don't say goodbye

Strange, the eyes.
How could something like that come down from the sky? 『No Goodbye』 begins with a dream scene that the main character, Gyeongha, a novelist, had. In a snowy field, thousands of black logs are planted all the way to the ridge like tombstones. While he was thinking about whether the graveyard was here, the water rose beneath his feet, and he thought he had to move the bones before all the graves were washed away by the sea, but he woke up helpless. Kyeong-ha thought it was a dream about the massacre discussed in the previous book, like other nightmares he had around that time, and he went to Jeju to take care of his mother while working on photography and documentary films, and went there with his friend In-seon, who worked as a carpenter. Make a plan to make a video of work related to your dream. However, after going through difficult times over the next few years and barely recovering his life, the plan did not progress, and Gyeongha changes his mind, saying that he misunderstood the dream.
Then one winter day, Gyeong-ha receives an urgent call from In-seon at the hospital. While In-seon was working on logs, his two fingers were cut off in an accident and he underwent surgery to repair them. In-seon suddenly asks Gyeong-ha, who went straight to the hospital, to go to Jeju's house within the day and save the lone bird. He can't bear to refuse In-seon's earnest request and hurries to Jeju. However, Jeju is suddenly engulfed in heavy snow and strong winds, making it impossible to see an inch ahead. To make matters worse, suffering from chronic headaches that come in fits and starts, Gyeongha manages to catch the last bus and head to Inseon's village. However, on the way up the mountain through the snow to In-seon's house, which is a long way from the bus stop, he gets caught in the heavy snow and darkness and gets lost. Snow almost always feels unreal. Is it because of its speed or its beauty? When snowflakes fall from the air at an eternity-slow speed, the important and unimportant suddenly become distinct. Some facts become frighteningly clear. (pp. 44-45) Your heart will start beating again.
That's right, you're going to drink this water. Arriving at In-seon's house after going through many hardships, Gyeong-ha encounters In-seon's family history, which is intertwined with the civilian massacre that took place in Jeju 87 years ago. The story of a father who lost his entire family and had to spend XNUMX years in prison without even having time to grieve, and a mother who lost her parents and younger brother in the same day and was left alone with her older brother, with no one knowing whether he was alive or dead. And along with that, the quiet fight of In-seon's mother Jeong-sim, who survived the time after the massacre and devoted decades to finding her brother's whereabouts and never chose to give up until the end, is faintly visible in the darkness of an isolated house isolated by heavy snow. Floating under candlelight. Among the tens of thousands of indifferent snowflakes that divide between light and darkness and fall as slowly as eternity, the heart that desperately thinks of people who are not here seeps from Jeongsim to Inseon and from Inseon to Gyeongha. I think of this when it snows like this. . I didn't even see it in person, but there was a girl who wandered around that school playground until evening. A XNUMX-year-old child, thinking that her XNUMX-year-old sister was her adult, hung on her arm without being able to open or close her eyes. (Page XNUMX) But it wasn't over. .
They haven't really broken up, not yet. The author said that this novel “hopes to be a novel about extreme love” ('Author's Note'). First of all, that love will be in the heart of In-seon's mother, Jeongsim, who never gave up her faith in people and life until the end. This would have prevented the light from being lost even in the darkness, where it was impossible to tell where the floor was. But we also learn that it is not just bright and warm. As much as that love is extreme and earnest, it is also a more terrifying pain than anything else. I remember the aching love seeping through my skin. It penetrates the bone marrow and makes the heart shrivel… … I knew then. What a terrible pain love is. (Page 311)

Just as In-seon's mother Jeong-sim did throughout her life, In-seon suffers from the pain of her mother's life seeping into her, but cannot turn away from that love. Gyeong-ha also struggles with In-seon's heart overlapping with his own, but cannot let go of it. . “I don’t love that bird enough to go through this blizzard to get to her house tonight” (page 88) and “I’ve never loved her enough to feel this pain” (page 152), even though I shake my head and can’t help but let go of that love. The novel may be saying that reaching out and choosing pain is the only way for humans to be human. That is the only way to protect life from extinction. Perhaps, in fact, that call has always been before us. As if it were our job to recognize her love as her love and hold her hand. When you carefully extend your hand in front of it, the place where your heart touches is cold like a snowflake and at the same time hot like a flame and never forgotten, isn't this an experience that only Han Kang's novels can convey? In this way, Han Kang's novel is before us.

I remember a few years ago when someone asked me, ‘What are you going to write next?’ and I said that I hoped it would be a novel about love. My feelings are the same now. I hope this is a novel about extreme love. _Excerpt from ‘Writer’s Notes’

Han Kang makes us think that the author does not choose the subject matter, but rather the opposite. Following 'Gwangju in May', we come to believe that 'Jeju April 5' also had areas that could only be expressed through Han Kang's sentences.
There is a narrative of the long and silent struggle of survivors to find their missing family members after the massacre. Spatially, it extends from Jeju to Gyeongsan, and temporally, it spans over half a century. Even when damaged by violence and crushed by fear, humans do not give up. It means you can't say goodbye.
All of this is conveyed through the daughter's eyes and mouth. Violence seeks the annihilation of the body, but memory is eternal without the body. You cannot bring the dead back to life, but you can keep the dead alive. It means that we will not say goodbye.
'I', the novelist beside them, listens to their stories only after reaching the border of life and death or beyond. As if only this much pain qualifies you to reach the truth, as if pain is the only way to reach it. Here is the most resolute answer to the ethics of representation.
From some point on, I feel solemn in front of his new novel. Everyone makes an effort, and of course writers do too. However, the Han River is doing its best every time.
_Shin Hyeong-cheol (literary critic)