64 pages 2 hours read

Haruki Murakami

Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World

Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 1985

A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.

Themes

Experience and the Self

Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World raises many questions about the relationship between memory and identity. Both narrators suffer from memory alteration. The hard-boiled narrator wants to get his “stolen memories back and live. Forget the end of the world, I was ready to reclaim my whole self” (239). The shuffling surgery causes him to have false memories and lose some brain space that held memories. The narrator in the end of the world is separated from his shadow, who holds their memories in the Shadow Grounds and later escapes through the Southern Pool with them. The shadow says, “I got most of our memories, but what am I supposed to do with them? In order to make sense, we’d have to be put back together, which is not going to happen” (247). Yet, the narrator believes that, even without his shadow, “little by little, I will recall things [...] And as I remember, I may find the key to my own creation, and to its undoing” (399). Finding memories, he argues, is the key to undoing the consciousness sealed off in the narrator’s mind.

Memories, as parts of the self, are not only destroyed by the shadows of the Town’s citizens dying at the end of the world but are also carried off by the beasts—unicorns—and stored in their bones.

Related Titles

By Haruki Murakami

Study Guide

logo

After Dark

Haruki Murakami

After Dark

Haruki Murakami

Study Guide

logo

A Wild Sheep Chase

Haruki Murakami

A Wild Sheep Chase

Haruki Murakami

Plot Summary

logo

Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman

Haruki Murakami

Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman

Haruki Murakami

Study Guide

logo

Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage

Haruki Murakami

Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage

Haruki Murakami

Study Guide

logo

Kafka on the Shore

Haruki Murakami

Kafka on the Shore

Haruki Murakami

Plot Summary

logo

Killing Commendatore

Haruki Murakami

Killing Commendatore

Haruki Murakami

Study Guide

logo

Norwegian Wood

Haruki Murakami

Norwegian Wood

Haruki Murakami

Plot Summary

logo

South of the Border, West of the Sun

Haruki Murakami

South of the Border, West of the Sun

Haruki Murakami

Plot Summary

logo

Sputnik Sweetheart

Haruki Murakami

Sputnik Sweetheart

Haruki Murakami

Study Guide

logo

The Elephant Vanishes

Haruki Murakami

The Elephant Vanishes: Stories

Haruki Murakami

Study Guide

logo

The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle

Haruki Murakami, Transl. Jay Rubin

The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle

Haruki Murakami, Transl. Jay Rubin

Plot Summary

logo

What I Talk About When I Talk About Running

Haruki Murakami

What I Talk About When I Talk About Running

Haruki Murakami