Ten Thousand Sorrows: Amazon.de: Elizabeth Kim: Englische Bücher

Amazon.co.uk

"I don't know how old I was when I watched my mother's murder, nor do I know how old I am today." So begins the incredible true story of Elizabeth Kim, born to a poor Korean woman in the 1950s after her affair with an American GI who promptly dumped her. Elizabeth's mother was condemned to a pariah existence on the edge of the village, virtually ignored and left to bring up her illegitimate daughter single-handedly. Elizabeth herself was spat at as a 'honhyol'--mixed-race, a non-person, an animal (anyone who thinks that racism is purely a Western disease should read this book). One day, two male relatives came to the hut, killed her mother, and subjected her hated child to a form of torture unimaginable in its barbarism. Elizabeth was sent to a Seoul orphanage where she was kept in a virtual cage, then--worst of all, psychologically--she was adopted by an American Christian fundamentalist couple and taken away to the mid-West dustbowl to be hammered into an all-American Girl. Although this may sound like no more than a catalogue of horrors, it is much more: a story of resilience, survival, and hope, and most importantly of all, of the rediscovery of love and trust when those values seemed quite extinguished. Elizabeth also found her true mother's religion of Buddhism and you can learn more about that creed from this book than from any number of glib Western DIY guides. This is Buddhism felt on the pulse and in the marrow. --Christopher Hart -- Dieser Text bezieht sich auf eine vergriffene oder nicht verf�gbare Ausgabe dieses Titels.

Amazon.com

Ten Thousand Sorrows starts with its young narrator watching her mother's murder; improbably, things go downhill from there. "Worse than the ordinary miserable childhood is the miserable Irish childhood," Frank McCourt famously wrote in Angela's Ashes. But McCourt's hardscrabble youth looks like a walk in the park compared to the experiences of Elizabeth Kim. The child of an illicit union between a Korean mother and an American father, Kim grows up the object of disgust and contempt in rural Korea. As a honhyol, or mixed-race child, she isn't considered a person at all.

Yet her mother refuses to sell her into servitude, and for that show of compassion she pays with her life. In the harrowing scene that opens the book, Kim watches from a hiding place as her mother--the victim of a so-called honor killing--is hanged from a rafter: "All I could see through the bamboo slats were her bare feet, dangling in midair. I watched those milk-white feet twitch, almost with the rhythm of the Hwagwan-mu dance, and then grow still." Left alone in the world, without so much as a name or date of birth, Kim ends up in an orphanage where she spends hours on end locked in a crib that resembles a cage. Things ought to look up when an American couple adopts her. Instead, one form of abuse merely replaces another, as the pastor and his wife tell Kim that her mother "left her to die in a rice paddy" and immediately take away any toy or pet to which she develops an attachment. Later, Kim escapes into a young marriage (arranged, naturally, by her fundamentalist parents), only to find no refuge there either. Surely there is a special place in hell reserved for her husband, the kind of pathological sadist who becomes aroused only by inflicting pain.

By this point, the reader begins to feel like something of a sadist herself. It's a tribute to Kim's skill as a writer that we can't look away from her pain, even when it might feel more comfortable to do so. True, she does leave her husband, make herself a new life with her daughter, begin a journalism career without benefit of training or degree--all of which demonstrates an amazing tenacity and inner strength. Yet the latter half of the book employs the familiar vocabulary of healing without doing much to convince. Reconciled with her experiences, Kim doesn't necessarily seem to have finished processing them. Her book has all the raw urgency of a call to 911: it feels written for the author's very survival. --Chloe Byrne -- Dieser Text bezieht sich auf eine vergriffene oder nicht verf�gbare Ausgabe dieses Titels.

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Non-Person to Super-Person 31. Juli 2000

Von Jennifer Christiansen

Format:Gebundene Ausgabe

Elizabeth Kim conveys her experiences with such elaborate and powerful detail! A book that was very difficult to set down, Kim invites the reader into her life as a child. Her amazing writing enables the reader to see everything through the eyes of "little Kim." As I was reading, I could actually see the Korean landscape; I felt the claustrophobia of being caged in a Korean orphanage; I felt her incessant fear of abandonment. Kim expertly develops the story in this way so that the reader can comprehend and understand the feelings and fears of Kim's adulthood. Kim establishes a story that induces empathy, not simply sympathy. The most compelling feature is Kim's honesty and disclosure of the personal damages she suffered not only from physical abuse, but also mental abuse and neglect - all of which were compounded by her mixed nationality and deeply rooted in the traditions of Korea society. Kim's journey in life portrays a kind of courage that may only exist in a "Super-Person."

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OUTSTANDING BOOK 31. Juli 2000

Von Nancy M.

This is the most compelling book I have ever read! My emotions were captured as the story unfolded and, it is written so well, that I suffered along with Ms. Kim as she described her life. When I finished reading it, I put it down, turned to my husband and said, "This is the most incredible book I've ever read" - and I am a big reader! After that I was speechless as I tried to absorb all of my emotions. How can I ever thank Ms. Kim for offering us this memoir! I would like to know more about her future years and her daughter, Leigh, so I hope she'll write more.

Could Not Stop Reading 28. Juli 2000

Von Book Lover

I read this book in two sittings in a twenty-four hour period. It was very difficult to put down. Elizabeth Kim has a beautiful writing style and her horrific story was told as though she was speaking directly to the reader. I am in awe of the strength of this human spirit. One thing I'll take with me from her book is how the smallest kindness may save someone else. You never know how a small action on your part may mean the world to another person. The epilogue of her book proves this, and also her brief experience with the man who flew from Korea to Hawaii with her before her adoption. Thank you, Elizabeth, for telling your story. I admire you very much.