Killing Commendatore

6/10

Published in 2017 by Haruki Murakami.

Spoiler for Commentadore, The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, The Great Gatsby, (mildly) The Picture of Dorian Gray. You should read all of those if you haven’t (though the Wilde ends far poorer than it starts).

I found this to be remarkably uninspired. Not long after I started Murakami’s catalogue, I’ve bifurcated his books into two. One group are the fantastic novels: 1Q84, Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage, A Wild Sheep Chase—and maybe Wind-Up Bird Chronicle and Kafka on the Shore (which I definitely need to re-read). These novels are very good, the first three exceptional, and it is no mean feat for Murakami to have put out so many of these high quality books. I don’t wish to detract from their quality nor his effort. However, the other set—viz. the remainder of his works which I’ve read—are all basically the same book written somewhat differently: auto-plagiarized. The setting may differ (somewhat), but the characters are almost always (basically) the same, the (same-old) plot tried and tired, and the language subliminally sublime. I read them almost the same way I read (classic) Clancys; to kill time with a comfort-food-styled story/plot/characters. Commendatore falls firmly into that latter, lesser category, and perhaps is the worst of that lot that I’ve read. These books feel as if Murakami writes them to pay the bills, playing for time whilst he dreams up his next fantastical, proper novel.

This book in particular felt remarkably recycled, and this much was clear from the onset. Dorian Grat, Gatsby, and even Murakami’s own Wind-Up Bird Chronicle are blended together with his typical type of magical realism and, well, other Murakami mainstays, if you know what I mean. Of course the protagonist’s wife would dump him, of course she was seeing another man, of course there will be some mysterious house, of course there is some random neighborhood girl involved—all identical in setup and somewhat close in execution to Wind-Up? There also is a pit, just like in Wind-Up, and whilst it doesn’t do exactly the same thing, the motifs are again rather close? The similarities were uncanny—it was strange to see this honestly, rather lazy work play out. The whole idea of paintings affecting life and such draws obvious connections to Dorian Gray (though I admit this is the weakest comparison), and Menshiki basically is Gatsby for all practical purposes, though dealing with a different set of issues. The parallels between the protagonist’s and Menshiki were also extremely obvious and well-worn, and from the onset I could feel the plot unravel before me; it didn’t stray far from what I expected. Perhaps I’m over-index on Murakamis after reading most of his novels, but I still can’t shake the feeling that this was a compliance book, brought together in a shorter amount of time without much of the love that his other novels received. Maybe this is just his new style. I’ll read his latest novel and see.

All that being said, I am still giving a 6 because there still are bits of Murakami charm. Also, parts of this bok were chilling in a way which I haven’t felt in any of his other novels, though that feeling was confined to the start. The language was fun as always, and I enjoy his descriptions greatly. There were plenty of tasty lines which rolled around in my head enjoyably for a little as I drunk the rest of the page. These characteristics just can’t carry the novel unfortunately.

There are plenty of better books to read, especially from Murakami. I wouldn’t say this is worth a read until you’ve read more of the famous Murakami novels + the ones I’ve mentioned before and still feel the need to read more. That is the boat I’m in—but honestly, I think you could stop there and not lose much. I need to read his short story collections (my library doesn’t seem to have them), and those I think will also be well worth a read (note that I am generally a fan of short stories). The novels though are getting to be very stale.