« The whole convergence was like a lucky but entirely
accidental chemical fusion, something that could only happen once. You might
gather the same materials and make identical preparations, but you would never
be able to duplicate the result. »
« Tazaki was the only last name that did not have a
color in its meaning. From the very beginning this fact made him feel a little
bit left out. »
« He never bragged about his grades, however, and
preferred to cautiously stay in the background, almost as if he were
embarrassed to be so smart. »
« Tsukuru could see that they genuinely loved it when
all five of them got together as a group. Like an equilateral pentagon, where
all sides are the same length, their group’s formation had to be composed of
five people exactly – any more or any less wouldn’t do. »
« He loved his friends, loved the sense of belonging he
felt when he was with them. »
« Her prominent cheekbones gave her an obstinate look,
and her nose was narrow and pointed, but there was something indefinably vital
and alive about her face that caught his eye. Her eyes were narrow, but when
she really looked at somthing they suddenly opened wide : two dark eyes,
never timid, brimming with curiosity.
He wasn’t normally conscious of it, but there was one part of
his body that was extremely sensitive, somewhere along his back. This soft,
subtle spot he couldn’t reach was usually covered by something, so that it was
invisible to the naked eye. But when, for whatever reason, that spot became
exposed and someone’s finger pressed down on it, something inside him would
stir. »
« He studied German and French ; he even went to
the language lab to practice English. He discovered to his surprise, that he
had a knack for learning languages. Yet he didn’t meet anyone he was drawn
to. »
« He never met anyone he felt like gettint to know
better, so he spent most of his time in Tokyo alone. On the plus side, he read
constantly, more than he ever had before. »
« And slowly he grew used to this new self, with all
its changes. It was like acquiring a new language, memorizing the
grammar. »
« Ideas are like beards. Men don’t have them until they
grow up. »
« Haida was a short but handsome young man. His face
was small and narrow, like an ancient Greek statue, but his facial features
were, if anything, classical, with a kind of intellgent and reserved look. He
wasn’t the type of pretty young boy who immediately grabbed people’s attention,
but one of whose graceful beauty only became apparent over time. »
« All five of them were already, at this point, thirty
years old – no longer the age when one dreamed of an ordered, harmonious
community of friends. »
"´Le mal du pays.' It´s French.
Usually it's translated as 'homesickness,' or 'melancholy.' If you put a finer
point on it, it's more like 'a groundless sadness called forth in a person's
heart by a pastoral landscape.' It's a hard expression to translate
accurately."
« People whose freedom is taken
away always end up hating somebody. Right ? I know I don’t want to live
like that. »
« Usually he wasn’t much of a
talker, but something about talking with this younger man stimulated his mind,
and sometimes the words just flowed. »
« Each individual has their own
unique color, which shines faintly around the contours of their body. Like a
halo. Or a backlight. I’m able to see those colors clearly. »
« Maybe I am fated to always be
alone, Tsukuru found himself thinking. »
« Words don’t come out when you’re
hurt that deeply. »
« You look sort of – I don’t know
– gaunt and fearless-looking. You have these sunken cheeks, piercing eyes. Back
then you had a rounder, softer kind of face. »
« Beautiful features, always
immaculately dressed, the kind of woman that makes a great impression. Their
hair is always nicely curled. They major in French literature at expensive
private women’s colleges, and after graduation find jobs as receptionists or
secretaries. They work for a few years, visit Paris for shopping once a year
with their girl-friends. They finally catch the eye of a promising young man in
the company, or else are formally introduced to one, and quit work to get
married. Then they devote themselves to getting their children into famous
private schools. As he sat there, Tsukuru pondered the kind of lives they
led. »
« The four of us who stayed behind
weren’t brave enough to venture out like you did. We were afraid of leaving the
town we were brought up in, and saying goodbye to such close friends. »
« Vacations and friends are the
two best things in life. »
« Some things in life are too
complicated to explain in any language. »
« Seeing her now, the true weight
of sixteen years of time struck him with a sudden intensity. There are some
things, he concluded, that can only be expressed through a woman’s form. »
« Before long, she developed a
severe eating disorder. She vomited up almost everything she ate, and gave
herself enemas to get rid of the rest. »
« She wanted to stop having
periods, Eri said. Extreme weight loss stops you from having periods. That’s
what she was hoping for. She didn’t want to ever get pregnant again, and
probably didn’t want to be a woman anymore. She wanted, if possible, to have
her womb removed. »
« One day I looked around me and
realized I was fading. »
« And no matter how much I tried
to help her, I couldn’t stop her retreat from reality. It was awful for me.
If I’d stayed in Nagoya, I think my mind
would have started to go, too. »
« Don’t let the bad elves get
you. »
« For a sicence type, you
certainly can get pretty passionate. »
« Everyone was boarding a night
train, heading to a far-off destination. Tsukuru envied them. At least they had
a place they needed to go. »
Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years
of Pilgrimage – Haruki Murakami
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