Life advice from a wise writer 200 years ago
“To increase life satisfaction, reduce your choices.”
[서평]
I will read the classics of the common people
Written by common people | Korea Economic Daily | 17,000 won
If you watch the popular entertainment show ‘Alley Restaurant’, there are often scenes where Baek Jong-won, CEO of The Born Korea, comes out and points out that there are many menus. It is said that the more menus there are, the lower the satisfaction with using the restaurant, but according to this book, ‘Reading Classics of the Common People’, our lives are no different. Psychologist Bhas Kast’s ‘Conditions for Choice’ said that the more options there are, the less satisfied they feel after making a choice. In other words, the fewer options, the higher satisfaction. How about applying this to your life?
The answer comes out that you can make the choice you made the only option. Here, in the 19th century, when it was difficult for women to enter society or speak freely, there is a woman named ‘Jane Eyre’ who rejected the given life and dreamed of an independent life. She is the main character of Charlotte Bronte’s work of the same name, and in an era where she lives her entire life in the place where she was born, she gives up a stable job as a teacher and advertises for a job as a tutor in other areas. She also falls in love with and even marries Rochester, an aristocrat in a conservative society where love marriages were not common, jumping over the difference in status. However, what is important here is not the romance of the century that transcended class. That her Jane made her own choice her only correct answer.
“I consider myself more blessed than anyone else in the world, blessed beyond words. Because I am my husband’s life, just as my husband is my life.” (from ‘Jane Eyre’)
In a conservative society, an orphaned woman married an aristocratic man, so it must not have been a smooth and pleasant affair. Nevertheless, Jane confesses that she, Rochester, and herself were life to each other, that is, the only beings. She felt that her life was blessed because of that. Could there be a more earnest confession of love than this? Not only that, she makes every choice she has made in her life her right answer. She cannot choose the environment she is given, but it is human will that makes the subsequent choice the correct answer. that is, meaning So she thinks that someone who is good at making meaning like Jane will inevitably be more satisfied with her life. In this way, she can learn useful life wisdom from the classics that have survived for a long time. The author says that there is an appeal for wisdom, which is an unchanging value, behind the recent ‘craze for reading classics’. There is no reason not to read it.
This book was written by a Dankook University professor who has emphasized the importance of reading by claiming that his life has changed through books, as well as the author of ‘Reading for the Common People’ and ‘Writing for the Common People’. The entry barrier to reading classics is ‘the prejudice that it is difficult’, and it is said that there are many interesting elements if you know classics, which are bestsellers of that era.
Therefore, from the poet Dante’s ‘Divine Comedy’ to ‘Don Quixote’, which is called the book of mankind, it tells the author’s own interpretation and appreciation points of the works that have been a motif in the lives of many people. It is a classic reading method that becomes a weapon of life. For example, it points out that ‘The Plague’, which deals with the Black Death in the Middle Ages, resembles the modern society that suffered from the Corona 19 incident like decalcomani. In addition, in ‘Don Quixote’, he talks about the source of storytelling and Nekhludov in ‘Resurrection’ talks about the importance of apology. Through the characters in the book, he asks questions about ‘how to live’ and reads humor and philosophy with his own insight give In addition, the opinions of others are important, but one’s own interpretation is also important, and the reader is encouraged to think as they feel. This is because the book becomes completely yours when you interpret it with your own experience and look at it with your own eyes.
No one will be interested in saying “this dirty world” while tilting a glass, but if you say “a world that even ‘The Brothers of Karamazov’ would reject,’ wouldn’t it be cool? Let’s fall into the sea of classics this year. (From ‘Reading Classics of Common People’)
Choi Kyung-min, Hankyung BP publishing editor
