Pachinko is the final book I reread last December. As longtime TOA readers are well aware, I’ve written plenty about this book in the past. It should therefore come as no surprise that I found very little to write about this time.
When there’s no obvious thing to write about, I say the thing to write is obvious – riff off.
A God who the people fully agreed with and who always did what was considered right would be a puppet, not a God.
I first decided to read Pachinko when I went to hear Lee speak at an author reading in Harvard Square. Hearing the author discuss her book before I’d actually read it gave me an interesting perspective on what to look for as I worked my way through Pachinko for the first time. I found for the most part that reading the book clarified much about her comments.
The one comment I did not see reflected in the book was about Christianity. Specifically, I recall Lee mentioning that she thought it was impossible to write a book about recent Korean history without including Christianity. The religion is certainly an important feature of the book in the sense that almost all the main characters practice the faith. However, for me the religion’s relevance in Pachinko was unclear given that the characters didn’t explore and challenge their faith in the same way they did so of a number of other vital forces, traditions, and institutions in their lives.
This thought I’ve highlighted illustrates my point. What are the implications of this thought? If people fully agree with a person in this way, is that person also a puppet? Are the characters who do wrong supposed to represent God-like figures in a certain respect? This is why I think although I understand what Lee was saying, I feel Pachinko, whether by design or not, left much unexplored about religion’s role for this particular set of characters.
What those who have not suffered say to those who have suffered can sound glib or foolish.
Foolish, for sure, but I don’t think glib works as well (unless the speaker is being intentionally malicious).
In a poor community, anyone perceived to have extra becomes a target.
I’ve referenced a similar thought from Katherine Boo’s Beyond The Beautiful Forevers a number of times on TOA – poverty means poor people competing to take from other poor people.
Parents should tell their children when they’ve done something well.
If you continue nodding, people will keep talking.
Though hardly definitive, I think the above represent some good ideas to keep in mind. I would expand the first thought to simply ‘people should acknowledge when someone does something well’ and I’ll add that nodding along forms only a small part of encouraging someone to keep talking.
People who start to believe too much in their own ideas risk losing track of their own interests.
It is OK to lie about ideals in order to stay alive, especially if others are dependent.
I read recently that even the most principled people eventually choose their lifestyles ahead of their ideals. I think this statement is broadly true from the perspective that principles mean the ideas or guidelines for translating philosophical thought into concrete action. However, those who include their family or group obligations atop their list of principles would see no relevance in the above ideas.
A business benefits more from steady customers who make small purchases than it does from the occasional customers who make outsize purchases.
Great businessmen often mistake themselves for great citizens. The poorer a country is, the more impossible it is for both of these things to be true.
Business played an underrated role in Pachinko as the characters turned time and again to entrepreneurship as a way to escape from their poverty, oppressions, or social standing. And yet, despite its importance in the plot, Pachinko’s view of business beyond a certain local scale is always suspicious, a point reinforced constantly in the way excess profits are used to take advantage of those who have next to nothing.
A dispute ends when both sides turn their attention to building a friendship.
It’s good to have conversation topics that can be visited without subtext or aggression.
There is a certain school of thought in the world of conflict resolution that demands a laser-focus on the points of contention. This approach, I feel, invites a transactional view to conflict resolution. But if both sides are unwilling to make concessions and accept exchanges, the only way forward is to build the relationship until the aggrieved parties can sit alongside rather than across from each other at the negotiating table.
Equally important is to know how to stabilize a relationship during a time of conflict. There is magic in simple conversation but it remains inaccessible if topics of conversation unearth buried resentments or inflame dormant embers.
The easy thing to do when life gets difficult is to leave.
This is, as I like to say, true until it isn’t.
It’s a special thing to touch someone when they are sick.
This might not necessarily be something I learned through hospice work but it is definitely something I remember because of it.
Those who are never their best selves can easily see the worst in other people.
The most interesting consequence of discovering your best is cultivating empathy for other people on the same journey. It’s hard to relate to those who remain oblivious of how their actions harm others and limit their own potential unless you’ve once been in that position yourself and understand that growing into someone better is a long and messy process.
The city looks pretty when you’ve been indoors.
I’m still learning a lot about life but one thing is pretty certain – life is tough. The easiest trap to fall into during a difficult time is to look through the window and see the other side with rose-tinted frames. The grass is, as they say, greener on the other side, but if that’s because your side has brown grass, then maybe it’s time to get to work on the lawn, you know?
Or… maybe it’s time to listen to ‘City Looks Pretty’ by Courtney Barnett, not one of my favorite tunes but certainly deserving a credit here for supplying my final thought.
Thanks for reading.
Tim
