Haruki Murakami's Daily Routine

Haruki Murakami is the Japanese novelist behind Norwegian Wood, Kafka on the Shore and 1Q84, and a committed long-distance runner. While he is writing a novel he keeps the same day, without variation, for 6 months to a year.

He gets up at 4:00 AM and writes until noon while the house is quiet. Then he runs 10 km or swims 1,500 m, and from 1:00 PM the day goes to chores, reading, music and family until bed at 9:00 PM. In the 2004 Paris Review interview that Mason Currey quoted on his Daily Routines blog, he calls the repetition a form of mesmerism.

Adopt it if you have one big thing to finish and can make everything else wait until after lunch. You get the whole morning for the work, a daily session that keeps your body strong enough to carry it, and an evening that ends early. Our estimates: the writing block drawn to noon, where he says 5 or 6 hours, the afternoon of chores and family, and the same day all week.