What images have been mentioned many times in Haruki Murakami's works?

Haruki Murakami is a modern Japanese novelist, born in 1949. He started writing at the age of 29. His first work, Listening to the Wind, won the Japanese group portrait newcomer award and began his career as a professional novelist. Up to now, his novels, such as Norwegian Forest, The End of the World and the Cold Wonderland, The Adventure of Looking for Sheep, Kafka by the Sea and West of the Sun, have been loved and admired by young readers all over the world.

Haruki Murakami's works are deeply influenced by European and American writers. The tone is light, and there is little gloomy and heavy writing atmosphere in post-war Japan. Sketch people, things and things with gentle and delicate brushstrokes, and make readers feel the same through the handling of details and the proper use of metaphors.

So far, many writers and scholars have explored Haruki Murakami from different angles. For example, Japanese novelist Neitian tree's work Beware of Haruki Murakami, and American writer Jay Rubin's work Listen to Haruki Murakami: Haruki Murakami's Art World, etc. Many images and phenomena closely related to today's society have been deeply discussed.

Haruki Murakami's novels use metaphors and hints to express his true thoughts, and many meaningful and intriguing images are worth exploring. The image of a well is one of them. "Quiet" appears many times in his novels and often becomes the key image that dominates the protagonist's fate. The symbolic meaning expressed by this image not only exists for the characters in the story, but also reflects some criticisms that are often ignored in real life.

Here, the author hopes to further explore how the well described by the author exists as a negative symbol, and at the same time explore and think about the social phenomenon reflected by it from many aspects.

Firstly, the image of "well" is briefly analyzed.

The meaning of "well" in his novels can be divided into two aspects: the well with water and the well without water.

A well with water symbolizes the source of life; A well without water symbolizes fear, darkness and alienation. This is particularly prominent in his work "The Travels of Strange Birds". The full text of this work runs through the image of "well", from the dry well without water at first to the sweet well water reappeared in the well later. This process coincides with the protagonist's experience of being squeezed by the secular from the beginning to being surrounded at last.

Second, the image of the well in the text

As an important image, "well" appears many times in Haruki Murakami's novels. From the author's early work Pinball in 1973 to the masterpiece Travel Notes of Strange Birds in the Middle Ages, the image of "well" has played an indispensable role.

In 1973 Pinball, there is a passage like this:

"... the well-digger is in his fifties, eccentric and withdrawn, but he is really a genius at digging wells. Every time someone begged him to dig a well, he walked around the house for a few days, muttering something and holding up the soil to smell it. Once you find your own approved excavation site, ask a few good colleagues to dig directly down.

"So, residents in this area can drink the well water on the number. The water is so clear and cold that even the hand holding the cup seems to be transparent. People say this is the snow water of Mount Fuji. Joke! Distance is impossible. "

As we all know, water is the source of life, well is the source of water, and it is the treasure on which people live. The author also conveyed the above information through the description of the well and the person who built it. This is also the word "Jing" as a "positive image" in Murakami's many works. Many times, the well appears in his works in a more terrible and sharp way. For example, at the beginning of Norwegian Forest, Naoko and Watanabe had a meaningful dialogue, and they described Well as follows:

"What did she say at that time?

"By the way, what she said is an unknown well. I don't know if there is a well. Or an impression or symbol that exists only for her is unknown-just like countless other things compiled in her mind in that gloomy day. But since Naoko told me about the well, as long as I can't see the wellhead, I can't remember the scenery of the meadow. Although I have never actually witnessed it, the appearance of the well, as an inseparable part of my mind, blends in with the landscape. I know I can describe this well in detail-it is located at the junction of grassland and miscellaneous forest, and the dark wellhead with a diameter of about one meter suddenly flashed on the ground, quietly covered by grass. There is no fence around, and it is not slightly higher than the stone stare blankly at the wellhead. Only the well is open. After years of wind and rain, the Shijing enclosure presents an indescribable turbid white, with vertical and horizontal cracks and looks crumbling. The little green lizard squeaked into the crack. Bend down and look into the well, but see nothing. The only thing I know is that this well is so deep that I don't know how deep it is; It is filled with thick black, as black as boiling all kinds of black in the world. "

Here, the well became a symbol full of darkness and fear. The author narrates the fact that "well" exists in grassland as a part of this world through Watanabe's mouth. If the beautiful "grass" is understood as the inner world of people, or as a beautiful part of the inner world, then the dark "well" symbolizes the bondage and alienation in people's hearts.