My Very Last Possession and Other Stories

This book is a collection of ten short stories written over twenty years, so it should come as no surprise that the topics and tone range widely, though all are of superior style and form. Ms. Pak addresses topics relevant to the rapid urbanization of South Korea during these two decades, such as how to support the elderly in a society without a social welfare net, the alienation resulting from the hollowing of the extended family/community-centered social construct in favor of industrialization and urbanization, and the prevalence of hatred and anger left behind from the storm of war and the oppressive, militaristic governments that held power into the 1990s. The title story, clearly meant as the centerpiece, is a stream-of-consciousness piece that might not work for some readers, but three other stories are masterpieces:"Butterfly of Illusion" brings together parallel lives of an elderly woman uprooted from her caretaker position and a young woman exploited by her money-hungry family and abusive employer now working as a fortuneteller in an old house. The older woman, longing for the rural village of her past, runs away from her daughter's urban apartment to the old house; here the pair form their own family away from the ugliness of reality."Thus Ended My Days of Watching Over the House" follows the life of a dutifully married woman and echoes the tones of Ibsen's "A Doll's House". Life interrupted by the taking of her soft-spoken professor husband into police custody, the protagonist becomes aware of her powerless state both as a citizen living under martial rule and as a wife/daughter-in-law within the traditional social structure. She compares her life to that of her husband's bonsai trees, bred and purposefully stunted to keep their size small; as her husband's absence lengthens, she smashes the trees.In "Three Days in That Autumn", Ms. Pak portrays with sympathy and emotion the life of a "woman's doctor" who is alternatively racked with guilt for "killing enough people to populate a town" and pride in providing relief for sexually exploited women. As the doctor approaches retirement, her work is sought out more often by housewives preferring sons than by victims of crime and exploitation, and the doctor slowly descends into madness as she longs to deliver a baby into life rather than death.In her stories, Ms. Pak effectively captures the gap between an older generation who longs for the simple past yet is plagued by memories of war, and the younger generation struggling to find deeper meaning in a newly urbanized, self-serving capitalistic society. Highly recommended.