distance trucks.
Ever since the incomparable cadences of his South of the Border, West of the Sun (English translation 2000), Murakami has been drawn to mixing the realistic with the bizarre. Here, too, the excellently-drawn scenes in the love hotel, and between Mari and Takahashi, alternate with the sci-fi-like mysteries of the sleeping Eri being watched by the mysterious masked presence (who may in fact be Shirakawa).
Aspects of modern city life are certainly recognized and incorporated - surveillance, insomnia, casual sex and individual isolation. The search for love, Murakami is perhaps saying, has formidable obstacles these days. Takahashi significantly tells Mari he will write her "a super-long letter, like in an old-fashioned novel," and the author may be summing up the book's events when he writes, "Mari has made her way through the long hours of darkness, traded many words with the night people she encountered there, and come back to where she belongs."
Even so, this very readable short novel has to struggle to compare with the classics in the novella genre. This is no Heart of Darkness or Death in Venice. As an evocation of modern life it can't really compare with Michel Houellebecq's grimly sardonic imaginings either. But it does embody Murakami's very distinctive poignancy and sadness (which, however, never descends into melancholy). Murakami fans will snap it up, while others will be disappointed by its brevity and inconclusiveness.
Nevertheless, After Dark is memorable enough, an evocation of the passing of time not unlike Virginia Woolf's The Waves. It's probably most valuably seen in relation to the Murakami canon as a whole, and best appreciated in conjunction with his other recent part-realistic, part-fantasy creations. The fine English version is notable for its polish and naturalness, and especially its rendering of modern American colloquial speech by Murakami's regular translator, Jay Rubin.
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