OREvery life contains infinite stories, but some more than others. An employee of the Golden Sunset retirement home in South Korea decides to ask every elderly guest three key words to tell about his existence and write his obituary together. During this undertaking he comes across Mook Miran, a sprightly almost centenarian whose life requires far more words to characterize it. The obituary writer ends up sucked into a vortex of stories so incredible that they sometimes seem impossible. But not too much, if you think about the events of Korea during the twentieth century, which went from Japanese domination to a civil war that split the country into a ferocious communist regime in the north and a democracy also marked by dictatorship in the south.
Mook Miran it was Kaiyo for the Japanese who deceived her forced as a young girl to be a comfort woman, the sex slave for the soldiers. She was an asexual teenager who interpreted for Americans and Korean women forced into prostitution, then a blossoming female beauty who returned to North Korea where she changed her identity. But she was also Deborah to the Canadian missionaries as a child they taught her English and French, useful for becoming a spy.
Miran, the old woman behind this false name given to her by the South Koreans, survived thanks to her tenacity and intelligence, as well as a bit of luck. And as a woman, despite weaving a web of deception, she was a happy wife and a proud mother. The Eight Lives of an Unnamed Centenarian by Mirinae Lee is not easily forgotten. Not only for her chameleonic protagonist but also for the labyrinthine narrative structure, in which Miran’s life is not told in chronological order, and the narrative voice is not always his. But as you progress through the reading, each chapter is littered with elements that shed light on the previous gray areaslike in a detective story.
Mirinae Lee, Korean, lives in Hong Kong. Her novel is inspired by the story of one of her great-aunts who fled North Korea. (Photo: Victoire Lethielleux)
Debut author Mirinae Lee, Korean from Seoul, lives in Hong Kong with her French husband and their two children aged 9 and 5. Since she was a child, she dreamed of becoming a novelist. «The desire to write came back to me when I was in my thirties» she says. «It took me four years to write this book».
Who inspired the character of Mook Miran?
A great aunt of mine, who is one of the oldest women to escape North Korea alone. Unfortunately, due to Alzheimer’s, she was unable to tell me about her life in a meaningful way. Therefore, the novel is the fruit of my imagination together with historical research. But some traits that belong to her are in my protagonist: like her, she is an arrogant polyglot, acutely aware of the power of languages, a devious and ingenious narrator who forces you to continually ask yourself what is true and what is false. She and she is a woman on the move, like many of her generation.
How did you research the historical period experienced by the protagonist?
I read books, talked to some escapees from North Korea, and watched many interviews with Korean comfort women. The most chilling details of their ordeal come from these testimonies. But my goal as a novelist is not to narrate historical facts accurately, but to provide readers with a compelling context in which to place my stories. As I write in the acknowledgments, I took some liberties in creating my narrative.
The Eight Lives of an Unnamed Centenarian by Mirinae Lee, North384 pages, €19
Why did you decide to write in English and not Korean, which is your native language?
I actually started in Korean, but after a few years I switched to English. For a practical reason: in Hong Kong where I live I took creative writing courses in this language. Despite having studied in the United States, I initially doubted whether I could write in a foreign, academic language learned as an adult. Succeeding was a pleasant surprise.
Was it your intention to portray women as victims of violence, including sexual violence, in war?
No, my decision to write about something comes to me with an instinctive excitement or urgency. But being doubly victims in war as women is such a universal truth that it imposes itself if you write about female characters who lived through the war period. Crimes similar to that of comfort women are countless throughout history, everywhere.
This novel also tells the story of the power of storytelling. Can telling stories save your life?
I believe storytelling is such a powerful tool in the right hands that it can both save and destroy people’s lives. It may have a therapeutic purpose of gaining control over one’s life, or giving it meaning. But it can also be used improperly, which can become dangerous, especially in the anonymity that the Internet offers.
Is it difficult to be a full-time writer with two young children?
I try to write in the morning, while they are at school and I can concentrate more. But managing time optimally is complicated: I’m still working on it.
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