A book gifted by the hearts of many

The Morning Piano is written by an author who had published nothing but Mourning Diary and Reading Modern French Philosophy for the First Time, and is a gift that came into being with the author’s final will for life and his students’ long-waited anticipation for the book. In fact, The Morning Piano was almost never published. Even after countless articles being published in newspapers and magazines and lectures being held in Aca Philo, libraries, and universities, the old scholar would always keep a rather stubborn and obstinate view toward his own writing whenever publishers reached out to him – maybe later, he would always say. After being diagnosed with cancer in July 2017, Kim even stopped lecturing at Aca Philo, cut off all contact, and isolated himself from the outside world – it lasted for about six months.

This book would not have seen the light of day if it was not for the 10th meeting of “When Proust Met Benjamin,” a gathering of the author and his students (who took his classes at Aca Philo) from Mar. 29 to early July of 2018. The gatherings consisting of mini-lectures and relaxed conversations always began at 1 pm, only to go on endlessly until 5 pm or 6 pm, and even 9 pm on some days. Seeing words being exchanged and scattered in the gatherings helped the author to solidify his belief that he “wanted to write his own writing, and not someone else’s texts.” From that point on, everything happened like a miracle – from another unexpected meeting with an editor to the moment when the author finally signed the contract for The Morning Piano a few weeks later.

However, the news of the author’s passing reached the readers even before the specifics of the book did. Eun-yu, a writer who was also a student of the author, writes in the recommendation that they “could not stop taking down notes in his lectures once we began. It was similar to how you cannot play the pause button when you are listening to a beautiful piece of music.” The words of the author were like “a score of sentences.” Those left behind next to the large, empty score gathered with their own notes – and with all their hearts, they succeeded in completing the beautiful piece of music that is The Morning Piano.

Glowing aphorisms caught in the sliver of transparent disappearance

The Morning Piano is full of glowing aphorisms that only the author would have been able to catch. The author writes, in regards to the final years of Proust, that “the last years of his life spent in his bedchamber were not a solitary, quiet life; rather, it was busier than ever. Proust would not have been lying still in his bed. He would have savored every second, running around in the room to make every second count. (…) Readers can tell, for his last book is filled with sentences and touches of a runner in a 100-meter race.” This is a brilliant discovery that shatters the fixed ideas that one might have about someone in a bedchamber. In the phrase “what flows is fleeting, but only what flows is what is alive,” readers will be able to feel the intense gaze of the author toward life and death.

“The world is beautiful, and life is deep. There are good things and bad things in life, so let the wind blow……” The sentences the author wrote about the Hankyoreh column on the poet Cheon Sang-byeong are full of affirmations of life. “I said I was writing not for myself, but for others. The same could be said for the records I left in my sickbed; they are not for myself, but for those who will be left behind when I am gone. I grow weaker when I seek to protect only myself. I grow stronger when I seek to protect others,” echoes the author in a firm voice. It gives a sense of what life should be – a life that never stops speaking of love, beauty, and gratitude.

From the first sentence, “The morning piano. I stare into the distance from the veranda and listen to the piano,” to the last, “My heart is at ease,” readers will feel like they have lived a life with the author. And only then, readers will come to discover themselves as “a person of music, a person of thought, and a person of pride” by the final page of the book.