Existential motives F.M. Dostoevsky in the work of H. Murakami

In this article, the authors find it productive to explore the relationship between Russian and foreign literature through the prism of the philosophy of existentialism, which is quite popular today. Research methodology: philological analysis of literary texts (problematic approach), comparative analysis with elements of comparative studies. The authors come to the conclusion that Murakami immerses his heroes in situations where it is possible to change everything, but such a situation requires unambiguous decisions and immediate action, but the heroes, for the most part, are endlessly lonely, melancholic people who become themselves an obstacle to making any decisions. They are merciless to themselves, stubborn to the point of absurdity and always torture themselves from within. Each hero has his own deep "Norwegian forest" in his mind, but not everyone finds the strength and resilience to get out of it into a real and noisy Japanese metropolis, continue his life without getting lost in the labyrinth of his own consciousness, and find the main meaning of his existence. Thus, the existential motives of F.M. Dostoevsky are acquiring a new sound in the prose of the Japanese author, who, despite his western orientation, did not succeed in avoiding the imposition of the national mentality proper on his artistic world-modeling.