How to Japanese Podcast · Daniel Morales

Episode 47 - Murakami and 見積もり

·39 min·2 clips

Jay Rubin says Murakami asked for the translation in 2018 and he finished it two to three years ago.

1. How to Japanese Podcast episode 47 centers on Murakami translation collecting, the Japanese word mitsumori, and a New Year update from Osaka. 2. The host speaks as a Murakami reader, translator-blogger, and recent apartment mover, which matters because he ties book prices to his own shopping and moving decisions. 3. The episode asks what happens when Alfred Birnbaum translations become scarce and how that scarcity affects price, access, and readership. 4. The host describes buying a used copy of Norwegian Wood in the Alfred Birnbaum translation as a mixed pair with one first-edition volume and one second-edition volume. 5. He compares that purchase to earlier sales of books through Myopic Books in Chicago, Facebook Marketplace, and Craigslist. 6. He says Hear the Wind Sing and Pinball 1973 were once hard to get, but copies of those titles have been available again since 2015. 7. He cites David Karashima's Who We're Reading When We Read Murakami and says Murakami was first translated for Kodansha International's English library line. 8. He distinguishes the Kodansha English Library editions of Hear the Wind Sing, Pinball 1973, and Norwegian Wood from later Kodansha International editions of A Wild Sheep Chase, Dance, Dance, Dance, and Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World. 9. He notes that Hear the Wind Sing stayed on Japanese bookstore shelves for years, while Norwegian Wood disappeared from print in that line. 10. He uses Mercari and eBay to show the modern market, citing 3,000 to 13,000 yen on Mercari, 650 pounds at Shapiro Rare Books, and $54 to $1,400 on eBay. 11. He argues that the market on Mercari feels like a neighborhood garage sale, while eBay often feels like a seller and buyer in a staring contest. 12. He suggests that Japanese and overseas buyers may value these books differently because many overseas readers want Murakami in English rather than in Japanese. 13. He also says the varying print histories of the translations make the market confusing, especially when first editions, reprints, and replacement translations overlap. 14. He recalls a New Yorker Festival Murakami signing in 2002 or 2003, where another attendee showed a first edition of The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle. 15. He then turns to a 2024 J. Rubin translation of Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World, scheduled for September 17, 2024 through Everyman's Library Contemporary Classics. 16. He notes that the Everyman's Library page shows a placeholder cover and a foreword by Murakami, while links currently point back to the Vintage or Penguin Random House Birnbaum edition. 17. He highlights Rubin's Wellesley talk from April 2023, which he says has only about 900 views on YouTube. 18. The episode's tone is conversational and archival, with long stretches of explanation, concrete price examples, and repeated references to blog posts, tweets, and saved searches. 19. Murakami readers who track translations, editions, and Japanese book markets will get the most from this episode. 20. Listeners wanting a short, purely literary discussion without shopping details may skip it.

As heard by us

A Murakami detour that turns a moving checklist into a quiet lesson on 見積もり.

A small domestic problem opens the door here: a move on the calendar, a pile of used books, and a New Year promise that barely holds. What follows is a calm drift through Murakami editions, Mercari searches, and the neat pressure of 見積もり, with the practical and the literary kept…

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Why you'd press play

If you are moving, hunting used books, or trying to get a handle on mitsumori, this one pays off.

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