Variant: I sometimes think that people's hearts are like deep wells. Nobody knows what's at the bottom. All you can do is guess from what comes floating to the surface every once in a while.
Source: Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman

“Memories and thoughts age, just as people do. But certain thoughts can never age, and certain memories can never fade.”

Haruki Murakami book The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle

Source: The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle

“People's memories are maybe the fuel they burn to stay alive.”

Haruki Murakami book After Dark

After Dark
Context: People's memories are maybe the fuel they burn to stay alive. Whether those memories have any actual importance or not, it doesn't matter as far the maintenance of life is concerned. They are all just fuel. Advertising filler in the news paper, philosophy books, dirty pictures in a magazine, a bundle of ten-thousand-yen bills; when you feed them to fire, they are just paper. The fire isn't thinking 'oh This is Kant' or 'Oh This is Yomuri evening edition' or 'Nice tits', while it burns. To the fire, they are nothing but scraps of paper. It is the exact same thing. Important memories, not-so-important memories, totally useless memories : there is no distinction — they are all just fuel

“People leave strange little memories of themselves behind when they die.”

Haruki Murakami book Norwegian Wood

Source: Norwegian Wood

“I've always done whatever I felt like doing in life. People may try to stop me, and convince me I'm wrong, but I won't change.”

Haruki Murakami book What I Talk About When I Talk About Running

Source: What I Talk About When I Talk About Running

“I'm often asked what I think about as I run. Usually the people who ask this have never run long distances themselves. I always ponder the question. What exactly do I think about when I'm running? I don't have a clue.”

Haruki Murakami book What I Talk About When I Talk About Running

Source: What I Talk About When I Talk About Running

“If I stayed here, something inside me would be lost forever—something I couldn't afford to lose. It was like a vague dream, a burning, unfulfilled desire. The kind of dream people have only when they're seventeen.”

Haruki Murakami book South of the Border, West of the Sun

Source: South of the Border, West of the Sun

“When people tell a lie about something, they have to make up a bunch of lies to go with the first one. ‘Mythomania’ is the word for it.”

Haruki Murakami book Norwegian Wood

Source: Norwegian Wood

“I never trust people with no appetite. It's like they're always holding something back on you.”

Haruki Murakami book Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World

Source: Hardboiled Wonderland and the End of the World (1985), Chapter 35, Nail Clippers, Butter Sauce, Iron Vase
Source: Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World

“I think that my job is to observe people and the world, and not to judge them. I always hope to position myself away from so-called conclusions. I would like to leave everything wide open to all the possibilities in the world.”

Haruki Murakami

“People whose freedom is taken away always end up hating somebody.”

Haruki Murakami book Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage

Source: Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage

“People soon get tired of things that aren't boring, but not of what is boring.”

Haruki Murakami book Kafka on the Shore

Source: Kafka on the Shore (2002), Chapter 13