The forest where the chichi bird lives
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Description
Book Introduction
“I loved unhappy memories.
Obsessed with misfortune.
I collected unhappy memories in a treasure chest in my heart.
“My love was in bad taste.”
A pretty lie piled on top of a terrible truth
Misfortune and misfortune twinkle
Forest of my memories, forest of my secrets
Jang Jin-young's full-length novel, "The Forest Where the Chichi Bird Lives," was published as part of Minumsa's Today's Young Writers series.
Jang Jin-young, who began her career by winning the 2019 Consonant and Vowel New Writer's Award, announced the emergence of a new voice in Korean literature through her first short story collection, If You Make Up Your Mind, and her novel, Hobby is Private Life, featuring suspenseful compositions, rhythmic and dense sentences, and characters who appear ordinary but reveal explosive power and desire in an instant.
In particular, the characters who honestly and boldly express even contradictory emotions and thoughts and lead the story with unpredictable developments are the unique characteristics and strengths that only Jang Jin-young can show.
"The Forest Where the Chichi Bird Lives" is a novel that unfolds as two voices from one person's past and present overlap and intertwine.
This is the voice of the fourteen-year-old 'me' who was given the new name 'Chichirim' 20 years ago, and the voice of the present 'me' looking back on that time.
In 2003, when the World Cup fever had not yet subsided, a man appears before the narrator, who was desperately trying to be accepted while going back and forth between the worst middle school assigned to him under the equalization policy and an even worse house.
The past 'me' who claims that his relationship with him is 'love' and the present 'me' who silently watches this and suffers from severe itchiness are contrasted and split.
"The Forest Where Chichi Bird Lives" takes us to the most dangerous ethical extreme imaginable through Chichirim, who rushes into a self-destructive fictional world in an attempt to save herself.
It leads us to face the root of all the standards and boundaries that our society has set, such as 'student-like' and 'victim-like'.
What is the power that turns oneself and the world around oneself into a 'secret forest' far from the truth?
Obsessed with misfortune.
I collected unhappy memories in a treasure chest in my heart.
“My love was in bad taste.”
A pretty lie piled on top of a terrible truth
Misfortune and misfortune twinkle
Forest of my memories, forest of my secrets
Jang Jin-young's full-length novel, "The Forest Where the Chichi Bird Lives," was published as part of Minumsa's Today's Young Writers series.
Jang Jin-young, who began her career by winning the 2019 Consonant and Vowel New Writer's Award, announced the emergence of a new voice in Korean literature through her first short story collection, If You Make Up Your Mind, and her novel, Hobby is Private Life, featuring suspenseful compositions, rhythmic and dense sentences, and characters who appear ordinary but reveal explosive power and desire in an instant.
In particular, the characters who honestly and boldly express even contradictory emotions and thoughts and lead the story with unpredictable developments are the unique characteristics and strengths that only Jang Jin-young can show.
"The Forest Where the Chichi Bird Lives" is a novel that unfolds as two voices from one person's past and present overlap and intertwine.
This is the voice of the fourteen-year-old 'me' who was given the new name 'Chichirim' 20 years ago, and the voice of the present 'me' looking back on that time.
In 2003, when the World Cup fever had not yet subsided, a man appears before the narrator, who was desperately trying to be accepted while going back and forth between the worst middle school assigned to him under the equalization policy and an even worse house.
The past 'me' who claims that his relationship with him is 'love' and the present 'me' who silently watches this and suffers from severe itchiness are contrasted and split.
"The Forest Where Chichi Bird Lives" takes us to the most dangerous ethical extreme imaginable through Chichirim, who rushes into a self-destructive fictional world in an attempt to save herself.
It leads us to face the root of all the standards and boundaries that our society has set, such as 'student-like' and 'victim-like'.
What is the power that turns oneself and the world around oneself into a 'secret forest' far from the truth?
- You can preview some of the book's contents.
Preview
index
The Forest Where the Chichi Bird Lives 7
Author's Note 174
Recommendation 176
Author's Note 174
Recommendation 176
Into the book
That year, I was assigned to a middle school that was incredibly unpleasant.
It was through a no-exam lottery system commonly called 'Bbaeng Bbaeng-i'.
To put it in a fancy way, it was through ‘leveling’.
Although it was a leveling test, I took the placement test.
This is because the level had to be leveled so that there would be no fluctuations in each class.
It was a time when people were crazy about average.
I remember that there was an atmosphere where dividing, lining up, and comparing were considered sinful.
To condemn something, conversely, also meant to desire it.
--- p.8
If I were to ask her this question now, 20 years later, she would say, "Stop talking nonsense."
What does that matter?
Get your act together and live.
Be discerning.
Please speak concisely.
What on earth are you trying to say?
Don't make me so upset.
Then I will accept it without being hurt at all and say, "That's awesome."
Instead of asking, "Why did you do that to me?"
It will make my sister laugh.
--- p.17
The world is not made up of cause and effect.
There was no way I would remember what the dermatologist said at that time.
Because I was fourteen.
I heard those words 20 years later in the clinic at Boraemae Hospital.
But it seemed like he had already heard that.
He seemed to hear and remember.
Is it possible to remember the future? I found out it is possible.
Because it is not the cause that creates the effect, but the effect that makes us reflect on the cause.
Because the future shapes the past.
Because the effect comes before the cause.
--- p.45
Cool water means cold water.
Cool water smells different from the smell of cold water.
Yet, when we say cool water, everyone thinks of the same smell.
Blue smell.
The smell that comes from the men's bathhouse or gym shower room.
I loved unhappy memories.
Obsessed with misfortune.
I collected unhappy memories in a treasure chest in my heart.
My love was in bad taste.
I don't remember scratching myself in that chairman.
There were other things to remember.
--- p.80
I keep talking like an old man.
It was only 20 years ago.
These days I live two days at a time.
Because time flows in parallel.
20 years ago and the present overlap like pastry and flow simultaneously.
It's a feeling that's hard to bear.
As if it were difficult to resist scratching one's skin.
Perhaps the poison of the skin is not heat, but memory.
I feel like I'm living too much at once.
It was through a no-exam lottery system commonly called 'Bbaeng Bbaeng-i'.
To put it in a fancy way, it was through ‘leveling’.
Although it was a leveling test, I took the placement test.
This is because the level had to be leveled so that there would be no fluctuations in each class.
It was a time when people were crazy about average.
I remember that there was an atmosphere where dividing, lining up, and comparing were considered sinful.
To condemn something, conversely, also meant to desire it.
--- p.8
If I were to ask her this question now, 20 years later, she would say, "Stop talking nonsense."
What does that matter?
Get your act together and live.
Be discerning.
Please speak concisely.
What on earth are you trying to say?
Don't make me so upset.
Then I will accept it without being hurt at all and say, "That's awesome."
Instead of asking, "Why did you do that to me?"
It will make my sister laugh.
--- p.17
The world is not made up of cause and effect.
There was no way I would remember what the dermatologist said at that time.
Because I was fourteen.
I heard those words 20 years later in the clinic at Boraemae Hospital.
But it seemed like he had already heard that.
He seemed to hear and remember.
Is it possible to remember the future? I found out it is possible.
Because it is not the cause that creates the effect, but the effect that makes us reflect on the cause.
Because the future shapes the past.
Because the effect comes before the cause.
--- p.45
Cool water means cold water.
Cool water smells different from the smell of cold water.
Yet, when we say cool water, everyone thinks of the same smell.
Blue smell.
The smell that comes from the men's bathhouse or gym shower room.
I loved unhappy memories.
Obsessed with misfortune.
I collected unhappy memories in a treasure chest in my heart.
My love was in bad taste.
I don't remember scratching myself in that chairman.
There were other things to remember.
--- p.80
I keep talking like an old man.
It was only 20 years ago.
These days I live two days at a time.
Because time flows in parallel.
20 years ago and the present overlap like pastry and flow simultaneously.
It's a feeling that's hard to bear.
As if it were difficult to resist scratching one's skin.
Perhaps the poison of the skin is not heat, but memory.
I feel like I'm living too much at once.
--- p.91
Publisher's Review
Children's way of survival
Chichirim's fourteenth spring, instead of filled with innocent and beautiful memories, is filled with the harsh violence of reality. Her parents, having lost financial resources due to the IMF crisis, neglect their children with a neglect bordering on abuse. Like her older sister, she can't go to college no matter how hard she studies. So, instead of envisioning the future, she fixates on things that can be valued in the present: her face, her body, and her sexual attractiveness.
Schools are already steeped in rampant discrimination and violence, both among teachers and students.
Just like in elementary school, where bullying or being bullied was normal, in middle school, 'I' willingly become the bully.
Because she is not as pretty as her friend Dal-mi, she thinks she has to work even harder to be recognized by her friends.
One day, the ‘Vice President’ appears before the narrator, who is navigating this minefield-like world of violence alone.
Although he drives an expensive car and is in a position that everyone envies, he is kind, smart, and unassuming. He is the only 'adult' that the narrator has ever met who approaches him in a different way than anyone else.
Adults who only ask the wrong questions
'I' receive questions from numerous adults and answer them.
When asked whether the actions of a minor were appropriate and how much protection he deserved, 'I' only gave wrong answers.
He keeps saying that his encounter with the 'Vice President' is "difficult to explain," and cannot answer why he got into his car or how he knew his birthday.
Moreover, in the memories with the ‘Vice President’, the cause and effect are frequently reversed.
The love letter that was decorated with the recipient's name left blank is filled with his name when he meets the 'Manager', and the beef that was already in his refrigerator becomes food prepared for 'me' in that he took it out to feed 'me'.
'Causality' soon becomes evidence of true fateful love.
When the adults who achieved satisfactory results turned around with relieved faces, I, who did not belong to either the 'student' or the 'victim', was left alone with no one to listen and faced the truth.
In this final moment of the novel, we finally realize:
Who was the other perpetrator in this story?
Past and present existing simultaneously
The voices of the past and present that lead 『The Forest Where the Chichi Bird Lives』 are always together, without any appearance or exit.
The fourteen-year-old me, who freely expresses my desires while going back and forth between anxiety, jealousy, resentment, and self-reproach toward my friends and family, and the current me, who cannot accept how much my family has changed over the past twenty years and hides my feelings with jokes.
The two voices with completely different tones are seamlessly connected through Jang Jin-young's characteristically flowing sentences, her honest way of speaking that reveals even contradictions without reservation, and the captivating energy that comes from her sharp insight.
On the magical path of storytelling that Jang Jin-young has laid out, the speaker's words, "20 years ago and the present overlap like pastry and flow simultaneously," become reality and unfold.
The past never goes far away, but is 'alongside' the present.
The present is 'by your side' to the past, which has left everyone behind to rewrite its memories.
As a secret friend and the only co-conspirator who built the 'Forest of Lies'.
Chichirim's fourteenth spring, instead of filled with innocent and beautiful memories, is filled with the harsh violence of reality. Her parents, having lost financial resources due to the IMF crisis, neglect their children with a neglect bordering on abuse. Like her older sister, she can't go to college no matter how hard she studies. So, instead of envisioning the future, she fixates on things that can be valued in the present: her face, her body, and her sexual attractiveness.
Schools are already steeped in rampant discrimination and violence, both among teachers and students.
Just like in elementary school, where bullying or being bullied was normal, in middle school, 'I' willingly become the bully.
Because she is not as pretty as her friend Dal-mi, she thinks she has to work even harder to be recognized by her friends.
One day, the ‘Vice President’ appears before the narrator, who is navigating this minefield-like world of violence alone.
Although he drives an expensive car and is in a position that everyone envies, he is kind, smart, and unassuming. He is the only 'adult' that the narrator has ever met who approaches him in a different way than anyone else.
Adults who only ask the wrong questions
'I' receive questions from numerous adults and answer them.
When asked whether the actions of a minor were appropriate and how much protection he deserved, 'I' only gave wrong answers.
He keeps saying that his encounter with the 'Vice President' is "difficult to explain," and cannot answer why he got into his car or how he knew his birthday.
Moreover, in the memories with the ‘Vice President’, the cause and effect are frequently reversed.
The love letter that was decorated with the recipient's name left blank is filled with his name when he meets the 'Manager', and the beef that was already in his refrigerator becomes food prepared for 'me' in that he took it out to feed 'me'.
'Causality' soon becomes evidence of true fateful love.
When the adults who achieved satisfactory results turned around with relieved faces, I, who did not belong to either the 'student' or the 'victim', was left alone with no one to listen and faced the truth.
In this final moment of the novel, we finally realize:
Who was the other perpetrator in this story?
Past and present existing simultaneously
The voices of the past and present that lead 『The Forest Where the Chichi Bird Lives』 are always together, without any appearance or exit.
The fourteen-year-old me, who freely expresses my desires while going back and forth between anxiety, jealousy, resentment, and self-reproach toward my friends and family, and the current me, who cannot accept how much my family has changed over the past twenty years and hides my feelings with jokes.
The two voices with completely different tones are seamlessly connected through Jang Jin-young's characteristically flowing sentences, her honest way of speaking that reveals even contradictions without reservation, and the captivating energy that comes from her sharp insight.
On the magical path of storytelling that Jang Jin-young has laid out, the speaker's words, "20 years ago and the present overlap like pastry and flow simultaneously," become reality and unfold.
The past never goes far away, but is 'alongside' the present.
The present is 'by your side' to the past, which has left everyone behind to rewrite its memories.
As a secret friend and the only co-conspirator who built the 'Forest of Lies'.
GOODS SPECIFICS
- Date of issue: October 20, 2023
- Format: Hardcover book binding method guide
- Page count, weight, size: 184 pages | 276g | 127*188*20mm
- ISBN13: 9788937473852
- ISBN10: 8937473852
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카테고리
korean
korean
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