Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    A Study Guide for Haruki Murakami's "The Year of Spaghetti"
    A Study Guide for Haruki Murakami's "The Year of Spaghetti"
    A Study Guide for Haruki Murakami's "The Year of Spaghetti"
    Ebook36 pages22 minutes

    A Study Guide for Haruki Murakami's "The Year of Spaghetti"

    By Gale and Cengage

    ()

    Read preview

    About this ebook

    A Study Guide for Haruki Murakami's "The Year of Spaghetti," excerpted from Gale's acclaimed Short Stories for Students. This concise study guide includes plot summary; character analysis; author biography; study questions; historical context; suggestions for further reading; and much more. For any literature project, trust Short Stories for Students for all of your research needs.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherCengage Learning - Gale
    Release dateJul 27, 2016
    ISBN9781535840729
    A Study Guide for Haruki Murakami's "The Year of Spaghetti"

    Read more from Gale

    Related to A Study Guide for Haruki Murakami's "The Year of Spaghetti"

    Related ebooks

    Teaching Methods & Materials For You

    View More
    View More

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    Related categories

    Reviews for A Study Guide for Haruki Murakami's "The Year of Spaghetti"

    0 ratings

    0 ratings0 reviews

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

      Book preview

      A Study Guide for Haruki Murakami's "The Year of Spaghetti" - Gale

      12

      The Year of Spaghetti

      Haruki Murakami

      2005

      Introduction

      The Year of Spaghetti is a short story written by Haruki Murakami, who is often hailed as one of Japan's most important modern writers. He wrote the story sometime in 1981 or 1982 as part of a collection of what he calls short shorts. An English-language translation of the story was first published in the New Yorker magazine on November 21, 2005. Finally, it was included in the short-story collection Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman, published in 2006. In 2007, the collection won Japan's Kiriyama Prize, but after the announcement of the winners, Murakami declined on principle to accept the award. The basis for his refusal appears to be unknown.

      The Year of Spaghetti is representative of Murakami's work as a postmodernist writer. Postmodernism is not easy to define, but postmodern writers typically rely on irony, playfulness, black humor, fragmented realities, parody, unreliable narrators, and magic realism—a term that refers to themes and subjects that are entirely imaginary and outlandish and that often have something of a dreamlike quality. Another characteristic of postmodern literature is its frequent tendency toward minimalism, that is, toward slice-of-life stories that provide the reader with a minimum of words, characters, and actions. This economy requires the reader to take part in the construction of the story and its meaning. The Year of Spaghetti, with its spare plot and mundane details, provides an example of the minimalist impulse in postmodernist literature. Within this context, Murakami writes surrealist stories and novels that often return to the themes of alienation and loneliness, based on the author's belief that post–World War II Japan buried its cultural values in work and the acquisition of wealth. In his view, modern Japanese people, especially those of his generation, are alienated and disconnected from one another, leaving them spiritually empty. Again, this is a point of view reflected in "The Year

      Enjoying the preview?
      Page 1 of 1