71 pages • 2 hours read
Kafka on the Shore
A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Chapters 41–44Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 41 Summary
Determined to journey into the forest labyrinth, Kafka prepares himself for the expedition the next morning, Wednesday. He brings along a compass, a knife, food, a canteen, yellow spray paint, and a hatchet to make his trip safer. He reaches the clearing and pushes onward, heading north. As he walks, he feels that something is watching him. He imagines jazz music, John Coltrane and McCoy Tyner, as he walks, and this music, too, contains labyrinths for Kafka. He marks trees with the yellow spray paint as he goes, and occasionally hacks a notch in a tree trunk. As he walks he imagines what is happening at the same time in the library.
He thinks about the soldiers who got lost in this forest and expects to see them around the next tree. He thinks about Napoleon’s army invading Russia, and why people wage war. Kafka’s mind “wanders into the realm of dreams” (386). He relives the dream with Sakura from the previous night, and finds Crow walking with him through the forest. Crow chastises him for not listening to him and for believing that by fulfilling the prophecy he could end his father’s curse. The curse hasn’t ended with the fulfillment of the prophecy, for “the dark confusion inside you remains” (387), says Crow. Crow advises Kafka to let a light shine inside him to overcome his fear, anger, and confusion.
Kafka stands at the “dead end of a maze” (387). He does not know what to do. He feels hollow and empty inside. He decides that death may be the release he seeks. He abandons all of his equipment, except for the knife, so that he has a weapon to kill himself with, and steps into the “heart of the forest” (388) to confront the darkness.
Chapter 42 Summary
Miss Saeki and Nakata talk. They discuss memories and their power and Nakata experiences memories when he touches Miss Saeki’s hands. In this manner, he is able to feel and experience her memories.
Nakata tells Miss Saeki that he opened the entrance stone to rearrange things in this world, to put them back the way they should be. Part of that process included Nakata taking Kafka’s place and killing Johnnie Walker, though Nakata himself does not understand why this is so. Now that the stone has been opened and reality rearranged, Miss Saeki and Nakata are not allowed to stay in this world.
Nakata tells Miss Saeki that they will both be leaving soon. Miss Saeki is ready to go. She opened the entrance stone long ago to try to preserve her perfect love, only to bring about destruction and unhappiness. Her only regret is that she may have damaged Kafka by sleeping with him. From her standpoint, when she made love to Kafka, she was her 15-year-old self and Kafka was her old love. She wrote her memories down, her whole life, in order to understand her life and come to terms with it. Her memoir makes up three thick files, and she asks Nakata to burn it for her. He agrees, and he takes it with him when he goes.
Oshima is very busy in the library that afternoon and doesn’t see Nakata leave. When he goes upstairs to check on Miss Saeki, he finds her dead at her desk. It is Tuesday at 4:35 p.m.
Chapter 43 Summary
Kafka forges deeper into the forest, and he is not afraid any more. As he moves further into the forest, Kafka imagines that the trees, the birds and insects, are all outward expressions of his own mind. The labyrinth without reflects the labyrinth within; the journey he’s taking is a journey inside himself.
He confronts the issue at the core of his identity: Why did his mother abandon him? He pictures himself on the day his mother left: a four-year-old boy sitting on the porch in the summertime. He tries to imagine what could overcome her love for him and make her abandon him: at this moment Crow appears. Crow tells him that he must accept that she both loved him and abandoned him. He must experience her anger and fear to release it and be able to move on. He must forgive her.
Kafka tries to understand, but a question intrudes: Is Miss Saeki his mother? Crow does not answer him directly. She may be. Kafka cannot understand the point of love if it causes pain.
Soon after, he comes upon two soldiers in the woods. They ran away from the war long ago, and found this place in the forest that stands apart from time. They stayed to guard the entrance. They tell Kafka that they have been waiting for him, and that he can go through the entrance. It’s his choice: turn around and return to his old life or step inside the entrance. If he chooses to go inside, they will guide him, because the path is hard to follow. They warn him that once he’s inside, it will be hard to leave. Kafka tells them to take him inside. The soldiers advise him that leaving is easier if you have something with you, a symbol or token to remind you of your life. They have their rifles. Kafka says he has nothing with him, only his memories. They seem dubious about whether that will work, but they guide Kafka through the entrance.
Chapter 44 Summary
Hoshino and Nakata take Miss Saeki’s memories to an empty riverbed and burn them. Nakata is exhausted and says he needs to go to sleep. Hoshino realizes that he may fall asleep for a couple of days, as he’s done before, and reminds him that they still have to close the entrance. Nakata tells him that they cannot close the entrance now; it’s not the right time. They take a cab to the apartment, and Nakata falls asleep in the cab. Hoshino carries him, still asleep, upstairs into his bedroom.
Hoshino finds Nakata dead the next day, Wednesday, before noon. He died peacefully in his sleep.
Hoshino briefly considers leaving and making an anonymous phone call to the cops about Nakata’s death. His conscience troubles him though, and he decides that he must honor Nakata’s memory and complete his task. He stays to close the entrance, knowing that he has no idea when or how that might occur. He misses Nakata; he cries.
Chapters 41–44 Analysis
The forest and the music Kafka imagines mirror the dark labyrinth he has been exploring within himself. As he goes deeper into the forest, he goes deeper into his own psyche.
At one point, Kafka describes how the boy named Crow came into being. When his mother abandoned him, the boy named Crow was created from the pain her abandonment caused, in order to help Kafka deal with it.
During Nakata and Miss Saeki’s talk, Nakata is the knowledgeable one for a change; he tells Miss Saeki what needs to happen. He is confident and certain in his role. His job is to make sure that things return to the way that they should have been all along. Though he does not realize it, this is the reason Nakata took Kafka’s place and killed Johnnie Walker. Kafka could not be allowed to kill his father. Miss Saeki mistakenly opened the entrance, and she paid the price for it. But now it’s time for her suffering to end. The entrance is open again, and wrongs will be righted.
Unlock all 71 pages of this Study GuidePlus, gain access to 8,800+ more expert-written Study Guides.
Including features:
Related Titles
By Haruki Murakami
