FINISHED READING - Men Without Women by Haruki Murakami

 

I don't know whether the choice of title is by way of a satirical wink towards Hemingway's book of the same title. This book is populated by less muscular gristly types of masculinity. These seven short stories are about men who are far less sure footed, doubtfilled and anxious twenty first century men. Most of them are struggling with the consequences of their choices in life and are in someway cast adrift from a feminine presence. Due to a range of events; bereavement, adultery, misfortune, personal idiosyncrasies or simply crippling shyness. Each feels an emptiness within them, they don't understand why what happened to them happened. Its a space where they vainly flounder, trying to create a way forward, to find something to compensate or plug the void that has unexpectedly opened up.

These stories exist in their own Murakami world, with its uniquely off kilter rationale. In the opening story Drive My Car, an actor employs a female driver to take him too and from the theatre and do errands. The relationship between him, the driver and the taxi becomes more confessional. The actor tells her he has never really understood why his recently deceased wife had so many extra marital affairs. He knew about all of them, but not why. Recounting how he deliberately cultivated a friendship with one of her boyfriends, simply to try to understand what she saw in him, or what she found lacking in himself. Creepy it is. These tales are all full of these telling little details. 

In the eponymous story Men Without Women a man is phoned by the husband of an former girlfriend from high school who has died. He recollects the time she gave him half of her eraser, obsessing over it, as if it symbolised so much more to him. In Samsa In Love, Samsa finds himself in a situation the very opposite of in Kafka's Metamorphosis. He feels he was previously an insect but now he's woken up in a man's body. Having to learn how to dress it, to eat. And to deal with a hunchback female locksmith who turns up to mend a lock. As I said, weird, but in a good way. The objectified and feminine sense of other, hovering in the wings whenever its not centre stage.

Murakami in these translations at least, has a clean, succinct and unfussy writing style. The stories flow, always with this strong sense of  dialogue or narrative propelling the tale on, whilst you simply enjoy being taken along for the ride. Men Without Women understands our era of somewhat lost, if not entirely clueless men. Unclear about where they are heading or what they should be doing. Often in quiet rebellion against their own shadow. Its a thought provoking as well as enthralling read.

CARROT REVIEW - 7/8