| The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle | |
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First US edition cover |
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| Author(s) | Haruki Murakami |
| Original title | ねじまき鳥クロニクル Nejimaki-dori kuronikuru' |
| Translator | Jay Rubin |
| Country | Japan |
| Language | Japanese |
| Genre(s) | Novel |
| Publisher | Shinchosha (Japanese) Vintage (US) |
| Publication date | 1994-5 |
| Published in English |
1997 |
| Media type | Print (Hardcover) |
| Pages | 607 |
| ISBN | 0-679-77543-9 |
| OCLC Number | 39915729 |
The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle (ねじまき鳥クロニクル Nejimaki-dori Kuronikuru) is a novel by Haruki Murakami. The first published translation was by Alfred Birnbaum. The American translation and its British adaptation, dubbed the "only official translations" (English) are by Jay Rubin and were first published in 1997. For this novel, Murakami received the Yomiuri Literary Award, which was awarded to him by one of his harshest former critics, Oe Kenzaburo.
Contents |
The original Japanese edition was released in three parts, which make up the three "books" of the single volume English language version.
In English translation, two chapters were originally published in The New Yorker under the titles "The Zoo Attack" on July 31, 1995, and "Another Way to Die" on January 20, 1997. A slightly different version of the first chapter translated by Alfred Birnbaum was published in the collection The Elephant Vanishes under the title "The Wind-up Bird and Tuesday's Women". In addition, the character name Noboru Wataya appears in the short story "Family Affair" in The Elephant Vanishes. While having a similar personality and background, the character is not related to the one in The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle of the same name. Noboru Wataya is also used in Jay Rubin's translation of the title short story in The Elephant Vanishes.
In May 2010, Harvill Secker published the Limited Centenary Edition of The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle to celebrate its one hundred years of publishing. It was limited to 2,500 copies. [1]
The novel is about a low-key unemployed man, Toru Okada, whose cat runs away. A chain of events follow that prove that his seemingly mundane boring life is much more complicated than it appears.
While this book has many major and minor characters, these are among the most important:
Two chapters from the second volume of the original three-volume Japanese paperback edition were not included in the English translation. In addition, one of the chapters near the excluded two was moved ahead of another chapter, taking it out of the context of the original order.[2]
The two missing chapters elaborate on the relationship between Toru Okada and Creta Kano, and a "hearing" of the wind-up bird as Toru burns a box of Kumiko's belongings.
The English translation of the novel was carried out by Jay Rubin.
It must also be noted that in addition to very notable differences between the Japanese and English versions, there are also differences between the original Japanese hardcover and paperback editions.[2]
Further differences exist between the American and British editions, but these are much more superficial.[2]
The German translation by Giovanni and Ditte Bandini is based on the English translation, not on the Japanese original.[3]
There is also an Italian translation from the original Japanese version by Antonietta Pastore, published by Einaudi, known as "L'uccello che girava le viti del mondo".
The Swedish edition, "Fågeln som vrider upp världen", was translated from the Japanese original by Eiko and Yukiko Duke and published in 2007.
The Danish version is "Trækopfuglens Krønike"
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