Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage

Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage is a 2014 novel by renowned Japanese novelist Haruki Murakami. The novel tells the story of a man who attempts to overcome past emotional suffering to make his present life more rewarding. Through Tsukuru’s point of view, we see the ripple effects of rejection and the necessity of sometimes confronting the past to make sense of who we are in the present. After a group of friends inexplicably abandons a young Tsukuru, he sets off on a path of complete alienation. He becomes suicidal and aimless, and the pain of his rejection lingers well into his adulthood. Finally, as he considers entering into a new relationship, he confronts the past once for all. When he does, he discovers that perhaps his interpretation of what happened was not what he had always thought it to be.

The edition for this guide is the Kindle edition published in 2014.

Content Warning: The novel portrays graphic sexual imagery, and rape is discussed explicitly. Additionally, the novel examines mental health issues surrounding trauma, including eating disorders, depression, and emotional distress.

Plot Summary

Twenty-year-old Tsukuru has a very trying six months. He struggles to find meaning in life, and his isolation leads him to an obsession with dying. This period follows Tsukuru’s unforeseen and sudden abandonment by his high school friend group: Four friends inexplicably cut Tsukuru out of their lives, with no explanation for their behavior.

Tsukuru finally emerges from his depression, as a result of a particularly intense dream about an unnamed woman. The dream stirred an intense jealousy in Tsukuru, which was a departure from his normal introverted and dispassionate temperament. Though he finally leaves behind his obsession with dying, Tsukuru cannot get over the pain that his rejection from the friend group has caused him.

Years later, 36-year-old Tsukuru is a respected member of society who works as a train station engineer. However, he is generally unable to form lasting relationships, especially with women. When he meets a woman named Sara and tells her the story of his friend group, she urges him to confront them and find out why they did what they did.

The narrative returns to the past. In college, Tsukuru becomes friends with a young man named Haida, drawn to Haida’s intellectual curiosity and his passion for life. One night, Tsukuru awakes to find Haida in his room. Disoriented, Tsukuru thinks he is still asleep, and when he falls back into a deeper sleep, he has a graphic sexual dream about two of his female friends, Shiro and Kuro. As the dream ends, Tsukuru awakens as he is having an orgasm and discovers that Haida is there with him. Still unable to determine if the whole thing was a dream or reality, Tsukuru begins to feel tension toward Haida, which culminates with Haida abruptly leaving Tokyo to return to his home in Akita. Again, like Tsukuru’s other friends, Haida leaves without explanation.

The narrative returns to the present, where it remains for the rest of the novel. Sara’s urging that Tsukuru should find his former friends takes on added intensity. Essentially, she offers him an ultimatum: If he wants to keep seeing her, then he must confront them. He agrees, setting in motion the second half of the novel.

First, he meets Ao, who is now a successful car salesman. During their conversation, Tsukuru learns that he was booted from the group because Shiro claimed that Tsukuru raped her. Ao says that nobody really believed this, but they felt obligated to take Shiro’s side. Ao also mentions that Shiro was murdered about six years prior. Tsukuru then visits Aka, who also backs up the story.

Tsukuru discovers that Kuro lives in Finland, her husband’s home country. Sara, a travel agent, arranges his trip there. Before he leaves, Tsukuru spots Sara walking hand-in-hand with another man. He does not say anything to her.

When Kuro first sees Tsukuru, she is speechless—she can’t believe that he would come all that way to see her without calling first. Eventually, the two discuss the past. Kuro hypothesizes why Shiro might have accused Tsukuru. Kuro also makes it clear that while she may have doubted that Tsukuru was the rapist, there was no doubt that Shiro had been raped. Kuro recalls the aftermath of the rape, and the tremendous toll that it had taken on Shiro. Kuro also reveals to Tsukuru that she was in love with him, a fact that takes him entirely by surprise.

As the conversation draws to an end, the two share a prolonged embrace. Tsukuru tells her about Sara, and Kuro urges him to take action and not let Sara go. Tsukuru takes this to heart. When he returns to Tokyo, he tells Sara that he wants to be with her and wants some kind of answer from her. She asks him to give her three days. The novel ends without her providing the answer.