Small talk: Krys Lee

Born in Seoul, South Korea, Krys Lee was brought up in the US but also studied in England. Her first book, Drifting House, is a collection of short stories set in North Korea, South Korea and the US. Lee lives in Seoul.

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When did you know you were going to be a writer?

Since I was young – I always wrote poetry. My parents encouraged me to turn my love of writing into law but I did an English degree instead.

What books are currently on your bedside table?

Adam Johnson’s The Orphan Master’s Son; The Vintage Book of Contemporary World Poetry and The Necessary Angel by Wallace Stevens.

What book changed your life?

I often return to Shakespeare’s Hamlet, the poetry of John Ashbery and Elizabeth Bishop, Samuel Beckett’s Waiting For Godot, and the work of Chang-Rae Lee.

Where do you write best?

Outdoors, indoors, in bed, anywhere. Wherever I feel loose.

What music helps you write?

Schubert’s Death and the Maiden, Chopin’s Nocturnes, jazz, Sinead O’Connor, The Rolling Stones, Florence and the Machine.

Who would you most like to sit next to at a dinner party?

God, if he exists. I have a lot of questions for him.

What are you scared of?

Love. Loving someone is a terrifying and a wonderful experience.

When do you feel most free?

When I’m travelling in a place where no one knows me.

What is the best piece of advice a parent gave you?

They told me to read. I don’t remember much of my childhood except for a few ugly bits and all that beautiful, necessary reading.

What book do you wish you’d written?

Charles D’Ambrosio’s The Dead Fish Museum; William Trevor’s Collected Stories; Kazuo Ishiguro’s The Remains of the Day; Toni Morrison’s Beloved.

How would you earn your living if you had to give up writing?

I’d be a park ranger somewhere as wild as possible, in the US or India.

What does it mean to be a writer?

It’s the cheapest profession in the world – it only requires a pen and paper. And it is a way to communicate with an unknown world, a world that is now coming to me.

Krys Lee’s ‘Drifting House’ is published by Faber