The book was very thin. It was probably the thinnest of the books I read in preparing for this class, as I recall. So I started opening the book with a glad heart, thinking I'd finish this one quickly, but of course things never go as you wish. This novel, which nearly drove me to frustration—well, let me tell you my impressions of it.
The function of 'the press' can be said to shine when it is most faithful to its basic function of 'delivering news.' Until not long ago I subscribed to TIME magazine, and the reason was that, oddly, the moment I entered school I'd be cut off from the world—not watching the news, not reading the paper. Of course there's internet news/articles, but that can't be all-purpose, can it? I remember once, when the Japan earthquake happened, clicking on the Daum news section about three times a day to read it, but before that I'd never done such a thing, and now too my news-watching has dwindled. TIME magazine was one means of getting rid of this indifference to some degree, and it was a better 'press' for encountering overseas articles. TIME has a World Briefing—the space where they spread out a world map, mark with red dots the places where the world's important events have occurred, and summarize and show the events from many places is precisely the World Briefing. This part serves as proof that it very faithfully keeps the 'press's' news-delivery function.
But not every press outlet performs only this function. A press outlet reflects the 'character' of that outlet. One example would be the 'editorial,' but the 'character reflection' I have in mind is the front-page cover story. No article reveals an outlet's character as much as the cover story. The very first thing shown is the cover story. (For the internet, you could think of it as the main article.) I think which article is carried on the cover, at what size, and with what photo, plainly reveals that paper's character. Within the novel's contents, how the front page of the 'Zeitung' is decorated is partly shown. I felt that the paper was close to anti-communist, and contained many traits aimed at dragging down the existence called 'Katharina' as much as possible. This character of the 'Zeitung' is not much different in the press of South Korea. Acts of taking some person and tearing them apart and breaking them into little pieces have occurred countless times.
I'd like to define the cause of these phenomena as precisely the 'indifference' and the 'sensationalism' of modern society. Even in South Korea, the 1990s are more modern than the 1970s–80s, and 'modern' here doesn't mean the standard of living became modern, but that the 'way of thinking' became modern. People became more individualized, prioritized their own interests more, and collective action came to occur less. These phenomena occurred about half a century to a century earlier in Europe (because industrialization was earlier than ours), and the novel's setting is likely the same, and people's ways of thinking are highly likely to be so too. Yet amid such indifference, people tend to seek out the 'interesting.' People busy filling their lives day by day need something onto which they can pour their 'energy' in daily life, and they want to pour their 'energy' not into 'professional work' but into things closer to a mere 'pastime.' And when an object that can be picked apart appears, even I who am writing this would, of course, pick apart a person who can be picked apart. That's how little there is to be interested in. About the second point I raised, 'the sensational,' I have far too much to say, but to give just two simple examples, one would be songs that grow steadily more 'sensational,' and the 'words' used in articles. In an age where even reporters writing newspapers use an expression like 'finisher,' I've said all I have to say.
A person like Katharina Blum is hard to find. After killing someone herself, how many people turn themselves in saying they killed? Whatever the reason for the killing, people who turn themselves in like that are rare. So when reading this novel, while there is criticism of the 'press's' evil function, on the other hand the distinctiveness of the protagonist's character also seems somewhat highlighted. The author could have brought a more everyday example, so it leaves a question as to why the writer went out of their way to choose such a protagonist.
What I disliked in this novel was, above all, the 'style' and the 'structure.' Of course it seems the author who wrote this book assumed the intended reader to be a so-called 'critical intellectual,' but I think it's rather 'ordinary people' who ought to read this kind of writing. Because I think critical intellectuals would likely already know this kind of press misconduct (attitude). It's questionable whether this novel brought about as much ripple effect as the author intended, but still, I think the mere existence of such a novel holds sufficient significance.
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