Teacher Kang kept the book for about a week. He told Jun-su he was reading it with the aid of a dictionary, and updated him about his progress, but refused to give any details until he’d finished. Something bright was shining in his eyes. A face he didn’t recognize was leaning over him. Jun-su felt wetness under his head. He was lying down in the paddy field. Two of his classmates helped him sit up.

The Sorcerer of Pyongyang | Marcel Theroux | London Review The Sorcerer of Pyongyang | Marcel Theroux | London Review

Teacher Kang closed the book he was marking and added it to the pile, which he squared up on the desk in front of him, then cleared his throat. Now he looked Jun-su in the eye. He let his gaze rest on the boy for an uncomfortably long time. Finally he spoke. “The House of Possibility is not something that everyone can understand,” he said quietly.After the business with the pajama cord, Jun-su wondered whether he’d see Teacher Kang again. He rather suspected not. But then, a few days later, the old man turned up as usual with his case of needles as though nothing had happened.

The Sorcerer of Pyongyang by Marcel Theroux | Waterstones

Dr. Park’s friend was the head of the pediatric department. He was a bony man in his forties called Dr. Ri who smoked the same Chollima brand of cigarettes as Jun-su’s dad. Han-na had brought him a gift of food. He accepted it wordlessly, but closed his eyes and nodded in a way that left no doubt about how welcome it was.There was a noise behind him and he turned his head. Teacher Kang had opened his eyes and said in a confused and croaky voice: “Plum blossom, is that you?” He sat up and reached beside him for a glass with some murky liquid inside. He swallowed it, belched lightly, and gazed in perplexity at Jun-su. Around him there was a babble of concerned voices. Jun-su was confused. He couldn’t understand anything they were saying. He heard the front door open. It was his mother. She sat on the end of his mattress and felt his forehead. Her cool hands smoothed his face and hair. “I bought you something,” she said, and she laid a comic book beside him and—equally wondrous—a tiny bottle of fizzy melon juice. In the middle of February, the school celebrated the Dear Leader’s birthday. Every child was given an egg to mark the occasion. Jun-su carried his home carefully in the palm of his hand. The old man looked him straight in the eye. Jun-su remembered the teacher’s furti

The Sorcerer of Pyongyang: A Novel by Marcel Theroux The Sorcerer of Pyongyang: A Novel by Marcel Theroux

All the same, Jun-su was aware that their relationship had altered. He and Teacher Kang had a secret and this secret had given him power over the old man. Now he was emboldened to be more direct with him. Lie still,” snapped Teacher Kang. “I studied medicine with Kim Bong-han. He was so smart the Great Leader put him on a stamp. If you work hard and do as your teacher says, they may put you on a stamp one day.”From the roof of this building an enormous floodlit portrait of the country’s Great Leader, Kim Il-sung, smiled lovingly out across the concrete airstrip, which still radiated warmth after a day of autumn sunshine. Silence fell on the classroom. But try as he might, Jun-su found he couldn’t keep still. His rolling and twitching continued. A compulsively readable tale, all the better for being set in one of the most secretive countries in the world. In The Sorcerer of Pyongyang, Marcel Theroux captures the extraordinary atmosphere of North Korean life with wit and insight' Michael Palin Who are the worst?” asked Jun-su. He sensed his father was distracted so he asked it again. In truth, it wasn’t a sincere question: every school-age child in North Korea knew the answer. The worst were the Yankee imperialists who had waged war on North Korea, who had divided the North from the South, and who had been defeated by the courage of the North Korean people inspired by the Juche idea. Like children around the world, Jun-su just enjoyed hearing the same stories told over and over, and he was priming his father for this one.

The Sorcerer of Pyongyang | Marcel Theroux | 9781668002667 The Sorcerer of Pyongyang | Marcel Theroux | 9781668002667

As the officer waved Kapsberger through, he pressed a concealed button under his desk to ensure that the customs men would search the professor’s luggage with extraordinary care. Jun-su knew that if he told his parents a word of what had happened, that would spell the end of the game. Teacher Kang grasped Jun-su’s skinny wrist with his left hand and placed three fingers along his forearm. Then he did the same with Jun-su’s other hand. That’s right,” said the medical officer. “But sometimes, when I listen to your heart through the stethoscope, I hear a whooshing sound after the boom-boom.” Growing up amid the starvation and oppression of 1990s North Korea, 10-year-old Cho Jun-su stumbles upon a mysterious game, left behind in a hotel room by a rare foreign visitor.A compulsively readable tale, all the better for being set in one of the most secretive countries in the world. In The Sorcerer of Pyongyang, Marcel Theroux captures the extraordinary atmosphere of North Korean life with wit and insight’ Michael Palin Autumn settled over the coast, bringing strong winds from the East Sea. Jun-su stared hungrily at the orange persimmons among the bare branches of the trees at the collective farm where he and his classmates were sent to work on weekends, harvesting sorghum and fashioning its long stalks into brooms. Nowadays when they went fishing, his father brought an army canteen of hot water for them to sip and fend off the cold. Has he—” Jun-su’s mother began a sentence, then seemed to think better of it. She glanced at her husband and began again, speaking almost in a whisper. “Has Yeong-nam ever tried to touch you?” she asked. There’s more to it than that,” said Jun-su. “He eats rats and makes shoes out of birch bark.” Trying not to disturb the needles in his chest, Jun-su slid his hand under the mattress to retrieve the mysterious book. He passed it to Teacher Kang. “It’s in here,” he said.