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A Poet Turns to Fiction

© Kay Day

I encountered Linda Sue Park's poetry when I first began to post my own work for critique at Gazebo. I still remember several of her poems, among them, a piece that described a mother and daughter doing a science project together. My interest was piqued immediately because I am a mother who has made an ocean in a pyrex baking dish so that my daughter could understand the way wind affects ocean waves. The narrator in the poem describes the process of sifting through soil, and all the other steps in the scientific process. The poem ends with both subjects' delight at finding what they were seeking. The reader realizes that the parent and child had found far more than success in a simple experiment. The same level of pleasure occurs upon reading her first novel, Seesaw Girl.

It is for poetry that Ms. Park has earned not only my respect, but the respect of some of the most learned people on the Net. So it was with great eagerness that I read her first novel, just released from Clarion Books. The main character in the story, Jade, is an upperclass girl who lives in seventeenth century Korea. The story begins with Jade and her young aunt, Willow, devising a prank to play on the boys in their family. As the story unfolds, Jade becomes, for the reader, a character fully rounded and empathetic, so much so that we fully understand how she feels when we read, "How hard it was to imagaine things that she had never seen."

The reason Jade sees so little of the world rests upon the customs of her people. Females from good families were not allowed outside their homes for any reason except an official occasion of utmost importance, such as the wedding of a relative. Jade's energy and personality make this a very difficult practice for her to accept. Thus she concocts a means to get around this confinement, and even does the unthinkable at one point in the book. She slips away from home to see her beloved Willow who has married and will likely see Jade only a few more times during their lives.

Women's history is a popular field now, and this book offers a significant contribution regarding the way some cultures protected females. The real triumph in Ms. Park's book involves Jade's creative manipulation of the system so that she can see a bit of the real world and keep it for herself. Part of that triumph revolves around the fact that rather than harboring bitterness about her situation, Jade simply learns to deal with it in a way that suits her yet allows her to bring no lasting disrespect to her family.

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