Read, read and read, inspired by real stories that bring us closer to the fascinating universe of emotional relationships between animals and us. Just a few days ago, a good colleague gave me the graphic novel Dogs, by Keum Suk Gendry-Kim. Editorial novelty, just released in Spanish.
Dear friends of these pages of ‘Peludos’, do not miss this comic with an intimate tone that works as a true battery of revelations about the essence of families, and that openly presents us with the imperative need to create emotional and meaningful bonds. International media such as the New York Times Book Review have praised this work.
So that you can understand what the approach of this graphic novel is, imagine that at the epicenter of this story you see a woman who never considered bringing a dog into her own house. At this point, her husband, deeply saddened by the death of her grandmother, with whom they shared a very close relationship since he was a child, insists and insists, until he manages to bring a dog into their lives. her.
And that will be precisely the decisive first step to generate a radical change in the life of that family unit without children, to such an extent that they will end up moving to the countryside, just an hour from Seoul. Furthermore, in a matter of very little time, they will decide to adopt a second dog.
The work is truly delicious, the narrative unfolds in an organic and real way, involving the reader at all levels. In each of their desired daily walks, the protagonists of the story come across various people and dogs of all kinds, some of them stray and abandoned, others mistreated by their savage owners, and some even locked in suffocating cages, waiting for be slaughtered and even stewed.
The author of this emotional story, Keum Suk Gendry-Kim, is inspired by her own life experience to be able to relate, with an amazing evocative power, the terrible degree of violence that is inherent in so many people. And it is at this point that the writer makes us feel what the urgent human need to build bonds on an emotional, sentimental level consists of.
To place ourselves in the specific context in which the work germinates, Keum Suk Gendry-Kim was born in Goheung, a province of South Korea. I strongly advise you to enjoy the author’s fantastic illustrations, since she has been able to capture her dogs as if they were alive, as if they appeared before us “here and now.”
In fact, both Carrot, Potato and Choco manage to detonate flashes of truth to the bottom of our hearts, showing us the immense love and tenderness that animals awaken in us.
This is by no means a naïve, sugar-coated story about what it means to have a pet at home and enjoy it. In reality, we are faced with a story that plunges us headlong into emotions that perhaps we had forgotten, into those invisible but powerful ties that reconcile us with beauty and goodness.
Apparently, the Korean author created this graphic novel absolutely faithful to her personal experiences with her three adopted dogs. When they adopted the first one, Carrot, they discovered that he was highly sensitive to any type of sounds, and that was why they decided to move to the outskirts, to the countryside, so that their puppy would have a better chance of being happy.
The writer wanted to make public that she is increasingly interested in exploring the shadowy corners of the human soul. That’s why she shares stories like this one, so absolutely real and concrete, painful and sad, but also hopeful.
Keum Suk Gendry-Kim works from home and is literally with his dogs 24 hours a day. He tells us that he has learned to communicate with them, to understand their body language, every nuance of their looks, the meanings of their tail movements. And she is fully convinced that it is through all of this that they manage to convey to us what they think and feel.
Recently the Korean Government has approved the ban on the consumption of dog meat, a custom that dates back to no less than 600 years BC in China.
Despite the strength of tradition, right now about twenty-five percent of the Korean population is already sharing their lives with animals. It is evident that the perception towards dogs has changed radically, especially among the younger generations. It should be noted that the birth rate in Korea is the lowest among advanced countries, and that Koreans are choosing to adopt dogs rather than have children.
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