텍스트 문화예술 도서 "A Trip to Mujin"

The Bus to MujinAs the bus curved around the mountain slope I saw a signpost that read “Mujin 10 km.” There it was sticking out of the weeds by the road, just as it used to. The people conversing in the seats behind me started up again. “So, just another 10 kilometers.” “Yes, we should arrive in about thirty minutes.” They seemed to be agricultural inspectors of some sort. Or perhaps not. In any case they were wearing short color-patterned shirts and polyester trousers, and making observations about the passing villages and fields and hills that only agricultural specialists would make in their specialized language. In my half-sleep I had been listening to them drone on in a subdued, formal tone, very unlike that of the local farmers, ever since I had got off the train at Gwangju and boarded the bus. There were many empty seats on the bus. They were saying that the bus was empty because it was farming season and nobody had time to travel. “Mujin isn’t really known for anything, is it?” They continued on. “No, nothing in particular. Funny that so many people live there.” “It could have developed into a port, perhaps, since it’s so close to the coast?” “No, you’ll see why not when you get there. The location isn’t quite right. The sea is too shallow near Mujin and you’d have to go miles out to reach a decent depth and face an open horizon.” “So it’s a farming town?” “One can’t really say it has any plain worthy of that name, either.” “But then what do the fifty to sixty thousand people in Mujin live on, I wonder?” “Isn’t that why there’s that expression, ‘by hook or by crook?’” They shared a controlled laugh. “Still, I’d say it should have at least one memorable product to be remembered by,” declared one man as their laughter faded.It’s not that there is nothing to remember Mujin by. I know what it is. The fog. When you woke up in the morning and stepped outside, there it was, an entire enemy troop laying siege on the town, as if it had spent the whole night creeping up on you. The fog had sent all the hills surrounding the town into exile in a faraway land. It was like the steaming breath of a female demon who bore you a grudge and sought you out night after night. No human power could disperse it before the sun rose and the wind from the sea changed its direction. You could not grab it but it was clearly there. It engulfed you and separated you from all distant things. The fog, the Mujin fog, that its people meet every morning, that makes them ache for the sun and the wind. What could be more memorable about Mujin than its fog?The bus was rattling a bit less now. I could gauge the rattling of the bus by the shaking of my chin. I was slumped in my chair, all limbs relaxed, so as the bus rattled and shook along the pebbly roads my chin would bounce along with the bus. I knew of course that riding a bus in that position would tire me a good deal more than if I were to sit rigidly on my seat. But the June wind that streamed into the bus windows, mercilessly tickling all my exposed skin, was putting me half to sleep, making it impossible for me to sit up straight. I considered the wind to be composed of an infinite number of small particles, each one filled to the hilt with sleep-inducing drugs. In that wind, I thought, there was fresh sunlight and a coolness that had not yet brushed against human sweat, also brine that told me that beyond the surrounding mountain ridge that seemed to be rushing toward the bus there lay the sea. The mixture of all these elements melted into the wind was strangely harmonious. The fresh brightness of the cool temperature of the air, just cool enough to make your skin feel the taste of brine mixed into the sea breeze. I thought to myself, if I could make a sleeping pill out of the mixture of these three things it would be a more refreshing pill than all other sleeping pills sitting on the shelves of all the pharm

제공기관 : 한국문학번역원 새창 이동

텍스트 문화예술 도서 "An Anonymous Island"

That spring, I graduated with a degree in education and took my first job at an elementary school in a rural village, which I will leave nameless. It was sixty li from the county seat, up past two high, rugged mountains in a valley where it seemed no one would want to live. I got off the bus and stood on the slope at the bus stop for a while, feeling desolate and alone. The mountains encircled me like the giant walls of a prison that would confine me for the rest of my life, and the village of about a hundred houses that I saw in the distance looked abandoned―like a ghost town. The school I was looking for must have been hidden behind a ridge. I couldn’t see it anywhere. The few people who had got off the bus with me had already disappeared, so I went to the store nearby to ask for directions. I had gone only a few steps when I felt something like a sharp beam of light pierce my skin. I stopped to look for the source and saw a young man sitting on the back porch of the store, silently watching me. His pants were so stained and dirty that I couldn’t tell what material they were made of, and the sleeves of his dyed Army jacket hung in tatters. His face was dark and weathered, with a prominent nose and high cheekbones. I stared at him without realizing it. Just then the light seemed to prick at my skin again. It was hidden behind a veil of madness, but the source was unmistakable―it was coming from the man’s eyes. It’s as if I were on a forest path. I see a snake through the thick foliage and the fear stays with me until I leave. No simple fear but a kind of primal thrill that dissolves into a hollow regret when I’m safely through and the danger has passed. That’s how it made me feel, the light from his eyes, until the shopkeeper opened the door and came out, breaking the illusion. “Ggaecheol, you idiot! What are you doing still sitting out there?” Although the man must have been five or six years older than him, the shopkeeper talked down to him, as if he were a child. The man was apparently not some vagrant just passing through―he belonged to the village. He didn’t even pretend to hear the shopkeeper, but just kept looking at me with those vague hooded eyes. His expression wasn’t lewd or disgusting, but for some reason it frightened me. “You deaf?” the shopkeeper said. “Get up!” He went over and gave Ggaecheol a loud thump on the back, and as I cautiously approached he called out, “Welcome! Are you looking for something?” It was only then that I was able to shake Ggaecheol’s clinging gaze from my body. I asked coolly, “Where is the elementary school?” “Ho! So you’re the new lady teacher they said was coming.” The shopkeeper’s face suddenly overflowed with kindness. He turned just as a boy, who looked about six, came out from the back of the store. “Hey, come over here,” he called. “What is it, Mr. Togok?” the boy said. “Looks like this is the new teacher. Show her to the school before you go.” He looked toward me with a hint of pity, and muttered, “The school’s the size of a booger, and it’s way out in those hills.” Obediently, I stepped forward to follow the boy. Ggaecheol’s eyes were on me again, but I had recovered my composure. I shot him a fierce look as I left. Walking to the school with the boy, I realized how quickly I was being introduced to the peculiar dynamics of the village. The boy nodded in greeting to each man we met, calling him “uncle” or “grandfather.” I had grown up in the city, and my only exposure to relatives was when I visited an uncle’s house once or twice a the closeness of this place felt strange to me. In the classroom, half the students had the same surname and even those with different surnames seemed to be first cousins. Later, I learned that this was because the village was surrounded on all four sides by layer upon layer of high mountains, with a single road threading through from north to south. The villag

제공기관 : 한국문학번역원 새창 이동

텍스트 문화예술 도서 "Banner"

1 The power went out at ten past midnight this morning. While people were asleep, all the electronic home appliances stopped working. The children who woke up were they missed the hum of the refrigerator and the whir of the fan, sounds as comforting to them as a lullaby. Housewives who opened the refrigerator in the morning found blood dripping from the pork in the freezer, the meat a dark red. The Popsicles had melted, leaving wrappers full of soft mush pooled around the sticks, and the marinated spinach gave off a sour smell. It gets so humid in July that food goes bad in no time. Everyone was calling the 123 hotline. Even up to the early ’80s, power failures were very common. Students cramming for their exams would have had to study by candlelight and sometimes, these candles caused fires. Since 1997, though, all this has become history. This particular power failure wasn’t that extensive. The affected area was limited to Kwangmy？ng Complex D and Rose Towers 1, 2, and 3. It could have been a worn-out line or even a bird on a high-voltage line. Birds perching on high-voltage lines are safe as long as they don’t touch anything else. But if they nod off and touch another line, zap! I looked at my map and checked the utility pole in question: No.021/8619E. I stepped into the alley with the poles marked 8619E. The alley went down a steep hill with a sixteen-metre-tall pole every fifty metres. The sun was hanging over the vents on the roof of Kwangmy？ng Complex A. Not yet ten and it was already sizzling. Before I knew it, I was at the bottom of the hill. Behind me were the eight concrete utility poles whose number tags I’d been busy reading on my way down. I’d developed a habit of calculating distance by the number of utility poles I passed. Three hundred fifty metres later, I was finally in front of No.021. I had worked in Ky？nggi Province before they transferred me here. Back there, not a day went by without a power failure. The cause? Magpies. They sometimes built their nests on top of the transformers and came in contact with the line, or a porcelain insulator had broken off. Maybe to magpies, utility poles looked like oak trees, sturdy enough to hold nests that would last a lifetime. So not only did I replace transformers and repair lines, but I also had to move the nests into trees. But where would you find magpies here in the city? City children would never see a magpie except in a picture book about birds. Climbing utility poles was a piece of cake. At the technical high school, they called me “Monkey Boy.” There were fifty practice poles rigged up on the school grounds and we had to go up and down them all. I set the speed record. I strapped on my leather tool belt crammed with gear and was about to start climbing when I stepped on something spongy. It was a pair of black leather dress shoes filled with water. They weren’t left behind by a drunk. Although the spines were crushed in and the heels were worn, they were placed neatly side by side, as if someone had removed them at the front door. I felt a drop of water. I looked up. Was it starting to rain again? It had been raining on and off until it had stopped earlier this morning. From the first peg two metres above the ground, a wet suit jacket hung, water dripping from its hem. It was the same guy who left had the shoes there. The metal pegs zigzagged up the pole, my gaze locking onto each peg as I climbed. The dark street lamp loomed above, staring down at me like the Cyclops. Two pegs above the suit jacket, on the other side of the pole, hung a damp pair of men’s trousers. And on the next peg, a white dress shirt with its sleeves rolled up was flapping in the wind. The breeze must have dried it out during the night. Above that hung a sweat-stained undershirt and looped around the next peg was a necktie, still knotted. Next, I met a pair of socks swaying back and forth in front of my face like a pair of tired balloons. I tilted my head

제공기관 : 한국문학번역원 새창 이동

텍스트 문화예술 도서 "Bodies"

* A short story fromAOI Garden, Moonji Publishing Co., Ltd., 2005. The phone call came about a month after his wife had gone missing. A body part appearing to belong to a woman had been discovered in a ravine. It was the same ravine where his wife was presumed to have drowned. He told the officer he would leave first thing in the morning and hung up. It was a five-hour drive to U City, not counting the time it would take to stop at a rest area for a bowl of udon noodles. Even if he left right away, he would not reach the police station that was handling the case until after two in the morning. A right leg had been found. He would have to confirm his wife’s death from nothing more than a right leg. The length of the average adult leg is about half the total height of the body. His wife was 160 centimeters tall. So her leg, he mumbled while spreading his arms eighty centimeters apart, is about like that. He pictured her body in four pieces, as if sketching it, from the bottom of her feet to her kneecaps, from her kneecaps to her genitals, from her genitals to her nipples, and from her nipples to her head. The rough outline of a female body took shape in his mind. He couldn’t tell whether it was his wife’s body or the body of some prostitute that he had slept with. He strained to remember what his wife’s right leg looked like. He recalled that she used to complain all the time that her legs were fat. But were they really that fat, and if so, how fat were they? Were they only fat in comparison to her unusually long and slender arms, or fat compared to other women her age? He couldn’t even remember whether she shaved her legs or not. He began to question whether he had ever in his life touched his wife’s right leg. He ran his hand over the air as if stroking the contours of her leg. He could not for the life of him recall whether she had thick calves or whether they were sleek and smooth, and whether the ankles hidden inside her long skirt were slim enough for him to wrap his hand around or so thick that they merged right into the calves. He lay down and tried to erase the imaginary woman But instead of disappearing, the woman raised her right leg and rested it on top of his head. As the leg bore into his brain, he finally remembered something about his wife’s leg. She had a small skin tag on her leg. That would tell him whether the unidentified leg was his wife’s or not. It was no bigger than a grain of rice. But to his wife, it was a lump the size of a fist. She had said that she sometimes felt like her body was nothing but leg, and it was all because of that skin tag. Someone had told her that if she wrapped a strand of hair around it, it would fall off on its own. Since her own hair was too short, she had used a thin strand of black thread instead. The thread cut off the blood supply and, after a while, the tag dried up and turned black. But it did not fall off. That blackened and withered fibroma dangling from her leg would be the clue that determined what had happened to his wife. She had gone missing and was presumed to have drowned to death. Someone had witnessed her f loundering and screaming for help in the watery ravine where she had fallen. To be precise, the witness did not see his wife but rather a woman. The witness could not recall his wife’s clothing or the length of her hair or any distinguishing facial features. He merely said that he saw a woman floundering in the ravine. The detective in charge of the case had concluded that it was most likely his wife but they could not be certain. He pictured the imaginary leg again in order to add the skin tag to it. But then it hit him that he did not know which leg the tag was on. If he did not know that, then he could not very well tell the detective there was small, black fibroma clinging to his wife’s right leg. His uncertain speculation might leave his still-living wife for dead. Or his long-dead wife could go missing forever. The leg fell on his h

제공기관 : 한국문학번역원 새창 이동

텍스트 문화예술 도서 "Ginkgo Tree"

But after three years, the Ginkgo tree suddenlystarted to grow with frightening speed, remarkableconsidering its slow progress in the first three years.The pea-sized tree grew to the size of a chestnut in amere month, and an orange in two months. On thethird month, it was the size of a watermelon. “It’s awesome! It grew so much this month, too.I think the manure really helped. A little smelly,though. Ha ha. Anyway, I’m glad the tree is growingwell, but I’d hate to draw attention to myselfbecause of this. What if I end up on TV? What ifpeople crowd me and demand to see my tree? I can’tstand a racket. It can’t be good for the tree, either.” But that was the least of our worries. We wereworried about his health. It goes without sayingthat the only source of nutrients for the tree wasthe man’s body, and there was no telling what thatmeant for him. The roots already run all the waydown to his wrist, and he had next to no movementin his left hand. But he was completely oblivious toour worries and driveled on about his plans for thetree. “Maybe I should just let it all out in the openand raise it proudly. It’ll be a little trying, but that’sthe only way I can have some semblance of a sociallife and still keep my tree. By the way, they haveGinkgo tree experts at the Korea Forest Service,no? I have so many questions. How much sunlightdoes the tree need? I hear Ginkgoes have male andfemale trees. How does the pollination work? Doesthe wind take care of everything, or do they needthe help of bees and butterflies? ‘Cause I hate bees. Butterflies are okay, though.” As time went on, the man shriveled. He keptlosing weight until he went from chubby to scrawny.His face was jaundiced, and his entire left arm wasparalyzed. His digestive system started to fail him―he couldn’t hold anything down. We implored himto consider the only option he had: to have the treesurgically removed by taking out a part of his fingerand digging the roots out of his arm. The way thingswere going, he was sure to die soon. But he politelydeclined and put his affairs in order like someoneon his way out. “Has he lost his mind?” cried his agitated wife.“It’s not like he’s got a new woman! He’s throwingeverything away―his life, his family!―and forwhat? A Ginkgo tree! Tell him to repot the tree in apot if he loves it so much.” From her point of view,this whole affair was unconscionable. I agreed. Buthis closures were irrevocable, quick, and simple. Hetransferred ownership of the stationery store andthe house to his wife, and left. He called us at thebus terminal. “I’m leaving now,” he said.“Thank youfor everything.” It was a simple message. He didn’tmention where he was going. I’ve heard that some plants only grow oncarcasses. But I’ve never heard of trees that grow onorganisms that are still alive. What happened there?Why did that Ginkgo tree choose human flesh andveins over the sacred and fertile soil endowed withthe blessings of Mother Nature? What an enigma. He sometimes wrote us. He was living in a huton Songni Mountain at one point, and in Taebaekountain at another. We couldn’t tell how he wasable to feed himself and stay hidden from the rest ofthe world. His last letter came from Jiri Mountain. The tree is well. I am also well. I think the time hascome for the tree to lay roots in the ground. I’ll have togo deeper into the woods. Once the Ginkgo tree goesinto the ground, I won’t be able to write anymore. Butthings will be just fine as they’ve always been. Thankyou for planting a life in my body. Don’t worry about athing. I am happier than I have ever been in any life Ihave ever lived. I don’t have a Ginkgo tree growing on me, soI don’t know how a monstrous tree that feeds onhuman blood like a vampire can make anybodyhappy. But he said he was happy. If he hasn’t diedyet, he’ll be living somewhere deep in the JiriMountain woods with the Ginkgo. If he lives on,it will be thanks to the

제공기관 : 한국문학번역원 새창 이동

텍스트 문화예술 도서 "My Sister’s Menopause"

* A short story excerpt fromThe 5th Hwang Sun-won Literary Award Anthology, JoongAng Ilbo, 2005. On the days she visited my apartment, my older sister would pass the evening seated at the table in front of the balcony window. Around dusk she would grow more chatty. Well, not exactly chatty. She was just barely managing to get her mouth open. I read in a special issue of a women’s magazine that menopausal women get anxious for no reason around dusk. Maybe my sister’s chattiness had something to do with that. The things she talked about in the evenings were mostly gibberish. Like the wind or the dusk's red glow, her words were vague and elusive, as if spoken from far away. Maybe it's not so accurate to say I heard her they seemed to just brush by me. I never knew how to respond to her. She would say, ―Hey, the plane looks just like a fish. Just look at those fins. appearing massive, like a shark, over the mouth of the river, until it eventually shrank to the size of a carp, receding into the dusk’s thick glow. ―Hey, it looks just like a minnow. Look at the head shimmer. Like it’s got a lamp on its tail? Come look. Though she called out to me, she was staring out the window with her back towards me. She passed the time at the window while I prepared dinner by the kitchen sink. ―Hey, how can it disappear like that? Like it's melting into the sky? The mouth of the Han River was widening to an unfathomable breadth, and flocks of birds had gathered in the mudflat laid bare by the evening ebb. Shadows of the mountain ranges receding towards the West Sea seemed to flicker in the darkening dusk. On a cloudless night, the evening glow would fill up the empty sky completely, so that the glow seemed like its own emptiness, a void drawing me in indefinitely. The slowly shrinking planes vanished into that thick glow, and the inbound planes, each a single speck, dripped out of it, emerged towards Gimpo. Just as my sister liked to say, the sky beyond the balcony window did sometimes resemble an aquarium, with various fishes flying in it. ―Hey, are there really people in the plane? My sister continued to gaze at the sky until dusk had burnt itself out, and across the river, the town of Gimpo became illuminated. I usually brought over wine or heated milk to her table. She would lick daintily around the glass’s lip. As she got older, my sister became increasingly fussy about what she ate. Even from an early age, she’d found the smoke from cooking meat revolting, and now that she was going through menopause, she refused kimchi stew that had even a single morsel of pork in it. Even when I'd removed the meat before serving her, a sniff of the broth was all it took for her to catch on. She could hardly eat any meat or fish, or anything for that matter now that she had gotten older. In the spring, she would mince wild chives and shepherd's pouch together and mix them over white rice with soy sauce and sesame salt. In the summer, she would dump her rice in water and eat it with individual servings of pickled shrimp or seasoned green laver. Another summer favorite was pickled cucumber slices dipped in hot pepper paste. The side dishes she could enjoy without raising a fuss were dried anchovies broiled in soy sauce withkkwaripeppers, white kimchi topped with minced parsley, and pan-fried lotus root. Before his death two years ago, my sister’s husband had been an executive at a steel manufacturing firm located in the free trade zone in the South Seas. He'd spent his whole life buried in work. As the head of his team, and later, his department, he'd been in charge of export operations for the company's steel products as well as importing raw materials. Once promoted to the post of managing director, he oversaw the labor disputes and personnel management of over ten thousand employees involved in production. My brother-in-law always wore a necktie emblazoned with his company logo, along with the company badge on his jacket lape

제공기관 : 한국문학번역원 새창 이동

텍스트 문화예술 도서 "Sampoong Department Store"

On June 29, 1995, Thursday at 5:55 in the afternoon, Sampoong Department Store in the 1675-3 district collapsed. It took less than a second for each floor to fall. That spring I had many things. I had comparatively genial,moderately conservative parents, a clean full-size bed, asemi-transparent, green Motorola pager, and four handbags. And at night, with my boyfriend recently employed at an investment firm company, we dated according toThe Ideal Couple’s Dating Manual(although I didn’t actually check to see if the book actually exists.) Those nights were responsible, boring dates. Because I believed that if I only tried I could become whatever I wanted, naturally I didn’t want to be anything. The fact that 1990 was barely half over was intolerably confusing. I’d start to say, “It was a really wonderful year,” then after thinking, would feel irresponsible like a real estate telemarketer who presses any phone number and pressures you to invest. The first chapter of my organized education 20 years before 1995: my mother, who had optimistic expectations about the reality of South Korea’s preschool education, held her daughter’s hand, who wasn’t yet even four-years old, and visited the local day care center. It was the most renowned school in the area. The director, with plastic butterfly-shaped glasses perched at the end of her nose, carefully studied my face. She still looks likes a baby. My mother’s feelings were hurt. Is that so? But she’s a much more competent character than she looks. I didn’t want to disappoint my mother, so I kept my mouth firmly shut like a clam and looked as fierce as I could. Even now, when I want to protect myself while meeting new people, I occasionally still do this. After the director gave me permission to attend, she left me the following curse. Now it’s time for you to slowly learn order in a group environment. The grand order of a group environment: waking up from the same dream to carry the same bag to attend school at the same time and sing the same songs and dance to the same rhythmic dance, then eat the same snack off the menu. Four years old. Tardiness was inevitable. Why every morning someone forced me to wake up from a sweet morning sleep, I couldn’t understand. I couldn’t even accept it. Each morning my mother had to throw me on her back and run through the side streets. Our housekeeper Sukja who at the time worshipped the top star Nam Jin, ran with her while hefting up my butt with her hands. The supervising teacher began to wonder about the cause of my repeated tardiness. That…Teacher, it isn’t my fault. When the round sun rises, I get up. The way you taught us to, Teacher. After I get out of bed first I brush my teeth, the top then the bottom teeth, then I wash my face and brush my hair and dress, then next in order I try to eat. But, oh no! Wouldn’t you know that my mother and my Sukja were still sound asleep? There wasn’t a single person getting my breakfast ready. Teacher, as you must know I’m only four, too young to make breakfast on my own. So I woke up my mother, waited for breakfast to be ready, then thoroughly chewed my food and ate, so I was late. The side dishes were black beans in soy sauce and pan-fried anchovies, and seaweed soup, all things I like. As the guardian of a habitually tardy student, my mother was immediately summoned. Though it probably felt unfair, she couldn’t let her daughter be branded a compulsive liar so she promised that even if there was a catastrophe, she would get up earlier than her child and have breakfast readily prepared. It was a period when, as if I were possessed by some god, lies flowed smoothly out each time I opened my mouth. Unfortunately, my parents didn’t seem to take seriously the laziness or habit of lying, all signs of people unfit for society. Instead, it’s probable that they were proud that their child’s language skills excelled in comparison to other children of the same age. Thirty-fi

제공기관 : 한국문학번역원 새창 이동

텍스트 문화예술 도서 "Sugar or Salt"

We had been at the lakeside that day. It was in K’s neighborhood. K, her husband, and I were each holding a fishing pole, but the lake was just still. The sound of birds and of trees shifting in the breeze shook the forest and dissipated, and we gradually grew tired. K was the first to put down her fishing pole. Fumbling in the basket on the grass, she sighed, “Whew.” We had been planning on catching fish and making spicy Korean fish soup, and all the basket contained was a few pieces ofkimchi. “I’m about to starve to death. I’m going to run home quickly and grab something to eat.” As K’s figure disappeared over the road, I felt that our surroundings had been blanketed with tranquility. Putting down the fishing pole and turning around, he opened the thermos and asked, “Would you like some coffee?” At soon as he asked, he made a strange face. That morning, I had put salt instead of sugar in his coffee. Salt and sugar were in identical bottles with the same cork lids. Looking at K’s round letters spelling outsugar,salt, I picked up the bottle labeled salt. K, making an omelet, was busy playing with a stray cat who had just walked up, so she didn’t see what I had done. I furtively tasted the coffee. It was salty and bitter, and it tasted unspeakably nevertheless, I silently put the cup in front of him. After taking a sip of the coffee, a peculiar expression appeared on his face. “The oil probably wasn’t hot enough. Isn’t that omelet a little greasy?” K asked. “No, it’s fine. The soup is good, too. I thought you might be a terrible cook, but you’re actually quite good at it,” I said with a calm face. The soup, which she had made with frozen vegetables and chicken, tasted metallic. Sipping my soup, I didn’t take my eyes off his face. If he had said, “You must have put salt in the coffee. It tastes weird,” then I only needed to say, “Oh, dear. I guess I was confused because the bottles look the same.” Escaping my eyes, he picked up the newspaper on the table. With an indifferent face, he quietly and slowly sipped the coffee. Cutting up sausages and putting bacon in my mouth, I stared at him fiercely. Every time a sip of coffee traveled down under his Adam’s apple, I felt as though some part of me also was also being swallowed with a gulp. “He likes Korean food, but he hardly eats the soup I make or things like that when I cook them. I guess it’s because it’s not like his older sister’s cooking.” K made some more comments on the menu, but he only smiled faintly and kept quiet. Maybe he grew up in an environment with no regard for a sense of taste. I thought of his father, who had been an almond farm worker, the tan-faced old man had never taken a break, working from dawn till the middle of the night until he had set up his own dry-cleaning shop, and his wrinkled sister who was fine with being called his father’s wife. This taciturn man, who supposedly had never slipped below first in his class, who had received a scholarship to complete his studies, and was immediately recruited by Boeing upon graduation. I was afraid of this man who didn’t even blink an eye about coffee with salt. I feared that K was going to become thin and pale with him, that she was going to become just like him. My back tensed at the sight of him. I knew he was looking at me and that he knew I had done it on purpose. Then something broke the surface of the boundless water. The floating cork was pulled deep down under the water and a heavy feeling reached the tips of my fingers. Just as he said, “I think you got a bite,” the reel started unraveling at a good speed. “Loosen it up a little first,” he called out, coming over to me. A carp or a bass or whichever type of fish had taken the bait was running away, further out into the water, with all its strength. On the surface of the water, it created a long stream of waves. “Now, wind the reel back in slowly,” he said. While reelin

제공기관 : 한국문학번역원 새창 이동

텍스트 문화예술 도서 "The Seven Thirty-Two Elephant Train"

Passi’s uncle had a gentle voice and face, but he didcruel things when no one was watching. He wasa cruel man. Passi barely moved his lips when heuttered those words. Did he beat you? With his fist or a tool? I askedhim. Passi rocked his body back and forth. It was amore subtle form of abuse, he said. Verbal abusethat conveyed a physical form. Malicious acts.Unpleasant contact. For instance, when he wastalking to you, he would always pull your upper ear.Like this. Passi pulled the top part of his ear with athumb and an index finger. His muscles tightened,and the right side of his face flattened out subtly. Akid has a thin neck, so when you pull his ear up likethis, his head tilts right away. Then you yell into hisear. Again! Again! You, little, bastard, you spilled,your food, again! Pick it up, and eat it, before I ripthat thing off! Passi was mimicking someone. My face wentcold when I heard that voice. I had never heardPassi speak in such a voice. There was somethingsticky to the tone. I thought of the time when I hadtouched a freshly painted wall. I took my palm offthe wall, and a thick layer of enamel paint cameoff with it, like skin. I washed my hands using allkinds of cleansers, but the paint wouldn’t come offcompletely. I felt as if I were looking at the paint.Passi took his fingers off his ear, and rubbed hisflushed ears with his hand. My uncle said ordinary things in the same way.When he did, there was always saliva on his lips,and the lips touched my ear. Over and over. Haveyour ears ever been bruised? I replied that I didn’t remember. Ears are a little different from other body parts,and aren’t easily bruised. I once tried to bruise myown ear, but it didn’t work. But whenever my uncletouched my ear, it always got bruised. Didn’t his wife say anything? She didn’t say anything. I don’t think she knew.Maybe she was pretending she didn’t know. Anyway,she worked and came home late in the evening.She was nice on the surface, but she wouldn’t letus cross a certain line. And there was somethingabout my uncle’s cruelty that couldn’t be explainedto others. What he enjoyed the most was to makeus stand in a room. He would make us stand thereand pile verbal abuse on us, pull our ears or wavesomething sharp, like a pencil, before our eyes. Forhours on end. He would go get a drink of water orgo to the bathroom in between, and always comeback to where we were and say awful things to us.We stood there. How do you explain somethinglike that to others? Uncle makes us stand thereand hurls abuse at us―like that? Listening to himsay those awful things, I felt as if the structure ofmy body were gradually getting bent out of shape,becoming different. My head turned into an arm,an arm into a leg, an arm into my head, my backinto my stomach, and my stomach into my back.I thought with a leg and with a finger. I thought itwas strange and painful but I couldn’t tell anyoneelse about it. There was no way to explain why it feltstrange and painful. Maybe I was too young. Passi had his head kicked during his lastsummer at the house. His uncle’s big toe dug deepinto his right eye. After the incident, Passi andhis brother were sent to live with their maternalaunt. It took a long time for Passi’s right cornea toheal. He still had his vision, weak though it was,but he developed severe corneal opacity. He saidthat when he closed his left eye and saw the worldthrough only his right eye, everything seemedto be steaming. Face. Faces. Street. Streets. Tree.Trees. Light. Lights. The world of my right eye grewdistant. I lost my sense of depth. Not being able tosee from both sides at the same time means thatyou lose your sense of balance. You can’t keep yourdistance from the cruel scenes inside you. Evenafter I began living with my aunt, I went to see thathouse several times. I stood at a corner, looking atthe house, and pictured cruel things. An intruderattacking my uncle and his wife and slashing themto death. That’s me. Th

제공기관 : 한국문학번역원 새창 이동

텍스트 문화예술 도서 "The Third Breast"

Do you remember how I unwittingly pinched yournipple when I first scooped up your breasts? You letout a short shriek and laughed loudly as you wrappedyour hands around my face. “Men usually touch it with their tongues first.Don’t you think you’re a little strange?” you askedme, pausing your laughter for a second. For somereason, your words made me feel smug. You keptgiggling and left your breasts to me. I felt a tightlyclosed door gently open at the sound of yourlaughter. Warm memories, confined behind theclosed door, walked out. I wanted to keep playingwith your breasts as I had done a long time ago withmy grandma’s bosom. Your breasts are not that pretty―I mean, atleast not according to generally accepted standards.You told me the most beautiful breasts were firm,cone-shaped ones, around size 30B, with abouta four-inch difference between upper and underbust measurements, the nipples facing away fromeach other like two sisters who don’t get along. Theline connecting the collarbones and nipples shouldmake an equilateral triangle, and the areola shouldbe less than half an inch in circumference. Yourbreasts are more bowl-shaped than cone, and theyare 28A, which is a little small. Your collarbones andnipples do not make an equilateral triangle, you see.Nevertheless, you have something else that is notusually seen on other people―a third breast. That’swhat you called the small bump on the edge of yourareola. I thought you had made up the name, but youtold me it was the official term, and listed names offamous women who had more than two breasts. Youmentioned the name of a Roman emperor’s motherand the name of a woman who was the wife of HenryVIII. I don’t remember exactly who now, though.Among the many names you listed, the only oneI recognized was the Venus de Milo. They say you can see Venus’s third breast if you closely examineher statue at the Louvre. It’s barely a bud without anipple, but you said that it was clearly visible nearthe armpit above her right breast. When I didn’tbelieve you, you brought a book that had the story init and showed it to me. “It’s like a tailbone―the trace now extinct,though it surely existed a long time ago whenhumans gave birth to more than two babies. I guessI haven’t fully evolved. Still, I like this third breast―even Venus had one.” You were so proud of your third breast. I glancedthrough the book while listening to you. The bookwas a sort of general knowledge encyclopedia thatcovered sundry topics in separate sections. Amongthem, I was most interested in the section aboutthe mysteries of the human body. It was fun toread, with the chapters on the human eye, shoulder,and buttocks all carrying interesting photographs.While glancing through pictures of women withtheir breasts exposed, I stopped at the words “thirdbreast.” As you said, the chapter listed names ofpeople who had a third breast. It also mentionedthe story about Venus de Milo. You might’ve readthe following explanation as well: the third breastbecame grounds for accusing women of witchcraftduring the Middle Ages, and witch hunters wouldsearch every inch of the body for a hidden thirdbreast. The book also said that people believedwitches had more than two nipples with which theywould fed their errand boys. But of course, you’dlove that, not because it was a trace of the wild butbecause it was the mark of a witch. A witch’s errand boy―as soon as I read thosewords, I thought it would be fine for me to put myhead on your chest and my mouth on your nipplelike a child. If what came out of the third breast waswitch’s milk, becoming an errand boy didn’t soundtoo bad. As a witch’s errand boy, I would have to findprey or ingredients for magic. In the meantime, I’d probably get to pick up magic. pp. 137？139Translated by Ally Hwang

제공기관 : 한국문학번역원 새창 이동