He is not doing something he wants to do or deriving any pleasure from it. Johnnie Walker discusses with Nakata this impersonal drive. It leads to its own ‘logical’ conclusion, which often turns out to be the exact opposite of the impulse that started it. Johnnie Walker appears to be the embodiment of that most ruthless force Namely the automated, unflinching and unrelenting ‘process’ A process that, once entrenched, can consume all. ‘Johnnie Walker’ is one of the more enigmatic characters in this novel As with ‘Colonel Sanders’, the other deeply ingrained product logo, they seem to be devices used to denote a ‘concept made visible’.Ĭolonel Sanders reinforces several times to Hoshino that he is neither a god, nor a buddha, he is a ‘metaphysical conceptual object.’ Logical steps, blindly repeating the rule An all-consuming machine. All the while, there is the pressing danger that unyielding ‘process’ will sweep it away. The creative spark finds it’s well-spring in the other world It needs to be nurtured and channeled through, into our world. No, not ‘good’ versus ‘evil’ More, the blossoming of the creative impulse versus the relentless onslaught of blind process. That's what this storm's all about.The central theme of this book seems to me to be that age old struggle. When you come out of the storm you won't be the same person who walked in. You won't even be sure, in fact, whether the storm is really over. You'll catch that blood in your hands, your own blood and the blood of others.Īnd once the storm is over you won't remember how you made it through, how you managed to survive. People will bleed there, and you will bleed too. No matter how metaphysical or symbolic it might be, make no mistake about it: it will cut through flesh like a thousand razor blades. That's the kind of sandstorm you need to imagine.Īnd you really will have to make it through that violent, metaphysical, symbolic storm. Just fine white sand swirling up into the sky like pulverized bones.

There's no sun there, no moon, no direction, no sense of time.

So all you can do is give in to it, step right inside the storm, closing your eyes and plugging up your ears so the sand doesn't get in, and walk through it, step by step. Why? Because this storm isn't something that blew in from far away, something that has nothing to do with you. Over and over you play this out, like some ominous dance with death just before dawn. You change direction but the sandstorm chases you. “Sometimes fate is like a small sandstorm that keeps changing directions.

Kafka on the shore