Whenever I read about Murakami novels being translated, I'm reminded of his writing process for his first novel, "Kaze no uta (The Wind Song)". He wrote the novel in English first, and translated that English version into Japanese. His reason being "if it is English, my vocabulary is not that great, so I'm forced to write in short sentences, which creates this natural rhythm. Kind of like an 8 beat." [1]

Being bilingual, I often find myself pondering whether I should write something for myself in English or in Japanese for tasks such as note taking or journal/blog entries for myself. More and more, I'm finding that my writing in English is clearer, and more to the point. Not only that, but my thinking is structured in a more productive way, so I can write at a faster pace.

This was not meant to be a comparison of languages. We have enough of those discussions with programming, why would we talk about Natural Languages and risk angering a whole nation, instead of just Java programmers. Maybe my Japanese is no longer at the level of my English. But when somebody like Murakami also says that he wrote his first novel in English because it was easier for him, I feel there might be something there besides my English being better than my Japanese. Something worth exploring at least.

There are many great things about Japanese writing, the kanji characters bring about conciseness to the writing. I can glance at a page and quickly get a sense of the contents from the face of the characters much easier than English text. The characters feel closer to pictures. I also love the style of the "Bunkobon", which is a smaller sized book, which can fit inside a pocket. I used to carry those everywhere with me and pull it out when I had a moment.

The novels and stories are great. People like Haruki and Souseki and Ranpo are my heroes.

I guess my Kokugo teacher would have liked for me to mention the beautiful poetry that arises from Haiku and the seasons, but those things are no longer practical use to me.

On the other hand, there are also many mental blocks and barriers that I face when writing Japanese. Finding the right Kanji characters is one thing. That's probably attributed to my poor memory of kanji characters. Another thing is sentence endings: Desu/masu and dearu/da. The Desu/masu is a more respectful tone. Dearu/da is authoritative and sometimes regarded as casual. So now in addition to wondering whether I should write in the first person or third person, I have to worry whether my reader will be offended by my writing.

Anyway, would love to hear from other multilingual people on their views of language preference and differences.

[1] This was from an interview he did with a magazine called "Kaie", The New Yorker also mentions this https://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/lost-in-translat...