Translating Murakami Haruki

I have read a number of novels by Japanese authors (translated) and audited a course by one of the principal translators of Murakami Haruki. You might be interested in a short radio piece with Philip Gabriel.
https://radio.azpm.org/s/25358-choosing-words-for-one-of-the-worlds-bestselling-authors/

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Thank you!!
I really like Murakami Haruki and read some books in english and some in german. Someday i want to read it japanese too. But until then im happy about those people who translate it for me.

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Very interesting, thanks! I also love reading his books and one of my goals is to read the Japanese original version of æ”·èŸșăźă‚«ăƒ•ă‚« which waits for me in my bookshelf.

Unrelated to the topic, I had the urge to sing along to

:durtle_love:

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Very nice. Here’s another one for you to try:

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I haven’t heard that one yet, thank you. Creates a nostalgic feeling and reminds me of the time I was in Yokohama for the æĄœç„­ă‚Š (cherry blossom festival). :cherry_blossom:

Am I too stupid to find it or is there really no ebook version of äž–ç•Œăźç”‚ă‚ŠăšăƒăƒŒăƒ‰ăƒœă‚€ăƒ«ăƒ‰? :confused:

I‘m currently feeling a bit bored by the morw level appropriate content that I‘m reading at the moment and thought I would aim for something „slightly“ more ambitious but unfortunately, reading paper books is just not realistic for me for multiple reasons.

I can’t find æ”·èŸșăźă‚«ăƒ•ă‚« as an ebook either.

Does anyone have any other Murakami suggestions that were both enjoyable but also at least somewhat manageable to read in Japanese? (and that are available in ebook format
).

Unfortunately, looks like you’re out of luck, because there aren’t any in Japanese. Apparently Murakami just doesn’t like ebooks.

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Oh, thanks for that link, interesting. I found some of his books available for Kindle but I won’t be holding out hope that the missing ones will be added soon then


Not Murakami, or even ebook, but I’m reading right now Breaking into Japanese Literature and Exploring Japanese Literature and it’s really great. It’s a selection of Japanese classic literature (like Rashomon, Snow Country, In A Groove etc) but on the left pages, there is the Japanese text, on the right pages an English translation, and on the bottom part a running dictionary, which give the definition of all the words appearing in this page. (To understand better, please check the “Look Inside” feature on amazon). So, while not an ebook, it’s almost the same feeling as reading with yomichan or japanese.io : every unknown words can be looked up very quickly. And as a bonus, the definitions in the running dictionary are exactly the one that are needed in the context of their sentences, no need to wade through a countless number of definition


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I can attest to the usefulness of Breaking into Japanese Literature. :durtle_noice:

Like Murakami慈生, I also prefer physical books over ebooks. I don’t really know why, it just feels better. But that’s just how I am wired. Of course everybody is entitled to their own opinion.

Back in the day I used a Japanese-English dictionary and a kanji dictionary as a reference. Searching by radical, stroke count or reading is great for learning. Another great tool would be an electronic dictionary, like the Casio X-Word series (I don’t know if they are still a thing or if they have been entirely replaced by smartphones), on which you can even write the kanji on a touchpad to search for it. At least there are fewer distractions that way.

Maybe there’s a university library at your location, that offers books in Japanese. They often also have scanstations available, which would help you make them digital for your own use - if it wasn’t illegal. :durtle_officer:

Beelinguapp (for iOS and Android) also has an assortment of texts and stories, sorted by reading level. You can read and listen to them in Japanese and English (or other languages) side by side in realtime.

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Thanks for the recommendation, that one is on my to list to buy soon :slightly_smiling_face: (Maybe it was you who had mentioned it somewhere else already and that is how it ended up on that list)

Just being able to look things up quickly is a large reason but not my only one for wanting an ebook. I really, really like the theoretic idea of sitting down somewhere with a real book and reading quietly. But for some reason this never seems to happen. If I have something available digitally on my phone, I have a much higher chance of actually reading it. I still keep buying books because I don’t want to believe that this is true but nothing is changing (although I try to change it) except the ever growing size of my pile of unread books


Thanks for the recommendation, I had not heard about that app yet, I‘ll check it out.

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