A House on the Road

“A House on the Road” features a disintegrating process of the patriarchal headship of a family, the basic pillar of Korean society, and the family members’ inner struggles in the process against the backdrop of political turmoil in the 1970s and the 1980s. The novel also features Korean women’s life that had to undergo sacrifice and men who suppressed them in a society which put great emphasis on productivity. The author insightfully describes that men were in turn suppressed by the bigger father, namely, the state, society, and custom. The characters in this novel wander in search of their own house, with a passion to be free from the fathers house.