Katagiri and Worm

     In the Haruki Murakami readings, we see each story unified by an event – the earthquake. In “Super-Frog Saves Tokyo,” Mr. Katagiri, the narrator, who has lived quite a thankless life, is confronted by a giant frog who tells him he is needed to save Tokyo from a second earthquake. In actuality, the second earthquake is a more personal upheaval – most likely a violent lashing out by Katagiri. Frog presents us with an entity known as Worm, who he says “goes on sleeping for years – decades – in the warmth and darkness underground” (97). Frog continues, saying that Worm feels “every little rumble and reverberation that comes his way... and then, through some kind of chemical process, he replaces most of them with rage” (97-98). If we examine Worm in relation to Katagiri, we'll see that Katagiri has a reputation for being unflappable. He seems to display little to no emotion. We can thus surmise that similarly, as his other emotions are repressed, so too is his temper – his anger. We're also told that he is perfect for his job as a collector, because he has no familial ties – nobody will mourn him. Even his own brother and sister have “shown [him] no respect and acted with the most callous disregard” (99). With this in mind, Katagiri becomes an unloved, undervalued man. He has neither a future nor a present to look forward to – a situation that is bound to cause quite a level of anger, even rage. To loop it back to Worm, Worm is normally dormant, until the day that the shakes and tremors – difficulties of life – eventually become too much and he awakens in a rage to destroy. We can thus connect Katagiri to Worm, with Worm being the manifestation of Katagiri's anger at his life situation, and Super-Frog's mission becomes an attempt to stop Katagiri from trying something that will inevitably harm many people.