Hong Seon-woong and Kim Dan-woo (1)
Hong Seon-woong. To explain him, I inevitably had to think of my father. Back when I was a high school senior preparing for the college entrance exam, Father accepted two disciples.
One was Hong Seon-woong, a college student; the other was Kim Dan-woo, a young man who had only graduated from high school. The fact that they became my father’s disciples, when he wasn’t even a professor - and more precisely, when he had refused to become one - meant they had knelt and formally asked to study under him. At the time, Father had no shortage of such aspirants.
Most were turned away at the door.
But every now and then, he did take in those whose talent stood out.
Though once they actually experienced him, they usually got sick of him first and left. In any case, they came and went through our house while learning fiction.
They ate my mother’s good cooking. Before long, they were often playing with me as well.
I read quite a bit of their fiction, and the two men’s styles were sharply different.
The well-off Hong Seon-woong praised the romance and beauty of life, whereas the poor Kim Dan-woo’s fiction had a comparatively lonely, rugged quality. Their personalities were different too.
I’m seriously the most jealous of Hyunsun in the whole world. Mok Pilhyun is your father? ...Why don’t you write fiction? What, you’re not interested in creative writing? You’re still too young to know anything. If you ever debut, wouldn’t your father push you hard? The association he sits on as a committee member isn’t just one or two.
Hong Seon-woong’s jealousy and impatience were severe. Even if I didn’t fully understand what he was saying, I could still feel how unpleasant it was.
By contrast:
Do what you want, Hyunsun. That’s the most important thing. I came all the way to Seoul and spent my entire savings because I wanted to learn how to write even one novel.
Kim Dan-woo was gentle, but he had a quiet sort of backbone. A country boy, he lived in Hong Seon-woong’s house, always careful to flatter his picky temper.
Time passed. I went into the army, and Hong Seon-woong debuted.
As for Kim Dan-woo, I heard with regret that he had given up fiction because of financial hardship and left.
Just as I was nearing the end of my military service, my mother was suddenly diagnosed with terminal cancer.
I think I spent each day of that service counting only the days until discharge.
But heaven was not kind. I received word that my mother had died.
At the funeral, I heard people around me whispering.
My father had been so consumed by writing that he hadn’t even kept vigil at the deathbed, they said. Did you hear that? No matter what, how could a person do that?
I checked with Hong Seon-woong, who was then closest to Father, to make sure.
Hong Seon-woong answered with tears in his eyes:
...You know how your teacher is. He doesn’t come out of his study until he’s finished the whole novel. You know that, don’t you.
I knew too well, which was exactly the problem.
What did I say back then?
All right. I’m going. Take care of yourself too, hyung.
That was my last meeting with him.
As soon as I was discharged, I left home. In truth, it wasn’t only because of what Hong Seon-woong said.
When I confronted Father about it, he... remained silent.
That was when I felt the deepest disappointment of my life.
Well, it was all in the past now.
I wasn’t the sort of person who clung to the past and grew depressed over it. In any case, Hong Seon-woong seemed to be doing well as a writer, didn’t he?
Being called “Korea’s Demian” and all that,
and publishing his books through Gyeongseong Publishing.
Boy, Tomorrow. In the end, I put the book in my bag.
He wasn’t a particularly good human being, but I was willing to give his first collection a look.
---
In a one-room apartment in Noryangjin, Kim Dan-woo came home after finishing his day’s work at the fish market.
“Why are you so late?” Hong Seon-woong, who had been lying on the bed, got up.
Kim Dan-woo frowned. “I told you to at least say something before coming over.”
“Your place is my place. Back then, my place was your place too.”
Kim Dan-woo shook his head. Back then, you didn’t even know the door code, so half the time I had to wait outside until you showed up. ...Never mind. There’s no point saying it.
“What is it? You didn’t even call.”
“What do you mean, what is it? I came to check whether it had been enough time since I asked you for a favor. Ugh. Fish smell. Hey. Go shower first. My head hurts.” Hong Seon-woong pinched his nose and grimaced.
Kim Dan-woo no longer even felt hurt by that sort of attitude. He was used to it.
He opened a drawer and rummaged through it as he asked, “You saw Hyunsun on Nutube, right? Looks like he’s working as an editor at Gyeongseong Publishing.”
“I saw him. He even wrote a review in Gyeongseong Geul.”
“Really? It’s not exactly common for an editor to publish writing. And he looked extremely capable on Nutube too. Does the teacher know Hyunsun is at Gyeongseong Publishing?”
“No.”
“...He doesn’t know?”
“No. His circle is tiny, he doesn’t use a smartphone, and he writes fiction on manuscript paper, which I deliver to the publisher. How would he know?”
Kim Dan-woo was dumbfounded. “How would he know? You should tell him. You’re his apprentice.”
“I’ll handle it. You stay out of it and keep your mouth shut. You know it’ll be a problem for both of us if you stir up trouble for nothing, right? Hm? What’s this?”
Hong Seon-woong snatched the battered USB drive from Kim Dan-woo’s hand. “Who even uses USBs these days? If you’d sent it through chat, I wouldn’t have had to come all the way to Noryangjin.”
“How are you supposed to send something like that through chat? What if it leaves a trail?”
“Ho, nice. Kim Dan-woo really is meticulous.” Hong Seon-woong smiled as if impressed. “Anyway, thanks. I’m heading out, okay?”
He turned toward the front door in one smooth motion.
Kim Dan-woo watched him quietly for a moment, then spoke. “Seon-woong.”
“What?”
“Don’t make me do that anymore.”
“...”
“You should be the one writing it. It’s your novel.” Hong Seon-woong’s expression stiffened slightly.
But then he gave a small laugh, as if he found it pitiable. “Just keep selling fish. You need to make a living.”
Bang.
After Hong Seon-woong left, Kim Dan-woo let out a long breath.
I shouldn’t have started helping him from the beginning.
Years ago, when he gave up fiction, he naturally intended to go back to his hometown.
It was Hong Seon-woong who stopped him.
Hey. I’ll cover the deposit for you, so work and keep writing. Isn’t it too good to give up?
You’re going to pay that much money for me? I, I can’t accept that.
It’s not that much money to me. Take it, man. What are friends for? But keep it secret from the teacher, okay? He doesn’t like it when I spend money recklessly.
That was when it started.
He began copying anything usable from Kim Dan-woo’s fiction.
Ideas, plots, sentences, everything.
Thanks to that, Kim Dan-woo had to give up on the novels he might have submitted to the New Spring Literary Contest or other competitions.
If he sent them in, the only thing he’d hear was that he had copied Hong Seon-woong. Even so, that was still bearable.
For the past three months, the situation had become the worst it could possibly be.
Hey, Kim Dan-woo. I’m taking this novel, okay?
Wh-what are you talking about? Taking it?
Ha... You’re not going to help me out like this? Don’t you know I’ve hit a really bad slump? I fucking helped you when you were having a hard time. I’m honestly hurt.
Hong Seon-woong. This isn’t just your and my problem. It’s deception toward the readers.
I don’t care. If you hate it, move out and pay me back the money.
That was when Kim Dan-woo understood it.
He saw exactly how petty and vile a person could be, even when he had thought of him as a friend.
Kim Dan-woo was in no position to send money home.
In a situation like that, he couldn’t simply end his life in Seoul right away.
In the end, the novel was taken from him.
This is the second time already... I’m really losing my mind.
Kim Dan-woo gathered his clothes and trudged into the bathroom. Shhhhhh... Even as he showered, his thoughts did not stop.
If only Hyunsun had stayed by the teacher’s side, Hong Seon-woong never would have behaved so outrageously.
It had been the same back then too.
When they went to the teacher’s mansion, Hyunsun, with his bright, alert eyes, was the one who welcomed them. For all his youth, he was sharp and steadfast, with a spine that did not bend.
Come to think of it, a guy like that would have left home without a shred of hesitation, all at once.
“I wonder if Hyunsun is living happily...”
Kim Dan-woo gave a bitter smile.
For some reason, today felt like a day when he wanted to see Mok Hyunsun.
---
After returning home, I began reading Boy, Tomorrow.
It was a collection of eight short stories. Four had already been published, and four were unpublished.
I had already read the published pieces, so they were all vivid in my mind. The strongest work was The Ignorance of P.
It was about a boy who traveled through Europe and grew into an artist. Hong Seon-woong portrayed the boy’s journey toward his dream with a light, clever touch.
It was the kind of story that made readers root for him without even trying.
I suppose that romance and optimism were the greatest charms of his fiction.
Then I might as well read the four unpublished stories. First came Blanket, about the pain of a boy who had lost his parents.
After reading the whole thing in a flash, I went, “Hm?” and felt disappointed.
Especially this sentence:
A candle melts itself to become light. One who wishes to become light must not fear sacrifice.
That was nothing more than a variation on the line from Hermann Hesse’s Demian:
The bird fights its way out of the egg. The egg is the world. Whoever would be born must destroy a world.
“Well, well. Look at this guy.”
So he was imitating Demian because everyone kept calling him Demian?
That’s a little cheap, isn’t it?
You and Your Smile and Inside the Desk were the same.
The sentences kept sounding impressive, but most of them were no more than sly alterations of Demian.
Still, I couldn’t exactly pick a fight over that.
It might be ethically questionable, but legally it wasn’t plagiarism.
Then I got to the first paragraph of the last story, The Fish and the Blade.
The sound of sharpening blades rang through the wholesale market. The boy imagined stabbing his grandfather in the back. But those blades would probably only slice open the bellies of fish. His mouth watered. That was the life of a merchant. No matter how many fish he gutted, he could not put them into his own mouth. The only thing allowed to the boy was the viscera. Every so often, he counted the eggs in the grilled innards with his tongue. One, two, three... It was meaningless. To the boy, whatever he ate was all the same. Just bitter, bitter innards.
“Huh?”
It felt completely different.
There was no cheap Demian imitation floating around in my head anymore. Instead, I sensed a kind of austerity and a precarious, almost trembling vitality.
Of course, style can differ from work to work.
But this... my head, my senses, simply refused to accept it.
It was as though I had run headlong into some fundamental error.
For now, I kept reading to the end.
The story was about a boy who sold fish with his grandfather. One day, a customer approached him.
Drawn in by that customer’s temptation, the boy became stained by a glittering street of indulgence.
The novel depicted the boy’s fall with brutal realism.
That hard, unflinching realism was the strength of the story.
Click. I closed the book.
“...Something’s strange.”
I called up all eight stories in my head.
Tens of thousands of words came tumbling out at once.
I classified them and combined them.
Even the themes, symbols, and meanings derived from those words.
I controlled every last one of them without missing a single thing.
It was a spectacle. Tens of thousands of words writhing and moving at once. The words had gathered into one great mass, buzzing with noise.
The four published stories, including The Ignorance of P.
Among them, the words that stood out most strongly were these: boy. romance. Yes. That was it.
If I had to describe Hong Seon-woong’s fiction in a single phrase, it would be “boyish romanticism.” The language of the other three stories was quietly clustering around the same center.
It was embarrassingly shallow work, but not impossible.
Then what about The Fish and the Blade?
Those words stood apart, heavy and sunken, just like the story itself.
I immediately recognized their essence.
The realism of poverty.
Exactly.
The true protagonist of this story was not the boy.
It was poverty.
How poverty repeats itself, or worsens.
Wasn’t that what the story was painfully pointing at?
Boyish romanticism.
The realism of poverty.
Could those two themes coexist?
And in the work of a single writer?
And then it happened. Flap.
Some bundle of papers fell in my mind.
“!”
It was a story buried in the depths of memory.
It had no title and the plot was different, but...
I could verify it down to the smallest detail.
The style, the sense of theme, even the tiny habit of placing periods.
They were overlapping with The Fish and the Blade.
And then I remembered who the writer of that story had been.
Hyunsun. It’s embarrassing, but would you read this once?
“...Dan-woo hyung.”
I opened my eyes.
Kim Dan-woo was working as Hong Seon-woong’s shadow writer?
It was hard to believe, but it seemed to be true.
My ability had made that certain.
“Ha.”
A laugh escaped me without meaning to.
“Life is interesting.”
So this was how I was meeting those two again.