When no one waits for you and you must walk home alone in the dark after a hard day at work, you would no doubt feel lonely. Or, someone might feel solitude when no one was beside them despite suffering terrible pain. When have you experienced severe loneliness? From April 2nd to 6th, the curtain went up on a play about solitude at ‘mu:n’ (an art theater in Daehangno), created by passionate youngsters.
In the play, two men were suffering dreadfully from forlornness. One was Duck Kim who was a Buddhist priest for a time, and the other was Bong Choi who used to be the president of a company. The story started with the second man looking for a Buddhist image that was a national treasure, and dreaming of making a fortune in one stroke. Bong became lonely as a result of money. Because he regarded money as the cause of his failure, nothing held any importance for him, not even grave robbery and smuggling. This view paints a true picture of common people in modern . Korean society, which includes us, has changed its face to one that no longer cares about dreams or justice in the face of realistic problems like money.
On the other hand, the character of Duck was somewhat different to Bong. At first, it could be difficult for the audience to ascertain the origin of Bong’s solitude. As time goes by, Duck’s lies are exposed in the open. We discover that he was never a monk and didn’t have a Buddhist image. Then the audience comes to know Bong’s mind, thus unfolding the story. I felt that in this story Duck’s solitude suggests the original loneliness of human beings who have been forgotten. What does it mean to be forgotten in the place where I came from? Realistically, Duck might never have overcome the problem and might have been influenced by his loneliness. Finally, Duck made an unusual request to Bong to kill him (Duck) and bury him in a grave after revealing his lies. Duck forced Bong to remember and visit him. His solitude made him desire to be remembered just by one person on the earth through extreme measures.
The play’s conclusion was left open. I consider that the tragedy of Duck and Bong was caused by the lack of love for themselves. While everyone feels alone like Duck at times, not everyone acts like he does. If we encourage and caress ourselves whenever we suffer from hardships, our destiny might be changed despite the adversity of life’s process.
