I just finished reading Nothing to Envy: Ordinary Lives in North Korea by Barbara Demick, an oral history about six North Korean refugees that was published in December of last year.
What an amazing book. It’s a similar story to the one that that Laura Ling and Euna Lee were striving to capture when they went into North Korea. In this case, Demick got her story from refugees who escaped North Korea. I’ve seen some video footage, and there is no reason not to believe what the book portrays–Kim Il-Sung created a theocracy in which he is the deity and head of state, and his son Kim Jong-Il presides over the last true communist country in the world. Their government keeps people under control through state controlled media and purges, and their population is cut off from communication with the rest of the world. People starved and died during the famine of the 1990′s, while people today are constantly hungry and undernourished. The infrastructure is shot, and nothing works. And yet many in North Korea still believe the North Korean government’s rhetoric that they have “nothing to envy.”
Some of the stories are touching–the young teenagers who fall in love but cannot consummate their love because of their place in the caste system, the son whose father chastises him for stealing and then dies of starvation, the older woman who works as a merchant on the black market to feed her family after her husband dies. The book was beautiful because of the focus on humanity. Too often the media distills news into faceless politics; it was nice to read a book focused on people and how they cope with a corrupt regime.
Someone once said that North Korea is like the annoying cousin that no one likes but people have to deal with. Their government is incompetent at just about everything except brainwashing a starving population. China isn’t a fan because the North Koreans are an embarrassment to communism with their complete lack of self-sufficiency. China, the U.S., and South Korea all get annoyed because all three countries end up feeding the North Korean population through humanitarian aid and don’t even receive polite thank-yous. Whenever the food runs out, Kim threatens to deploy nukes, and in come the pledges and donations. (In a funny scene from the book, one of the interviewees sees donated rice bags with an American flag on it and then hears a rumor that the rice was captured from a truck operated by American “warmongers.”)
In any case, if you’re interested in North Korea, Korea, or the Korean people, you’ll want to read this book. You’ll find yourself cheering for the players as they go about their lives and strive to succeed against the odds. As North Korea is often in the news these days, I found this book helpful in understanding the gravity of the situation in their country.
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Barbara Demick, who I believe is a correspondent for the LA Times, is a familiar and well-regarded name in the field of North Korea coverage.
The book was beautiful because of the focus on humanity. Too often the media distills news into faceless politics; it was nice to read a book focused on people and how they cope with a corrupt regime.
That’s a great way of putting it.
Kobukson,
You would love this book. This was another one of those long-waiting list books–I was #10 or 11 in line when I ordered it from the library. It took two or three months to get here. But it was well worth it.
By the way, a lot of familiar concepts came up. When they talked about the yangban, I thought of you and King.
I’ll have to check this out. There’s also a new-ish documentary called “Crossing the Line” about an American defector in North Korea. Amazing footage, and if you have Netflix you can watch it instantly: http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/19/movies/19cros.html
Man, I wish I had Netflix!
By 1972, Mr. Dresnok was considered rehabilitated and was granted North Korean citizenship. He married an Eastern European woman and had two children. After that wife died, he remarried and had another child. He started appearing in propaganda films in 1978 and acted in more than a dozen over the next decade. Many North Koreans still call him Mr. Arthur, after a character he played in one film.
I guess if you can’t make it or don’t want to make it in Hollywood, there are always other alternatives! At 6 foot 5, he’s lucky though that Kim didn’t cut his rations. In “Nothing to Envy,” the first people who die in a famine are the big athletic guys.
Dresnok was too valuable to Kim’s propaganda machine. Keeping him big and scary looking was a smart move.
He is white, and that comes with a lot of privilege that even Asian in Asia don’t get.
I’m totally picking up this book. Thanks for the tip. I used to go through at least 5 books a month. At least! Now I’m lucky when I get in 5 books a year. What happened!? Sigh…
Obviously you don’t understand the situation there. Kim used Dresnok as propaganda against America and proved to be useful. The other 3 white men who defected with Dresnok didn’t fare so well. Please see the documentary before making generalized complaints like that.
There is a man named Joo Seung Ha who defected from the north in 2002 and now resides in the south, working as a journalist and runs a popular blog. The blog is interesting to many South Koreans because it offers rare insights about an extremely closed society that only a person who was once part of it can offer. He also writes about his impressions and opinions about South Korean society and the wider world, from the perspective of a former North Korean.
There is a translated post from that blog about North Korean humor:
http://askakorean.blogspot.com/2010/01/ask-korean-news-north-korean-jokes.html
I love Korean people and culture and movies. Thats all i have to say. Can i say that?Never mind too late. Ive already said it. Hold on ill say it again…i love
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