Novelist as a Vocation, page 5
If winning the Akutagawa Prize meant that the war in Iraq might not have happened or something of that sort, I’m sure I would feel terrible. Since that’s not the case, however, why on earth would anyone bother to write a book on the topic? I just can’t get my head around it. This “controversy” is too trivial to be called a tempest in a teapot—it’s more like a tiny dust devil.
At the risk of causing offense, I should state the obvious: the Akutagawa Prize is just another literary award presided over by the Bungei Shunju publishing house. Its purpose may not be strictly commercial, but it would be folly to pretend that Bungei Shunju’s bottom line is not involved.
Be that as it may, as someone who has been a novelist for a long time, it is my experience that a new writer whose work deserves close attention comes along only once every five years or so. Maybe once every three years, if we relax our standards. The Akutagawa Prize, on the other hand, is handed out twice a year, which means its quality tends to be watered down. Though I have no argument with that (prizes can be seen as congratulatory gifts aimed at encouraging new writers, providing a entry point for more rookies), it does make me wonder about the circus atmosphere the media creates each time around. Looked at objectively, it all seems out of proportion.
If we expand the discussion to include not just the Akutagawa Prize but the value of literary prizes everywhere, then we run up against a wall. That’s because there is no basis, again objectively speaking, for the true value of any prize, from the Oscars to the Nobel, except of course in those special cases where the criteria are based on a numerical assessment. If you start picking holes in how they make their decisions, there is no end to it. If you worship the award, however, there is no end to that, either.
This is what Raymond Chandler said about the Nobel Prize in one of his letters: “Do I wish to be a great writer?” he wrote. “Do I wish to win the Nobel Prize? Not if it takes much hard work. What the hell, they give the Nobel Prize to too many second-raters for me to get excited about it. Besides, I’d have to go to Sweden and dress up and make a speech. Is the Nobel Prize worth all that? Hell, no.”[1]
American novelist Nelson Algren (The Man with the Golden Arm, A Walk on the Wild Side) won the National Institute of Arts and Letters Award of Merit Medal in 1974 thanks to the support of Kurt Vonnegut, but he blew off the awards ceremony and got drunk with a woman at a bar instead. Of course, his absence was intentional. When asked “What’d you do with the medal?” Algren answered: “I dunno, I threw it away or something.”[2]
These two writers may have been extreme exceptions. They wrote in unique styles and stood against the establishment throughout their lives. Yet the feeling they shared, or perhaps what they wished to express through their attitudes, was that there are more important things to a true writer than literary prizes. One of those things was the conviction that what they wrote had real meaning; another was that they were speaking to a community of readers—the number wasn’t really that important—who understood what that meaning was. Writers convinced of those two things have little use for prizes and awards. In the end, after all, honors are merely a formal social and literary ratification of an existing reality.
Still, many in the world pay attention solely to things that possess visible and concrete form. Literary quality is inherently formless, so prizes, medals, and such provide that concreteness. This “form” then induces people to look. What really rubbed Chandler and Algren the wrong way was the decidedly nonliterary quality of the awards and the overbearing arrogance exhibited by the authorities, whose attitude was “The prize is yours only if you come to receive it.”
I have a standard answer when interviewers ask me about literary prizes—this question invariably comes up, whether in Japan or abroad. “The most important thing,” I tell them, “is good readers. Nothing means as much as the people who dip into their pockets to buy my books—not prizes, or medals, or critical praise.” I repeat this answer over and over ad nauseam, yet it doesn’t seem to sink in. Most often it’s completely ignored.
When I stop to think about it, though, interviewers may simply find my answer boring. There may be something about it that sounds packaged for public consumption. I sometimes get that feeling, too. It certainly isn’t the kind of comment that sparks a journalist’s interest. Nevertheless, since the answer reflects what I see as the honest truth, I can’t really change it, however boring it may be. That’s why I end up saying the same thing time and again. Readers have no ulterior motives when they shell out twenty or thirty dollars for one of my books. “Let’s check this out” is (probably) what they’re thinking, pure and simple. Or they may be full of anticipation. I am eternally grateful to such readers. Compared to them…no, let’s just drop the comparisons.
At the risk of stating the obvious, it is literary works that last, not literary prizes. I doubt many can tell you who won the Akutagawa Prize two years ago, or the Nobel Prize winner three years back. Can you? Truly great works that have stood the test of time, on the other hand, are lodged in our memory forever. Was Ernest Hemingway a Nobel Prize winner? (He was.) How about Jorge Luis Borges? (Was he? Who gives a damn?) A literary prize can turn the spotlight on a particular work, but it can’t breathe life into it. It’s that simple.
* * *
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What has not winning the Akutagawa cost me? I have turned the question over in my mind, but can’t come up with anything. Have I gained something? No, that’s not true, either.
Still, perhaps I am fortunate not to have the title “Akutagawa Prize Winner” affixed to my name. Otherwise (and this is pure conjecture on my part), it might be suggested that it was somehow thanks to the prize that I have reached this point, which I would probably find upsetting. Life is more free and easy without such titles. Being only Haruki Murakami is just fine with me. And if I’m not bothered, what’s the big fuss?
I bear no animosity whatsoever toward the Akutagawa Prize (I feel the need to keep emphasizing this), but I must admit that I am proud to have written my novels and lived my life as an independent agent. It may be a trivial thing, but for me at least it carries some weight.
It’s a very rough estimate, but my guess is that about five percent of all people are active readers of literature. This narrow slice of the population forms the core of the total reading public. There is a lot of talk today about people becoming estranged from books and the written word, and I must admit I see that, too, but I imagine that five percent would find a way to read somehow or other even if the authorities ordered them to stop. They might not take refuge in the forest and commit books to memory as in Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451, but I’m sure they would escape the crackdown and keep on reading somehow. Of course I would be among them.
Once the habit of reading has taken hold—usually when we are very young—it cannot be easily dislodged. YouTube and 3D videos may be within easy reach, but when we five-percenters have free time (and even when we don’t), we reach for a book. As long as one in twenty is like us, I refuse to get overly worried about the future of the novel and the written word. Nor do I see the electronic media as a threat. The form and the medium aren’t all that important, and I don’t care if the words appear on paper or on a screen (or are transmitted orally, à la Fahrenheit 451). As long as book lovers keep on reading books, I’m happy.
My only serious concern is this: What can I offer those book lovers next? All other questions are peripheral. After all, five percent of the Japanese population adds up to six million people. Shouldn’t a writer be able to keep his or her head above water with a market of that size? If you look beyond Japan to the rest of the world, the number of readers increases that much more.
But what about the other ninety-five percent? They have few opportunities to encounter literature face-to-face in their daily lives, and those chances may grow even slimmer in the future. The move away from reading may continue. Yet, from what I can see, at least half of those people—another very rough estimate—might take a work of literature in hand and read it if they had the chance, either as a sociocultural phenomenon or as intellectual entertainment. These are the latent readers, the “undecided voters” in political terms. They need a welcome counter to usher them into the world of literature. Or maybe something like a showroom. Perhaps this is (and has been) the job of the Akutagawa Prize, to act as a welcome counter for new readers. It could be compared to Beaujolais Nouveau or the Vienna New Year’s Concert or the Hakone Ekiden relay; in short, to those entry points into the worlds of wine, classical music, and marathon running. Then, of course, there is the Nobel Prize for Literature. It is when we come to the case of the Nobel, though, that things become more complicated.
I have never served on a selection jury for any literary prize. I have been asked, but have always politely refused. That is because I feel I am not qualified for the task.
The reason is a simple one—I am just too much of an individualist. I am a person with a fixed vision and a fixed process for giving that vision shape. Unavoidably, sustaining that process entails an all-encompassing lifestyle. Without that, I cannot write.
That is my yardstick, my recipe for success, but although it works for me, I doubt it would be suitable for other writers. I cannot pretend that my way is the only way, and I respect many of the other methods adopted by writers all over the world—yet there are approaches that I find incompatible or that I just can’t get my head around. I am the sort of person who can only appraise things that fit with his own viewpoint. Looked at positively, this is an example of individualism; negatively, the mark of a self-centered and egotistic person. Were I to extend this self-centered focus and use it as a yardstick to evaluate the works of other writers, they would likely find it intolerable. Experienced writers might be able to handle it, but I shudder to think how those just starting out might react to having their fates influenced by a viewpoint as slanted as mine. I just can’t do it.
Should someone attack me for having abandoned my social responsibility as a writer, I would have to confess he or she might have a point. After all, it was thanks to the Gunzo Prize for New Writers that I got my start—it was at their gate, so to speak, that I got my ticket punched. I doubt that had I not won that prize, I would have continued as a writer. “Oh, well,” I might have thought, “so much for that.” Given that experience, why don’t I extend the same opportunity to the younger generation that I myself was offered? Whatever my biases, shouldn’t I grit my teeth and muster the minimum amount of objectivity required to issue a similar ticket to those following in my footsteps, to give them the same chance? I must admit that, too, makes sense. Perhaps I am to blame for not putting in the effort.
There is, however, another way to think about this. A writer’s greatest responsibility is to his readers, to keep providing them with the best work that he is capable of turning out. I am an active writer, which is to say, someone whose work is still in progress. A writer perpetually groping to discover what to do next, inching forward through the perils of the literary battlefield. The task set before me is to survive, and to try and keep moving ahead. Developing the objectivity needed to approve of or reject others’ works in a responsible manner, however, sits entirely outside the boundaries of that battlefield. If I were to undertake that new task seriously—and of course that is how it must be done—it would consume no small amount of time and energy. That in turn would cut into the time and energy I have for my own work. To be honest, I don’t have that much time to spare. I know that there are others who can manage both, but my hands are full trying to carry out the tasks already on my plate.
Is this egoism? Certainly it’s self-centered. I can’t argue with that. I simply have to swallow whatever criticism comes my way.
Nevertheless, from what I have seen, publishing houses seem to have no problem putting together juries for their literary prizes. Nor have I heard of publishers forced to terminate a prize for a lack of jury members. To the contrary, from what I can see, the number of prize competitions is only increasing. It feels, in fact, as if someone is being awarded one every day. My failure to serve, it seems, is not causing a social problem by reducing the number of tickets for aspiring writers.
My reluctance stems from another problem, too. Suppose I were to criticize a work under consideration, and someone said to me, “Who are you to be so high and mighty? What about the stuff you have written?” What could I say in reply? I could only agree. I prefer to avoid that situation if at all possible.
Please don’t misunderstand—by no means am I denigrating writers (my comrades in arms) who sit on literary prize juries. There are those who are able to focus on their work single-mindedly, while at the same time objectively critiquing works by new writers. They must have a mental switch of some sort that allows them to play that dual role. I can only extend my deepest respect and gratitude to them. Sadly, however, I cannot join their group. I need time to make decisions, and even then, I often make the wrong ones.
* * *
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I have written very little about literary prizes until now. That is because the media tend to play them up irrespective of the quality of the works. Nevertheless, as I said at the outset, that short column about my relationship to the Akutagawa Prize has made me think that the time has come to weigh in on the topic. Otherwise, I fear that a strange misconception might arise that, if left unaddressed, could harden into commonly accepted fact.
It is not as easy as it looks, though, to talk about what that article claims, given its fishy origins and its contentious nature. The more I bare my soul, the less believable—and the more arrogant—I sound. Like a boomerang, my attempt to correct the record could come flying back even faster. When all is said and done, though, I think that honesty is the best policy under the circumstances. For at least some of my readers are sure to believe me.
What I wish to emphasize above all is that a writer’s own individual qualities are their most important possession. A literary prize should indirectly reinforce those qualities and not be considered a form of compensation. Still less should it be taken to sum up who the writer is. If the prize manages to reinforce the writer’s capacity in a positive way, then it is a “good prize”—if it doesn’t, or if it interferes with the writer’s work or becomes a burden, then unfortunately it can no longer be called a “good prize.” Hence Algren threw away his medal and Chandler was prepared to turn down a trip to Stockholm (though I can’t know if he would have followed through on that had he actually won the Nobel).
Literary prizes thus mean vastly different things to different people. Their significance depends on an individual’s standpoint, on the writer’s circumstances and the way he thinks and lives. You can’t lump us all together. That is really all I want to say on the topic of literary prizes. You can’t make sweeping statements about them, one way or another. So you should avoid that, too!
Not that what I have asserted here is likely to change things in any real way.
On Originality
What is originality?
That’s a hard question to answer. When we say that a work of art is “original,” what exactly do we mean? What are its qualifications? These kinds of questions only make us more and more confused when we try to answer them head-on.
The noted neurologist and author Oliver Sacks had this to say about originality, in his essay “Prodigies” from the book An Anthropologist on Mars:
Creativity, as usually understood, entails not only a “what,” a talent, but a “who”—strong personal characteristics, a strong identity, personal sensibility, a personal style, which flow into the talent, interfuse it, give it personal body and form. Creativity in this sense involves the power to originate, to break away from the existing ways of looking at things, to move freely in the realm of the imagination, to create and recreate worlds fully in one’s mind—while supervising all this with a critical inner eye.[1]
This is a profound definition, precise and to the point. Yet laying it out this way seems to leave something unsaid…I can only fold my arms and wonder.
Perhaps the concept of “originality” can be understood more easily if we set direct definitions and rational theories aside and look instead at concrete examples. I remember, for example, the thrill I felt on first hearing the music of the Beatles—I think it was “Please Please Me” on the radio when I was fifteen. I have never forgotten how I felt at that moment. Why such a strong reaction? Well, I had never heard a sound like that, on top of which it was just so cool. It’s hard to put into words why I found it so wonderful, but it totally blew my mind. I had felt much the same thing a year earlier the first time I heard the Beach Boys sing “Surfin’ U.S.A.” “Wow!” I had thought. “This is amazing, not like anything else I’ve heard!”
Looking back, it was the originality of these groups that enthralled me. Their sound was new, their music different than what anyone else was doing, and its quality was far and away the best. They had something special. Something even a fourteen- or fifteen-year-old kid clutching a dinky AM transistor radio with crummy sound could instantly understand. It was that simple.
Far less simple is articulating that difference. In fact, nothing could be more difficult. There’s no way I could have done it back then, and even now, as a professional wordsmith, it taxes my linguistic abilities. A somewhat technical approach is required—yet too analytical an explanation can’t tell the whole story. It’s faster to listen to the music. Your ears will tell!
Nevertheless, more than a half century has passed since the Beatles and Beach Boys came on the scene. It is hard for anyone today to comprehend how powerful the impact of their music was for those of us who experienced it when it was first released.
