Ji-min Lee - Marilyn and Me

4th Estate

An imprint of HarperCollins Publishers

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London SE1 9GF

www.4thEstate.co.uk

This eBook first published in Great Britain by 4th Estate in 2019

Copyright © Ji-min Lee 2019

Translation copyright © Chi-Young Kim 2019

Cover design by Jo Walker

Cover art adapted from design by Joanne O’Neil. Photographs © Bettmann/Getty Images (Marilyn Monroe), MorphartCreation/Shutterstock (flower), ShutterMagician/EyeEm/Getty Images (woman)

Ji-min Lee asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work

This book is published with the support of the Literature Translation Insitute of Korea (LTI Korea)

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.

Source ISBN: 9780008322359

Ebook Edition © June 2019 ISBN: 9780008322335

Version: 2020-05-19

To my son and daughter

1 Cover

2 Title Page

3 Copyright

4 Dedication

5 Contents

6 Letter

7 A Day in the Life of Miss Alice of Seoul

8 Colonial-Style Romance at the Bando Hotel

9 Welcome to Seoul, Marilyn Monroe!

10 The Other Man

11 The Fateful Triangle

12 The Return of the First Ghost

13 A Living Ghost

14 Seoul Crybaby

15 Goodbye, Blondes!

16 Author’s Note

17 References

18 About the Author

19 About the Publisher

Landmarks CoverFrontmatterStart of ContentBackmatter

List of Pages iii iv v vi 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 3536373839404142434445 4647484950515253545556575859606162636465666768 697071727374 757677787980818283848586 87888990919293949596979899100101102103104105106107 108109110111112113114115116117118119120121122123124125126127 132133134135136137138139140141142143144145146147148149150151152153154155156157158 159160161 163164165166 168169170

Marketing Department,

Twentieth-Century Fox

To Whom It May Concern:

My name is Herbert W. Green and I am currently stationed in Korea with the 31st Regiment, 7th Infantry Division. I am very homesick; Korea is a terrible place. I do not believe I can effectively convey the sorrow and terror I’ve seen here. I worry about the children who have lost their parents and their homes; where will they sleep tonight? May the grace of God be with them, though perhaps God’s blessings are avoiding Korea for the time being.

I write to you from a hospital in Pusan. I was mistakenly hit by napalm by allied troops providing air support and lost many of my comrades in a place called Hwachon, just above the 38th Parallel. Hearing the screams of the dying made me want to die, too. Thankfully I got out of there alive and am getting better.

I am lying in bed recuperating, but the days are long and tedious. Would you be able to send me a new poster of the lovely Miss Monroe? All of us, from my fellow soldiers to the Korean errand boy, dearly love Miss Monroe. Her beautiful smile is like the warm sun and her poster by our beds melts away our worries. I don’t even go to the USO shows as I vastly prefer looking at a picture of Miss Monroe. A few days ago, all my pictures of Miss Monroe were stolen. I feel like a man stranded in a desert without water. Please consider what I’ve been through—I hope you’ll send me a poster. I heard Miss Monroe is filming a new movie. We would be thrilled if you could also enclose a few pictures. We would love for Miss Monroe to visit us here, but we know that is a long shot.

I trust that you will grant us our request. Thank you in advance. I wish you all the best.

P.S. If you see Miss Monroe please tell her that we are all rooting for her to be happy.

February 12, 1954

I go to work thinking of death.

Hardly anyone in Seoul is happy during the morning commute, but I’m certain I’m one of the most miserable. Once again, I spent all last night grappling with horrible memories—memories of death. I fought them like a girl safeguarding her purity, but it was no use. I knew I was under an old cotton blanket but I tussled with it as if it were a man or a coffin lid or heavy mounds of dirt, trusting that night would eventually end and death couldn’t be this awful. Finally, morning dawned. I looked worn out but tenacious, like a stocking hanging from my vanity. I used a liberal amount of Coty powder on my face to scare the darkness away. I put on my stockings, my dress, and my black, fingerless lace gloves. I walk down the early morning streets as the vicious February wind whips my calves. I can’t possibly look pretty, caked as I am in makeup and shivering in the cold. Enduring would be a more apt description. Those who endure have a chance at beauty. I read that sentence once in some book. I’ve been testing that theory for the last few years, although my doubts are mounting.

As always, the passengers in the streetcar glance at me, unsettled. I am Alice J. Kim—my prematurely gray hair is dyed with beer and under a purple dotted scarf, I’m wearing a black wool coat and scuffed dark blue velvet shoes, and my lace gloves are as unapproachable as a widow’s black veil at a funeral. I look like a doll discarded by a bored foreign girl. I don’t belong in this city, where the ceasefire was declared not so long ago, but at the same time I might be the most appropriate person for this place.

I get off the streetcar and walk briskly. The road to the US military base isn’t one for a peaceful, leisurely stroll. White steam plumes up beyond the squelching muddy road. Women are doing laundry for the base in oil drums cut in half, swallowing hot steam as though they are working in hell. I avoid the eyes of the begging orphans wearing discarded military uniforms they’ve shortened themselves. The abject hunger in their bright eyes makes my gut clench. I shove past the shoeshine boys who tease me, thinking I’m a working girl who services foreigners, and hurry into the base. Snow remaining on the rounded tin roof sparkles white under the clear morning sun. Warmth rolls over me as soon as I open the office door. This place is unimaginably peaceful, so different from the outside world. My black Underwood typewriter waits primly on my desk. I first put water in the coffee pot—the cup of coffee I have first thing when I get in is my breakfast. I can’t discount the possibility that I work at the military base solely for the free coffee. I see new documents I’ll have to translate into English and into Korean. These are simple, not very important matters that can be handled by my English skills. First, I have to notify the Korean public security bureau that the US military will be participating in the Arbor Day events. Then I have to compose in English the plans for the baseball game between the two countries to celebrate the American Independence Day. My work basically consists of compiling useless information for the sake of binational amity.