Audition QUOTES

1 " To distort our faces with joy, or wail and weep with sorrow, or collapse in agony, or wallow in sentimentality – wasn’t an inviolable human trait but something we can lose simply by leading dull and dreary lives. ‘A rich emotional life,’ she’d written, ‘is a privilege reserved only for the daring few’. "

― Ryū Murakami , Audition

2 " It was the face of a human being who’d been constructed exclusively of wounds. Not time or history or ambition, nothing but wounds. The face of a person who could probably kill someone without feeling anything whatsoever. "

― Ryū Murakami , Audition

3 " People were infected with the concept that happiness was something outside themselves, and a new and powerful form of loneliness was born. Mix loneliness with stress and enervation, and all sorts of madness can occur. Anxiety increases, and in order to obliterate the anxiety, people turn to extreme sex, violence, and even murder. "

― Ryū Murakami , Audition

4 " But sometimes things happen that no one hopes for. Events that cause everything you've worked towards, the life you've carefully constructed piece by piece, to come tumbling down all around you. No one is to blame, but you're left with a wound you can't heal on your own and can't believe you'll ever learn to accept, so you struggle to escape the pain. Only time can heal wounds as deep as that - a lot of time - and all you can really do is place yourself in its hands and try to consider the passing of each day a victory. You tough it out moment by moment, hour by hour, and after some weeks or months you begin to see signs of recovery. Slowly the wound heals into a scar. "

― Ryū Murakami , Audition

5 " That’s what violence was: emotion leaking out from consciousness into the physical world, linking up with the muscles of the arms and shoulders and diaphragm and, inevitably, the face. Stifle emotion during an act of violence and the face becomes a blank, unreadable mask. "

― Ryū Murakami , Audition

6 " People were infected with the concept that happiness was something outside themselves, and a new and powerful form of loneliness was born. "

― Ryū Murakami , Audition

7 " In Japan, even when you're alone, you're never really that lonely. But the loneliness you feel living among people with differently coloured skin and eyes, whose language you don't even speak very well - that sort of loneliness is something you feel down to the marrow of your bones. "

― Ryū Murakami , Audition

8 " A person without self-confidence is incapable of being independent, and people who are dependent on their partners always create unhappiness. Always. "

― Ryū Murakami , Audition

9 " Only time can heal wounds as deep as that—a lot of time—and all you can really do is place yourself in its hands and try to consider the passing of each day a victory. "

― Ryū Murakami , Audition

10 " You have to watch your step with women these days, Pops. She could be involved with Yakuza or something. Even some of the girls in my class -- you should hear the stuff they talk about. Fifteen years old, and there's nothing they don't know. We're not in the age of Peace and Love anymore. "

― Ryū Murakami , Audition

11 " Nice person, bad person -- that's not the level this girl is at. I can see you're crazy about her and probably won't be able to hear this, Ao-chan, but I think you'd be better off staying away from someone like her. I can't read her exactly, but I can tell you she's either a saint or a monster. Maybe both extremes at once, but not somewhere in between. "

― Ryū Murakami , Audition

12 " No forgiveness for lies. "

― Ryū Murakami , Audition

13 " Yeah. He wants to be a…what do you call those guys?” “A sommelier?” “Right. Said he wanted to see your collection.” “At fifteen he’s already decided what he wants to be?” “Lots of guys have.” “Is that wise? To limit your options at such a young age? "

― Ryū Murakami , Audition

14 " Advertising departments, as you know, are crawling with people whose frontal lobes are so underdeveloped that if you flatter them a bit they'll swear shit is platinum. "

― Ryū Murakami , Audition

15 " The young people
nowadays – men and women, amateurs and pros – generally fall
into one of two categories: either they don’t know what it is
that’s most important to them, or they know but don’t have the
power to go after it. But this girl’s different. She knows what’s
most important to her and she knows how to get it, but she
doesn’t let on what it is. I’m pretty sure it’s not money, or
success, or a normal happy life, or a strong man, or some weird
religion, but that’s about all I can tell you. She’s like smoke: you
think you’re seeing her clearly enough, but when you reach for
her there’s nothing there. That’s a sort of strength, I suppose.
But it makes her hard to figure out. "

― Ryū Murakami , Audition

16 " After hanging up the phone Aoyama sank back back on the sofa feeling like a balloon in a warm blue sky. "

― Ryū Murakami , Audition

17 " People always talk about the health benefits of Japanese food,’ he said, ‘but I’m fascinated by other aspects of the Japanese dining experience. Like the whole system of serving food at a counter like this, with the customers all facing the same direction, instead of each other. It’s strange when you think about it. At a sushi bar, for example, everyone’s facing the itamae-san, and you discuss the things you’re eating – what type of squid this is, and where they’re caught, and how this is the season for them but they’ll only be at their best for another couple of weeks, and so on. Discussing the food with the chef even as you eat it – that’s a peculiar system.’

‘I suppose it is, isn’t it? I don’t go to sushi restaurants very often – they’re so expensive – and I could probably count the number of times I’ve sat at the counter, but I know what you mean. There’s something about that atmosphere.’

‘At its worst, it’s almost an atmosphere of collusion.’

‘Collusion?’

‘Everyone at the counter becomes a member of the group. In some sushi bars, all the customers are regulars and they all know each other. As an outsider, you need courage to walk into a place like that and take a seat. It’s a tight-knit little community, and harmony is of the utmost importance. Nobody’s confronting anyone else individually. The conversation all proceeds through the chef, who’s like a moderator or a master of ceremonies. You couldn’t spend some quiet time with a lover, for example, in a place like that, because you’d be isolating yourselves from the others and spoiling the atmosphere for everyone. "

― Ryū Murakami , Audition

18 " People were infected with the concept that happiness was something outside themselves, "

― Ryū Murakami , Audition

19 " Crede în intuiție și Universul te va călăuzi. "

― Ryū Murakami , Audition

20 " She told me that real strength is the capacity for kindness to others, and that I should do whatever I could to find that kind of strength. She said she couldn’t tell me how to go about doing that, because she never found it herself, but that people who where strong enough to be kind to others could always get by in this world. "

― Ryū Murakami , Audition