What Are You Reading These Days?
By Hyon O'Brien
I guess as a retired librarian, my writing this column with this title won't come as a surprise to anyone.
Recently I read an interview with the 1997 Pulitzer Prize-winning American author Philip Roth (1933- ) by a Wall Street Journal reporter on the occasion of the publication of his 30th book, ``The Humbling." One of the journalist's questions was ``What are you reading these days?" His answer intrigued me. ``Mostly what I'm doing is rereading stuff that I read in my 20s, writers who were big in my reading life who I haven't read in 50 years. I am talking about Dostoyevsky, Faulkner, Turgenev, Conrad. I'm trying to reread the best before I die."
I have a tendency of almost never reading any book a second time (other than the Bible, of course), because I think there are so many books out there beckoning me. But lately I've been rethinking that. ```Tell me what you read and I'll tell you who you are' is true enough, but I'd know you better if you told me what you reread," as someone has said. That comment, and Mr. Roth's nudging, have inspired me to reread Jane Austen's ``Pride and Prejudice" for my book club after nearly 45 years, and I enjoyed it immensely.
Yes, I have seen the BBC production of that book almost every year as a family tradition with our younger daughter, Jane, whose name was inspired by my love of Jane Austen. But reading the book is quite different from watching the film. I can stop and ponder. I can go back and reread a paragraph that speaks to me. I can write on the margins of a page what I am thinking and learning so I can share that with others. I enjoyed afresh the wit of Mr. Bennet, the silliness of Mrs. Bennet, the awesome ability of Elizabeth to speak her mind, and the subtle depth of romantic stirring between her and Darcy.
So this year I may pick up my favorite classics from my youth and reread them, as well as searching for new authors I haven't encountered so far.
One of the delights being back in Korea is getting acquainted with Korean books. ``Take Care of Mother" by Shin Kyong-sook is one of them. I used up half of a Kleenex box while reading this tear-jerker. The story begins with the elderly mother of the family being lost at Seoul Station after coming up from the countryside with her husband. Each chapter shows how this affects her daughters, son and husband who gain a new appreciation of her as a mother and a wife, as they search for her throughout Seoul and their hometown. Throughout the book, I couldn't help but thinking about my own mother whose selfless love and sacrifice kept her family of seven children intact despite so many difficulties.
The novel's main character could have been my mom. This book offers an opportunity for readers to think back on their mothers' sacrificing love and provides a never-too-late chance to express their appreciation. There is something peculiarly Korean in this book. Absolute selflessness is a near impossible phenomenon these days but something happens when a Korean woman becomes a mother. Their animal instinct manifests itself in an intense love that at times makes those who receive that love take them for granted. This total devotion, its intensity never ebbing, loving and sacrificing for their children, becomes their raison d'?tre.
Franz Kafka (1883-1924) once said, ``A book must be an ice-axe to break the seas frozen inside our soul." Reading ``Take Care of Mother" melted everything frozen in me and I was thoroughly spent in the deepest emotion of mourning my mother with a new light of appreciation. I wished she were still around for me to express the width, breath and length of my indebtedness to her selfless love. I look forward to seeing this book being performed on stage. Yes, I will make sure to have plenty of tissues with me.
Another book I have been happy to spot and reread is Lee O-young's (1934- ) ``In This Earth & In That Wind." It is a collection of 50 essays that contains the writer's often humorous and always perceptive observations on things Korean. One of the sources he used for his keen insights is Korean vocabulary. Using the Korean language, he highlights Korean's preoccupation with food, death, sadness and emphasis on the group.
For instance, Koreans say ``eat age" for getting old, ``eat heat" for being hot, ``eat public money" for embezzlement. Our hunger and poverty for ages have made Koreans fixated with food and that is reflected in the language. The subject of sorrow is also often incorporated in idioms: When a bird sings or a bell is ringing, we say ``a bird cries" and ``a bell is crying." When we learn English, we realize the word ``I" is very first centering subject of most sentences. For us Koreans who have been raised with a language of group mentality, this concept is slow in entering our consciousness. It has always been ``our house", ``our parents", ``our school", ``our country" and even ``our wife." To shift that thought to the idea of possessing all by myself to say my house, my parents, my school, my country and my wife takes some practice.
The American poet James Russell Lowell (1819-1891) aptly describes books as bees that carry quickening pollen from one mind to another. I have been blessed having been the recipient of countless pollen from other thinking people's minds and souls through my reading over the years. I hope all of us regularly read and spread good things from them to others, making our world a global classroom in which we constantly learn and grow.
Hyon O'Brien, a former reference librarian in the United States, has returned to Korea after 32 years of living abroad. She can be reached at hyonobrien@gmail.com.