Book Review·Book Review｜The Wanderings Written by Yoo Mi-ri

When I realize that August is here, half of August has already passed. I am looking forward to Miri Yanagi's new book (because the new book is called "The End of August"), and of course because I have just put down her "JR Ueno Station Park Gate", the English version is called Tokyo Ueno Station.

Bereavement and wandering

This story is about a homeless man who suffers the loss of his son. My beloved son did not die due to any dramatic reasons, but died in his sleep. Faced with the tragedy of sudden death, the protagonist begins to think about the past, present and future. After that, the protagonist experienced the death of his first wife. Finally, when he was old, he did not want to cause any trouble to his granddaughter and chose to wander alone.

Of course, Yanagi Miri also introduced the background of the protagonist. Through the same birthday in the background as the royal family, two people and two social classes in the universe were originally unrelated to each other - the protagonist himself was born in the same year, the same month and the same day as Emperor Akihito, and the protagonist's son He was born on the same month and day as the current Emperor Naruhito (the Crown Prince at the time), but he died suddenly at the right time in his youth. Although Liu Mi-ri's works do not describe these two disparate social classes, this "destiny" of being born on the same year, the same month and the same day has always accompanied the entire reading experience. This is a kind of disparity that seems to follow.

The protagonist wanders around Ueno Park and also meets some other homeless people who gather there. Through the perspective of the protagonist, these homeless people have facial features in the book, but at the same time, the faces are not particularly clear. The effect seems to be the same as the choices of those homeless people - their families cannot find them, and they are in Novotel. Wandering in the big world.

Wandering is walking and staying without purpose.

What exactly do you choose when you choose to wander? Does a person who has lost the care of his loved one feel that life is meaningless, so he runs away and enters the unexplainable vast "between heaven and earth" with loose wandering connections?

Homelessness and suicide

Yoo Mi-ri describes the thoughts of the protagonist facing the death of a loved one like this -

"And as I retreated into the future, the only thing I could ever see was the past."

Originally, the future was moving forward, but in the eyes of the protagonist, the future brought about a " retreat-like" defeat . It was as if I was being pushed unwillingly into an unrelated future.

is death where time stops and the self is left all alone in this space? Is death where space and the self are erased and only time continues?

So what exactly is death? Is it the cessation of time, the self being abandoned in the vast space, alone? the hero asked. Is death the complete obliteration of space and self, with only time continuing? No wonder the protagonist walks into the future as if he has no control, because time will not stop because of the cessation of anyone's life. Time has always existed, but space and that person's self have indeed disappeared.

Yoo Mi-ri's description of death here made me immediately think of "suicide." What exactly do you choose when you choose suicide? According to Yoo Mi-ri, choosing to commit suicide means choosing to completely separate yourself from the space where you live, or to escape. I thought about these thoughts I had. When I wanted to commit suicide, did I want to stop time? Or do I want to completely escape the space my body is in? Suicide is not a choice to die, nor is it a choice to stagnate in time or space, but to escape from the violence from my mother that has always invaded me, the pure violence that I can never control or stop, wrapped up in the lowest level, weak victim. There is no love in this violence, but the paper is full of "love". My feelings and reality have been trampled and obliterated in the name of cunning by the person who was supposed to protect me at the beginning of my life. Even if I committed suicide in the end, she is still the one who "wanted to Daughter", the injured mother who "loves her daughter". Only I know her true face. If I choose to die with the true face that gave me life, no one will see through it, and the "face" that remains in this world for as long as possible will become real no matter how ferocious it is.

Suicide is the critical point between control and loss of control , like a zero point, like a place where you can return to your original innocence. Because suicide is the ultimate way to isolate oneself from the living, it is a way to finally gain control and autonomy; at the same time, suicide is a complete abandonment of the future direction of time and space, and it is impossible to pay attention to it again without raising interest. . Suicide is to wrap the pain in wax paper, put it on the shelf, and put it in a space surrounded by tragedy. In that space, there is no flow of time, but only frozen points in time. There is only the past and no future.

So, what about choosing to wander? There are no more fetters. I completely integrate myself with the passing time and the changing space, allowing my mind to be invaded by the rushing emotions without saying stop. Wandering seems to have no past, no future, and is aimless; yet full of purpose. The purpose is to fully integrate into space and time, and ultimately leave without leaving a trace.

Aphasia

Suicide or wandering, which one is the ultimate aphasia? Or are they all speechless? Facing the world and no longer having the desire to speak? The homeless people described by Yoo Mi-ri have not lost their desire to speak. They are still expressing themselves and even have their own cats and dogs. They are not completely desperate and no longer want to live. However, the purpose of their expression has been blurred, and it has completely become an expression of the moment. Alice Miller said that as long as people survive, they will have the desire to express themselves, and the desire to express their true self will always exist and is human nature. The homeless man makes me feel that he has chosen to live in the present, and feels a bit like a monk, but not completely. After all, the homeless man has not chosen to convert to Buddhism or any religion.

Also: I really like the Taiwanese term "street friend". Homeless people are always associated with men, but what about women?

Crowdfunding for homeless people

I once crowdfunded a book called "Four Feet Under." A reporter interviews homeless people and writes their stories in a book, including many women. The crowdfunded money was used to buy them sleeping bags. I Pledged and also read that book. Her writing did not touch me as powerfully as Liu Mi-ri's. It undoubtedly made me think again about what is the most touching text when writing about the tramp's life trajectory?