I’m glad that Murakami-san has been selected as one of the 100 most influential people in the world by TIME. He deserves the honor. He is a writer of great imagination and human sympathy, one who has enthralled millions of readers by building fictional worlds that are uniquely his. Murakami-san has a singular vision, as informed by pop culture as it is by deep channels of Japanese tradition. And he’s a Japanese writer—while Murakami-san spends much of his time in the U.S. and has earned acclaim internationally, he and his books are very much a product of Japan. In recent years, as the government in Japan has become more conservative, Murakami-san has become a valuable voice for peace.

Ono is a multimedia artist known for her groundbreaking conceptual and performance pieces, experimental films and music

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