Writing Workshops

Exploring the Surreal World of Haruki Murakami with Varud Gupta

$545

8 sessions

Out of stock

Once a week Mondays, 6:00 pm EDT - 8:00 pm EDT August 11 to October 6, 2025

Online via Zoom

Haruki Murakami’s unique blend of magical realism, introspective characters, and existential themes has captivated readers around the globe. With novels like Norwegian Wood, Kafka on the Shore, and 1Q84, Murakami has created a literary world where the ordinary intertwines with the extraordinary, and where characters search for meaning in a seemingly indifferent universe.

In this workshop, we will dive deep into Murakami’s rich body of work, exploring his distinct narrative voice, elusive characters, and the subtle threads of existential angst that run through his stories. Each session will focus on a different aspect of his style—whether it’s his nonlinear structure, his use of music, his blending of Western and Eastern influences, or his enigmatic metaphysical themes.

We will read selected chapters or short stories from Murakami’s novels and short fiction, using them as springboards for discussion and writing exercises. The focus will be on understanding how Murakami’s characters grapple with loneliness, memory, and identity in a world that seems both deeply personal and mysteriously disconnected.

Through these readings, we will explore and write toward:

Character Creation: How Murakami crafts characters who are both deeply ordinary and otherworldly, often caught between the mundane and the supernatural.
Narrative Structure: Murakami’s signature use of fragmented time, dual plots, and the blurred lines between reality and fantasy.
Voice and Style: The quiet, often detached tone of Murakami’s writing and how his language serves to deepen themes of alienation and longing.
Existential Themes: The exploration of isolation, the search for meaning, and the passage of time—key elements of Murakami’s work that echo universal human experiences.

By engaging with Murakami’s stories and employing his techniques in our own writing, we’ll discover how to bring complexity, surrealism, and emotional depth to our own work, while confronting the ever-present questions of what it means to be human in an unpredictable world.

Course Outline:

Week One: Introduction to Murakami’s World & Characters
Week Two: The Murakami Plot Structure – Mystery as Frame or Genre
Week Three: The Ordinary and the Surreal – Blending of Worlds
Week Four: Music, Pop-Culture, and Other Narrative Tools
Week Five: Memory, Identity, and the Past
Week Six: Loneliness and Connection – Themes and Voice
Week Seven: Angst and the Absurd – Themes and Voice (continued)
Week Eight: Writing like Murakami – Process and Writer’s Life

Recommended Reading:

Norwegian Wood
“Barn Burning” from The Elephant Vanishes
“A Shinagawa Monkey” from First Person Singular
Kafka on the Shore
Selections from What I Talk About When I Talk About Running

Level: Introductory

This course will be held online via Zoom.

This course skips 9/1.

Led by

Varud Gupta

Varud Gupta

Varud Gupta is an award-winning author and visiting professor. He’s written the graphic novel Chhotu: A Tale of Love and Partition (Comic Con India “Best Writer”) and the travelogue Food of the Gods (Gourmand Cookbook nomination for “Peace”) released with Penguin with a sequel to the graphic novel set to release in 2026. He received his bachelors in Finance from New York University and is currently an MFA in Creative Writing candidate at Columbia University where he received the Felipe P. De Alba fellowship and serves at the Director of the Columbia Artist / Teachers program. He has taught with Columbia University, Indian Institute of Art and Design, Center for Fiction, 826NYC, Catapult, and Gotham Writers.

About this series

Writing Workshops

We strive to make our classes the most inviting and rewarding available, offering an intimate environment to study with award-winning, world-class writers. Each class is specially designed by the instructor, so whether you’re a fledgling writer or an MFA graduate polishing your novel, you’ll find a perfect fit here.

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