"I am furthest from myself. I am the 'end of the world' to myself."

Believing Amidst Doubt. Writing Amidst Shame.

Everything for him began with quiet reading.

As a reader, it is delightful to savor the fundamental questions that captivate author Lee Seung-woo in this book— the driving forces behind his writing. The titles of the included pieces—nostalgia and pursuit, ignorance and the unknown, things belonging to eternity and those that do not, dreams, things that cannot and should not be spoken of the temptation of the extraordinary—give a glimpse of what lies within. To add to the mix, Lee’s long-standing thoughts on love and faith, life and death, and the relationship between the work and the reader are explored. His dense and profound reflections are woven into sentences like: "Nostalgia longs for what once existed but is no longer, while pursuit longs for what has never been." "Death is lazy and impulsive at the same time; in short, it is unpredictable. Death does not come until it does." "Absence is not due to a failure to obtain, but to the loss of what once was." "Blind faith is not the highest form of belief, but the very opposite." "What a reader can do is not to change an existing story, but to rewrite it. To awaken a sleeping story and revive a finished one."

These sentences, steeped in Lee Seung-woo's characteristic deep contemplation, are interspersed lovingly among his books. They offer readers the layered experience of reading the works of an author who ponders deeply about the act of reading.

The question of "How much more chaotic would life have been if at critical moments, one had not encountered a certain person, event, opportunity, book, or sentence?" is not unique to the author. As finite beings walking the tight rope of time on the fickle passage of time, the act of "quiet reading"—now increasingly rare—becomes something we yearn for, a desperate need.

Support from Munhakdongne Publishing Corp.