Fantastica

In “The Neverending Story,” a fantasy novel by acclaimed German writer Michael Ende, Carl Conrad Coreander, an owner of a used bookstore, hands out the book by the same title to Bastian Balthazar Bux, the hero of the novel. Bastian, a boy whose life was uneventful, reads the book by chance and ventures his way into it to save the the land of Fantastica. Later, the boy returns to reality and musters the courage to lead his life based on the confidence he gained from his journey.

At this juncture, what kind of person do you think Carl would be, who gave the book to Bastian? Ralf Isau, a writer of“The Museum of Stolen Memories,”whose talent was discovered by Ende, says that Carl was a coward and indecisive.

“The Museum of Stolen Memories”centered on Carl’s adventure and explains how he took over the bookshop from Thaddäus Tillmann Trutz. Expectedly, the “museum of stolen memories” is a place where fantasies and stories are clandestinely played out deep inside the bookstore. The nearly 600-page book does anything but bore readers with its amazing stories of adventure.

Carl, a 24-year-old history major expelled from his university for upsetting professors with uneasy questions, started to work for Trutz’s used bookstore in pursuit of his dream to live surrounded by books. However, Trutz suddenly disappears, and while looking for him, Carl comes across a dwarf called Alphabetagamma inside the shop. Alphabetagamma tells Carl that the bookstore is in fact the library of fantasies and that Trutz had him in mind as a new director of the library.

The library was in danger. Books vanished, and “nought” filled their space. With the disappearance of books, the library was fated to collapse, jeopardizing Fantastica. Carl hesitates to jump in to save the world. However, he finally enters Fantastica in an attempt to find Trutz and take the library.

Why is it that in reality, there isn’t a hero like the one saving the fantasy world and why is Carl a hero? Isau explains that Carl is imaginative and compassionate, and above all, he likes reading as a source of imagination.

In this book, the five-faced monster threatening Fantastica tries to spread “nought” instead of evil. While good and evil repeat creation and destruction, renewing lives, “nought” is literally nothing with no respect for diversity. If Fantastica is full of nought, the reality, mirroring the fantasy world, would be desolate, too.

To sum up, “Museum of Stolen Memories” describes to us how Ende’s “Neverending Story” ends up in the hands of Bastian, the true reader of the book.

However, readers can enjoy this book even if they are unfamiliar with Ende’s story. By guiding boys and girls to the world of fantasies, “Museum of Stolen Memories” gives hope to them to become heroes who can indeed save the world.

kjk9@donga.com