I think this story is very understandable. The huge differences in ideologies, the way the characters think, the importance they give to certain actions and how all their actions have to conform with the “commandments” of the Communist Party (besides the rarified atmosphere of the army) are only pieces of the background of the story, and one has to set them aside in order to get to the core of the message.
This is a story that has been told too many times to count. It deals with one of the most important things for a human being. It is about love.
The story describes the thrill of the man -a very innocent man, by the way- when he discovers that, at the other end of the communication lines and in the middle of his loneliness there is a woman whose voice makes him idealize her immediately. The way the presence of this woman he doesn’t even know starts filling his days and nights with emotion and anxiety ; and how she becomes such an important part of his life, that he even imagines having a life with her- babies included.
He goes from wonder to adoration, and then from longing to loathing. He finally decides to abandon his present life and situation and ruin his future just because he feels he has to run away from this woman he wishes he could forget. He is Big Kang but he feels so small. In a short period of time he has left behind his previous isolation and now he has a vision of the outside world, he discovered how powerful his feelings are and the whole situation overwhelms him.
We can very easily relate to all these symptoms because that has happened to all of us at a certain moment of our lives. Everybody has one of these stories. Even people who consider themselves very lucky in love matters had one of these anguished and mystifying platonic experiences. It usually hurts... and to top it all, almost always, the object of all these emotional stumbling was someone who didn’t even know we existed. Do you remember??
No comments:
Post a Comment