by Mr. Quale on May 10, 2012
In the third episode of our 11th Grade English Literature class Podcast Series, students discuss Haruki Murakami’s The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle:
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Part 1 (0:25-16:03): Cinthiya, Aidyn & Rachel investigate the novel as agenre and the debate between how Japanese or Western Murakami’s style is. They focus on interpretations of a few of Murakami’s symbols, find some connections to O’Brien’s In the Lake of the Woods, and discuss the thematic conflicts between destiny, free will and the prophecies that characters consistently give and get.
Part 2 (16:26-35:32): Rachel, Selma & Christina tackles Murakami’s argument of the “potential danger of symbolism” by investigating wells, the wind-up bird, the baseball bat, and Toru’s lost cat.
Part 3 (36:04- 1:01:04): Alex, Katie & Sarah conclude this episode by digging into Murakami’s stye and narrative technique. They look at how some of symbolic aspects of the characters, the importance of superstitions and magical realism, issues with translation, and the problematic layered, labyrinthine, and possibly infinite text that Murakami creates.
Discussion Links and Works Cited:
Random House Murakami Website
Haruki Murakami: In Search of this Elusive Writer (Documentary)
In the Lake of the Woods, by Tim O’Brien
“Freddie Freeloader,” by Miles Davis, Kind of Blue
More Murakami links can be found on the 11th Grade English A Literature Class File Page.
by Mr. Quale on May 4, 2012
My 11th grade English class has been studying translated texts by authors–Borges, Murakami, and Marquez–who reference and use labyrinths as symbols in their writing, and we have been working with a semester thematic focus of “Narrative Labyrinths and Infinite Possibilities.” We decided to create a walking labyrinth outside.
The guidelines for walking a labyrinth are simple:
- Walk at your own pace, becoming aware of your own breath
- Follow the path until you reach the center
- Stay as long as you want in the center, reflecting on your journey
- Use the same path that led you to the center to take you to the exit.
by Mr. Quale on May 3, 2012
View The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle in a larger map
This will be the final installment of our reflections on translated works, and we we will use the same requirements as when we wrote about Chronicle of a Death Foretold and our discussions of J.L. Borges.
We have discussed, journaled and podcasted about the following topics in relation to Murakami’s novel:
- Analysis of time and place in the novel
- What was easy to understand and what was difficult in relation to social and cultural contexts and issues
- Connections between issues in the novel and our own culture(s) and experiences
- Aspects of style and technique
- Insights that we have learned from our readings / viewings
Now every student in my IB English A Literature class will write and post one reflection below. These reflections will be between 300-400 words in length (please specify at end of your post), and address the following general question:
How was your understanding of the cultural and contextual considerations of The Wind-up Bird Chronicle developed through our discussions?
by Mr. Quale on April 29, 2012
From Borges to Cervantes to Shakespeare to Velazquez, many artists have produced works that ask the question of “what happens when fiction lives in fiction?” and experimented with the play-in-play, or painter-in-painting, or novelist-in-novel, and so on, ad infinitum. Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream is no exception, and in class we have been drawing conclusions about this concept, and the effects that it could have on an audience.
As evidenced from the scene above, I like to use Wes Anderson’s film The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou as another prime example of the idea of fiction living in fiction, emphasized by the fact that that the film is about documentary filmmakers trying to make a memorable, realistic movie. At certain points, the audience watches the film that they are creating, and in general the film plays around with the reality of a semi-fantastical world that the characters exist in. In an interview, Wes Anderson admitted that he had to work really hard to find new ways to make his movie look fake. What a strange task, with every interesting results. Embedded is the scene from the film where we are introduced to Steve Zissou’s boat, The Belefonte:
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by Mr. Quale on April 28, 2012
Admittedly, Theory of Knowledge class has its limitations: 1. For some strange reason, we are forced to assess our students (One can sarcastically imagine teachers asking themselves, “How proficient are their theories about knowledge? Excellent, very good, or adequate?”), 2. As a class the meets regularly in a high school, students are inhernently disinterested, and 3. Our once-a-week class seems to run out of time whenever we are getting somewhere interesting and worthwhile.
Anyways, I wanted to compile a few resources (films, podcasts, literature) that I think my students would genuinely enjoy experiencing outside of the confines of a Tuesday afternoon classroom, some of which might help to challenge, question and–at times–affirm our assumptions about what we know, and how we know it.
Waking Life, Richard Linklater (2001)
RadioLab Podcast
This podcast describes itself as a “show about curiosity. Where sound illuminates ideas, and the boundaries blur between science, philosophy, and human experience.” Every episode that I have listened to has been fascinating, and I would recommend “Limits,” “Choice,” and “The Turing Problem” as starting points.
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by Mr. Quale on April 11, 2012
Some praise for Haruki Murakami’s The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle:
“The disappearance of a cat, the return of water, a compelling mystery. A labyrinth you just can’t escape.” –Alex & Selma
“A unique and gripping adventure through the subconscious mind, giving insight into modern life. Murakami takes you to another world.” –Rachel & Selma
“Compilations of ideas creating a narrative labyrinth highlighting Murakami’s metafictional genius. Set in Tokyo, this avant-garde novel transports you to the alternate realities of the mind. We hail Murakami.” –Aidyn & Rachel
“Another original masterpiece by Murakami. A surrealistic journey through a mysterious narrative labyrinth . . .You wont be able to rest until you’ve reached the end. Captivating.” –Christina & Cinthiya
“A strange, complex and unsettling novel by Japan’s most visionary novelist. Borges and Kafka would both be very proud of this man’s transformative chronicle. –Mr. Quale
Through this final translated work and unit of the year, my class and I will try to make some sense of what Murakami is doing, and how he is doing it. Perhaps this process will become similar to what Rachel is investigating with the visual medium of the painting of the author above, and her documentation of the series of stages that she went through to get to a finished piece of art. As with every one of our authors, poets, and documentarians that we have studied this year, we are attempting to get closer to the center of the proverbial labyrinth, where our understanding becomes honed, developed and steadfast, but never complete. In this sense, Rachel provides a visual representation of the textual, where little by little we begin to find contrast, definition, clarity, complexity and characters behind translated words.
One intriguing interpretation of Murakami’s The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle is the current theatre production of the novel, directed by Stephen Earnhart, and described as combining “dazzling elements of live performance, live music, puppetry and dance/movement with cinematic video and audio technology to create a hypnotic ‘theatre of dreams.’” The “trailer” looks interesting:
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