MATER 2–10 crisscrosses modern Korean history like the railroads of the Japanese colonial period. Yet for all the romantic notions evoked by trains, Korea’s experience with this modern mode of transportation is one marked by bitter tragedy. Railroads have represented many things: the unstoppable force of modernity, fire and iron harnessed to speed forward into a gleaming future, or a web of connectivity bringing people and places closer together than ever. But the railroads in Korea, as one character in the novel frames them, were “built from the blood and tears of the people of Joseon.” Koreans were driven from their homes to make way for a railroad network and exploited to lay its tracks. The title of the English translation refers to a legendary locomotive from this time. It has become a symbol of national division, adding yet another layer of tragedy.
The novel opens with the protagonist, Yi Jino, engaged in a sit-in to protest the closing of his factory. His physical world is limited to the catwalk at the top of a towering factory chimney, but his memories and the stories shared with him by his grandmother and other relatives allow him to travel through time and space. His family is closely connected to the history of the railroad on the peninsula, starting with his great-grandfather, Baekman, who falls in love with trains at a young age. Baekman names his two sons, Ilcheol and Icheol, “One Steel” and “Two Steel,” respectively, to express his love for the railroad. But Jino’s grandfather and great-uncle adopt paths that embody the dichotomy of the railroad: opportunity and exploitation. Ilcheol gets a job on the railroad and works his way up the ladder to engineer, enjoying a life that is comfortable but predicated on Japanese oppression and dependent on their whims. Icheol, on the other hand, choses a very different direction; he joins forces with the communists and becomes a labor activist who is constantly on the run from the police, yet his conscience is clear.
This is not a story with a neat and tidy ending. Instead, the struggles of Korean workers during the colonial period and under the authoritarian government after liberation are echoed in Jino’s struggle against the owners of his factory workplace. It is a struggle that has persisted since the formation of a working class, and Jino eventually realizes that he is just another actor playing his part on the stage. Yet he is determined to play that part to the best of his ability, and Mater 2–10 manages to find in the past both a sense of hope for the future and an urgency to continue a fight that is far from over.
One final note on the translation is in order. There is a prominent school of thought in literary translation that holds that translations should be seamless and invisible (that is, domesticated), but the translators here have chosen to maintain certain aspects of the original, particularly kinship terms and titles, to avoid erasing Korean history and culture. In the end, they do not ask too much of the reader, and the inclusion of the cultural terms makes for a much richer narrative landscape.
한국국제교류재단
