Style

I'm rereading Murakami's "South of the border,  West of the sun" and it's giving me really weird dreams about Japanese teenagers, it is also, however,  reminding me of why I love his books so much: style.

It's all about style.

I was upset to see that I had all but forgotten the contents of its pages,  but the first couple of pages down and soon I was in rural Japan and omniscient observer of the events unfolding letter by letter. The progression in this novel is quick, and before you know it you've reared a child into an adult bearing witness to first relationships and awkward sexual encounters.  And that's just he first four chapters. Murakami's use of specific diction is captivating,  harboring the perfect climate for forcing readers to engage their imagination.  It's mastery epitomized.

It's more interesting still to see that a book, sentences and ideas penned on paper in 1992, are excepted from age.  You could read this book 20 years from now and it would still (hopefully) evoke the same feelings that someone who read it 20 years prior experienced. Timelessness is not inherent but a skill developed painstakingly over countless revision, the indicative quality of a good writer. But that's my opinion.  While his work is likened more to contemporaries like Palanuik, he is unique in the respect that his narrator's perspective breaks away from motif of the "unreliable" concept of post mordenist authors. His characters are real,  relatable and suffer the human condition honestly.

I hope one day,  as my writing matures and I continue to refine my style and identity as a writer,  that I too will learn to captivate and engage in a similar manner.; I believe that I'm not alone in this respect, either that or I'm suffering from blind sense of unintentional hubris. 

Guess I've got time to figure that one out.