Some literature fans on the Internet are currently putting together a list of Great First Lines in Novels, to make a top 100 list of such opening lines. Of the 150 nominations received so far, only two are from Japanese novels, but surely there are more good opening lines from Japanese novels or short stories.

Can you nominate a few here, in the comments section below, and write them in either the original kanji (with pronounciation in romaji added as well for those of us who cannot read Japanese) or in English translations you have seen? Just the first sentence, something that grabbed you when you first read it.

So far, posters overseas have called attention to this opening line, from The Kappa Child, written by Hiromi Goto:

I am a collector of abandoned shopping carts.

And from Abe Kobo’s The Box Man, this opening line was nominated:

This is the record of a box man.
The paragraph continues: “I am beginning this account in a box. A cardboard box that reaches just to my hips when I put it over my head. That is to say, at this juncture, the box man is me. A box man, in his box, is recording the chronicle of a box man.”