
Is the thought of a unicorn a real thought?


About a month ago, I finished reading Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World, and I found its ending conceptually fascinating perhaps more so than any of Murakami’s other works. As you might know, the unicorn motif in that novel is directly connected to the idea of false or constructed memories, something I think Murakami may have borrowed from Blade Runner. If you recall, in Blade Runner, Deckard is revealed to be a replicant, and his false implanted memories are also symbolized through the image of a unicorn. Unicorns are such fantastic, mythical creatures recurring across many stories and dreamlike narratives.

Recently, I’ve experienced a kind of Mandela effect around this unicorn motif in my own life, something that feels strangely meta. I’m a writer myself, and much like in Murakami’s novels, back in 2023 I found myself caught in a bizarre incident. I had encountered a mysterious, anonymous woman online (through a random chat site, so I never knew her true identity). She was quite unusual and then, a year later in 2024, she reappeared in my dreams and, surprisingly, sent me an image of a unicorn, which I ended up including in my own book. Later, while analyzing the artworks of a deceased painter for an exhibition, I discovered that the artist had also used a unicorn hidden like a tiny sticker, in one of her pieces titled LSD-25. It was so small and uncanny that it felt as though it was meant only for me to find.
Now, once again, I have come across the unicorn motif while reading Robert Anton Wilson’s Illuminatus! Trilogy again tied to themes of false memory and existential questioning through reality tunnels , Timothy Leary second circuit and brainwashing this time!
So I wonder: is this merely a case of Chapel Perilous where one starts to see the same symbol everywhere, or could there be something deeper at play?



Murakami and Mandela Effect