Author Archives: Steve Kim

Conclusion

Wow, I’m really glad that I reached the final week of this term. First of all, this RMST 202 class has been the most favourite course I have taken so far. Throughout the whole term, I have had an opportunity to read some great books and discuss them.

what have I learned?

In my entire life, I have read the book without a deep thought or analysis. For me reading books was a form of entertainment; enjoying and chilling out by reading text and stories. Through this course, I could learn how to observe the actual theme the author has intended and how to consider the historical background of the story. It allowed me to read more than just enjoyment.

Reflecting on my first post, saying I want to challenge myself and grow my ability to read and analyse the story written in English, I personally think that I struggled to catch up with the reading. However, I also could expand my perspective on how to read the book. This intense process of reading books each week, writing a blog post, and commenting on others’ posts was tough, but also very helpful not only for my academic

my most favourite & least favourite book

[Death With Interruption] was my favourite book in this course, although it was not an easy book to read through, mostly because of the absence of punctuation. I enjoyed the supernatural settings — death stopped working, and people who should die wouldn’t die anymore — to elaborate the heavy and philosophical theme. Personally speaking, I am also a fan of Jose Saramago — I enjoyed reading [Blindness] by him.

[Combray] was my least favourite. It definitely does not mean I don’t like this book, but this is the only book that is unfinished. I will definitely read the whole [Swann’s Way] and [In Search of Lost Time] but for now, it is left unfinished. Besides, the way Proust expressed the story is really long-winded and the timeline is arbitrary, which makes the story even more difficult to understand.

[Nadja] was also really hard to read. Despite the complexity of the narrative style, the theme of the book is hidden in the dreamy and psychedelic expressions. It was not a typical literature I could think of, which made a hindrance when I first started reading this.

Overall, it’s been a journey, and it was really worth it!

How was your experience in this course? Did you reach the goal you set in the first post?

When human go against the nature — [Death with Interruptions] by Saramago

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“It’s also true, as we well know, that there were a few cruel families who allowed themselves to be carried away by their own incurable inhumanity and went so far as to employ the services of the maphia to get rid of the miserable human remains […] (84)

The natural world has the so-called ‘force of nature,’ which is impossible to go against as a human being. Death is the most extreme example of the force of nature. However, the development of science tries to reach its step to overcome death. This book, [Death with Interruptions], made me doubt the overheated race of science and trying to overcome the force of nature.

“The following day, no one died. This fact, being absolutely contrary to life’s rules, provoked enormous and, in the circumstances, perfectly justifiable anxiety in people’s minds […]” (1)

Throughout human history, we have tried to overcome death, and that is how science (especially medical science) has been developed. Everyone is instinctively afraid of death, and we all want to push it further as much as possible. But what if the death is actually stopped? At least in the book, lots of chaotic consequences occurred. Church became meaningless since there was no resurrection; the hospital experienced a plethora of patients; insurance companies, undertakers and all the societies, in general, were thrown pell-mell.

“[…] we are not here just for the good times, […] we are here, too, for the bad times and the worst, when they have become little more than a sinking rag that there is no point in washing.” (72)

But the biggest problem was the patients themselves and their families, who were suffering from the step behind the death. They had to endure the painful moment (and the actual pain for patients), just because the death was removed from nature. It reminded me of a hospice and DNR (Do Not Resuscitate). Is it all worth treating patients who have no hope of being revived? Who is going to care for their family, or even themselves?

“[…] therefore, resign yourselves and die without protest because it will get you nowhere […] (110)

Death is inevitable, although it is dreadful and hard to deal with. Human beings have been trying to avoid death as much as possible, and we will keep trying it. But at the point where we can overcome most of the common diseases, we also have to think about the ethical question of keeping people away from death, even when they suffer from unfathomable pain and agony.

Is it really the right way to keep patients who suffer from pain alive?

It was a nice thriller novel…wait, is it? — [Money to Burn] by Ricardo Piglia

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“This novel tells a true story. It involves a minor case, alrady forgotten among police chronicles […]” (204)

When I started to read the book, being informed that it is a hard-boiled style thriller, I was really excited. I personally like the thriller, and heist movies (not the book, sorry to say). As I expected, it was interesting to read through the book, following the timeline of the incident. Interestingly, the book was written in the form of documentary/encyclopedia style — not much conversation, and time specific.

However, it is ashamed to say, that I did not feel something. It does not mean that I felt anything from the book, but I could not find any of the author’s thoughts from the book, unlike the other previously read books. It may also be the author’s intention, or it might be because of my ignorance. I just followed the incident the author provided, and I enjoyed it as if I were watching an entertaining criminal movie.

Indeed, there would be a moral of the story the author intended for readers to feel (or maybe not, I never know). Again, it might be my ignorance of how I “should” feel toward this book. But it is a novel, and although it is based on a true story, It is “fiction” after all. Books are meant to enjoy and indulge the incidents and story the author is elaborating for us. Especially the thriller and the heist fiction, in my opinion, are more of entertaining genre for as a consumer.

It reminded me the book [If On A Winter’s Night A Traveller] I have read on a previous week, about introducing multiple style of ‘how to read’, including active and passive reading. I, in this book, follow the passive style of reading, just enjoying the book and not really went deeper of searching the author’s thought. I also thought that being passive on reading is not a good way of reading, and even ignoring the author’s effort of writing.

However, this book, or rather this ‘story’ helped me to think again about it. Although this whole course is about finding and feeling what the authors are thinking when writing this book, “book” is ultimately a pastime activity, which is meant to enjoy myself and enrich my heart with interesting stories.

“Our first goal is to engage with a series of interesting and challenging texts, devise strategies to read them well, and expand our horizons through this exploration of new texts, new readings.” (Inventing Romance Studies slides, page 4)

It might not be the answer of how to read this book (and of course, there is no perfect answer of how to read), or maybe it is a justification of my reading; many others would refute my thought. I even also felt like I might be wrong, and even asked myself “am I stupid?” However, remember the first goal of this course — engage with interesting texts, and devise how to read them well. This is how I read this “thriller” book, and that’s what I felt through this book.

So, my question is, what was the “initial” thought on this book? It’s not about the moral or lesson of this book. I am asking about the impression of this book. What did you feel right after finished reading this book?

Must it so be that whatever makes man happy must later become the source of his misery — Marguaret Duras [The Lover]

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This book, [The Lover], was more familiar for me than other books, and it is most likely because of the movie released in 1992. It was not a completely different experience with texts, but indeed had a different impression on writings about her youth.

Every time I write the blog post, I feel like I focus on the broader subject and self-reflecting impression instead of the minutiae; and I think it also applies with this book.

I wanted to kill—my elder brother, I wanted to kill him, to get the better of him for once, just once, and see him die. I wanted to do it to remove from my mother’s sight the object of her love, that son of hers, to punish her for loving him so much, so badly […] (7)

The book is almost an autobiographical ficiton, recalling the memory of her childhood. She grew up in a family where father was already passed away, mother, after “a terrible business”, was loving her elder brother who is overly dominant and violent. Indeed, it is a disturbing environment to experience a puberty as a fifteen-year-old girl who was growing up in a foreign country.

[…] he understands what my mother means, this dishonor, he says. He says he himself couldn’t bear the thought if it were a question of marriage. I look at him. He looks back, apologizes, proudly. He says, I’m Chinese. We smile at each other. (44)

He won’t let his son marry the little white whore from Sadec (38)

She was fall in love with an older Chinese man. He took advantage of her, and it is definitely dangerous to be seen as an ‘affair’. He was also afraid, and thus he started to suffer, and said he is ” horribly lonely because of this love he feels for her.” (37)

Moreover, they had to face the racial problem (he is Chinese, or rather, he is Asian and she is Westerner). Her mother was saying it is a dishonour to marry with Chinese man, and she herself was also heard “the little white whore”. Although they were in an affectionate relationship, they had to give up their love towards each other.

The wild love I feel for him remains an unfathomable mystery to me. I don’t know why I loved him so much as to want to die of his death. I’d been parted from him for ten years when it happened, and hardly ever thought about him. I loved him, it seemed, forever, and nothing new could happen to that love. (106)

It reminded me of the Hong Kong movie, [In the Mood for Love], which also deals with “a forbidden love”. They could not deal with the guilty and the people’s eyes suspecting the affair. Although it is definitely a different story — [The Lover] is not actually an affair in the era, it is clearly shown that their love was not accepted, and they eventually gave up on their relationship. It made a huge impact on their lives, and even when they are old they clearly remember the emotion they felt.

Have you ever felt the strong emotion (whatever, including love) toward aother person which was not accepted by others?

Touché; You are a nice storyteller, Italo Calvino — Thoughts on [If On A Winter’s Night A Traveller]

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“I’m beginning to read Italo Calvino’s new novel!” (3)

If On A Winter’s Night A Traveller was definitely a novel with a different story structure. It started with a man suggesting a perfect posture to read a book, and started the story. However, the story suddenly cut off — literally, cut off — as the book was mistakenly published. He, or rather, you visited the bookstore to complain the publishing error of the book.

First impression — I felt like I was fooled by the author. I was expecting the proper story that has a proper structure, like the quintessential books we all know and the book we have read in this class. But at the point where he suddenly cut off the story [If On A Winter’s Night A Traveller], I felt the same emotion “You” felt — frustration and annoyance. Where is the story? Why did he cut off the story? What game is he playing with me?

After the short moment to feel the frustration, I started to question myself “what is a ‘quintessential’ story?”

“You have now read about thirty pages and you’re becoming caught up in the story.” (25)

“The novel you are reading wants to present to you a corporeal world, thick, detailed.” (42)

The story is written in second person point of view (“You”). It feels like I, as a reader, am being directed to where I should be in the book. In other words, I am, you are, we are the main character of the story, no matter who you are. It helps for me to immerse more to the journey of “you” searching for the story.

At the same time, I was doubting myself on my first impression. It is because, if I was in my own frame of typical story structure, this book was the perfect story of confuting my stereotype. Is it necessary to follow the typical story structure made by the book and its author? Although the story seems like drawing the journey of a man searching for the story of the Polish book, it is talking about “you”. In other words, again, “you” are the main character of this story, or rather, you are the main role of this journey!

“If on a winter’s night a traveler, outside the town of Malbork, leaning from the steep slope without fear of wind or vertigo, looks down in the gathering shadow, in a network of lines that intersect, on the carpet of leaves illuminated by the moon around an empty grave—What story down there awaits its end? —he asks, anxious to hear the story.” (258)

If Italo is trying to draw the different side of the story, he did the successful job. A story within a book is just a portrait of short period of someone’s life, but it’s not the end of the life. In other words, we never know what’s in the past and what’s in the future; we merely need to rely on the author’s description. However, the life is not a book, and it never ends like the ending of the book. We still have to carry on even if the story ends, and we never know what awaits. And that’s the reason we feel “anxious”.

“Just a moment, I’ve almost finished If on a winter’s night a traveler by Italo Calvino.” (260)

Now, our story comes an end, and we still have to carry on our lives. How was your story so far, and what story down there awaits its end? Please let me know on the comments (if you wish!)

[The Time of the Doves] – Life During Wartime

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This is the picture I took in Barcelona

I have been traveling to Barcelona last year. Despite the awe I was experiencing with the beautiful buildings — more specifically, Guell Park and La Sagrada Familia — I was fascinated with the fact that those small villages that we usually never pay attention to when we travel was surprisingly similar to the small town in Korea. It might be a coincidence, but as I read the book [The Time of the Doves], I could realize the reason why.

“And we lived. We still went on living. And I didn’t know anything about what was going on […]” (141)

As I went through the book, I was having a sympathy-like emotions to the protagonist, Natalia. Although the Spain, and specifically Catalonia itself, is a beautiful city, there is a harsh wound from the history hidden from the foreigners, which was the point where I felt the feeling of sympathy. South Korea is also a country where the civil war was held, and is still ongoing. It is often easier to focus the war itself and the sacrifice of soldiers, and neglet our attention from the common people who has to struggle within day-to-day life. I was enjoying the way Rodoreda explains the life during wartime, in one of a person’s eyes. It was a great moment to experience their life.

“[…] and pour the acid into them and then pour it into myself and that way we’d put an end to it all and everyone would be happy since we wouldn’t have done anybody any harm and no one loved us.” (146)

This personal impression on this book and Natalia got me thinking the morality of her act of attempting murder her kids. Indeed murder, especially filicide, is a morally terrible thing to do as a parent. However, the situation she was facing was extreme — in the middle of the wartime, her husband, Quimet, had been killed in action, she couldn’t even buy a food to eat. In other words, she was barely being survived in a day-to-day life.

Despite the fact that it is ethically wrong, this hardships Natalia was facing made me doubt on quintessential view of morality, especially on parenting. Of course it was a hard decision to make for her to kill herself and her kids. Personally I think it is morally wrong in a common sense, but I feel hesitant myself to criticize her decision.

Do you think it is necessary to put situational factors when we judge people’s morality and ethics of their actions?

[Deep Rivers], under the oppression and dissonance

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I was intimidated by the book before actually reading the book, since it doubled the length than the book read before this week. I was unconfident to even finish the book in time. However, [Deep Rivers] was, in my opinion, way easier to understand compare to the first few books previously read. Following the easiness of reading through, there was a lot to think about the identity between two different cultures, and oppression by power.

“gangs of “Peruvian” and “Chilean” students did battle” (47)

“If they were older, he teased them by insulting them with the filthiest of words until they attacked him, so that Lleras would intervene; but if he were quarreling with a smaller boy he would beat him unmercifully.” (49)

The book [Deep Rivers] is about the story of experiences in a perspective of Ernesto, the main character. He, after years of traveling around the country, entered the Catholic boarding school. He was with people around his age, but there was an obvious conflicts between “Peruvian” and “Chilean”, and inequalities between people who are from landowning family and those who are poor, indigenous people who are derogatorily called cholo, k’anra, and so on.

There was a severe inequality between those who are from hacienda family and those who are not really rich, and it was explicitly described. It was disturbing to read through the incidents which weak and “febble-minded” people were experiencing within the oppressing and discriminative power. However, at the same time, it was interesting to see the Peruvian society of this era in a nutshell.

“I recalled this, recalled it as relived it in moments of great loneliness.” (61)

“[…] at nightfall my feelings of loneliness and isolation grew more intense. Even though I was surrounded by boys my own age and by other people, the dormitory was more frightening and desolate than the deep gorge of Los Molinos, where I had once been abandoned by my father when he was being pursued.” (60)

Under the oppressed atmosphere against Andean people, Ernesto feels loneliness and dissonance, as he is not feeling any attachments from where he is. Although it can’t be comparable, I could personally resonate this with my own lifetime story. As an international student who were travelled to countries for 10 years, I was experiencing a dissonance between the culture I had exposed as I grow up, and the culture I have experienced through my academic journey. In fact, it was hard to relieve of feeling isolation and loneliness, and like what Ernesto chose, I traveled around when I have even a short period of time.

Have you ever experienced the cultural (or identity) dissonance in your life? Or Do you have any personal experience to share about facing inequality or oppressed power?

Life Behind Tragedy — “The Shrouded Woman”

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It was painful to read — not only about the difficulty of the book, but also the tragic feeling, maily from the love, I could look through Ana Maria’s life. As I follow Ana Maria’s life, from the “cowardly desertion” of Ricardo, her first love, lunatic jealousy of Silvia towards Maria Griselda, and marriage “out of spite” with Antonio, those pain and anxiety from her made me even hurt to read through.

“Why, oh why must a woman’s nature be such that a man has always to be the pivot of her life?” (226)

“[…] when her father had said to her: “Child, kiss your fiancé.” She had then obediently approached this man so handsome…and so rich;” (221)

Throughout the story, it is candidly drawn the invisible hierarchal inequality between man and woman in the relationship in 1930s. Although it was not explicitly stated, men who engraves the scar in Ana Maria’s life, the tendency that they care their lives and “hecinada” shows that they looked down on women. It was interesting to see how Bombal women endured the pain with the life story of Ana Maria.

I am a man, who is living in 21st Century. It was quite a shock to see how painful to live as a woman, and how heavy the pain and constrain they should endure in their life. Indeed, it was not the only reason why Ana Maria was suffering in her life, but it must not be negate the fact that the main source of her pain is from men.

“It was a sunny morning and the day gave promise of being radiantly beautiful. Against the stained glass of the windowpanes dragonflies beat in great numbers. From the garden rose the cries of the children running after each other with the sprinkling hose.” (226)

One thing I want to point out is that, despite all the events are against her, which gives the emotional pain, all the settings and expression she is using is contradictorily romantic. It gives a polarized feeling in one story. I think it is a perfect metaphor of life — life is full of “death of the living” (259), but also there are a few glimpse of beauty.

Story-wise, I think it is really important element of this story. For me, as a reader, it gives some room to breathe out. Within the tragic story, it might be easier to be negatively affected emotionally as a force of sympathy. These romantic expressions and lines provides us some space to step back, and neutralize the tragic life story.

Question. Do you feel constraint, or suffering, in daily life as a women? & Do you think women is still under pressure as a men?

Freedom? — André Breton “Nadja”

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“I shall discuss these things without pre-established order, and according to the mood of the moment which lets whatever survives survive” (23)

[Nadja] was never an easy book to understand fully in one reading. In fact, the first impression of the book was pure confusion — it never goes as time passes generally, and it even seems a collection of unconnected events. The author, André Breton, just listed down depicted incidents of what he saw and felt. It, as a story, is not a story which helps us to understand what he actually tries to say.

However, as I continued reading, and eventually finished the reading, I could find the fascination of this book. As the main themes are obsession and madness in a surrealistic style, and they would be discussed even if I don’t, I want to point out two main things I found fascinating.

“Is there anything more detestable than these systems of so-called social conservation which, for a peccadillo, some initial and exterior rejection of respectability or common sense, hurl an individual among others whose association can only be harmful to him and, above all, systematically deprive him of relations with everyone whose moral or practical sense is more firmly established than his own?” (139)

One thing I was surprised by as I read the book was the way the author depicts the dark side of “freedom” in the real world, and how he criticizes the world. Unlike the other literature which merely delivers the story per se, Breton tries to claim his opinion toward the real world. This is the point where I felt it was not just a novel, but it is more of a critique or a column which shows the “dark side”. It was surprising that he drastically stated his opinion with a surrealistic story of a mad woman.

“Those are your thoughts and mine. Look where they all start from, how high they reach, and then how it’s still prettier when they fall back. And then they dissolve immediately, driven back up with the same strength, then there’s that broken spurt again, that fall…and so on indefinitely.” (86)

Another thing I felt fascinated by was the dreamy and beautiful metaphors and expressions throughout the book — not only in the quotation above but also in many other parts. Despite its beauty and splendour, it provides warmth to the story that can be just a dry journal of Breton. Furthermore, these metaphors allude the Breton and Nadja’s inner notions more elegantly.

To conclude, I want to ask one simple question, “Do you think freedom needs to be controlled, or even confiscated, just like Nadja?”

“Combray” by Marcel Proust

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[Combray] by Marcel Proust is not a page-turner. Every sentence in the book is lengthy and contains long-winded details, and every scene is, in my perspective, descriptive as the protagonist tries to depict everything he feels in the moment. One explicit example is the sentence above. In the sentence, he is trying to describe the moment he has a hard time sleeping in a very esthetically. This characteristic of the writing style makes the reading harder and slower.

However, as I continued reading the story, I could completely delve into the world Proust built in the story. There are two elements I want to point out. The first one is the detailed and in-depth delineation. The language and expression Proust used colourized every scene as the reader is allowed to travel down the memory of the protagonist vividly. It is shown not only in the part where the narrator has tea and a petites madelines, but also across the story. I want to point out one scene, where Mama read Francois le Champi to him.

“[…] taking care to banish from her voice any pettiness, any affectation which might have prevented it from receiving that powerful torrent, she imparted all the natural tenderness, all the ample sweetness they demanded to those sentences which seemed written for her voice and which remained, so to speak, entirely within the register of her sensibility.” (43)

It does not merely deliver the dry fact that his mom reads the book for the narrator, but actually focus more on the suitable metaphors and clear description of “feeling”, which allow the reader to experience the moment fully.

Another one to point out is the irrelevance of time. This book does not follow the generic narrative structure. Instead, the story travels through the protagonist’s stream of consciousness and describe scene by scene accordingly. I realised that following the passage of time when reading this book is not an effective way to enjoy the story. I think it would be more enjoyable to read the story by following the stream of the narrator’s thoughts and memories, although it is hazy and obscure in time.

One thing I found conjecturable as a psychology major — although it might be extremely controversial — is that the narrator shows the symptoms of oedipus complex. I know it is a refuted, old-fashioned theory, but it is also a classic view of ego formation. It is vaguely shown from his obsession of mom’s goodnight kiss, to a different designation between mom and dad (he even started with a capital letter to write a word “Mama”, whereas dad is just called “my father”).

I am aware that it is going to be controversial. Therefore, I would put this as a question I would ask.

Q. Do you think Proust used Freudian theory (Oedipus complex) as a theme of the story?