Annarasumanara Chapter 27 Discussion

vaporlilas said:
This ending was very disappointing. It seems that you can only be a magician in between the time left between university and studying. The main character's dream wasn't strong enough to overcome society. Also, if you choose to fight for your dream and live off as a magician and accept being poor (even though magicians may build a fortune) you are suffering from psychosis. So, once again, live real life the way others want you to. :/

pometlo said:

What I took from the story is that there's need for balance: if you live only for others, you destroy yourself (the magician, heroine, weird-head guy), but if you live only for yourself, you destroy those dearest to you (heroine's parents). In the end, Ah-ee manages to compromise - and that's what adulthood seems to be about, combining the inner child with responsibilities.

pometlo said:

Btw, anyone got a theory as to why Il Deung's head looked the way it did? At first I thought it represented the guy's lack of awareness of his true self, since it turned to "normal" once he understood life isn't all about academics; however, in the final chapter, the head became weird again for a moment, specifically when Il Deung seemed to be emotionally overwhelmed. Could it perhaps be the fact that at such moments, he still views himself inaccurately (in terms of self-confidence, etc.)?

The common explanation is: the head symbolizes Il-Deung’s pride and arrogance, his “big head,” so to speak. Indeed, in Korean one of the phrases for arrogance is 목에 힘을 주다 , “to put power into one’s neck.” While it’s certainly true that Il-Deung’s family is distinguished and proud of it, I don’t think that’s the only reason for their appearance.

In most Asian cultures, there is a concept of “face” and saving face. Essentially, “face” is your honor/dignity, represented by your external image, and maintaining a positive outer image and covering up your embarrassments can be considered more important than anything, sometimes even death. I believe Il-Deung’s elongated head represents the “face” his family was endowed with, along with the pride, the conceit, the “prestigious” image, but also the stress and pressure that maintaining such an image comes with.

tane-kun said:

I'm not sure why his head became weird again. But I guess, the whole "head thing" is about pride, arrogance, and prestige. Maybe it represented a lack of awareness, as you said. However, in that case, some other characters would have a long head. (Maybe not haha.)

I've read this on a webpage:


Source

tane-kun said:

So, I think, in the last episode, his head became "weird" again for a moment; because in that moment he felt stressed and he became arrogant again. (Yeah, we can't actually say he became arrogant in that moment, but that's the point of all this symbolism, I guess)

pometlo said:


Oooh, all right, that makes sense; thank you! This makes the heads' ugliness so much better. :) According to this "pride" interpretation, they're supposed to symbolize the ideal (!) image Il-Deung's family's maintaining - and yet, when Il-Deung discovers his true and much less perfect self (and abandons the image), he instantly becomes way handsomer. I love this.