Alfred Birnbaum is an American author whose deep engagement with Japan, where he has lived since childhood, informs his distinctive literary voice. He has been an active participant in the country's visual and performing arts scene. As a leading translator of contemporary Japanese fiction, he bridges cultural divides through literature. His work often explores themes of identity and cross-cultural understanding.
Alternate cover edition here.High-class call girls billed to Mastercard. A psychic 13-year-old dropout with a passion for Talking Heads. A hunky matinee idol doomed to play dentists and teachers. A one-armed beach-combing poet, an uptight hotel clerk and one very bemused narrator caught in the web of advanced capitalist mayhem. Combine this offbeat cast of characters with Murakami's idiosyncratic prose and out comes Dance Dance Dance.
A marvelous hybrid of mythology and mystery, A Wild Sheep Chase""is the extraordinary literary thriller that launched Haruki Murakami's international reputation. It begins simply enough: A twenty-something advertising executive receives a postcard from a friend, and casually appropriates the image for an insurance company's advertisement. What he doesn't realize is that included in the pastoral scene is a mutant sheep with a star on its back, and in using this photo he has unwittingly captured the attention of a man in black who offers a menacing ultimatum: find the sheep or face dire consequences. Thus begins a surreal and elaborate quest that takes our hero from the urban haunts of Tokyo to the remote and snowy mountains of northern Japan, where he confronts not only the mythological sheep, but the confines of tradition and the demons deep within himself. Quirky and utterly captivating, A Wild Sheep Chase is Murakami at his astounding best.
Zen pro kočky potěší všechny ty, kteří přežili přísný vztah mistr-žák, jímž kočky vedou nás, lidi, k Pravdě. Více jak sedmdesát perokreseb zachycuje podstatu koček v kontemplaci, osvětluje tři sloupy Za-zenu, Za-svačiny, Za-zdřímnutí a odhalí tajná esoterická umění znamení v krabici s pískem. Ať jste hostem či pánem lstivého následovníka Stezky, zjistíte, že Zen pro kočky je transcendentní.