＜prologue＞
I started a blog called “The Baby Boomer Generation’s Miscellaneous Blog”（Dankai-sedai no garakutatyou:団塊世代の我楽多（がらくた）帳） in July 2018, about a year before I fully retired. More than six years have passed since then, and the number of articles has increased considerably.
So, in order to make them accessible to people who don’t understand Japanese, I decided to translate my past articles into English and publish them.
It may sound a bit exaggerated, but I would like to make this my life’s work.
It should be noted that haiku and waka （Japanese short fixed form poems） are quite difficult to translate into English, so some parts are written in Japanese.
If you are interested in haiku or waka and would like to know more, please read introductory or specialized books on haiku or waka written in English.
I also write many articles about the Japanese language. I would be happy if these inspire more people to want to learn Japanese.
my blog’s URL:団塊世代の我楽多（がらくた）帳 | 団塊世代が雑学や面白い話を発信しています
my X’s URL:団塊世代の我楽多帳（@historia49) on X
<Added October 9, 2025> Haruki Murakami will not be awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature this year either.
<Added October 10, 2024> Haruki Murakami will not be awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature this year either.
<Added October 5, 2023> Haruki Murakami will not be awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature this year either.
<Added October 6, 2022> Haruki Murakami will not be awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature this year either.
The 2022 Nobel Prize in Literature has been awarded to Annie Ernaux (82), a French female author renowned for her autobiographical novels.
<Added October 8, 2021> Haruki Murakami will not be awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature this year either.
The 2021 Nobel Prize in Literature has been awarded to Abdulrazak Gourna, a writer from Tanzania, Africa.
<Update: October 8, 2020> Haruki Murakami will not receive the Nobel Prize in Literature this year either.
The Swedish Academy has announced that the 2020 Nobel Prize in Literature will be awarded to American poet Louise Glück (77).
The Academy stated that the award was in recognition of “her unparalleled poetic expression, celebrating a simple beauty that elevates the individual to the universal.”
My honest impression is not so much that “they failed again this year,” but rather that “I’m disappointed by the Swedish Academy’s stubborn decision to exclude Haruki Murakami.”
The Nobel Prize in Literature announcement season has arrived once again. This year, it will be on Thursday, October 8th.
Haruki Murakami (1949- ) is a member of the baby boomer generation, just like me. His novels have been translated into many languages and he has legions of devoted readers and fans. Since receiving the Franz Kafka Prize in 2006, he has been called a leading candidate for the Nobel Prize every year, but for the past 14 years, he has consistently lost.
I believe that this year will be the year that Murakami Haruki wins the Nobel Prize in Literature (it would be strange if he didn’t), but what will happen?
This time, I would like to reconsider the long connection between Murakami Haruki and the Nobel Prize in Literature.
1. Global Reputation of Murakami Haruki’s Works
(1) Murakami Haruki Reshaped the Image of Japanese Literature
An English translation of Murakami Haruki’s short story “TV People” was published in the September 10, 1990, issue of the American magazine The New Yorker. This event, in which a work written in Japanese was published in an American literary magazine, marked a milestone not only in Murakami Haruki’s personal career, but also in the history of reading modern Japanese literature in translation (especially in English).
Since then, Murakami’s works have been translated into over 50 languages, winning international literary awards such as the Franz Kafka Prize and the Jerusalem Prize (2009), while becoming international bestsellers—unusual for a Japanese novel. He has achieved both critical acclaim and commercial success, and has achieved a rare presence among Japanese authors, even surpassing that of Yukio Mishima.
Murakami Haruki’s emergence dramatically changed the image of “Japanese literature” in translation. The rediscovery of Japanese culture in America, centered around the “Big Three” of Junichiro Tanizaki, Yukio Mishima, and Yasunari Kawabata, established the image of “exotic and aesthetic modern Japanese literature” as firmly established.
In contrast, Murakami’s works, which are heavily influenced by American literature and set in contemporary Japanese society, intertwine the real world with the world of fantasy, have significantly reshaped the image of modern Japanese literature in the English-speaking world.
(2) Murakami Haruki is highly regarded by novelists overseas
Kazuo Ishiguro (1954-), the British-Japanese novelist and 2017 Nobel Prize winner in Literature, cited Murakami as the most interesting contemporary author, stating, “People all over the world can’t think of him as Japanese. He’s a writer who transcends national borders. At the moment, Murakami represents something very interesting in contemporary literature.”
American novelist Jay McInerney praised his work, saying, “Murakami skillfully depicts the everyday lives of ordinary people living in cities. What’s unique about his works is that even if they’re set in Japan, the characters wouldn’t feel out of place living in New York, Stockholm, or Milan. They can be read equally easily around the world.”
(3) The Presence of Writers and Critics Criticizing Murakami
Murakami’s style has low barriers to translation into Western languages, and while it has been embraced by a wide range of readers around the world, there are also many writers and critics who are critical of his writing style and composition.
2. History and Anecdotes of the Nobel Prize in Literature
(1) Yasunari Kawabata and Yukio Mishima
In 1968, Yasunari Kawabata (1899–1972) became the first Japanese to win the Nobel Prize in Literature. During the selection process, Yukio Mishima (1925–1970) was the leading candidate. However, Kawabata (69 years old) was chosen for the prize, taking into consideration his age and long history of contributions as president of the Japan PEN Club.
(2) 2012 Laureate: Chinese Peasant Writer Mo Yan
Regarding this award, Dagens Nyheter newspaper once reported that “Sweden may have sold the soul of the literature prize in exchange for 9 billion Swedish kronor (approximately 116 billion yen) in investment from China.”
Göran Malmqvist, the Academy’s head of Chinese literature, who appears to have strongly recommended China’s Mo Yan over Japan’s Murakami Haruki, had planned to translate several of Mo Yan’s works into Swedish himself, distribute them to members, and then have them published by a publishing company.
If Mo Yan were to win the Nobel Prize in Literature, his translated works would surely be hits, and it was suspected that Malmqvist would receive large translation fees.
Incidentally, Mo Yan is a Chinese national, and has accepted the “censorship” of the Chinese Communist Party government, leading to criticism that he is a “writer on the side of the Communist regime.”
(3) Criticism of the 2019 Laureate, Austrian Writer Peter Handke
The announcement of the 2019 Laureate was postponed due to a sexual harassment scandal involving an official at the Swedish Academy, the selection body, so the 2018 and 2019 Laureates were announced separately.
The 2018 Laureate was Polish writer Olga Tokarczuk, and the 2019 Laureate was Austrian writer Peter Handke.
Peter Handke consistently supported Serbia during the conflicts in the former Yugoslavia in the 1990s and defended the late Serbian President Milošević, who was indicted for “crimes against humanity.” He has also caused controversy in the past by denying the Serbian genocide of Muslims and comparing Serbia to the Jews persecuted in Nazi Germany.
After the award was announced, criticism erupted from countries with large Albanian Muslim populations, who were oppressed under the Milosevic regime. Albanian Prime Minister Rama strongly protested the selection on Twitter, saying, “It is unthinkable that a Nobel Prize could make me sick.”
PEN America, an American organization that advocates for freedom of expression, stated, “We are appalled that the Academy chose an author who used his public voice to capture historical truth.”
3. Questions about the fairness of the Nobel Prize in Literature
Among the Nobel Prizes, the Nobel Peace Prize has long been tinged with political content, and this has not changed recently. However, it is possible that the Nobel Prize in Literature is also under a political shadow.
In his speech when he accepted the Jerusalem Prize in 2009, Haruki Murakami gently criticized Israel’s attacks on the Gaza Strip using the metaphor of a wall and an egg. While he apparently had no intention of sending a political message, the Israeli government may have been secretly displeased.
I can’t help but feel that the problem lies not so much in the political content of the Nobel Prize in Literature, but in its fairness. What exactly are the award criteria for the Nobel Prize in Literature?
Are the personal preferences and interests of the selection committee and other parties involved at the corrupt and depraved Swedish Academy, whose long-running scandal came to light in 2018, given priority? There must be some more objective, plausible, and fair criteria. If there aren’t, it would be strange.
Have the authors, journalists, and singer-songwriters like Bob Dylan who have won the Nobel Prize in Literature over the past 14 years left behind more outstanding literary works beloved worldwide than Murakami Haruki?
I can’t help but wonder. I don’t know why, but I can’t help but feel like Murakami is being excluded.
As an aside, the Swedish Academy, which selects the Nobel Prize in Literature, has a lifetime membership of 18 members. Under the system, members cannot resign of their own volition, and membership is not renewed until the death of a member. A minimum of 12 members must be present to make decisions for the Academy.
Two members have been inactive for several years, and three, including the former Secretary General, announced their resignations in protest of the Academy’s lenient handling of the 2018 scandal, bringing the total number of active members to 13. If two more members announce their resignations, the Academy will be forced to cease functioning.
I believe that, taking into consideration the “harm of old age” such as dementia and the idea that “power corrupts,” the rules should be revised to promote a younger workforce.
4. Who is Haruki Murakami?
Murakami Haruki (1949- ) is a novelist and translator from Hyogo Prefecture. While he was a student at Waseda University, he opened a jazz cafe (which operated as a jazz bar at night), and graduated in 1975 after seven years.
He made his literary debut in 1979 with “Hear the Voice of the Wind,” and was nominated for the Akutagawa Prize three times, but ultimately lost out, partly because he shifted from “short stories and novellas” to “full-length novels.”
His works include “Norwegian Wood,” “The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle,” “Kafka on the Shore,” “1Q84,” and “Killing Commendatore.”