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Hoonie
Yangjin, Hoonie’s wife and Sunja’s mother, is born into a poor family in Yeongdo. She is matched with Hoonie as a teenager, and the two have a happy marriage, although she loses several children before giving birth to Sunja. Yangjin takes over the running of the boardinghouse after Hoonie dies. After Sunja becomes pregnant with Hansu’s child, she allows Sunja to marry Isak and move to Osaka, where she’ll have a chance for a better life. During World War II, Hansu finds Yangjin and reunites her with Sunja and her family in Japan. Yangjin helps with Sunja’s confectionery business and lives with Kyunghee until she dies of cancer in 1979.
Yangjin Quotes in Pachinko
The Pachinko quotes below are all either spoken by Yangjin or refer to Yangjin. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
).
Book 3, Chapter 12
Quotes
“Go-saeng,” Yangjin said out loud. “A woman’s lot is to suffer.”
“Yes, go-saeng.” Kyunghee nodded, repeating the word for suffering.
All her life, Sunja had heard this sentiment from other women, that they must suffer—suffer as a girl, suffer as a wife, suffer as a mother, die suffering. Go-saeng—the word made her sick. What else was there besides this? She had suffered to create a better life for Noa, and yet it was not enough. Should she have taught her son to suffer the humiliation that she’d drunk like water? In the end, he had refused to suffer the conditions of his birth.
[…]
Noa had been a sensitive child who had believed that if he followed all the rules and was the best, then somehow the hostile world would change its mind. His death may have been her fault for having allowed him to believe in such cruel ideals.
Related Characters:
Related Themes:
Page Number and Citation:
Explanation and Analysis:
Get the entire Pachinko LitChart as a printable PDF.
Yangjin Quotes in Pachinko
The Pachinko quotes below are all either spoken by Yangjin or refer to Yangjin. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
).
Book 3, Chapter 12
Quotes
“Go-saeng,” Yangjin said out loud. “A woman’s lot is to suffer.”
“Yes, go-saeng.” Kyunghee nodded, repeating the word for suffering.
All her life, Sunja had heard this sentiment from other women, that they must suffer—suffer as a girl, suffer as a wife, suffer as a mother, die suffering. Go-saeng—the word made her sick. What else was there besides this? She had suffered to create a better life for Noa, and yet it was not enough. Should she have taught her son to suffer the humiliation that she’d drunk like water? In the end, he had refused to suffer the conditions of his birth.
[…]
Noa had been a sensitive child who had believed that if he followed all the rules and was the best, then somehow the hostile world would change its mind. His death may have been her fault for having allowed him to believe in such cruel ideals.
Related Characters:
Related Themes:
Page Number and Citation:
Explanation and Analysis:
