Fiction writing as boxing

Haruki Murakami, as quoted by Jay Rubin in his crappy but interesting book on the Japanese novelist, essayist, short story writer:

The most important thing is confidence. You have to believe you have the ability to tell the story, to strike the vein of water, to make the pieces of the puzzle fit together. Without the confidence, you can't go anywhere. It's like boxing. Once you climb into the ring, you can't back out. You have to fight until the match is over.
This is the way I write my novels, and I love to read novels that have been written this way. To me, spontaneity is everything.

(Haruki Murakami and the Music of Words p.82)

I call the book interesting because Murakami is interesting. And I seem to remember having no trouble with Rubin's translations of Murakami. The book itself though is tedious, full of endless plot summary and occasionally a wonderful little chunk from or about Murakami himself.