Without You, There is No Us ranks right up there with the scariest books I’ve ever read. Suki Kim, a South Korean-American journalist, takes a job at a university in North Korea. The school is run by Christian missionaries hoping to crack into the “evangelical Christian Holy Grail. . .converting [North Korean] people would guarantee the missionaries a spot in heaven.” Suki’s not actually a missionary–she’s there to write an expose on North Korean culture. The result is Without You, There is No Us, a […]
Imagine Russia Kidnapped Brangelina to Make Putin Propaganda
Remember the hissy fit North Korea pitched over Seth Rogan’s cinematic turd fest The Interview? From their reaction, you’d think the famously repressive country had something against the silver screen. As it turns out, nothing could be further from the truth. After Kim Jong-il died in 2011 (he was the one in jumpsuits) it came out that the former Dear Leader was a huge movie buff, with a dedicated smuggling system implemented just so he could watch western cinema. In his twenties, he was appointed […]
“We Tell Ourselves Stories in Order to Live”-Joan Didion
When I was in college, I remember taking an international politics class. It was an Intro class, populated by a lot of students who heard it was a skate class. We ended up talking about North Korea one day, and one waste of valuable mass stood up to proclaim that if he were a North Korean, hewouldn’t be taking any of “ this Kim Jong Whatever’s shit.” When our professor (I hope trying to amp up our fremdschämen, and as a slight tangent, seriously God […]
Nothing to Envy Here…
I could not put this one down; normally when I read non-fiction I intersperse my evening reading with fluffy memoirs or popcorn fiction but despite the difficult subject matter I read this one in two nights. Barbara Demick spent numerous years in Seoul covering both Koreas for American articles; in that time she formed relationships with North Korean defectors and began piecing together what eventually became Nothing to Envy. Six defectors are interviewed and their stories are woven together to create a multi-dimensional picture of […]
1984 IRL
While reading this book, I had to keep reminding myself that it is not, in fact, 1984. The stories Demick tells are true. North Korea is a place that actually exists. These stories happened, are happening. This is the story of North Korea as told through the lives of 6 ordinary but very different people, from the Korean War through 2010. The story is told masterfully, gliding between the details of the regime and the details of these people’s lives: there’s Mrs. Song, my personal […]
On Despotism, Famine, and Glimmers of Hope
Imagine this. You’re a college student from a fairly prosperous family. You know things are starting to go wrong in your country, but your position in life shelters you from the profoundly bad shit that’s going down. You have a girlfriend, but social mores and the difference in your stations mean that the most you’ve ever done is hold her hand during late-night walks down unlit streets. But then, your family begins to run out of money, long after less fortunate people have already begun […]