Japanese novelist Haruki Murakami sends message backing Hong Kong protesters
Acclaimed writer expressed encouragement for Occupy Central, drawing parallels between the situation and that of people confined by the Berlin Wall and ongoing conflict in Gaza.
Japanese novelist Haruki Murakami sent a message of encouragement to Hong Kong’s pro-democracy protesters in Berlin on Friday, drawing parallels between their situation and that of people confined by the Berlin Wall and ongoing conflict in Gaza.
Murakami is the first Japanese author awarded the Welt Literature Prize by German daily newspaper Die Welt since the 10,000-euro prize was established in 1999.
Accepting the prize, he spoke of his own memories of the Berlin Wall prior to its fall 25 years ago, and attributed ongoing conflicts throughout the world to a system of walls that drive people apart based on intolerance, greed and fear.
Murakami said it is the task of novelists to help readers pass through these walls, and that harnessing the power of each person’s imagination “could be the starting point of something.”
A world without walls can be created “in the quiet but sustained effort to keep on singing, to keep on telling stories, stories about a better and freer world to come, without losing heart,” he said.
“We can see [a world without walls] with our own eyes – we can even touch it with our own hands if we try hard.