To the World, Perhaps to Ourselves — Seven Writers in One Book

To the World, Perhaps to Ourselves collects forty-nine short pieces. Seven writers chose seven things each to write about.

The contributors are Hong Se-hwa, Kim Yong-taek, Lee Chung-geol, Park Chan-il, Seo Min, Song Ho-chang and Ban Yi-jeong. I knew the poet Kim Yong-taek best before opening the book.

Reading seven pieces by somebody gives you time to hear a voice that was unfamiliar when you began. By the end, the shifts in tone are large enough that the collection feels like several small books bound together.

Kim Yong-taek and a Life in Nature

The poet Kim Yong-taek opens the collection. His subject is the natural world and what it means to live with it over time.

I found his pieces calming. Reading about people whose days are still shaped by the land brought back memories that are easy to lose track of in a city.

Lee Chung-geol Takes a Sharper View

Lee Chung-geol comes next. The change in tone is immediate. His pieces can be critical, speculative and at times quite dark.

Seo Min, the Parasitologist

Seo Min tells how he came out of medical school and fell into the unfamiliar field of parasitology. He also writes about himself with an eye for the details he can turn into a joke.

Song Ho-chang on Politics

Song writes from inside politics. He goes back to things he experienced when he was getting started and considers what they taught him. For a television account of political life, he singles out the American series The West Wing.

Park Chan-il in the Kitchen

The chef Park Chan-il writes about food with the interest of someone who has had to decide what to use and how to cook with it.

Among the details that stayed with me were his discussion of cured pork in carbonara and his explanation of what animal fats can do in a dish.

Hong Se-hwa, Journalist and Activist

Hong Se-hwa writes about a life that took him from well-known schools in Korea into exile in France for political reasons. It took about twenty years before he was able to return. The length of that absence gives his pieces much of their weight.

Ban Yi-jeong on Imagination and Work

The last pieces are by the art critic Ban Yi-jeong. He begins with a flight of imagination and gives the reader some room to follow.

I recognised one of his observations in particular. Writing often does little to remove the difficulty of making the next thing.

There are forty-nine pieces, and most are short. You can read one between other things, then go back to find out what somebody with a completely different working life thought worth putting down.

Book Information

To the World, Perhaps to Ourselves: Forty-Nine Stories by Seven Writers (Korean title, translated)

Contributors

Hong Se-hwa, Kim Yong-taek, Lee Chung-geol, Park Chan-il, Seo Min, Song Ho-chang and Ban Yi-jeong

Publication date

15 July 2013

ISBN13

9788992533546

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