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  • Published: 10 October 2011
  • ISBN: 9781448103737
  • Imprint: Vintage Digital
  • Format: EBook
  • Pages: 192

What I Talk About When I Talk About Running




The first, fascinating insight into the life of this internationally bestselling writer

'Pain is inevitable, suffering is optional'

A compelling meditation on the power of running and a fascinating insight into the life of this internationally bestselling writer.


In 1982, having sold his jazz bar to devote himself to writing, Murakami began running to keep fit. A year later, he'd completed a solo course from Athens to Marathon, and now, after dozens of such races, he reflects upon the influence the sport has had on his life and on his writing.

Equal parts travelogue, training log and reminiscence, this revealing memoir covers his four-month preparation for the 2005 New York City Marathon and settings ranging from Tokyo's Jingu Gaien gardens, where he once shared the course with an Olympian, to the Charles River in Boston.

By turns funny and sobering, playful and philosophical, this is a must-read for fans of this masterful yet private writer as well as for the exploding population of athletes who find similar satisfaction in distance running.

*Murakami's new book Novelist as a Vocation is available now*

'There can never have been a book quite like this memoir of running and writing before. In its self-contained way, it's nothing less than an inspiration' Evening Standard

'Hugely enjoyable...You don't have to have run a marathon to be captivated' Sunday Telegraph

'Comical, charming and philosophical...an excellent memoir' GQ

  • Published: 10 October 2011
  • ISBN: 9781448103737
  • Imprint: Vintage Digital
  • Format: EBook
  • Pages: 192

About the author

Haruki Murakami

In 1978, Haruki Murakami was twenty-nine and running a jazz bar in downtown Tokyo. One April day, the impulse to write a novel came to him suddenly while watching a baseball game. That first novel, Hear the Wind Sing, won a new writers’ award and was published the following year. More followed, including A Wild Sheep Chase and Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World, but it was Norwegian Wood, published in 1987, which turned Murakami from a writer into a phenomenon. His books became bestsellers, were translated into many languages, including English, and the door was thrown wide open to Murakami’s unique and addictive fictional universe.

Murakami writes with admirable discipline, producing ten pages a day, after which he runs ten kilometres (he began long-distance running in 1982 and has participated in numerous marathons and races), works on translations, and then reads, listens to records and cooks. His passions colour his non-fiction output, from What I Talk About When I Talk About Running to Absolutely On Music, and they also seep into his novels and short stories, providing quotidian moments in his otherwise freewheeling flights of imaginative inquiry. In works such as The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, 1Q84 and Men Without Women, his distinctive blend of the mysterious and the everyday, of melancholy and humour, continues to enchant readers, ensuring Murakami’s place as one of the world’s most acclaimed and well-loved writers.

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Praise for What I Talk About When I Talk About Running

Murakami gives me a reason. It might seem romantic, but it's true. I had to run…but I didn't enjoy running. I do enjoy, however, running with Murakami.

Ioan Marc Jones, Huffington Post UK

Murakami distils his own process of writing fiction in this layered and meditative memoir.

Big Issue

A wonderful exploration of work, place and life’s meanders.

Geographical

It’s an inspiring, reflective read that’ll make you want to dust your trainers off

Andy McNicoll, Professional Social Work

An outstanding read

Peter Sharkey, Eastern Daily Press