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A review by teh_samantha
The Cabinet by Un-su Kim
4.0
Kim Un-Su's "The Cabinet" is an absurd little book made up of little vignettes about files from a mysterious, but also really banal, cabinet. Documents detailing the lives of "symptomers" - people with strange mutations or conditions that defy the rules of reality as we would understand them. A man who's turning into a gingko tree. People that can fall asleep for months at a time and others who simply vanish off the Earth before abruptly returning.
The book is a darkly hilarious and depressing meditation on life under capitalism. One criticism I see from readers is that the little stories documented by the narrator never really come together to anything meaningful. And it's true. Not to spoil anything, but the book ends on an unsatisfying note. Subplots and themes come together somewhat but never fully coalesce into anything grand or pointed. It just ends.
However, that is the point, right? Our main character finds himself in a bullshit job without purpose. The plot ends up happening to him because he was bored of getting paid to sit around so he spent months guessing a three digit combination to a lock for a cabinet that held some weird stories in it. The absurdity of the fantastical is grounded to the point that they are as banal and dull as a day job. Our main character is so ridiculously straight and normal that that alone is absurd.
So if you are looking for a book motivated by a coherent plot, you will not find one here. Instead, "The Cabinet" critiques the day-to-day of living in a late-stage capitalist hell hole by mimicking the essence of living in a late-stage capitalist hell hole. Which is to say: alienating, pointless and, above all else, absurd.
And for that it is a pretty darn good book.
The book is a darkly hilarious and depressing meditation on life under capitalism. One criticism I see from readers is that the little stories documented by the narrator never really come together to anything meaningful. And it's true. Not to spoil anything, but the book ends on an unsatisfying note. Subplots and themes come together somewhat but never fully coalesce into anything grand or pointed. It just ends.
However, that is the point, right? Our main character finds himself in a bullshit job without purpose. The plot ends up happening to him because he was bored of getting paid to sit around so he spent months guessing a three digit combination to a lock for a cabinet that held some weird stories in it. The absurdity of the fantastical is grounded to the point that they are as banal and dull as a day job. Our main character is so ridiculously straight and normal that that alone is absurd.
So if you are looking for a book motivated by a coherent plot, you will not find one here. Instead, "The Cabinet" critiques the day-to-day of living in a late-stage capitalist hell hole by mimicking the essence of living in a late-stage capitalist hell hole. Which is to say: alienating, pointless and, above all else, absurd.
And for that it is a pretty darn good book.