TJ
Great book. It starts off strong and kinda falters towards the middle, but comes back with an incredible ending segment. Love the themes about the nature of human relationships, and murakami has incredible prose.
UPDATED: probably my favorite book of all time. Especially interesting that in a story where the downfall of all characters stems from wanting to protect their reputation and put up a facade to others, it ends with sensei asking the narrator to protect his reputation from his wife even after his death.
Such a banger tho
OLD: 4.5/5 Incredibly good book. Only gripe is that it never comes back and continues the story of what happens with the narrator after he finishes reading sensei's letter. Also for whoever wrote the review that “sensei changes his whole life for something that would barely raise an eyebrow today” what in the fuck are you talking about? Although the book comments on how culture has changed, even today most people would agree that essentially inducing your best friend to commit suicide would raise a little more than an eyebrow.
Besides that, awesome book and I love soseki's writing style
“A whole minute of bliss! Is that really so little for the whole of a man's life?”
There's no author that can truly capture the anxiety, panic, and passion of loneliness and unrequited love quite like Dostoevsky.
“Can you really have lived your whole life like that?”
Best to ever do it.
3.75/5
Beautiful language and prose, but I feel the allure of the story falls off a lot towards the end. Still a good read.
What men truly want is to be accused of heinous crimes and live in a mountain fortress while killing government soldiers and growing fat from wine and meat.
Everyone in this book is so mean to each other :(
