I wrote that he did.

Author Kim Ae-ran · Publisher Munhakdongne · Published 2026-08-24 · ISBN 9791141618575

About the Book

Once, in an essay, I asked, “What does time look like?”
That was a sentence I wrote over ten years ago.
At the time, in my thirties, I wrote down my own answer.
It was a sentence closer to an image, an imagination, rather than a definitive answer.

Much time has passed since then.
Life still approaches me with many faces, asking the same question.
I share the lingering impressions of those faces with you.
Something that is both an afterimage and a mark, a trace.

Within it, of course, there are smiling or surprised faces, shadowed or frowning faces.
I have roughly divided these into three parts and included them in this book.
Part 1 gathers writings that contrast a human being gradually losing memory and words with a program whose language abilities develop day by day.
These were written a few years ago, and with the rapid pace of technological change today, I’m not sure how they will be received.
I look with concern at the net, full of holes made of metaphors and similes, but I decide not to mend all the holes with logic and defense to turn it into a curtain.

I imagine you, who have simply grown a little older than before, and after repeated meetings and partings,
have suddenly become quieter and your eyes have deepened.

What form will the time we face in the future take?
I don’t know yet, but if I can cross that time with you, with human sentences, I would be overjoyed.

Midsummer 2026
Kim Ae-ran


From the book

For a long time, I am myself, then myself again, fully myself, or I thought I was myself, then I dream ‘a dream of not becoming myself.’ This is true both as a natural person and as a creator. How reassuring it is not to have to become my ‘true’ self. How liberating.
---p.20 from 「A Dream of Not Becoming Myself」

The mind that conceals instead of revealing everything and confessing everything. And the mind that notices and understands this. These days, I often think about such a mind in front of AI. Perhaps literature, contrary to AI, is a genre that has confessed its own ignorance in very long and diverse ways.
---p.36 from 「Three Lights」

However, I think I now understand a little why certain kinds of stories, which I previously considered cliché, have been repeated for so long throughout human history. Because in life, everyone experiences moments when all the lights around them suddenly go out. And sometimes, we illuminate what’s before us with the light saved in our souls, with an inheritance we didn't even know we received.
---pp.54-55 from 「In a Prose-like World」

I will strive to continue to carefully observe the world through the eyes of a human who understands the human heart joking in the face of certain worries and fears, and the human mind speaking sincerely, and to keep writing awkward and error-prone sentences.
---p.93 from 「Undying Flower」

In my first year of middle school, I once told scary stories to my classmates in the classroom during self-study late at night. It was a story about a ‘headless face ghost’ I had read in some horror novel collection at the time. That day, feeling the energy of concentration filling the classroom, I controlled the pacing of the story, and at its climax, I finally made my friends scream in unison. I still remember the thrill, the sense of power. The feeling that ‘the pleasure of listening’ and ‘the pleasure of speaking’ coincided. I, too, was willingly swayed by the power of the story, and felt the impulse to use that power.
---p.99 from 「My Ghostly Literary Wanderings」

Like any other creator, an author also has a 'creator self' and an 'everyday self,' and generally lives by blending the two appropriately, but when I write, I occasionally feel elevated to a truthful, pure state, unrelated to art or everyday life. I encounter a sense of exaltation that, while not making me great, makes me clear, and a feeling of being the subject. And perhaps it is precisely because of such moments that many creators are so engrossed in work that does not make economic sense for the time invested.
---p.131 from 「Beauty Grows」

I also try not to judge a person entirely by a single word they utter. Sometimes, what a person says and who they are have little to do with each other.
---p.135 from 「Words That Don't Disappear」

Humans are generally cliché and obvious, but upon closer inspection, they are wonderfully diverse in their clichés and uniquely obvious. We must understand and examine how our lives and labor, our loves and daily routines, are made up of astonishing concrete details.
---p.139 from 「I Wrote That」

If life after adulthood means getting used to emptiness or ennui, then I gained the skill or tool to manage that through literature. And I am relieved that I can accomplish that increasingly without any illusions or worship of literature.
---p.142 from 「I Wrote That」

The many conversations we shared—discussions and arguments, reconciliations, jokes hiding anxiety—still feel precious not because they were necessarily ideal conversations, but because, despite being rough and imperfect, they were conversations where we didn't give up on each other.
---p.148 from 「Lending Each Other a Hand」

I've learned that dreams don't have a single right answer, and that life approaches us with many faces. And also that a person's worth isn't measured by the achievements of a single period, but includes all their contradictions and flaws, failures and wanderings throughout their entire life.
---p.149 from 「Lending Each Other a Hand」

These days, disillusioned with others, tired of others, yet missing others. Meeting someone after a long time and feeling an empty "was that all there was to it?", then getting back on my feet thanks to others, and learning from others every day.
---p.179 from 「Corona Theater Play」

Perhaps when someone makes a wish, what they believe in is not the sun or the moon, or even God, but 'life' itself. In fact, among the wishes posted on the National Science Museum Gwacheon channel, the most impressive was not a request like "Please make good things happen" or "Please prevent bad things," but the sentence, "Please help me overcome difficulties."
---pp.189-190 from 「The End is Light and Transparent」

But isn't it strange? We can never see our own faces unless we stand in front of a mirror, yet why do I feel like I clearly saw my face, many times, back then?
---pp.199-200 from 「Real as Fake, Fake as Real」

Table of Contents

Part 1: Human Faces

A Dream of Not Becoming Myself … 009
Three Lights … 022<
In a Prose-like World … 038
An Empty Seat … 057
(Appendix) Undying Flower – Acceptance Speech for the Choi In-ho Youth Culture Award … 086

Part 2: Faces of Story

My Ghostly Literary Wanderings … 097
What is a Climax … 110
Humans are Such Beings … 120
Some Books Are … 123
Beauty Grows … 126
Words That Don't Disappear … 133
I Wrote That … 138
(Appendix) Lending Each Other a Hand – Congratulatory Speech for the 30th Anniversary of Korea National University of Arts, School of Drama … 144

Part 3: Faces of Everyday Life

Everyone's Seven Years … 155
Sharing Breath … 162
Corona Theater Play … 171
The End is Light and Transparent … 180
New Footprints, Life's Footprints … 192
Real as Fake, Fake as Real … 198
(Appendix) Let's Go Out and Play Again – Congratulatory Speech for the 100th Anniversary of Daesan Elementary School … 208