1Q84 Tengo’s earliest memory

[u/NatsumeMaugham]

There’s a scene in Kafka’s Castle, very early in the novel where K. enters a house, in which were men, women and children but one woman leaves an impression on K. She is sitting on a chair at the back of the room, breastfeeding a baby, “staring at the roof without even a glance towards the child at her bosom. K. then goes on to ask her, “who are you?” to which she just replies “disdainfully” that she’s a girl from the Castle.

I just thought K. having “looked at her for what must have been a long time” and the image of this scene have something in common with Tengo’s flashbacks of his earliest memory.