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41 " Later, when he arrived in Seoul, Ki-yong saw Stanley Kubrick's The Shining. Watching Jack Nicholson go crazy in a cabin in the snow-covered Rockies, he remembered his mother, which he hadn't done in a long time. As Jack Nicholson typed, "All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy," over and over on several hundred pages, he imagined Mother, sitting alone in her store, tittering like an idiot. "
― Kim Young-ha , Your Republic Is Calling You
42 " If there's something I want to do I have to do it," Song-uk says, then stops talking, obstinate.I suppose you can say something like that if you grow up hearing what a gifted child you are, study at the best undergraduate law department in the nation, tutor high school kids for fun to buy yourself the newest tablet notebook, and hang out with friends who want to become judges, prosecutors, diplomats, or politicians. I'm sure if you say something like this, everyone usually feels guilty and says they're sorry and lets you do whatever you want. I'm different. I know what kind of person you are. I think you expect me to be maternal with you, but that's not part of the deal. I'm a woman, not your mother. "
43 " Citizen ethics, which taught him about the importance of putting the state and societal morals before anything else, was familiar. It all made sense if he replaced "state" and "nation" with "Leader" and "Party." Like the prince and the pauper in Mark Twain's classic, the ethics of the South and the North were similar enough that when they ran into each other, each recognized something in the other. "
44 " I realized something today. I think I always believed that people were worried about very abstract things. Like life, fate, politics, that kind of thing. You know I like math," Ki-yong tries to explain."You always said that it was the purest abstract world.""Exactly. Time flies so fast when I'm working on an equation. I always thought everyone had that side to them. but now, today, everyone's...""Everyone's what?" Soji asks."Everyone's just struggling to survive. They're doing everything they can to survive. Why was I the only one who didn't realize that? "