The interest in North Korea is unsurprising in an era of rising totalitarian states and growing threats to basic freedoms in democratic countries. The latest addition to the catalogue of books about this little understood place is Marcel Theroux’s The Sorcerer of Pyongyang, which sets out to narrate the story of a nation, beginning in the 1990s, through the life of its main character, Cho Jun-su.
Jun-su isn’t one of North Korea’s elite; he has the typical problems of a high school student anywhere, in addition to the horrors of widespread famine around him and endless political requirements, such as the mandatory weekly self-criticism sessions that require public confessions of wrongdoings from all citizens. His life is transformed one day, however, when he accidentally encounters a Dungeons and Dragons rulebook, The Dungeon Masters Guide, left behind by a foreign hotel guest and later picked up by Jun-su’s father, one of the hotel’s kitchen staff.
This manual becomes Jun-su’s entry point into role-playing games, and into the world of storytelling. It accompanies him through high school, helps him improve his English as he laboriously translates the text, and aids his success in a prestigious poetry competition, which leads to his acceptance into Kim Il-sung University in Pyongyang.
Arguably the most thematically interesting aspect of The Sorcerer of Pyongyang is its examination of the fictive reality of North Korea. Jun-su’s student life in Pyongyang looks idyllic: he drinks with friends, begins a secret role-playing group on campus, and starts dating a girl from the Pyongyang elite. But the maintenance of this existence requires an Orwellian doublethink. Only when it is destroyed does he become painfully aware of how he had “compartmentalised his own internal life, how he’d arranged things so his undeniable knowledge of arrests, disappearances and executions was never openly examined; so he’d never had to face difficult questions about the regime – and his own complicity with it”.
The Dungeon Masters Guide, formerly his talisman, now causes his downfall: it leads to a detention centre and torture by the Thought Examination Committee, until he finally confesses to accusations of counterrevolutionary activities. His past life takes on a surreal, impossible quality during nine gruelling years in the brutal reality of a penal colony. Still, the power of constructed reality is omnipresent: “Even in prison, Jun-su hadn’t let go of the fantasy that the Dear Leader was a loving parent who cared for him. He would tell himself that if Kim Jong-il knew what had befallen the youthful poet whose verses he had praised, he would be outraged and rehabilitate him immediately.”
The great irony central to life in North Korea is highlighted by the narrative structure. Jun-su is rehabilitated and assigned to work at the elusive Office 39, a shadowy organisation whose role is to generate foreign currency for the nation. There, he concocts insurance claims to be filed in western countries, fabricating accidents to create foolproof narrative arcs that will convince the most suspicious insurance companies. His life becomes devoted to inventing such fictions, much as his youthful idle hours were devoted to constructing imaginary worlds.
Reading The Sorcerer of Pyongyang is an informative and entertaining way to learn about North Korea. Theroux’s painstaking research intimately reveals the workings of North Korean society, in the public and private spheres. Its greatest achievement, however, is occasionally its greatest weakness. The lively, page-turning narrative sometimes falters into thinly disguised nonfiction that overshadows the characters and the development of their relationships.
There are other issues. The storytelling is fast-paced, sometimes too much so. The action relies on improbable coincidences, and Jun-su’s motives are not always convincing, particularly in the concluding pages. Yet Theroux also writes with intelligence, compassion and an occasional quiet lyricism. Most crucially, the novel powerfully embodies the plight of North Koreans in the state’s vast shadow: “How much of their lives was spent in waiting! Waiting for the bus, waiting for their day to collect rations from the distribution centre, waiting for a glimpse of the leader, waiting for the on-the-spot guidance, waiting for the decisive arrival of socialism that would finally make sense of all their waiting.”
• Krys Lee’s How I Became a North Korean is published by Faber. The Sorcerer of Pyongyang by Marcel Theroux is published by Corsair (£16.99). To support the Guardian and Observer, order your copy at guardianbookshop.com. Delivery charges may apply.
