2025 Readings 77

 I just finished a reread of Haruki Murakami's Kafka on the Shore. I had read it a couple of times before, but this time I listened to, based on my son's suggestion of a really good recording. He was right, the one that pops up on Audible was really well-done. Thankfully, he told me to avoid the recorded Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, which he says is terrible. My best memory of Kafka on the Shore was using it in a Rhetoric of the Self class that I was tagged at the last moment to teach at Champlain. I also had the students read the Overture to Proust's Remembrance of Things Past, the combination of which I'm pretty sure broke them. Despite the high quality of the recording, I'd also have to admit that I didn't like the novel as much as I did previously, and I'm not certain why exactly. If you research lists of best Murakami novels, Kafka on the Shore often comes out on top, which, truthfully, I've never agreed with. All of that said, the private library where Kafka retreats to, and which launches his true adventure, always carries a special place in my heart, and it would make the short list of literary locations where I could settle.