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Book 2, Chapter 12
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Reality and Subjective Experience
Free Will
Desire and Irrationality
The Personal Impact of War
Social Alienation
Summary
Analysis
The first thing Toru notices is that Creta is entirely naked. She is sleeping soundly and does not seem to notice that Toru is awake. Toru moves into the living room and thinks about the bizarre situation he’s in. For now, he does not try to offer up a guess as to why Creta is asleep in his bed. Instead, he allows his mind to wander to other subjects, such as what to do about the mark on his face; he wonders if he should see a specialist. Eventually, Toru drifts off to sleep in the living room.
Toru wakes up and falls back asleep so often in the novel that it becomes difficult to distinguish between his dreams and his reality. Certainly, Creta’s naked figure next to him in bed closely matches his dreams about her, and, even if she is real, her sudden presence is so strange that it seems unreal.
Themes
When Toru wakes up the next morning, he sees Creta in the kitchen wearing Kumiko’s clothes. Toru asks Creta where her clothes are, and she apologizes for stealing some of Kumiko’s. She asks Toru if it bothers him that she’s wearing his wife's clothes. Toru tells Creta that it does not bother him that she has Kumiko’s clothes; however, he still wants to know where Creta’s clothes are. Creta realizes it is a good question, but she responds that she does not know what happened to her clothes.
Here, Creta beings to literally embody Kumiko. Earlier in the novel, Toru mentions that Creta and Kumiko look alike. Now, as Creta dons Kumiko’s clothes, they are nearly indistinguishable. It is as though Creta is replacing Kumiko as Toru's wife, though neither of them seems to notice.
Themes
Creta explains that the last thing she remembers before waking up in Toru’s bed is that she was naked at the bottom of the well. In response, Toru looks at Creta’s feet and sees that there is nothing abnormal about them. It was raining the night before and Toru would expect to see some evidence of scratches or mud on them if Creta had walked to his home naked. As such, her explanation does not make sense.
Like so much of the novel, Creta’s sudden appearance in Toru’s home never receives an explanation. If the well acts as a portal to another reality, then perhaps there are multiple exits, and Creta came out a different place than she went in. However, this is only one of any number of explanations that one could use to explain this inexplicable scene.
Themes
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Creta switches up the conversation and asks Toru about the mark on his face. Toru says it does not hurt, though he is considering going to a doctor to figure out what to do. Creta tells him he should not bother going to the doctor because it is not the type of mark a doctor could do anything about. Instead, Creta recommends that Toru talk with Malta about the mark. Toru asks Creta to get him in touch with her sister, but she says she cannot. According to Creta, she cannot bring people to Malta; Malta must summon Toru on her own. Toru is unsatisfied with Creta’s answer but does not know what else to do.
This section exposes the power dynamic between Creta and Malta. Although Malta loves her sister, she is the one in charge, and her priorities always come before Creta’s. This was true during Creta’s childhood, when she needed Malta most, and it is true now that they are adults. Regardless, Creta’s comment all but confirms Toru’s suspicions; the mark is supernatural in nature and likely came from his time in the well.
Themes
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Finally, Creta circles around to finish the story she started in Book One.
Themes
Creta describes how her company sent her to Noboru’s hotel room one day. When she went inside, she saw a proper-looking man sitting calmly, reading a book. At first, all Noboru did was look at Creta silently. Then, he ordered Creta to remove her clothes and lay face down on the hotel bed. Creta did as Noboru asked her. For a while, Noboru did not do anything. He just sat there and looked at her. Because nothing was happening, Creta assumed that Noboru was impotent. She had run into clients like him before that only wanted to look and naked women and nothing else.
At first, nothing about Noboru concerns Creta. He seems like a normal, relatively harmless client. However, given Noboru’s track record, he is almost certainly doing something perverse as Creta lies on the bed, even if she does not realize it. Certainly, he has something else in mind other than merely looking at her.
Themes
However, moments later, Noboru violated Creta while she bent over the bed. Creta is not exactly sure what happened, but she knows he inserted something that was not his penis into her. She does not know what the object was, but it caused her intense pain. It was the first time she had felt pain since her automobile accident. Because of what Noboru did, Creta feels as though he violated her.
This moment is the rape Creta mentions at the beginning of the book. Like everything Noboru does, the narration does not acknowledge the explicit details of his actions. However, somehow, he has done something terrible to Creta—something she cannot precisely articulate.
Themes
In addition to the pain Noboru caused Creta, he also brought her a great deal of pleasure. In the hotel room, Creta felt like something was splitting her in two; one half of her became filled with pain, the other half with pleasure. Creta had the strongest orgasm she had ever had in her life. In that moment, it felt like something important inside her left her body. She cannot identify what that something was, but she feels that Noboru took it from her. This incident fundamentally altered Creta’s life.
There are two moments that Creta uses to define her life; the first is her suicide attempt, and the second is her interaction with Noboru. Both moments fundamentally changed her as a person, though the latter is more disturbing to her because she was the victim of someone else. Several times throughout the novel, Toru mentions the wicked and perverse influence Noboru has on other people, and Creta experiences the worst version of his corrupting force.
Themes
