Ο ΧΑΡΟΥΚΙ ΜΟΥΡΑΚΑΜΙ ΥΠΕΡ ΤΟΥ ΓΑΜΟΥ ΟΜΟΦΥΛΩΝ

Haruki Murakami: I support gay marriage

Japanese author's latest novel features a same-sex relationship

gaystarnews.com,22/1/2015

Japan's best-known living author Haruki Murakami has said he supports gay marriage.

The Nobel Prize favorite made the declaration yesterday (21 January) on Mr Murakami's Place, a temporary website he set up to answer readers' questions.

One reader asked his view on gay marriage as his latest novel features a same-sex relationship.

'I have very many gay friends and acquaintances,' the author said.

Murakami said that he knew many gay married couples in the US.

'They are all very happy that they were able to marry. It’s a good thing. Which is to say, I support same-sex marriage,' he said.

Murakami has written several LGBT characters in his novels, such as transgender male librarian Oshima in Kafka on the Shore and gay bodyguard Tamaru in 1Q84.

His latest novel, Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage, features a gay relationship and sold 1 million copies in its first week in Japan.

Gay marriage is not legal in Japan, although the conversative country does recognize same-sex marriages to foreigners from jurisdictions where gay marriage is legal.