Min Jin Lee 의 에세이 "A Lifetime of Reading ... Immigrant World"

A Lifetime of Reading ... Immigrant World

Essay By Min Jin Lee

April 7, 2021, The New York Times

 

 

뉴욕타임즈의 '작가와의 독서에 관한 인터뷰' 칼럼인

'By The Book"을 읽어보면 African-American 의 시나 소설은,

자연스럽게도, 특히 그쪽 작가들이 많이 읽고 얘기하는 것

같다. 나도 한국계 미국 작가들의 작품에는 더 먼저 관심이

간다. Min Jin Lee 의 소설 "Pachinko"도그래서 나오자마자

도서관에서 빌려다 읽고 나중엔 책을 사놓기도 했다.

 

Betty Smith 의 “A Tree Grows in Brooklyn” 이나 V. S.

Naipaul’ 의 “A House for Mr. Biswas” 을 읽으면서의 내

느낌이 Min Jin Lee 와 크게 다르지 않았을 것 같은 거며, 내가

읽은, 한국인의 영어 소설 중에서는 가장 처음 나온 소설

"The Grass Roof" (1931) 의 작가인 Younghill Kang 을 언급한

거며, 이 에세이가 내겐 친근하게 읽힌다. 

 

위 에세이에서:

 

"I remain vulnerable to a certain kind of book, whatever its

cultural origin, that embodies the ethos of American rugged

individualism and the Korean quest for knowledge.

 

"I’ve never been without consolation. Books have found me

at every stage of my life.

 

"Before middle school, I found Betty Smith’s “A Tree Grows

in Brooklyn,” the quintessential New York immigrant novel,

which underscored the power of education.

 

"I’ll never forget the broken Hurstwood in Theodore Dreiser’s

“Sister Carrie,” who refused to accept that his love would not

be returned. I was learning about tragic archetypes like

Balzac’s Père Goriot, who might have commiserated with

Shakespeare’s King Lear.

 

"During [Frederick] Douglass’s lifetime, most girls in Korea

were not allowed to read. Nobi, the hereditary serf class,

had existed for centuries. Nobi men, women and children

could be treated like property, cruelly abused and sold. The

Nobi class was formally abolished only decades after the

American Civil War.

 

"In high school, I read Sinclair Lewis’s best books and applied

early decision to Yale because Lewis had gone there. I was

deferred, then accepted that April.

 

"Even if I couldn’t take the history of architecture, or 20th-

century European philosophers, I hoarded the  syllabuses.

At least I’d know what to study later, on my own.

 

"I read through two courses on African-American literature,

one on Jewish literature and the only one on Asian-

American literature offered at the time. From my own

reading, I already  had a wonderful foundation in literature

written by great dead white people. I loved those books; I

still do. In college, I got to read books by great writers who

were not white Anglo-Saxon Protestants, and I loved those,

too.

 

I read Nella Larsen, Anzia Yezierska, Paule Marshall, Henry

Roth, James Baldwin, Theresa Hak Kyung Cha and Younghill

Kang, among others — and they led me to add new shelves

in my heart. Reading these authors nourished me in a

wholly different way and enlarged my thinking.

 

"By my mid-30s, I was a mother. One day, I was on the

subway and, of course, reading. As I finished V. S. Naipaul’s

“A House for Mr. Biswas,” I burst into tears. Oh, how I

wanted Mr. Biswas, the humiliated sign-writer turned

journalist, to get his heart’s desire."

 

 

사진: 위 에세이의 삽화 중에서