A Wild Sheep Chase- Grasping at Reality

One aspect of A Wild Sheep Chase that really jumps out to me is the contrast between Boku’s plain acceptance of seemingly magical elements and the mental exercises he does to ground himself in reality. The first major instance of this for me was when his most recent girlfriend predicts that Boku will receive the call that launches him on the “wild sheep chase” down to the timing and subject matter. Though he does briefly question her after the call comes, he shows no dissatisfaction over the lack of answer. Another instance is when she insists on staying at the Dolphin Hotel with no other reason than her intuition. Though Boku would prefer to stay at a nicer hotel, he easily agrees to their stay without demanding an explanation of any kind and doesn’t seem particularly surprised when the hotel leads them to their next major breakthrough in the search. I would expect most people to be more surprised or affected by their significant other’s seemingly prophetic abilities, but Boku takes them in stride without much of a second thought.

On the other hand, Boku seemingly engages in several mental exercises throughout the novel. For example, he takes special attention to note numbers. Occasionally, he groups numbers in a sort of counting pattern (one… two… three…). He also seems to especially mention numbers involving 3 (3 cranes at his hometown, 3 ten yen coins, drawing 13 stars, counting above the number 3), though I am not quite sure if there is any significance here or if it is pure coincidence. Boku also attempts to calculate impossible numbers in his head, such as the rotational speed of the earth or the total number of times he and his ex-wife had sex throughout the course of their relationship. In both cases, he seems frustrated with the lack of a satisfactory answer and even states, “Accurate figures give things a sense of reality.”

Based on this context, the best reason I can think of for these thoughts and behaviors is that he uses them as a way to keep a grasp on reality. This especially makes sense with the context of the Rat’s letter where he states he can no longer count above the number 3. It makes for an interesting contrast when Boku doesn’t seem particularly phased by mystical, unreal events that would typically stand out to anyone else based in reality, yet he regularly engages in behaviors commonly associated with grounding oneself in reality, suggesting that it might be something he worries about or struggles with unconsciously.

-Angela Pyo

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[I don't have anything insightful to say so I just wrote some stupid shit that popped into my head that may or may not make sense. Apologies in advance.]

• Chandler's Marlowe was given a name and Murakami's protagonist was not, but they both start and end their adventures nameless.
• The Long Goodbye and A Wild Sheep Chase are both works of supernatural fiction. For one, they both end with a ghostly encounter.
• Both protagonists would be good at running tech startups.
• Both writers must have had some weird dreams.
• Both protagonists have god's phone number.
• [Insert other surface-level similarity here]

As others have already said, a lot of similar story b(l)eats, similar characters, similar pacing, similarly  blea(t)k undertones --- it woold not be surprising if Murakami took inspiration from Chandler's The Long Goodbye as he was writing A Wild Sheep Chase. Try swapping the titles around; I think they would still be fairly well representative of the stories they're attached to, although it might help one to squint a little bit. Does this constitute literary theft? I would think not, but I'm also inclined to believe that the question of what does and does not constitute originality and how much recognition or credit should be given to creators for their work is probably too messy a question to even bother with these days. The following is a quote I found on Reddit around two years ago in a discussion thread about originality in digital music that I think might apply to the discussion of intertextuality and originality in literature as well.

"I thought using [drum] loops was cheating, so I programmed my own using samples. I then thought using samples was cheating, so I recorded real drums. I then thought that programming it was cheating, so I learned to play drums for real. I then thought using bought drums was cheating, so I learned to make my own. I then thought using premade skins was cheating, so I killed a goat and skinned it. I then thought that that was cheating too, so I grew my own goat from a baby goat. I also think that is cheating, but I’m not sure where to go from here. I haven’t made any music lately, what with the goat farming and all."

- An unnamed Reddit user, circa February 2019

 

Dylan

Queer Coding in The Long Goodbye

After discussing the potential of Earl being queer in The Long Goodbye, I wondered about the portrayal of a queer character written in the 1950s. In class, we couldn't pinpoint where Earl was explicitly described as queer, and that's because he wasn't—he was queer-coded.

Queer coding is when a character’s sexuality isn't explicitly stated or confirmed but is inferred through the attribution of stereotypical, often exaggerated traits associated with queerness. Many villainous or otherwise “unsavory” characters are queer-coded; some queer-coded villians you may recognize from your childhood are Ursula, Jafar, Scar, Maleficent, and many other Disney villains. Queer coding became especially popular after the 1930 Hays Code in the US, which dictated what could and could not be portrayed in films. One example of this was “sexual perversion,” including “homosexuality.” Thus, queer coding was used to get around this by alluding to one’s sexuality through stereotypes and exaggerated character traits without any direct mention. Queer coding also intrinsically linked the idea of queerness and immorality, hence why many villains were queer coded. This technique was seen not only in films, but in most, if not all, forms of media.

In The Long Goodbye, Earl’s character is linked with classically feminine traits. For example, he's described as having “delicate” features and “graceful” behaviors. Marlowe spends significantly more time discussing Earl’s clothing than other characters’ clothing, and derisively asks Dr. Verringer if Earl thinks he’s Valentino. He's depicted swinging his hips, filing his nails, and repeatedly calling Marlowe “sweetie,” indicating a subversion of the traditional masculine (and even hypermasculine) behavior that other men in the novel exhibit.

Marlow’s perception of Earl is that he’s a “nut” and he wonders whether Dr. Verringer is running a sanitarium after Earl threatens Marlowe with brass knuckles. Marlowe further classifies Earl as “manic-depressive,” and even Dr. Verringer describes Earl as “unstable.” This reinforces the idea that queerness is perverse and linked with mental illness, a detrimental belief that was institutionalized until 1973 when homosexuality was removed from the DSM.

Queer coding can be harmful by perpetuating stereotypes and linking the idea of queerness with violence and instability. It also reinforces the damaging yet persisting belief that queerness stems from mental illness and is inherently subversive and dangerous.

- Christa (she/her)

The Mysteries of our Protagonists

     The Long Goodbye could indeed be considered the hypotext to A Wild Sheep Chase; there are certainly borrowed elements that the latter morphs into its own story. In particular, the two protagonists, Marlowe and Boku, are unwillingly sent on quests by authority figures that seem to operate at a higher level than our middling protagonists. In both cases, the result is preordained: Marlowe has been following the requests of Eileen Wade, a woman who created the inciting incident by killing Sylvia Lennox, and Boku discovers that the secretary who sent him on the quest already knew everything. This is a tried and true formula: a person who has made the protagonist dance turns out to have knowledge of everything, and in the most cliché fashion, they are the villain. It works particularly well because we experience everything from our protagonist's perspective; we share their knowledge and make our own guesses, which works especially well in a mystery novel. Sherlock Holmes does this with Moriarty, James Bond does this with innumerable "crime organizations." In all four cases, our protagonist operates as a cog in a machine with little knowledge of more powerful forces at play. Thus, it is all the more spectacular when our protagonist succeeds.

    In these two novels, however, our protagonists' mysteries seem to be preordained. Marlowe, who has routinely shown a disinterest in justice and the law, only wants to clear his friend's name. He comes into contact with Harlan Potter and Menendez, who operate as the aforementioned more powerful forces. He's ultimately only successful due to disinterest from Potter, and he is deus ex machina'd from Menendez's harm. Boku, who has consistently been dealing with a lack of information, is blackmailed into finding a sheep by someone who already knows the situation of the sheep. In both cases, the protagonist is in relatively the same spot as when they started, with only their discoveries to award them any merit. In Sherlock, he solves the case. In Bond, he gets the girl. In these two novels, they're left empty-handed. Well, they're given money as recompense, but neither character seems to interested in a monetary reward. That's where they differ from the stereotypical detectives: they're ordinary people who don't possess any special skills.

    Ultimately, these two protagonists are starkly similar: both are disillusioned figures on the fringes of society with their own guide for what's right and wrong, both find an old friend who's not the same as he once was, and both fail to find meaning in their quest. 

 James

Murakami and his conciousness

     It is evident that Haruki Murakami's "A wild sheep chase" draws inspiration from Raymond Chandler's "The long goodbye". From searching for a mysterious figure that leads the main character into the adventure, having ruffians and millionaires being playing a role in the story and the mysterious figure taking an alternative identity. However, what makes Murakami's work different from Chandler's is the use of surreal and odd elements. For example, Boku's girlfriend has magical ears capable of captivating people, and the main character is able to have conversations with Rat's ghost. These surreal elements and odd details seem to show subconscious thoughts Murakami has, as he has mentioned that he likes to free-write, letting his story flow from his consciousness. This type of writing captivated me as I was always on edge trying to figure out what he was trying to say/its meaning. One particular element that stood out was the whale penis. He talked about how he saw a whale penis in the aquarium and felt sad for it as it seemed like it was trapped there forever without being able to be free. This was very odd to me at first, but I believe that it was foreshadowing Rat's encounter with the Star pattern sheep that had him trapped in the isolated mountain home. In conclusion, I think his writing style really helped me immerse myself in the story as it made me try to think more like Murakami to figure out how the odd things fit in the story.

 

Zion

The Long Goodbye & A Wild Sheep Chase

I ended up enjoying both of these stories. Initially, I liked The Long Goodbye more than the wild Sheep Chase. I perceived The Long Goodbye to be more grounded in reality, which seemed to make a more cohesive, and Marlowe was an interesting flawed character who put up a bravado of being a tough guy detached of emotions, which is clearly the exact opposite. I had first thought the A Wild Sheep Chase’s Boku was a little of a bland character who seemed to be going with the flow. But once he reached the end of his wild sheep chase it seemed that Boku had some form of emotional awakening. Because it seemed as if everything he had experienced had finally caught up to him. His company closing down, losing his girlfriend, his close friend dying in order to stop a sheep bent on dominating the world. Which really started when he looked himself in the mirror. 

    I noticed that the scene in which Loring leaves Marlowe and the emotion he experienced was similar to what Boku had experienced when his girlfriend had just upped and left him without a word. Though in the case of Boku, it left him in a touch of deep melancholy. Murakami also seemed to have included a reference to his story Mirror. As the mirror in A Wild Sheep Chase played a role in the story, allowing Boku to gain some semblance of self but also to see that sheep man was not real. 

    Overall both were interesting reads because The Long Goodbye had elements of noir and a hard-boiled detective, which were genres I’ve heard about but never read. A Wild Sheep Chase was a story that seemed to parody noir and the hard-boiled genre mix with a supernatural aspect to it.

Michael A. Landestoy

Thoughts of Wild Sheep Chase

The one part of The Wild Sheep Chase was similar to the short excerpt that we read which was The Mirror. I felt like after looking at himself in the mirror, he was dissociated with himself up until he left the place. Boku would mention how it would look like him but it was not him but another person who looked like him. Boku went into lots of details of every movement and thought when he was in front of the mirror, I wonder what his thoughts were and why he felt that way. 

The ending was somber and now that Boku has lost everything and had to start over, it also reminded me of Terry Lennox when he created a new identity for himself. This might be a long stretch but the relationship between Boku and the Rat is similar to the relationship between Marlowe and Terry. I felt that Boku and the Rat can be true to themselves compared to any relationships they had with other people where they had a different front which is similar to Marlowe and Terry's. Technically the relationship between the characters is still there but it feels like they also ended in some way.

I am still confused as to what happened in the ending as well as the significance but it felt like it was about self weakness or reflection? Why did the secretary send him out when he knew all along. Why did the Rat not come out to the secretary? Was it because he was not pursuing him out of his own free will unlike Boku's? 

- Caroline Huynh

Hypotextuality and the Sheep Man

     While reading and discussing A Wild Sheep Chase in class we often spoke to the words as being Murakami's writing. What is so easily forgotten, and done so purposefully, is that these words are the work of two writers; one being Murakami and the other being Alfred Birnbaum who translated the novel for us. There are many moments in this novel where it is so easy to forget the influence that Birnbaum may have on what we are reading and how it is laid out, where we do not question that these are the words of Murakami himself. In this sense, the words of Murakami are so easily seen through the writing of Birnbaum. 

    Although we discussed areas where the translator's fingerprint is visible in the text, such as the title and the name "rat" replacing the Japanese original of "mouse", as well as moments that do not change that lead an English speaking reader down unfamiliar rabbit holes such as the black and white goats eating each other's letters. But there is one example that makes me wonder whose touch was most directly involved in the English translation: the speech pattern of the Sheep Man.

    In Daniel Chandler's article Semiotics for Beginners, he defined the term hypotextuality as "the relation between a text and a preceding 'hypotext' - a text or genre on which it is based but which it transforms, modifies, elaborates or extends (including parody, spoof, sequel, translation)." with the extra emphasis being on the translation side of things during my thought process. In the translation, Birnbaum removes the spacing from between practically every word spoken by the Sheep Man, including the spacing that would follow punctuation. This has a very interesting effect on how I perceived the Sheep Man. Dialogue along with cadence are so conducive to emotional portrayal in speech, and this lack of spacing removes these key aspects from the Sheep Man. On page 320, Birnbaum writes "Youwereplayingguitar," said the Sheep Man with Interest. "Welikemusictoo.Can'tplayanyinstrumentsthough." Not only is this a little off-putting to read (and to type), but it also removes a lot of the comfort and familiarity that can be found in words since they become so conjoined. It feels almost dystopic in a way, forcing the reader to live in the world of the Sheep Man.

    I highlight this writing style because with my knowledge of the Japanese language I am quite unsure how an effect similar to this could be created, so I am unsure who to give credit to, but it is a decision that I admire and enjoyed reading very much. Either way, I think it is important to thank both writers and keep both in mind when reading the words of the sheep man. Because ItmademespendmoretimewonderingaboutthesheepmanthanIthinkIwouldhaveotherwise. 

Bergen

Similarities and Differences in Chandler and Murakami

    After finishing both The Long Goodbye and A Wild Sheep Chase, I feel like I can point out many similarities, as well as many differences. For me, one major difference between these novels is that The Long Goodbye did not leave me with many questions at the end, whereas A Wild Sheep Chase answered many of my original questions, but left me wondering what exactly happened. I believe that this has a lot to do with the supernatural elements of Murakami's story. Since Chandler's story is rooted completely in reality (or at least set in the real world), the crime, reason behind the murders, etc. all made logical sense to me when the truth about them is revealed at the end. With Murakami's story, you cannot use logic to understand the truth to the mystery that he sets up. Even after many questions that Boku had were answered by the Rat, the Boss's secretary, etc., there are still so many aspects of the story that remain unresolved. For example, I am still quite confused about the sheep with the star on its back and I feel like very little about it was actually revealed. There was enough information given about it to understand the brain cysts, eternally searching "sheepless" people, and other aspects of it that were relevant to the plot, but what was its grand plan after all? Also did it have something to do with Boku's girlfriend losing her powers or whatever was special about her? And who is the Sheep Man and why is everyone so normal about that fact that he walks around in a full-body sheep costume all day?

    In addition, on another note, the similarities between Terry Lennox and the Rat became quite clear to me at the end of The Long Goodbye and A Wild Sheep Chase. They are both friends with the protagonist and needed a job done that only the protagonist could do. Also, they reunited with the protagonist at the end of the novel in a plot twist (Lennox is alive when he was expected to be dead, the Rat is dead when he was expected to be alive) and came to them in a different form (Lennox had surgery and came to Marlowe as another person; the Rat came to Boku both as a ghost and a possessed Sheep Man). Additionally, at the beginning of the story, they both go off to far away, secluded places (Otatoclan and Junitaki), and they are also generally considered "weak" men (based on their own words).

- Melody Sweeney

Chandler and Murakami's Detachment from Reality

     It was incredibly fascinating to read The Long Goodbye and A Wild Sheep Chase simultaneously. Although I had read this Murakami novel in the past, I had never considered its relation to detective novels, but Raymond Chandler's influence on Murakami became increasingly clear as I read through these books. Both Chandler's character of Phillip Marlowe and Murakami's protagonist, Boku, have a noticeable detachment to the events and other characters surrounding them. This aspect of both characters seems to allow them to perform extremely time-consuming or stressful tasks, such as Marlowe's late night visits to the Wade household to deal with familial issues or Boku's treacherous journey up to and subsequent multi-week long isolation in the mountain home. It is also clear that Murakami either admired or was at least inspired by Marlowe's disinterest in receiving payment for these tedious and difficult jobs. While Marlowe never spends the money that Terry Lennox sends him or accepts any checks from his clients, Boku responds similarly by gifting his check to J after the Boss's secretary pays him. 

    Although the influence is clear, Murakami strays so far off the beaten path of the search-and-find detective novel genre through his mind-bending metaphysical story elements. In the same way that Marlowe will describe a beautiful blonde woman as being intoxicating and enticing, Boku will spend pages on the description of his girlfriend's ears and how every person in the restaurant becomes entranced by them and their "special powers". In the final chapters of A Wild Sheep Chase, entire known rules of reality are broken when The Rat finally arrives at the house and reveals that he died several weeks earlier and took the form of The Sheep Man whose reflection was starkly missing from the living room mirror. Because of the juxtaposition of these elements with the grounded familiar reality of The Long Goodbye, these twists hit even harder than they did for me when first reading Murakami. Although the similarities are many, the major genre differences between the novels were what made me enjoy both of them even more than I would have reading them separately. 

- May Painter

The Metaphysics of Name Reference in Murakami’s A Wild Sheep Chase

 In the chapter titled “One for the Kipper”, the chauffeur tells Boku that “[towns and parks and streets] are all given names in compensation for their fixity on the earth” (Murakami 182). Dissenting from his original identification of name function as it pertains to purpose, Boku suggests that a name denotes a permanence of state within space and time. At the same time, the protagonist posits that “the basis of naming is this act of conscious identification with living things” (Murakami 181). Interestingly, none of the characters in A Wild Sheep Chase have a name beyond arbitrary nicknames or placeholders like the Rat or J. Taken in conjunction with the two definitions, the lack of proper names in the novel reveals the protagonist’s lack of connection to the physical world and his reluctance, and potentially fear, to render his relations permanent. Throughout the novel, Boku attempts to legitimize his lack of emotional attachment to most things which an average person may find significant: a pet, a hard-earned job, a marriage, a home. Time and time again, he denies having anything of value in his life and instead, argues that he has absolutely nothing to lose. When discussing names with his semi-magical girlfriend, Boku mentions the futility of naming every object in existence, alluding to the corrupting nature of mass production which strips things of their meaning, thereby also removing the necessity for names as something that lacks meaning does not require a name. Boku’s emphasis on being “an utterly mediocre person” (Murakami 163) throughout A Wild Sheep Chase plays into the idea of a faceless generality; the protagonist believes he and the relationships he may hold are insignificant, hence, the lack of name reference. 

However, at the same time, the absence of names may be understood in a completely opposite light. The name of an object is not the same as the object itself; a name is representative of an object like a shadow but fails to grasp the essence of its reality. When we give things names, we project our subjective perception onto the external world thereby converting the real object into something new - something that it is not. Perhaps, Boku refuses to give things names in order to avoid confusion of their reality in hopes of uncovering the things themselves rather than the shadow. In that case, Boku is no longer drifting through life without a sense of direction or purpose but is doing the exact opposite: he is experiencing the world for what it is, not for what it appears to be and subsequently, does not require a name for himself either because he is acquainted with his true self rather than a phantom disguised under pretense.

- Ruska Mumladze