Tourists come to Sokcho in the summer to escape, but what happens to the people who never escape Sokcho? The disposable nature of tourist towns is explored in this novel through the livelihood of the inhabitants as we follow them through their daily routines and their expectations of a fulfilling life some, like the narrator’s boyfriend, are desperate to leave for the city that glitters, and others return with their degrees to work in a decaying guesthouse. Already, we have the first of many tensions between the surface and what lies underneath in this evocative and visceral novella. Elisa Shua Dusapin is unrestrained in her exploration of the innards and the inkiness, the poison and the flesh, the pliable and the deformed, and yet the translator’s restraint in conveying this to an English reading audience is utterly captivating. Reading WINTER IN SOKCHO is a cinematic experience and the image of the eponymous coastal town in South Korea lingers like a memory, which is further sustained once the final page has been turned and the reader closes the book to gaze upon the cover, depicted like a postcard in a retro and hazy style, as if plucked from a tourist shop to bring home. There is nothing quite as satisfying as a deceptively simple book.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |