After Dark

“Our point of view, as an imaginary camera, picks up and lingers over things like this in the room. We are invisible, anonymous intruders. We look. We listen. We note odors. But we are not physically present in the place, and we leave behind no traces. We follow the same rules, so to speak, as orthodox time travelers.”

In Eri Asai’s room for the first time, the narrator lays the “ground rules” for these observation scenes, introducing the theme of Voyeurism and the Narrative Camera. The narrative takes on the perspective of an imaginary camera, voyeuristically examining everything, while remaining unseen and unable to intervene, no matter what happens. The narrator includes the reader in this act of voyeurism, referring constantly to what “we” observe and experience.

“Mari bites her lip and tries to gather her thoughts. ‘And she only speaks Chinese?’

‘Yeah, she knows like two words of Japanese. I can’t call the cops, though. She’s probably an illegal alien, and I don’t have time to go testify every time something like this comes up.’”

Mari’s introduction to Kaoru and the Alphaville is her first foray into the seedy underbelly of Tokyo at night, setting up the motif of light and dark. Kaoru lives in an almost alternate world where sex work and human trafficking are not uncommon. The aftermath of violence that Mari witnesses in the hotel room is inherent to this world.

“What makes the mask truly eerie is that even though it fits the face like a second skin, it prevents us from imagining what (if anything) the person within is thinking, feeling, or planning. Is the man’s presence a good thing? A bad thing? Are his thoughts straight? Twisted? Is the mask meant to hide him? Protect him? We have no clue. […] All we can do, it seems, is to defer judgement and accept the situation as it is. We shall call him the Man with No Face.”

The enigmatic Man with No Face joins the narrator and “us” in watching Eri Asai sleep. The man is one of the more ambiguous figures in After Dark; he is linked thematically with Shirakawa, and his presence seems intimidating, but he remains nearly as neutral as the narrator. Unable to assess the importance of the Man with No Face, the narrator merely continues to monitor the situation.

“‘So you studied hard?’

‘Yeah, pretty much. But I never liked the competition for grades. Plus I wasn’t good at sports and I couldn’t make friends, so the other kids kind of bullied me, and by the time I got to the third grade I couldn’t go to school anymore.’

‘You mean, like a real phobia?’ Kaoru asks.

‘Uh-huh. I hated school so much, I’d throw up my breakfast and have terrible stomachaches and stuff.’”

Growing up constantly compared to her “perfect” sister, Eri, Mari developed an inferiority complex that impacted her school life to the extent that she ended up dropping out of the high-pressure Japanese public school system. Mari does not have a clear concept of herself, and her low self-esteem causes her to regard herself as “ugly” and as a “coward.” This is a small example of The Individual and the Collective; unable to fit in with society, Mari withdrew completely.

“Kaoru says, ‘I guess it’s none of my business, but to tell you the truth, this is not the kind of neighborhood where respectable girls ought to be spending the night. It’s got some pretty dangerous characters hanging around. I’ve had a few scary brushes myself. Between the time the last train leaves and the first train arrives, the place changes: it’s not the same as in the daytime.’”

Kaoru and Mari effectively live in different worlds. The world of daytime Tokyo and the world of nighttime Tokyo do not often intersect. Kaoru and Takahashi are valuable allies for Mari in navigating the dangerous world of dark Tokyo.

“Our viewpoint camera lingers in here for a while, observing the restroom. Mari is no longer here. Neither is anyone else. Music continues to play from the ceiling speaker. A Hall and Oates song now: ‘I Can’t Go for That.’ A closer look reveals Mari’s image is still reflected in the mirror over the sink. The Mari in the mirror is looking from her side into this side. Her somber gaze seems to be expecting some kind of occurrence. But there is no one on this side.”

Mari’s reflection remaining in the mirror after she leaves the restroom is another example of Murakami’s surrealism. Little explanation is given for this scene, or when Shirakawa’s reflection does the same thing later on in the night. However, it does reinforce the novel’s themes of doubling—how dark Tokyo continues to exist outside the notice of the city in the daylight.

“‘Looks like a totally ordinary guy,’ says Komugi.

‘The ordinary-looking ones are the most dangerous,’ says Kaoru, rubbing her chin. ‘They carry around a shitload of stress.’”

Shirakawa’s ordinary appearance is incongruent with his violent assault on Guo, the Chinese sex worker. Shirakawa is a member of the “salaryman” social category, men who are often overworked and separated from their family by their long hours. Kaoru suggests that Shirakawa lashed out at Guo due to the stress he bears from his life.

“Nah, they’re not gonna kill him. The police don’t give a shit when those Chinese guys kill each other, but it’s a different story when they start bumping off respectable Japanese. That’s when the trouble starts. Nah, they’ll just grab him and teach him a lesson, and maybe cut off an ear.”

Kaoru’s comment about the Chinese gangs shows a degree of ethnic tension in Japanese society. Foreigners are often looked down upon. Even Shirakawa, a violent criminal, is valued by the law more than the Chinese gangsters or Guo.

“He does not look like the kind of man who would buy a Chinese prostitute in a love hotel—and certainly not one who would administer an unmerciful pounding to such a woman, strip her clothes off, and take them away. In fact, however, that is exactly what he did—what he had to do.”

This passage is the most that Murakami reveals about Shirakawa’s motives beyond what Kaoru suspects of them. Shirakawa fits the trope of a “wolf in sheep’s clothing,” an innocuous-looking man who hides a violent nature. The emphasis on the fact that he had to assault Guo indicates that violence is a compulsion for Shirakawa; he likely does this regularly.

“‘What was what?’

‘Your midnight snack. What’d you eat?’

‘Oh. Chinese. Same as always. Keeps me full.’

‘Was it good?’

‘Not especially.’”

Shirakawa’s cynical joke about having “Chinese” as a snack, given what he has done to Guo, emphasizes the underlying cruelty within his double life. Like many salarymen, Shirakawa lives an estranged life from his family due to his work hours. Unlike most, he uses this as an excuse to see sex workers and commit violent acts. Shirakawa is representative of “light” and “dark” Tokyo—his normal daytime life completely contrasts with what he does in the dark of night.

“I’m sitting there listening to these trials, and all I can see in my head is this creature. It takes on all kinds of different shapes—sometimes it’s ‘the nation,’ and sometimes it’s ‘the law,’ and sometimes it takes on shapes that are more difficult and dangerous than that. You can try cutting off its legs, but they just keep growing back. […] And this creature, this thing doesn’t give a damn that I’m me or you’re you. In its presence, all human beings lose their names and their face. We all turn into signs, into numbers.”

The terror Takahashi felt for this figurative creature, which underlies many facets of society, drove him back to studying law. Knowing the law would mean shedding some light on at least one aspect of the creature, relieving some of the fear. The creature is the embodiment of The Collective, as evidenced by the way Takahashi describes how all human beings blend together.

“‘What I want to say is probably something like this: any single human being, no matter what kind of person he or she may be, is all caught up in the tentacles of this animal like a giant octopus, and is getting sucked into darkness. You can put any kind of spin on it you like, but you end up with the same unbearable spectacle.’”

In addition to representing The Individual and the Collective, Takahashi’s “weird creature” takes on a sense of inevitability, aligning it with the recurring theme of the inevitable passage of time in After Dark. The “unbearable spectacle” of “getting sucked into darkness” is evocative of the inevitable death of every single human. This aligns with Korogi’s fear of nothingness after death later on in the novel.

“It’s not that difficult once we make up our mind. All we have to do is separate from the flesh, leave all substance behind, and allow ourselves to become a conceptual point of view devoid of mass. With that accomplished, we can pass through any wall, leap over any abyss. Which is exactly what we do. We let ourselves become a pure single point and pass through the TV screen separating the two worlds, moving from this side to the other.”

Murakami plays with the idea of narrative and perspective with Voyeurism and the Narrative Camera. The narrator has put self-imposed limits on itself; the authorial voice may break these limitations at any time. The narrator’s action demonstrates an author’s ability to show any perspective at any given time in a piece of fiction.

“Eri runs her fingertips over her face, touching every bit of skin. Through her pajama top, she lays her hands on her breasts. […] I’m a lump of flesh, a commercial asset, her rambling thoughts tell her. Suddenly she is far less sure she is herself.”

Eri has recently lost her job on a quiz show, which likely factored into her decision to go to sleep for an indefinite time. Her reflection that she is a “commercial asset” shows that her sense of self is just as conflicted as Mari’s: she exists for others to objectify, her self-worth tied to her good looks and nothing else. Eri’s feelings run parallel to Mari’s; she lacks a sense of individuality, as she has spent too long existing solely for the collective.

“Finally, no matter what I say, it doesn’t reach her. This layer, like some kind of transparent sponge kind of thing, stands between Eri Asai and me, and the words that come out of my mouth have to pass through it, and when that happens, the sponge sucks almost all the nutrients right out of them. She’s not listening to anything I say—not really.”

Mari has felt the exact same type of barrier between her and Eri that Takahashi describes feeling during his conversation with Eri. Eri has long since become distant with the world, becoming less a person than a spectacle for other people’s consumption. This results in her pill addiction and retreat from the world.

“Having run for a while, the taxi with Shirakawa in it stops at a red light. This is a big intersection with a long red light. Also waiting for the light next to the taxi is the black Honda motorcycle with the Chinese man. They are less than a meter apart, but the man on the cycle looks straight ahead, never noticing Shirakawa.”

The Chinese gangster is out searching for Shirakawa, emphasizing the novel’s underlying theme of surveillance. This is also another example of Synchronicity in After Dark. Shirakawa has no idea that he is in danger, or how close he was to being caught by his pursuer; Murakami allows them to pass each other by chance, raising the possibility of what could have happened should the gangster have spotted Shirakawa.

“I keep having the same dream. I’m seven years old and an orphan again. All alone, with no adults around to take care of me. It’s evening, and the light is fading, and night is pressing in. […] Software like that you can’t exchange once it’s contaminated.”

Like Mari, Takahashi has emotional baggage from childhood. He carries a fear of abandonment stemming from his father’s absence due to his prison sentence at the time of Takahashi’s mother’s death. This pervasive feeling of being an “orphan” makes Takahashi an empathetic person.

“‘Run!’ we shout to her. On impulse we forget the rule that requires us to maintain our neutrality. Our voice doesn’t reach her, needless to say, but Eri perceives the danger on her own.”

The narrator shows concern for Eri, breaking its self-imposed rule that “we” remain nothing but an impartial point of view. Whatever unknown danger Eri faces is reaching its climax; there seems to be a real threat that if the television picture goes out, Eri will be trapped in the alternate world for good. The use of “we” is meant to draw the reader deeper into the story, blurring the line between Voyeurism and the Narrative Camera and participation.

“Let me tell you something, Mari. The ground we stand on looks solid enough, but if something happens it can drop right out from under you. And once that happens, you’ve had it: things’ll never be the same. All you can do is go on living alone down there in the darkness.”

Korogi used to live a normal life with a normal job, but unknown circumstances drove her into the world of nighttime Tokyo. Her flight from unknown pursuers parallels Eri’s retreat from the world: the ground has dropped out from underneath her as well. This is also evocative of Takahashi’s fear of the dark inevitability underpinning all life.

“You may not feel that close to her now, but I’m sure there was a time when you did. Try to remember a moment when you felt totally in touch with her, without any gaps between you. You probably can’t think of anything right this second, but if you try hard it’ll come. She and you are family, after all—you’ve got a long history together. You must have at least one memory like that stored away somewhere.”

Korogi lives by the principle that her memories are the fuel that keep her going. Her suggestion to Mari that she try to recall a moment of closeness with Eri later seems to help close the gap between the two sisters. This removal of barriers puts them in sync and allows Mari and Eri to inhabit the same world once more.

“[...] [T]he strange sequence of events that occurred in this room during the night has ended once and for all. A cycle has been completed, all disturbances have been resolved, perplexities have been concealed, and things have returned to their original state. […] Everything, finally, unfolded in a place resembling a deep, inaccessible fissure. Such places open secret entries into darkness in the interval between midnight and the time the sky grows light.”

Murakami is characteristically vague about the events that Eri Asai experienced over the course of the night. However, the “inaccessible fissure” she crosses closes just as Mari gains more insight into her relationship with Eri. This suggests that Eri now has more of a grounding in the real world, pulling her back from the strange, lonely, metaphysical realm she briefly visited. Eri’s journey thus parallels the day-night cycle, actualizing the transition from “darkness” back to “light.”

“‘You’ll never get away,’ a man’s voice says instantly. ‘You will never get away. No matter how far you run, we’re going to get you.’”

The threat that Takahashi receives on Guo’s cellphone is meant for Shirakawa, and it likely came from the man on the black motorcycle. The threat is clearly meant to induce fear and paranoia in Shirakawa: even if the Chinese gang does not find him, he would live with that fear for the rest of his life. Takahashi is innocent, but he cannot shake off the feeling that the threat was meant for him. This coincidental overlap is similar to the way Shirakawa and the man on the motorcycle happen to pass by each other.

“But that was the last time. That was…how should I say it?...the one moment when I was able to draw closest to Eri…the one moment when she and I joined heart to heart as one: there was nothing separating us. After that, it seems, we grew further and further apart. We separated, and before long we were living in different worlds. That sense of union we felt in the elevator, that strong bond between our hearts never came back again.”

Thanks to Korogi’s advice and Takahashi’s insights into Eri’s personality, Mari is at last able to remember a time when she and Eri were close, though it was a long time ago. Remembering this core memory is the first step to closing the gap between Eri and Mari, the trigger that pulls Eri back from the other world. Mari’s description of the separate worlds she and Eri inhabited is a direct example of the motif of different but connected worlds: light and dark Tokyo, the individual and the collective, and so on.