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NORWEGIAN WOOD.

STUDY GUIDE FOR FURTHER CLASS DISCUSSION1


Published in 1987 as Murakami's fifth novel, Norwegian Wood is based on his short story "Firefly, which was later included
in his short story collection Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman. Contrary to his expectations and wishes, the book turned him
from a moderately successful author into a national star, with millions of copies of the book bought primarily by young
Japanese. He left the country for several years to avoid the fame.

Write a summary of the novel (700 to 800 words)

Norwegian Wood Summary

While on an airplane descending to Hamburg Airport, Toru Watanabe hears the Beatles song "Norwegian Wood" played
over the speakers and is overcome by painful memories of his past. He remembers a meadow where he and Naoko, the
girl he loved, walked 18 years ago when he was still 19.

Toru grew up in Kobe with Kizuki as his best and only friend. Along with Naoko, who was Kizuki's girlfriend and childhood
friend, Toru and Kizuki formed an inseparable small group. However, their lives were torn apart in their second year of
high school when Kizuki inexplicably committed suicide. Independent of each other, both Toru and Naoko decide to leave
their hometown for Tokyo to attend university, where they run into each other in 1968 in their first year. The two end up
going on dates every Sunday, simply walking extensively throughout the city; meanwhile, Toru deals with his stuttering
and eccentrically neat roommate, nicknamed "Storm Trooper," and gets to know Nagasawa, a charismatic and egoistic
upperclassman in the dorm. Nagasawa begins to take him out some nights to find random girls to sleep with.

On Naoko's 20th birthday, Toru comes over to her apartment, and when she breaks down into tears he comforts her and
then has sex with her. The next day he tries to contact her again, but later finds that she has moved. Concerned, he sends
her a letter. Meanwhile, Toru meets Midori Kobayashi, an underclassman in his drama class with a vibrant and quirky
personality who seems to have taken an interest in him. A few weeks later Midori invites him over to her house, and while
watching a house fire from her balcony they kiss.

Toru receives a letter from Naoko explaining that she has gone to Ami Hostel, a special kind of sanatorium, to recover
from psychological problems she has been having. Toru visits her there and meets Reiko Ishida, a woman in her late thirties
who is Naoko's roommate. Reiko explains that at the sanatorium, located in the middle of a remote forest, people do not
try to cure but rather adapt to their individual deformities. That night Toru sees Naoko in the moonlight by his bed, and
mysteriously she reveals her naked body to Toru, astounding him with its perfection.

During Toru's stay, Reiko and Naoko separately tell him their life stories. Reiko was an aspiring concert pianist until a
nervous breakdown derailed her career; and then her mental problems made it difficult for her to have a normal life until
a man married her and promised to take care of her. However, due to an incident in which a young piano student of hers
manipulated her, she had another nervous breakdown, after which she came to the sanatorium. Naoko tells Toru about
how she witnessed her older sister's suicide.

Upon returning to Tokyo, Toru feels disoriented, as though he left part of himself in the quiet world of Ami Hostel.
However, Midori revitalizes him by taking him drinking. Later she takes him to the hospital where her father is dying of
brain cancer, and Toru bonds with the man, who dies within a week. Around this time, Nagasawa invites Toru to a dinner
with his girlfriend Hatsumi; at the dinner, the couple falls out over Nagasawa's inability to consider Hatsumi's feelings.

Toru makes another visit to Ami Hostel to see Naoko and then moves from the dorm into a house. Due to his ignoring her,
Midori angrily refuses to speak with Toru, and this combined with news from Reiko that Naoko's condition is worsening
sends Toru into a depression. However, he manages to pull himself out of it. He and Midori come to realize that they love
each other, but they agree to wait while Toru tries to understand his relationship with Naoko.

Out of nowhere, Toru receives news that Naoko has killed herself; grief-stricken, he spends a month traveling alone
aimlessly away from Tokyo. However, he feels compelled to return and restart his life. Reiko leaves the sanatorium to visit,

1
http://www.gradesaver.com/norwegian-wood in MLA Format
Lin, Alexander. Suduiko, Aaron ed. "Norwegian Wood Study Guide". GradeSaver, 12 April 2016 Web. 28
August 2017.
and together the two hold a small funeral for Naoko involving Reiko playing every song she knows on the guitar.
Afterwards, Reiko sleeps with Toru, and then the next day she leaves for a new life in Hokkaido. Some time later from
some unknown place, Toru calls Midori telling her that he needs her.

Write a short description of each one of the characters of the novel.

Norwegian Wood Character List

Toru Watanabe

A student studying drama at a university in Tokyo, he was best friends with Kizuki back when they attended high school
together in Kobe. He considers himself a very ordinary person.

Naoko

Kizuki's girlfriend, also from Kobe, who goes to Tokyo for university after Kizuki's suicide. She becomes very quiet, has
trouble finding words sometimes, and has incredibly clear, bottomless eyes.

Midori Kobayashi

An underclassman Toru meets in his History of Drama class with a short haircut and a quirky, exuberant personality.

Kizuki

Toru's best friend and Naoko's boyfriend, he killed himself without explanation when he was seventeen.

Nagasawa

An upperclassman in Toru's dorm studying in the Faculty of Law at the prestigious Tokyo University and looking to join the
Foreign Service. Supremely self-confident, intelligent, and driven, he does not feel for other people and spends his time
womanizing.

Midori's father

A man dying of brain cancer. He loved his wife so much that he told Midori and her sister that he would have preferred
for them to die in her place.

Hatsumi

Nagasawa's girlfriend. She is a very well composed and skillful girl who, like her boyfriend, attends a prestigious university.

Storm Trooper

Toru's dorm roommate, a stuttering, eccentric, and kind young man studying geography.

Reiko ishida

Naoko's roommate at Ami Hostel, a woman in her late thirties who was on her way to becoming a concert pianist until a
nervous breakdown ended her career. She plays guitar and smokes.

Itoh

A painting student whom Toru gets to know briefly while Midori is ignoring him. Toru talks with him about relationships.

Norwegian Wood Symbols, Allegory and Motifs

Motif Definition2

Motif is an object or idea that repeats itself throughout a literary work.

2
https://literarydevices.net/motif/
Motif and Theme

In a literary work, a motif can be seen as an image, sound, action or other figures that have a symbolic significance and
contributes toward the development of theme. Motif and theme are linked in a literary work but there is a difference
between them. In a literary piece, a motif is a recurrent image, idea or a symbol that develops or explains a theme while
a theme is a central idea or message.

Motif and Symbol

Sometimes, examples of motif are mistakenly identified as examples of symbols. Symbols are images, ideas, sounds or
words that represent something else and help to understand an idea or a thing. Motifs, on the other hand, are images,
ideas, sounds or words that help to explain the central idea of a literary work i.e. theme. Moreover, a symbol may appear
once or twice in a literary work, whereas a motif is a recurring element.

Allegory

A story, poem, or picture that can be interpreted to reveal a hidden meaning, typically a moral or political one.

Simile

A figure of speech involving the comparison of one thing with another thing of a different kind, used to make a description
more emphatic or vivid (e.g. as brave as a lion ). The use of similes as a method of comparison: "his audacious deployment
of simile and metaphor"

Metaphor

A figure of speech in which a word or phrase is applied to an object or action to which it is not literally applicable. "when
we speak of gene maps and gene mapping, we use a cartographic metaphor"

Based upon the previous definition, plase explain the following literary devices:

The firefly Toru releases from the dormitory roof (symbol)

The symbolic significance of the firefly that Storm Trooper gives to Toru is immediately established by Storm Trooper's
suggestion that Toru give it to his "girlfriend," i.e. Naoko. Toru sees the firefly somewhat as he sees Naoko: a creature
once bright and free that has lost much of its life and become caged. Looking at its pale glow in the dark night, he thinks
not of the present but is instead flung back into memories of a past with brighter fireflies. When he frees it on the rooftop,
it is still for such a long time that Toru begins to doubt whether it is still alive; but he waits, as any true lover waits, and
finally the little bug takes flight, tracing an arc in the air that seems to reclaim a lost past, and then flying off into the night.
Although this image is very positive for the firefly, Toru is left grasping in vain at the trail of light it left behind in his mind.

Moonlight (motif)

Although there are no explicitly magical scenes in this Murakami novel, one can be sure that nearly anything that happens
under the moonlight has been charged with a special significance transcending everyday reality. Naoko, who already
possesses a decidedly otherworldly character due to her unnaturally clear and bottomless eyes, enters into an even
stranger state when she is in the clear moonlight. The scene in which she exposes her naked body to Toru only makes
sense if one considers the supernatural atmosphere created by the moonlight; conversely, it is only when the clarity of
the moon, and her eyes, has been blocked by the mist of heavy rain that she is able to experience (painful) intimacy with
Toru the night of her birthday when Toru sleeps with her.

Rain (motif)

Perhaps the weather condition that occurs the most frequently in the story, rain is a crucial figure to the novel. From the
very beginning of the novel when Toru's plane lands in Hamburg in the rain to such climactic scenes as the night Toru
sleeps with Naoko, rain creates a presence of the supernatural, or at least an emotional charge that far exceeds that of
everyday life. In fact, even when there is no rain, such as the fair day when Toru and Naoko walk through the meadows
near Ami Hostel, rain makes itself felt through its absence.
Midori's hunger (motif)

Toru first meets Midori while he is having lunch. Thenceforth a great many of their dates involve getting lunch together,
as opposed to the extensive and aimless walking that Toru did with Naoko. Moreover, when Toru first visits Midori at her
home, she shows off the cooking skills, which she has determinedly honed. Though she is small and importantly vulnerable,
unlike Naoko she is not abashed to express her hunger for love to the world, and in doing so she stirs up a certain vitality
in Toru that no one else does.

Letter writing (allegory)

If we want to identify Toru's first letter, it would either be the note that he left with Naoko the morning after he slept with
her or the letter he sent to her home after he found that she had moved from Tokyo. It contains the crucial theme
sustained through their correspondence: the desire for understanding and dealing with pain. Apart from Toru's two visits
to Ami Hostel, the letters that he exchanges with Naoko remain his one link with her, and during the month that he is cut
off from all people, including Midori, his letter writing becomes the only thing connecting him to the world outside himself
at all, just as letter writing was for Naoko.

"We forged straight ahead, as if our walking were a religious ritual meant to heal our wounded spirits." (27) (simile)

The one thing that Toru and Naoko never talk about during their walking-dates is the past: Kizuki's suicide back in Kobe
from which they fled to Tokyo, which provides them with an endless metropolitan expanse in which to continually run
away. The two feel implicitly that by walking together, often with Naoko leaning on Toru's shoulder, they can forge a bond
to sustain each other. In the end, though, they are not able to walk forever, and their walking does not take them
anywhere.

"Fresh, simple, smells like life. Really good cucumbers" (191) (simile)

When Toru visits Midori's father in the hospital where he lies dying of brain cancer, she tells him of her toils taking care of
him and is slightly exasperated to find that her sister has packed a cucumber for her to feed him. Doubtful that he would
want to eat it, she asks him, and indeed he refuses. However, when Toru takes over and begins to eat the cucumber,
Midori's father too takes interest in it and asks to eats some. In this case, just as Toru is able to make people feel
comfortable and bring out their best selves in conversation, he is able to restore Midori's father's appetite, thus giving him
a burst of new life just before his death.

"You look like you've seen a ghost" (168) (simile)

Right after Toru's first trip to Ami Hostel to visit Naoko, he becomes disillusioned with the bustling everyday world of
Tokyo. In fact, just as Midori comments, Toru has been to a strange land of the dead where Naoko lives in a limbo, still
tied to the dead Kizuki but also to Toru; this is especially evident from the episode when Naoko shows her "perfect" naked
body to Toru as though in a dream at night. The implication is that Midori is decidedly not a ghost; indeed, she cures Toru
of his malaise by going drinking with him.

"We're all each others' mirrors" (97) (metaphor)

Reiko explains that the unique aspect of Ami Hostel is that patients and doctors alike expose their own vulnerabilities and
become attentive to others' vulnerabilities. More than a simple isolated solitude, this environment of totally honest and
nonjudgmental communication is meant to allow people to understand themselves better and thus adapt to their own
deformities.

"Midori removed her sunglasses and narrowed her eyes. She might just as well have been looking at a crumbling,
abandoned house some hundred yards in the distance" (254) (simile)

Toru experiences something very similar with Naoko when he looks into her eyes the night she exposes her naked body
to him: even though the two are close, their estrangement makes itself apparent in the distance of their eye contact.
However, in this case with Midori there is the significant difference that Midori has taken off her sunglasses, which,
recalling the first time Toru encountered her, is a sign of her feeling vulnerable; the Naoko of the "perfect flesh," on the
other hand, was one who was unnaturally free of all deformities.

Norwegian Wood Essay Questions


Select ONE of the following questions. Write a 1,200-word essay about it. Try to bring elements from reality to your
response. Use some of the functions learned in class.

Should we take Toru at his word and consider him an "ordinary" guy?

Although Toru, whether introspecting or talking with others, frequently describes himself as a very ordinary person
without any special ambitions or peculiar characteristics, one gets the sense that he is always in the middle of thingsnot
simply because he is the main character and narrator, but from a propensity he has to fit in and make people comfortable.
It might be helpful to think of him in contrast to other characters such as Nagasawa: though Nagasawa perhaps shares a
self-centered personality with Toru, he lacks any of the capacity for feeling pain that Toru has. Also, since Toru usually
finds it difficult to realize what is unique about himself, characters like Midori who comment on his personality explicate
much of what remains unsaid. For example, he does not force things on anyone else, unlike what most people in the world
do.

Why does the elder Toru decide to write the story of his younger life?

The impetus to write for Toru is inseparable from the impetus to remember. He writes in the first chapter: "Clutching all
these faded, fading, imperfect memories to my breast, I go on writing this book with all the desperate intensity of a starving
man sucking on bones. This is the only way I know to keep my promise to Naoko"that is, his promise to always remember
her (10). However, this promise is filled with paradoxes that he did not understand at the time: as a living, growing person,
Toru is naturally unable to remember all things as time sweeps them farther back in his mind, and Naoko's request is
somehow already aware of this fact. Just as when Naoko could only have sex with Toru when her usually unusually clear
eyes became clouded, so is Toru only able to understand and write after his memories have lost their painful clarity. In
that sense it is also a process of coming to understanding for him and of dealing with his past pain.

What is the significance Toru's habit of ironing his laundry on Sundays?

Toru tells Midori's sick father that he does his laundry and irons every Sunday, which, as he explained to Naoko, is the day
he "unwinds his spring." He explains: "I don't mind ironing at all. There's a special satisfaction in making wrinkled things
smooth. And I'm pretty good at it, too"; although he also says that he has missed a good day for laundry due to coming to
the hospital with Midori, one might think that he is still doing his job of "making wrinkled things smooth" and in fact doing
it quite well by making Midori's father feel more alive and thereby also raising Midori's feelings (189). Though it is
something that Toru usually only mentions tangentially, it represents the essence of his personality: a desire to help other
people feel comfortable with themselves, somewhat like how Ami Hostel is supposed to help patients "adapt to their
deformities."

Naoko describes Kizuki as "weak," and Toru resolves to become "strong." What do these terms mean, and do you agree
with the characterizations of the characters?

By Toru's recollection, he and Naoko were Kizuki's only friends, and though the three formed a very intimate group
(especially thanks to Toru's mediating influence between the two lovers), there were certain tensions that could not be
resolved in the end. As Naoko explains to Toru, she and Kizuki very much wanted to have sex with each other, but for
some reason Naoko was never physically able to do this. One way to interpret the qualities of weakness and strength is
how much a person is able to wait for anything that they love; while they were all on the cusp of adulthood, Kizuki perhaps
could not bear maturing and losing the utopian existence he had with Naoko, whereas Toru is much more willing to bear
the pain and continue moving forward in the process of maturing.
5

What does the opening scene of Toru landing at Hamburg Airport tell us about his life after the events of the novel?
Since this scene is situated at the beginning of the novel, is it relevant to how we read the rest of the novel? If so, how?

One significant detail that could easily have been missed appears out of nowhere in the middle of the story: when before
Toru leaves Hatsumi the night after his dinner with her and Nagasawa, the narrator Toru suddenly changes the perspective
to mention that, several years later, he finally came to understand the special feeling he got from Hatsumi while
interviewing a painter. This implies that he became a journalist or some other kind of writer. Thus, he has probably been
integrated into society and is on some kind of work-related trip flying to Germany. In that opening scene he is located in
a specific place, Hamburg Airport, but he is painfully alone, a situation which allows memories of Naoko to arise easily.
Does this mean that his call to Midori at the end of the novel ultimately failed, or did he end up marrying Midori and
starting a family? It seems as though he has truly matured, as he began to towards the end of the novel, but at the same
time he cannot escape his pain.

Norwegian Wood Glossary

Write the definition to each one of the words/expressions:

1. Summon

To call someone to attendance.

2. Paperweight

An object used to hold down paper.

3. Sukiyaki

A traditional Japanese dish cooked in a bowl with meat and vegetables.

4. Kyoto

A city in the Kansai province of Japan; the ancient capital.

5. Bullet train

A high-speed train.

6. Facility

A space or place for doing something.

7. The Magic Mountain

A modernist novel by Thomas Mann published in 1925 about a young man who stays at a sanatorium.

8. Knapsack

A backpack.

9. Uruguay

A South American country bordered by Argentina and Brazil.

10. Asahikawa

A city in Hokkaido.

11. Hokkaido
The northernmost island of Japan.

12. Rising Sun

The Japanese national flag.

13. Shinjuku

A central ward of Tokyo.

14. Love hotel

A Japanese hotel specialized for short stays for couples that want to have sex.

15. Barrette

A bar-shaped clip for hair.

16. John Coltrane

An American jazz saxophonist.

17. Kichioji

A neighborhood in the city of Musashino in Tokyo.

18. Midori

Japanese for "green."

19. Das Kapital

Marx's magnum opus, a critique of capitalism.

20. Takashimaya

A Japanese department store chain.

Norwegian Wood Quiz

Select the appropriate response.


1 3

How does Kizuki kill himself? Where does Toru work?

Sleeping pills. Record store.

Hanging. Restaurant.

Slitting his wrists. Library.

Exhaust from his car. Book store.

2 4

What memory does hearing "Norwegian Wood" on the Where is Toru's hometown?
airplane give Toru?
Tokyo.
Midori.
Kobe.
Naoko's face.
Kyoto.
The meadow.
Osaka.
Kizuki's suicide.
5 That he doesn't understand why Kizuki hadn't slept with her.

Where is Toru in the beginning of the novel? That he slept with Reiko.

America. That she should relax.

Tokyo. 11

Kobe. Where do Toru and Naoko first meet in Tokyo?

Hamburg Airport. At a bookstore.

6 On the train.

What did Toru do with Kizuki just before the latter committed In Toru's drama class.
suicide?
On the street.
Talked about their futures.
12
Drove on a motorcycle.
What is Toru's major?
Chatted with Naoko.
Engineering.
Played pool.
English.
7
Drama.
Storm Trooper hangs up a poster of what in his and Toru's
room? History.

A naked woman. 13

The Eiffel Tower. What does Toru tell Naoko that makes her laugh?

Amsterdam canals. About Storm Trooper.

Mountains. About Itoh.

8 About his firefly.

Why didn't Toru write about Naoko earlier in his life? About his dorm.

His memories were too clear and sharp. 14

Midori did not let him. What accessory of Naoko's does Toru pay particular attention
to?
His memories were too hazy.
Necklace.
He wanted to wait.
Barrette.
9
Earring.
What is the second of Naoko's requests to Toru?
Ring.
That he remember her.
15
That he visit her again.
What is Naoko's trouble with communication?
That he love her.
She can't look people in the eye.
That he wait for her.
She stutters.
10
She can't find the right words.
While the two are walking through the meadow, what does
Toru say that upsets Naoko? She can't speak loudly enough to be heard.

That he is seeing Midori. 16


Complete the quote: "Death exists...." 22

As the opposite of life. Over what book do Nagasawa and Toru become friends?

As something which we must submit to. A Joseph Conrad book.

Not as the opposite but as a part of life. A Raymond Chandler book.

As something we must struggle against. The Centaur.

17 The Great Gatsby.

What do Toru and Naoko do on their weekly dates? 23

Talk about the past. What does Nagasawa plan on doing after graduating?

Eat lunch. Marry Hatsumi.

Watch movies. Work at the Foreign Ministry.

Walk. Womanize.

18 Work at the Finance Ministry.

When do Toru and Naoko have their dates? 24

Mondays. Complete the quote: "Only the dead stay ____ forever."

Fridays. Eighteen.

Saturdays. Seventeen.

Sundays. Beautiful.

19 Young.

Why do Toru and Naoko walk so much together? 25

To avoid school. What was the weather like then night that Toru slept with
Naoko?
To spend more time together so that they may fall in love.
Clear skies.
To try to overcome their shared pain.
Rain.
To exercise.
Thunderstorm.
20
Snow.
What is the defining characteristic of Naoko's eyes?
26. What is one thing Toru does to remember Naoko?
Brightness.
Call her.
Darkness.
Write about her.
Clarity.
Keep a photo of her.
Haziness.
Masturbate thinking of her.
21
27. Who is Seagull?
Why does Toru feel guilty spending time with Naoko?
Toru's neighbor's dog.
He feels she still belongs with and longs for Kizuki.
Reiko's guitar.
He has slept with Reiko.
Toru's cat.
He feels like he has tricked her.
Toru's bird.
He wants to stay committed to Midori.

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