8 Lives of a Century-Old Trickster
Embittered by her divorce, housewife Lee Sae-ri seeks distraction by helping the residents at the Seoul elder hospice she works at compose their obituaries. In the process she meets “Mook Miran,” a woman who claims to be a centenarian and promises an epic tale of her life under Japanese, North Korean, and finally South Korean rule. She describes herself initially in eight words: “Slave, Escape-artist. Murder. Terrorist. Spy. Lover. And Mother.”
What follows is an extraordinary literary experience: eight separate but interconnected fictional stories explain the identity of the mysterious and charismatic character that Mirinae Lee has created out of the real life memories of her great-aunt, one of the oldest women to escape alone from North Korea. “Miran” takes on a number of identities in the course of the narrative, but her fierce and unsentimental voice remains the same throughout her childhood escape from an abusive father, her capture by the Japanese, her exploitation by the Americans, and her training as a spy in the North Korean Secret Service.
The narrative requires careful attention: points of view shift from one story to the next and include not only Miran’s alternate identities, but also her husband, daughter, and other characters, and the reader usually has to get several pages into each section before figuring out who is speaking. The action is harrowing at times, with descriptions of sexual and many other kinds of violence, but 8 Lives is ultimately a story of survival, achieving intense beauty (violence and joy alike are poetically rendered), as well as a glimpse into the isolated culture of post-1950s North Korea. Fans of Pachinko will embrace this unusual but unforgettable story.
