The City and Its Uncertain Walls Chapter 69 Summary and Analysis
⚠️ Spoiler Warning: This guide contains detailed spoilers for the entire novel. Proceed only if you've finished reading or are comfortable knowing the plot.
Summary
Winter ends and spring comes to the Wall Town. The narrator sheds his heavy coat for a wool jacket as he walks to and from the library. He remarks that even if time appears to have stopped, the seasons still change—snow melts, the river rises, buds appear, and animal fur regains its luster with the approaching mating season.
By now the narrator has become fully accustomed to being merged with Yellow Submarine Boy. They function as a single unit, “inseparable,” and the girl in the library does not seem to notice the change. Their joint work of reading old dreams proceeds smoothly; they now read six or seven dreams a night, and the pleased girl bakes apple sweets for them as a reward.
One evening they sit in the little room deep belowground, a candle between them. Yellow Submarine Boy asks if the narrator has read The Papalagi, a book purportedly written by a Samoan island chief describing his travels in Europe. The narrator recalls reading it but remembers few details. The boy explains that the book is actually a German forgery, but that facts and truth are different things. He focuses on a passage about coconut trees: the chief says anyone can climb a coconut tree, but no one has ever climbed higher than a coconut tree. This was meant as a critique of Europeans building ever higher.
The boy suggests that they themselves have done exactly what the chief said was impossible—they have climbed higher than a coconut tree. The narrator pictures climbing to the top of a coconut tree and then reaching into empty blue sky or nothingness. The boy confirms: they are floating in empty space with nothing to hold onto. To fall requires the flow of time, but time in the town has stopped, so they remain suspended.
The narrator asks what would happen if time started moving again; they would plummet and likely die. The boy agrees but says there is a way to make the fall non-fatal: unconditional belief that someone on the ground will catch you. The narrator cannot picture a face. When asked if he has such a person, Yellow Submarine Boy firmly says no—at least no one among the living. He will therefore stay forever in the town where time has stopped. The candle flame vanishes, plunging them into pitch-black darkness.
Key Events
- Spring arrives in the Wall Town, and the narrator changes his winter coat for a wool jacket.
- The narrator confirms he is fully merged with Yellow Submarine Boy, and the girl in the library does not notice.
- Their dream-reading output increases to six or seven dreams per night, and the girl bakes apple sweets in appreciation.
- Yellow Submarine Boy brings up The Papalagi and explains its allegory about climbing higher than a coconut tree.
- The boy argues that they have in fact climbed higher than a coconut tree and are now floating in empty space.
- They discuss that time exists in the town but has no meaning, so they cannot fall.
- The boy states that only unconditional belief in someone catching them could prevent a fatal fall if time resumed; he has no such person among the living.
- The candle flame goes out, leaving total darkness.
Character Development
- The Narrator: He has grown completely comfortable with the merged existence, viewing it as seamless and natural. His curiosity about the metaphysical implications of their situation deepens as he engages with Yellow Submarine Boy’s allegory.
- Yellow Submarine Boy: He reveals a stark loneliness. Despite his intellectual insights about belief and salvation, he admits he has no living person who would catch him, condemning himself to remain in the time-stopped town forever.
- The Girl in the Library: She appears pleased with the progress and expresses gratitude through baking. Her role remains that of a supportive figure, though her awareness of the merged being is uncertain.
Themes, Symbols, or Motifs
- The Coconut Tree Allegory: Taken from The Papalagi, the image of climbing beyond the top of a coconut tree symbolizes reaching the limit of a known system and then stepping into the unknown—an act that defies ordinary reason.
- Floating in Empty Space: Represents the condition of the narrator and the boy within the Wall Town: suspended without progression or decay, untouched by time’s flow.
- Time without Meaning: The town has time but it is meaningless, trapping characters in a static existence where falling (change, consequence) is impossible unless belief intervenes.
- Unconditional Belief: Introduced as a potential escape from metaphysical free fall, echoing earlier themes of faith and connection in Murakami’s work.
- Darkness and Extinction: The sudden extinguishing of the candle parallels the finality of the boy’s statement and his acceptance of an endless, lightless existence.
Why This Chapter Matters
Chapter 69 crystallizes the metaphysical stakes of the Wall Town. Through the discussion of The Papalagi, Murakami deepens the story’s investigation of truth versus fiction and the nature of impossible achievements. The allegory of climbing beyond a coconut tree gives a concrete image to the narrator’s and the boy’s merged state. More importantly, Yellow Submarine Boy’s confession—that he has no one to catch him—reveals the emotional core of his character and foreshadows a potential crisis. The chapter sets up a critical choice: whether belief can truly alter reality or whether the town’s suspended animation is an inescapable fate.
Study Questions and Answers
1. What does Yellow Submarine Boy mean when he says “facts and the truth are two different things”?
He uses The Papalagi—a known forgery—to illustrate that a story can be factually false yet convey a deeper truth about human experience. The literal fabrication does not diminish the allegory’s validity.
2. Why does the boy believe he cannot leave the Wall Town?
He explains that if time started moving again, he would fall from the height beyond the coconut tree with nothing to catch him. Since he lacks unconditional belief in any living person to break his fall, he chooses to remain where time is meaningless to avoid a fatal plunge.
3. How does the narrator’s reaction to the candle going out reflect his state of mind?
The sudden darkness ends their conversation abruptly. The narrator is left in pitch-black silence, mirroring the uncertainty of his own position. He has not yet identified a person on the ground to believe in, and the extinguishing of light underscores the unresolved tension between hope and despair.