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  IDEAS & IDEALS

Retirement With English

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     I am a very lucky man in that I took a liking to English early in my life, did it fairly well through my school days, majored in it at college, got a job of teaching it, and retired as of the end of February, 2006 after teaching it for more than thirty years. To my great relief and happiness, English has been steadily, nay increasingly popular with students in my country during that long period of time, and as a professor of English I have never worried about the number of enrollment in my classes every semester. I thank English for its enduring popularity and the service it has done to me until now.
    
     The lot of other foreign language teachers have not been as fortunate as mine. The fortune of German and French in Korea, for example, has not been so smooth as English, and that of of the teachers consequently. When I was a high school student, French or German was equally or even more popular with some good students, and I myself had once seriously considered German as my major at college. Luckily, however, I dropped the consideration at the last moment. German and French have met a sad fate of decline and fall, while Japanese and Chinese, once so neglected and even hated, are gaining new force recently among the students.

     As so many wise philosophers in the past have said, and as we see in the vicissitudes of the other foreign languages in the recent history of Korea, everything changes, and has its ups and downs, but English seems to have successfully defied even this law of nature and stood above or beyond it. What perplexes me still more is the fact that there are no signs or symptoms to be found anywhere yet that foretell the waning or weakening of its influence and power. I wonder at its permanence and resilience.

     It is a mystery indeed, I think, that English, among so many foreign languages on the earth, has taken such a unique position and role in our life and world. We cannot deny the fact that it is the language of the most powerful country in the world with whom we have kept close political, economic, military and cultural ties since the end of World War II and the Korean War; but it’s not necessarily for those reasons only. Like it or not, English has become the first language in the world. Without question it is the principal language of business and diplomacy today. No doubt it is the international argot of all sea captains and airline pilots. It is the first language of sports and science, too. Needless to say, it is the language of computer software and hard rock, and what not. So, why not other European language, such as French, German or Spanish?

     Definitely, there is something in it that makes us love it, or at least use it more than any other language. One of the many linguistic elements that make English so universal lies, I think, in its duality: its easiness and its difficulty. My long experience of it tells me that English is the easiest language to speak badly, but most difficult one to speak well. English is an exquisitely subtle and endlessly flexible tongue. It is crammed with idioms and slangs. It is vastly hospitable to new words and fresh cultures. Kimchi is included in it, but not in German or in French. It is as earthy as it is elegant, as randy as it is fastidious. However, the undeniable fact that we speak in broken English or in "Konglish" so often and so well testifies that anyone can jump into it with little difficulty or hesitation. I wonder if we can have the same ease or temerity with German or French.

     Quite naturally, like many other retirees, I feel sorrow at leaving the routine of work and the accustomed position to which I have attached myself so long and so fast. And I feel somewhat uneasy and uncertain about what to do with my time, freedom and the knowledge of English I have accumulated hitherto. I don't have any  place where I can use my hard-earned English, nor will anyone need it from me any more. From now on my memory will deteriorate slowly but steadily from disuse, and I am afraid I will forget all the English words, phrases, and idioms I have memorized with so much energy and diligence until now. And finally there will be nothing left in me anything like English at all.

     It is less than a month since I have retired. To my great relief and happiness, however, I find most of my worrisome predictions have proved to be utterly wrong and ungrounded. More than anything else, there is no sign anywhere of my English leaving me. Every week Time, Newsweek and The New York Times Book Review and every month National Geographic and Readers' Digest pile up on my desk, and they keep me busy and company as before, and each time I consult a dictionary for the words that I had once remembered but forgotten, I do not lament or curse my failing memory. Instead, I thank God for granting me the most effective cure for the worst and the commonest disease affecting the aged people: forgetfulness.

     No one would believe me if I said that I came to appreciate English far more in retirement. But believe me or not, I am honest and sincere in my statement. Since I am now retired, English has lost much of its practical use and need for me. Now it exists mostly for my personal satisfaction and pleasure, and all I ask and want for is the great works of English literature on my bookshelf. Although I have lost my proud title, my luxurious office and a good source of income, and now I am mostly confined to a narrow room in my apartment, yet I feel so much freer, richer and even prouder than I ever was, simply because with my English I can be in the company of Shakespeare, Milton and Wordsworth - the greatest and the noblest souls mankind has ever produced.
                                                                             (March 25, 2006)

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