Caveat: 9 Months Cancer Free

Today is the three-quarters-of-a-year-iversary of my surgery. I know that I "beat the odds" in that I have a mostly normal life: I can talk, I kept my job, etc. I have to remind myself of that when I feel so miserable and depressed, as I have, lately.


I ran across a quote from Shakespeare's Macbeth in a very unexpected place: on page 921 of my Practical Dictionary of Korean-English Buddhist Terms.

Under the term 인생 (人生 [insaeng] = life), the dictionary says:

무엇이 인생? 사전에는 "목숨을 가진 사람의 존재"라 쓰여 있다. 영국의 문호 셰익스피어의 인생관을 들어보는 것도 나쁘지 않을 것 같다.

인생이란 어설픈 형상 없는 그림자
뽐내고 안달하다 곧 사라지는
한낱 가설무대 위의 광대.
– 셰익스피어, "맥베스", 5막 5장 –

Then, the reference book being a bilingual glossary, a translation into English is provided.

Life: What is life? Let's see what Shakespeare says:

Life's but a walking shadow; a poor player,
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage,
And then heard no more.
– Shakespeare, Macbeth, V, v –

Note that the translation provided does not translate the introductory phrasing word-for-word – the Korean slightly more detailed, saying something to effect that "the dictionary says 'life' is 'existence of people who have breath of life' but England's great writer Shakespeare's summary is not bad."

I have run across other very interesting tidbits of humor and erudition in this book. I'm glad that I bought it. I'm so strange, my favorite books have always been reference books.

[daily log: walking, 5 km]

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