see it. The readers were able to see it, because she was the one beside him, the one he went to for help, the one he could tell anything to, and they had a certain bond, that helped them both to learn and grow from each other, as if they really needed each other.

Black Men and Public Space, Free Essay Sample

Black Men and Public Space Black Men and Public Space is an essay written by Bent Staples which reflects his position in the society and the manner in which people treated him because he was an African American. Therefore, as a result of his skin color, he was faced a lot of discrimination in the public space. He gives various examples of such incidences such as the night whereby he met a white woman and she began avoiding him. However, he did a couple of things to change the manner in which people viewed him and, in turn, reduce the level of discrimination that he was facing. Hence, I agree with Stapless essay as he tried to teach the world that stereotypes can have a great impact on both the African-Americans as well as other races across the world. One of the way that stereotypes can affect someones race is by judging them by their way of dressing. In the current society, there is a great difference that exists in the manner in which professionals dress as compared to other people. However, it is not necessarily that a person in a suit is a professional or that a person wearing a casual outfit could be a smuggler. Staples proof this fact when the white woman runs away from him simply because of the clothes that he was wearing. He, therefore, decides to change his dress code and walking style in order to gain respect in the society and avoid being discriminated. Hence the stereotypes judgment of a persons dressing can result in a lot of changes in that person. This is common among the African-Americans because the colonial view of slavery and rapists is still intact in some peoples minds in the society. Also, it affects people from other races. In addition, stereotypes of skin color can affect an individuals way of living. Changing skin color is not something easy that people can do. The racial looks of an individual will still be visible regardless of whether they have breached their skin or not. Therefore, in order to survive the discrimination, it is important to find other ways of changing the way that the stereotypes view skin color. Also, one can choose to accept their existence and ignore the fact that they are being discriminated in public space. In the world we are living in, not everybody is a stereotype, and hence the discrimination will not be faced in all corners. Therefore, an individual can make through the day by surrounding themselves with people who appreciate their race. Besides, stereotypes can result in chaos and violence in the society. Staples shows this through the reaction to the people who discriminated him. He did not feel offended neither did he question them for their behavior. Instead, he made a personal choice of changing his appearance so that the stereotypes can change their point of view about who Staples was. As a result of compromising with the situation, Staples ended up changing his dress code and personality to fit the stereotypes expectations of class and professionalism. After the change, Staples did not face as much discrimination as compared to his earlier books. Therefore, the key to overcoming the discrimination of stereotypes is by ignoring them and avoiding conflict as much as possible. The public space is full of such space and therefore, giving them attention will only be wasting somebodys time that should instead be used in carrying out constructive things. A combination of people from different races is what builds a n ation due to the diversity of ideas. The emotions and attitudes of a person can help them go through a day of discrimination. Staples points out a time whereby people would make negative comments about him in his presence. As a way of hiding his anger, he would just smile and walk away. This has been proven to be an effective way of avoiding negative energy, especially in the workplace. Whenever a person makes a negative comment, and the person it was directed to reacts by smiling, then it leaves the later feeling embarrassed and intimidated. Therefore, once people have gotten used to ones character of ignoring the negative energy, then it will be difficult to discriminate them. Instead, people will be left with no options but accommodating such a person. As well, some stereotypes make such comments in order to pick an argument with a person. Therefore, ignoring them would be a good solution to avoid the conflict. Staples put a lot of effort in convincing people that their view about him was wrong. He says that people are quick to judge and hence, in such cases, it is important to show ones level of intelligence by the manner in which they respond to stereotypes. In some cases, someone can give an answer that will keep people thinking and regretting the reason as to why they gave a negative comment. The fight does not have to be physical. Concisely, Black Men and Public Space is a great essay that acts as an allegory to todays life. Our society is full of stereotypes of every kind and people who are out to discriminate others in regard to their race and cultures. It is the obligation of every individual who feels like a victim of discrimination to find out ways of fighting the discrimination. As outlined above, avoiding negative energy, changing ones personality, and accepting the existence of stereotypes are the ways through which an individual can avoid feelings of discrimination. Given the fact that a persons race will always remain to be the same regardless of how much they try to change, it is important to understand the social circle to avoid being caught up in negativity. Staples provides good examples of how an individual should not allow racial discrimination to disrupt their day to day activities. In the case whereby an individual has tried their best to convince others about who they are, they should be rea dy to face any responses. Whether negative or positive, life must move on.