What I Talk about When I Talk about Running

What really fascinates me about Haruki Murakami is not his body of work per se, but the process through which he rose from anonymity and became a world-renowned author. Until he was 29, he’d never imagined he had the talent to write a novel. Before his rise to fame, novelists were known to live a wild and intemperate existence, drinking lots of alcohol into the wee hours and getting started on their manuscript past deadline. Murakami, however, broke this stereotype as someone who wakes up early, works out every day, and has run multiple full marathons. I have no doubt… show more.

Murakami’s running memoir is really the first of his books that I’ve really understood. At least I think I understand it; maybe there’s an epiphany that will detonate on my death bed. It’s wild to see an avant-garde writer produce such a straight-up account of his running habit. His routine verges on boring, which is maybe the point. You hang in there with boredom, because on the other side of it is a fascination and maybe even enlightenment. A couple of Murikami’s lines popped into my head, like a tonic, as I struggled to not be dead-last in my heat… show more.