Min Jin Lee, Author of PACHINKO
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[0:27]I'm thrilled to be here today with Min Jin Lee.
[0:30]Min Jin Lee is the award-winning best-selling author of The Chinko, a multi-generational
[0:34]novel about a Korean family and the Korean diaspora.
[0:38]But Chinko was a finalist for the National Book Award for Fiction and a New York Times
[0:43]10 Best Books of the Year in 2017.
[0:45]It will be translated into 24 languages.
[0:48]Her first book, Free Food for Millionaires, was also a national bestseller.
[0:52]Min Jin Lee has written for The New Yorker, The New York Times Book Review, The Wall Street Journal,
[0:56]and many other notable publications.
[0:58]She received a Guggenheim Fellowship in 2018.
[1:01]Born in Seoul, Korea, Min moved to Queens and graduated from Bronx Science High School,
[1:05]where she was inducted into the Bronx Science Hall of Fame, and then went on to Yale University
[1:09]winning prizes in both fiction and nonfiction.
[1:12]Now based in Boston, she will be a writer in Residence at Amherst College from 2019 to
[1:17]2022.
[1:18]So you've said that you worked on the story for Chinko for almost 30 years, that you've
[1:24]written it re-written it multiple times, even starting completely from scratch in 2008.
[1:28]I want to know what it felt like the minute you threw the draft away and then you had
[1:32]to sit back down at your computer and start over again.
[1:35]When the cursor was blinking that moment, what was that like?
[1:37]What did that feel like?
[1:38]How did you motivate to start it again and then again?
[1:42]Well, I'm really familiar with feeling discouraged.
[1:45]So it helps.
[1:46]And it's kind of funny, but at the same time it's also something that I realize about
[1:51]not expecting very much from what you do.
[1:54]So I have really low expectations of outcome, but I feel very committed to my projects.
[2:00]And I'm also really slow.
[2:02]So I just kind of think, no one's expecting this.
[2:04]I didn't have a contract, so I don't work on some sort of contract-based I work on spec.
[2:10]So it was okay.
[2:11]I just decided that nobody cares anyway, so mine as well just do it.
[2:14]I know that sounds really strange, but no, that's Jane.
[2:16]In a way, not having expectations is really freeing.
[2:20]It's true.
[2:21]It's a good way to look at it.
[2:22]A lot of people get blocked because they have all these expectations of how this book
[2:26]is going to somehow say their lives or it's going to give them money, power, and glory.
[2:30]And I've never actually met a writer who has any of those things.
[2:33]So just let that go.
[2:36]So then when you actually finished, how did it feel?
[2:39]Did you feel this enormous sense of accomplishment?
[2:41]Went to see said, okay, this is my final draft.
[2:44]I'm done.
[2:45]And then to see it come out, does it feel like I felt free.
[2:48]This project is not normal.
[2:50]I don't think most writers work on books for almost three decades.
[2:54]So after I finished and they agreed to publish it, I just felt the sense of like,
[2:58]oh, I'm free.
[3:00]I don't have to work on this book anymore.
[3:02]And the fact that it's been well received, that's totally gravy.
[3:05]I did not expect that because I didn't think anybody would care about 600,000 people.
[3:10]Because that's pretty much how many Korean Japanese are in the world today.
[3:14]So I figured like, you know, I wrote this thing, it was really hard to do.
[3:17]For some reason, I felt call to write it.
[3:19]But I didn't think people would actually buy this book.
[3:22]The fact that it's doing so well, that's a real mystery.
[3:25]It's not a mystery.
[3:26]It's so good.
[3:27]Oh, thank you.
[3:28]I mean, it's like dense and powerful and full of heartbreak and I feel dense.
[3:32]Thank you.
[3:33]And sure, you know it, but whatever you did over this years.
[3:38]But it's not a map being modest.
[3:40]If you really think about it, why would anybody care about these people?
[3:44]Because they haven't before.
[3:45]This is the first book ever written for adults about the Korean Japanese and the world in English
[3:50]is a novel form.
[3:51]So I used to think nobody wants this book and that's the reason why when I finish it,
[3:57]I can just sort of forget about it and go to the next thing.
[3:59]It almost felt like somebody had put the spell on me and I had to go finish it.
[4:04]And I was like, oh, the spell is broken.
[4:05]No, it could be free.
[4:07]And then I figured it does well, right?
[4:08]But if it doesn't do well, that's to be expected.
[4:11]But really, it goes back to what you're saying in the literary affairs escape that you've
[4:15]spoke out today.
[4:16]It's not really about just this group of people, about all humanity and family and everyone
[4:22]can relate to that.
[4:23]And parenting.
[4:24]And parenting.
[4:25]Yeah.
[4:26]And it became about parenting, which was not in the first version, because I became
[4:28]apparent.
[4:29]OK.
[4:30]And I don't think I realized just how much I would change as a result of being a mother.
[4:34]So my son's going to be 21.
[4:36]So that space of 21 years, that really dove tails in with a period that I was working
[4:41]out with the book, especially with the book, the versions that we're working.
[4:45]So in a way, every aspect of parenting really fit into this book about what does it mean
[4:49]to be a father?
[4:50]What does it mean to be a mother?
[4:51]What does it mean to have children?
[4:53]What does it mean to have wishes for your child, which you can't fulfill?
[4:56]Like, that was a really important thing.
[4:59]As I get older, I kind of think I want all these things and I realize does he want all
[5:02]these things?
[5:03]Right.
[5:04]And also, everything that he wants will he get them.
[5:07]And if I have to witness him getting things and not getting things, it's so hard.
[5:11]It's really different than what I don't get things that I want.
[5:13]Right.
[5:14]So much worse.
[5:15]It's so much worse.
[5:16]It's heartbreaking.
[5:17]You had this passage speaking of mother, daughter, relationships, and parenting.
[5:22]You have a mother daughter seen towards the end of the book with Hannah and Etsuko.
[5:25]Mother and daughter, and Etsuko sitting reflecting about the difficulty of their relationship
[5:29]and what ended up happening in the family.
[5:31]And you wrote, when Etsuko had been a young mother, there used to be only one time
[5:35]in her waking hours when she felt a kind of peace.
[5:38]And that was always after her children went to bed for the night.
[5:40]She longed to see her sons as they were back then.
[5:42]She wished she could take back the time she had scolded her children just because she was
[5:45]tired.
[5:46]There were so many errors.
[5:47]If life allowed her visions, she would let them stay in their bath a little longer, read
[5:51]them one more story before bed, and fix them another plate of shrimp.
[5:55]That just got to me.
[5:56]I feel like that's every mother's, every parent's really what they say, ready to go.
[6:01]fast, and you wish you could go back and all the mistakes.
[6:04]And then you're just left sitting there and they're like, grown up.
[6:06]Right.
[6:07]It's like, but when you're in it, you're so tired.
[6:10]Yeah, there's too much.
[6:12]There's too much.
[6:13]You're so tired and you want things to be according to your plan.
[6:16]And children don't go according to your plan.
[6:19]But if you really think about it, it's the real gift of having these children and
[6:23]being with them.
[6:25]And you don't see it at that moment.
[6:26]And I was just holding this baby earlier today.
[6:29]Her name is Esther.
[6:30]And she's a little, this perfect little bundle.
[6:33]And I thought to myself, I wish I had been as grateful as I am, right?
[6:38]This moment when I had my own son, because that felt interminable to me.
[6:42]It's like, when will he walk?
[6:44]And all of a sudden he's running and now he's in college.
[6:46]And I'm holding Esther and I thought, what a gift it is just to hold this little person
[6:50]who are not crying.
[6:51]Yes.
[6:52]That was a gift.
[6:53]That is a gift.
[6:55]In terms of the process of writing, Pichinko, how did you keep all the story lines straight?
[7:01]Especially out of DLL.
[7:03]Yeah.
[7:04]I outlined a lot.
[7:05]And for my second book, I use a software called Scrivener, which is an academic and nonfiction
[7:10]software.
[7:11]Usually people who write disertations and nonfiction books use this.
[7:15]It's a very organizing software.
[7:17]And I used it for it because it was so much research.
[7:20]Well, you said earlier, you do about 100 interviews for each book.
[7:24]Really.
[7:25]Easily.
[7:26]Easily.
[7:27]Easily.
[7:28]More.
[7:29]Sometimes they're like 15 minute interviews.
[7:30]Sometimes they're actually several days long.
[7:31]Or I could take a class.
[7:32]It's a whole semester.
[7:33]And I do it because it makes me feel more confident about my subject matter.
[7:37]And I'm very confident about my subject matter after I finish my book because at that point
[7:41]I know it.
[7:42]But I produce so little, like I only have two books.
[7:46]So I'm sure there's a way you could tell people are much better and also I was a parent.
[7:51]Like I was really busy.
[7:52]Because I'm a full-time mom.
[7:54]And writing was my second thing.
[7:56]It's true.
[7:57]Because it didn't pay anything.
[7:58]No one was paying me to do it.
[8:00]So it was my job to deal with the dishwasher and the laundry and show them to PTA.
[8:05]I did all those things.
[8:06]I think there's this belief fiction.
[8:08]It's just, oh, it's going on in your head.
[8:10]You know, you just write up all these stories.
[8:12]But yours is not really like that.
[8:13]Yours is like serious historical fiction with a lot of real life influences throughout.
[8:18]Yeah.
[8:19]And that was my second thing though.
[8:22]My first thing was really being a parent.
[8:23]Yeah.
[8:24]And if I had to clock my hours in a spreadsheet and see the most of my time was really
[8:29]spending a long time.
[8:30]Well, I won't ask you to, you know, compute your bill of flowers.
[8:34]We're in this session, but so in the book, Hansu is a real central character.
[8:40]In fact, it was Sunya's first interactions with him that ended up changing the whole
[8:43]trajectory of everyone's life, basically, in the whole book.
[8:47]So I found a reader that my feelings towards Hansu kept shifting and I don't know if that
[8:50]was deliberate on your part.
[8:51]I was wondering.
[8:52]I wanted to ask you, you know, at times I really hated him and at times I felt very grateful
[8:57]to what he was doing for the family and sometimes I felt pity like towards the end.
[9:02]How did you feel about Hansu?
[9:03]Would you want Hansu to be a person in your life?
[9:06]Yes.
[9:07]But I wouldn't let him be my lover.
[9:10]Like I think when you have a person like that who's that powerful, they're really intoxicating
[9:14]to be around.
[9:16]Because they can make things happen and it's very cool to have somebody make things happen
[9:21]because you want to have all these wishes.
[9:22]Imagine if you just call somebody go, hey, by the way, can you get my friend a job?
[9:27]Or can you make this building open for me for the use that I need?
[9:31]Like he's that kind of person who could just make it happen.
[9:34]Where's open?
[9:35]Yeah.
[9:36]That said, if that person became your lover or the father of your children, they have
[9:40]that same level of control and you become the thing that they control and that's very
[9:45]different.
[9:46]So in my experience with beating people like that, you want them in your life in a way
[9:50]but you should be really careful about how much intimacy you have with them.
[9:55]Interesting.
[9:56]So always tell them and don't sleep with Hansu.
[10:00]Don't do it.
[10:00]All right, so now I want to look forward for now.
[10:02]OK.
[10:03]But he's very sexy.
[10:04]I think people like that are very sexy.
[10:06]Yeah.
[10:06]Well, the confidence, too.
[10:07]Sure.
[10:08]The confidence, the power, the ability to move the dial.
[10:11]It's very cool.
[10:12]And in fact, you address this in the book
[10:14]in the beginning, Hansus, the senior, sorry
[10:17]if I'm pronouncing this wrong, by the way.
[10:18]People are rotten everywhere you go.
[10:20]They're no good.
[10:21]You want to see a very bad man?
[10:22]Make an ordinary man successful beyond his imagination.
[10:25]Let's see how good he is when he can do whatever he wants.
[10:28]Do you believe that?
[10:29]Do you believe that when people get power, the power itself?
[10:32]You said earlier, you believe that empathy is sort of
[10:34]as inversely proportional to power.
[10:36]As power goes up, the empathy levels sort of go down.
[10:39]Do you think most men or women too, I shouldn't say men?
[10:42]Do you think people when they do power become bad?
[10:45]I think when you have an extraordinary amount of power,
[10:47]you have to work very hard to check yourself.
[10:52]I think we need to have checks and balances all the time,
[10:55]because your heart is filled with things that you want.
[10:59]And sometimes what happens is that you can become
[11:01]more compromising with your ethics.
[11:04]Because you think, oh, well, I'm a good person
[11:05]and I want this.
[11:06]So it's okay if I fight a little bit here.
[11:09]And that's when you start to get in trouble.
[11:10]And that's the reason why you have become more transparent
[11:12]about what you're doing to other people.
[11:14]Someone can say, you know, I know you want that.
[11:17]And I know that you're a good person,
[11:18]but that's a little shady.
[11:20]And I find that a lot of really powerful people
[11:23]aren't transparent.
[11:25]because they justify that because they're benevolent,
[11:28]it's okay that they're authoritarian.
[11:30]Yeah, it happens.
[11:32]That's really what I found.
[11:34]So I don't have that kind of power,
[11:36]but I kind of think if I did,
[11:38]I would have to become more transparent with other people.
[11:40]Especially people who are going to be brave enough
[11:43]to tell me the truth.
[11:45]Right.
[11:45]Because you can become isolated from people
[11:48]who are willing to confront you.
[11:50]We all need to be confronted.
[11:51]Right, I think.
[11:52]Yeah.
[11:53]So I was like, you have to keep people from back in the day.
[11:55]Right.
[11:56]I think I need to keep you honest.
[11:58]It's like the guys in entourage.
[11:59]Right.
[12:00]And to keep those guys from way back went,
[12:02]I don't want to give anything away about anything in the book.
[12:05]But the scene that you wrote when Isaac returns home
[12:08]was so harping, I was literally covering my eyes
[12:10]and trying to beat it through my eyes, like opening it.
[12:15]It was like a movie.
[12:15]Like I felt like that scene was happening to me.
[12:18]Do you get overwhelmed by emotion
[12:20]the way I was getting overwhelmed by emotion at that scene?
[12:23]Like do you ever find when you're writing
[12:24]that your eyes are tearing up or your heart is pounding?
[12:28]Or is it just?
[12:29]Absolutely.
[12:30]You do.
[12:31]Absolutely.
[12:31]I have so many feelings.
[12:33]They're very uncomfortable.
[12:35]I'm very uncomfortable with the fact that I feel so much.
[12:38]And when I was younger, I used to think
[12:40]it was really bad that I had all these feelings.
[12:43]But as I've gotten older, I realized,
[12:44]so that's where I'm really strong.
[12:46]I'm very good at feeling things.
[12:48]And I'm very good at recognizing other people's feelings
[12:52]of certain things.
[12:53]And I realized, oh, I have to use that in my fiction.
[12:55]So when I am working on difficult scenes,
[12:58]I do sob all the time.
[13:00]And I think part of my job is to stay there
[13:02]sobbing and to finish the scene rather than walking away.
[13:06]Do I always have that courage?
[13:07]No, I do eat a lot of cookies.
[13:09]But then something like, OK, you've had the cookie.
[13:13]And I go back to your desk and finish your sobbing and finish that scene.
[13:17]But it's uncomfortable because you don't
[13:19]know if that scene will destroy you or that feeling
[13:24]is too much and sometimes it feels like it's too much.
[13:27]Yeah.
[13:27]I know what you mean.
[13:28]Kanyi and Yossab's marriage was really
[13:31]complicating and heartbreaking itself.
[13:34]And when I was writing out my questions,
[13:35]every question I wanted to say was heartbreaking.
[13:37]This was heartbreaking.
[13:38]Thank you.
[13:39]Your book should just be in Pachinko.
[13:41]Hashtag heartbreaking, so that everything is heartbreaking.
[13:44]Kanyi ends up using these-
[13:46]You know what Carly Simon says?
[13:48]What that-
[13:49]She says in the song, don't mind if I fall apart.
[13:52]There's more room and a broken heart.
[13:53]Oh.
[13:54]I love that.
[13:55]I love this idea that after your heart is broken,
[13:57]there's actually a lot more room because we
[14:00]were constricted by having our heart intact.
[14:04]So a part of me always feels like, OK, you know what?
[14:06]You have to make a mess sometimes.
[14:09]And then somehow you'll become a more expansive person.
[14:12]So I think it's a good thing.
[14:14]But I'm sorry if I need to cry.
[14:16]OK, sorry.
[14:17]So this particular woman in the book
[14:19]shows so much strength and selflessness.
[14:21]And she becomes like this ultimate model
[14:24]of not thinking about herself at all,
[14:26]despite all the challenges, which just kept piling
[14:28]up throughout the book.
[14:29]What do you think made her that way?
[14:31]Do you think it was this whole culture-wide mandate
[14:34]that you referenced in the book about a woman
[14:36]sort of not just right, but obligation to suffer?
[14:40]Her lot is to suffer.
[14:41]Go saying, I think you called it.
[14:43]So saying, suffering.
[14:44]So was that just something that she inherited?
[14:47]Or should we view her as this, was it a good thing
[14:50]that she was so selfless and suffering?
[14:52]Or should we feel sorry for her?
[14:54]I don't think that that's a good thing that women suffer.
[14:57]If I could.
[14:58]Or not the suffering, obviously.
[14:59]No, no, no, I mean, I know what you're saying.
[15:01]Is that her selflessness and her suffering is something
[15:04]it is you're absolutely right.
[15:05]It's almost a cultural mandate.
[15:08]And for some so many women of this generation,
[15:10]including today, if you look at all the fairytales
[15:12]in South Korea and Korea basically throughout the history
[15:15]of time, it is about women should sacrifice and suffer
[15:20]and forget about their own happiness and their joy.
[15:22]I find that to be very problematic.
[15:24]I don't like it.
[15:25]I know women to be empowered and happy
[15:28]and fulfilled and all those things.
[15:30]That said, I think it's realistic to say,
[15:32]if you love somebody, you will sacrifice
[15:35]and you will suffer.
[15:36]You can't always have your way.
[15:37]And I mean, being a parent, oh my goodness.
[15:40]You're going to have to give up a lot of things
[15:42]to be a parent.
[15:43]And yet if you do, you also get to be part of something
[15:47]that's much bigger than you.
[15:48]So it's when these trade-offs about love,
[15:51]whenever you love somebody, you have to give up something
[15:54]about yourself.
[15:55]And as I get older, the more I realize it's a privilege
[15:58]to be in a love relationship.
[16:00]Whether it's vertical or horizontal or diagonal,
[16:03]whatever kind of love relationship that you're in,
[16:06]it does require negotiations and compromises.
[16:10]And some suffer.
[16:11]And some separate.
[16:12]And some separate.
[16:13]And some separate.
[16:14]So Noah, he was so funny what you said in the lunch
[16:18]that people are sending you messages on Twitter,
[16:20]like page 414, like what's going on?
[16:23]How could you do that?
[16:24]What happens with Noah in the book, again,
[16:27]heartbreaking in this sort of portrait of him?
[16:29]I was wondering what makes you want
[16:32]to write these heartbreaking stories?
[16:33]Did something happen in your life
[16:36]that made you want to explore sort of this pain element
[16:39]or the inner workings of people's hearts
[16:41]and the tragedies?
[16:43]Like, well, I study Aristotle's poetics.
[16:48]And part of the thing that he writes about the way tragedy
[16:52]works is that when the viewer of the play of the tragedy
[16:57]experiences catharsis, then you have done
[17:01]for the viewer what the viewer needs.
[17:05]I think we all need to experience catharsis
[17:07]because all of us are carrying this pain within us.
[17:10]Art has the power to release that emotion.
[17:14]I think it's really cool for me to create something
[17:18]that could make you feel this catharsis.
[17:20]But also, I'm feeling it when I'm making it.
[17:22]So you're absolutely right.
[17:23]There's something in me that has all this pain.
[17:26]I'm trying to figure out how do I get this thing out.
[17:29]But ideally, it's not just about releasing it.
[17:32]How do I create something beautiful and intact
[17:34]and a kind of model in which you can experience catharsis
[17:38]and become more whole?
[17:40]Because we don't want to be carrying that pain around.
[17:43]And if you could feel more connected
[17:47]to your sense of why you have a family
[17:50]and what you want with your family and your sense of history,
[17:53]you become a bigger person and a more powerful person
[17:55]as a result of it.
[17:57]And I think it's worth releasing that pain.
[17:59]I think most of us are kind of frozen
[18:01]because of the pain that we have.
[18:04]I do see that quite a lot.
[18:05]People kind of suck in a certain pattern.
[18:07]Yeah, thanks for giving this vehicle, you know?
[18:10]Oh yeah, so I mean, even a little way.
[18:12]Even in a small way.
[18:13]We really, something that I want to do.
[18:16]So going back to the beginning of your career for a second,
[18:20]when did you know you were a writer?
[18:22]Or do you still not even consider?
[18:23]I feel like you're so self-defocating.
[18:25]You're gonna say, I'm not a writer.
[18:27]I feel like a writer.
[18:28]But I don't think that I'm the same writer
[18:30]that I was when I started.
[18:32]I think it took me a really long time
[18:33]to figure out that I know what I'm doing.
[18:35]It took me a really long time.
[18:37]It took me the 12 years to publish my first book.
[18:40]But after I published it, I thought,
[18:41]oh, I know how to do this omniscient thing.
[18:43]Most people don't do this anymore,
[18:44]but I really figured it out.
[18:46]And that was really amazing.
[18:49]And then I thought, my second book,
[18:50]I'm gonna figure out how to write that book.
[18:52]I knew how to do the craft of it.
[18:54]I didn't know how to do the subject.
[18:57]So for Virginia, I kept on trying to approach the subject
[19:00]in every different corner,
[19:01]and I just couldn't get it in it.
[19:04]But it wasn't the craft part,
[19:05]but the craft part took a really long time to figure out.
[19:08]In terms of when did I decide I was a writer,
[19:11]I think you're a writer if you're writing.
[19:13]I don't think you're a writer because you're publishing.
[19:15]But I think in terms of how you perceive your own talent level
[19:19]and your skill level, that takes a really long time.
[19:23]It does.
[19:24]And you said earlier today,
[19:26]which I hadn't read anywhere else about you,
[19:28]I feel like I tried to dig up what I could learn,
[19:31]that you didn't speak really until middle school.
[19:35]Yeah, I didn't really talk to other kids.
[19:36]I had a lot of social anxieties to kids too,
[19:38]and what you were saying about not being able to figure out
[19:40]how to enter into a conversation.
[19:42]I had this one summer where I was traveling in France
[19:45]at this whole group, and I just couldn't talk.
[19:47]I just couldn't.
[19:47]I just was felt paralyzed,
[19:49]and I spent a lot of time thinking about language
[19:51]and conversation.
[19:52]How is it so easy, usually?
[19:54]And I would watch everybody else talking and thinking,
[19:56]how are they doing that?
[19:57]It's like coming so naturally to them.
[19:59]I feel like...
[20:00]What you were saying earlier today about your experience that you would just watch and not jump in
[20:05]May do you feel like there's such an on-ball. I like I relate it to that. I read a lot of interactions
[20:12]And reading interactions in fiction really helped me. Yeah, as well as observing other kids
[20:18]But then I would watch these other children and young women who are so successful socially
[20:23]And I would think to myself, oh, I can't do that. I don't look like that
[20:28]And I don't know how to have that sort of manner. Mm-hmm. And it took me a really long time to figure out
[20:33]Oh
[20:34]They're really just being themselves
[20:36]They have given this freedom away of being liked
[20:40]Yeah, and I think at some point when I decided I'm gonna be okay. So I don't like me
[20:45]because I know I'm a little off and
[20:48]That again gave me a kind of freedom like okay. Well
[20:52]maybe two people like me and ten will not and
[20:56]That's not terrible at
[21:00]Rather than thinking I'm gonna get all told people to like me. Yeah, it can't please everyone
[21:03]No, and then also I decided that I would like all 12 people. Okay. That was a huge decision for me to I decided okay
[21:09]Forget about the response
[21:11]What will be my action? And I was like I'm going to like all 12 of them and try to see them for their
[21:17]intentions and that gave me a lot of power. Yeah in the social dynamic. Yeah, I agree
[21:23]I think being nice to everybody is
[21:25]Way to go. Right? Everybody has something to offer. I totally agree. I do even the most reprehensible person still wants to be loved
[21:33]Mm-hmm. I've really have seen that because I've interviewed a lot of people who do very very bad things
[21:38]And I'm going oh my goodness. What am I gonna do with you?
[21:42]Not nice
[21:44]And then I think okay, well you probably have a mom. Mm-hmm. Yep. What is she thinking when she sees you?
[21:50]Yeah, she probably thinks that you hurt the apple of her eye even though you have done
[21:54]Not good things or what happened to you that made you want to do that. Yes
[21:59]But I think about that a lot. I think about like what would your mother think?
[22:02]Mm-hmm. Or the person who delights in you somebody delights in you. I really say I hope so. Yeah, right?
[22:07]You hope so that somebody loves you, you know this kind of
[22:11]spectacular way not just like tolerates you but like just adores you
[22:15]What is he or she thinking about you and I think I want to see what that is
[22:19]Even if I don't feel that way. I want to understand that because somehow you're appealing to somebody
[22:27]And you're writing now another book right is a third part of this Korean de-s for a
[22:32]Shirlish religion what's that called and what's that gonna be about if you can say it's absolutely it's called American hog one and
[22:38]H-H-E-W-O-N
[22:40]The hog one is a not is a for-profit tutoring center
[22:44]So a very simple explanation will be like come on it's a hog one you send your kid for enrichment
[22:50]You become better and math or English or something or SAT tutoring
[22:55]You send your kid to get SAT tutoring
[22:57]In South Korea today starting at the age of four children start getting enrichment tutoring even before starting kindergarten
[23:05]So I'm writing about these tutoring centers that are all over the world that Korean start
[23:10]But now it's not just Koreans to go to these tutoring center to other people go to so this book will be set in
[23:17]Los Angeles and Boston and Sydney and London and New York and
[23:21]Washington DC that is sort of area and I'm writing about the tutors themselves or
[23:26]often artists who are
[23:29]Pursuing dreams and any to make money and I'm also writing about the parents who have these wishes for their children
[23:34]And I'm also writing about the young people who are the students themselves
[23:38]And it'll be a very global book and the question that I'm asking is how do you live a wise life?
[23:45]Sounds great. I hope so. Are you
[23:47]Are you on any sort of timetable for this or I'm in the interview stage right now and also doing fieldwork
[23:53]So I actually go visit the sites and it's really nice because it does tails in very well with all my touring. Yeah, yeah
[24:01]So you're gonna check out some already have here in the Orange County for example has a very serious tutoring culture
[24:08]So I'll be doing some more interviews with them at the end of December. I think we've really loved this place called
[24:13]Mascanazium have you heard of it? Oh, yeah, they come around the country. Yeah
[24:16]Yeah, yeah, yeah, I feel that's this right not not the four-year-olds
[24:20]But Mascanazium apparently makes math relief fun and work a game for kids totally
[24:25]Which is great my daughter like keeps asking me to get like you don't have to do this like you don't need you don't have to
[24:30]So no, that's what I want to do. I want to go
[24:32]I mean, I think that's sort of interesting because it's not that I'm so
[24:36]Pro academic enrichment or I'm not but I've noticed in the United States is an incredible stress towards sports
[24:43]Yes, right that's for to incredibly important in this country
[24:46]And I like sports a lot too. There's a lot of virtue in being in a team and also learning how to be personally excellent
[24:53]But if a kid says to you I really like math and science and they want to pursue this
[24:58]I think okay, why not yeah, I think and you don't have to play the grass
[25:03]but people often make fun of
[25:05]Kids and parents in this country right if they focus on those things and I kind of think no one would ever blink if you said
[25:12]I'm gonna go to tennis camp
[25:13]Yeah, Florida and you're gonna pay $10,000 to go
[25:16]But if you said I'm gonna spend $10,000 a year on your kid going to a physics camp
[25:21]People would roll their eyes and I kind of think why is that? Yeah, you're right
[25:25]Maybe it's like people feel like you're trying to get ahead in some way like it's like she dares
[25:30]Right, but then if you play baseball and you pay $10,000
[25:34]No, that's why is that not cheating. I don't know. You're right. You're absolutely right
[25:39]So do you have any advice to any aspiring writers out there?
[25:43]Absolutely. I think that the most important thing is reading that I mean that's really how I learned
[25:47]I don't have an MFA
[25:49]So I would read the books that I really love. I would read I would read read them
[25:53]Especially the ones that are just truly great at point of view
[25:56]That's the thing that I think is the most important decision that a fiction writer makes
[26:00]Which point of view will I employ and for me?
[26:03]I chose omniscient which meant that I had to study all the emission narratives and try to figure out
[26:07]How it's done and how the transitions work so I was very mechanical and the way I approached it
[26:13]The other thing that's really harder than learning to skill is just saying with a project
[26:19]That's really difficult because no one's asking you this book for most of us yet
[26:24]No one's asking us for our books. So it's a toilet of security
[26:29]Or the toilet privacy whichever way you look at it. That's difficult
[26:33]And the other thing that I think is curious is
[26:37]I think most of us have the wrong projects. This is very upsetting for people to hear this
[26:42]I had to recently write a letter for
[26:44]A national novel writing month then a writing moment
[26:47]It's gonna come out pretty soon
[26:48]So if you so sign up for Nana Raimo
[26:50]You'll be getting a letter for me and one of the things that I try to share with
[26:54]People that I work with who are my students is a lot of the times
[26:57]You think you want to write a book about something and that topic is very respectable
[27:02]Of that respectable topic whether it's your grandfather who did something heroic or some important subject that commands attention
[27:10]Those are these sound great
[27:12]But if they don't have your personal important questions tied up with it
[27:17]You're not going to finish it
[27:19]So I always say that topic that you choose and the questions that you have have to be as important as something
[27:26]Intoxicating and alluring as something like an illicit love affair
[27:29]It has to be that compelling that you would break public and social bonds
[27:35]Then you'll get up in the morning every day and you'll work on your book
[27:41]So I really encourage people to find their very most important questions
[27:46]The questions are almost afraid to tell their best front
[27:50]And choose that question and try to answer it in your book
[27:54]Because then you'll do it. I love that. That's fantastic
[27:57]Thank you so much. So thanks for doing this interview. I'm someone on momstone. I have time to read books
[28:03]Thank you
[28:04]This episode has been sponsored by bookhampton bookhampton.com
[28:08]Thanks to Ryan and Steve at texture sound for the audio editing and mixing
[28:12]Thanks for listening to momstone have time to read books