If I Had Your Face

“Sometimes I just can’t stop thinking about how ugly she is. I mean, why doesn’t she get surgery? Why? I really don’t understand ugly people […] Are they stupid? […] Are they perverted?”

Kyuri describes the madam of her room salon, stating that she doesn’t understand why she doesn’t get cosmetic surgery to alter her appearance. As a character, Kyuri is obsessed with people’s physical appearances, and she can’t help but judge them for it. Kyuri’s obsession, as well as Sujin and Ara’s, with their physical appearance shows how deeply ingrained the gendered Beauty Standards are within South Korean society.

“Her cousin still couldn’t feel her chin and had a hard time chewing, she said, but she had gotten a job in sales at a top-tier conglomerate.”

Sujin, like Kyuri and her friend’s cousin, has undergone a very severe cosmetic surgery in which the upper and lower jaw are shaved to create a more ideal facial shape. The surgery is dangerous and very painful. South Korean women, to fit the Beauty Standards that elevate them within the social hierarchy, choose to undergo these procedures and the pain they cause to reach a higher status.

“On their rare visits, women usually gape like fish, judging us. You can tell they are thinking, ‘I would never compromise my morals for money. You probably only do this to buy handbags.’ I’m not sure who’s worse, them or the men. Just kidding, the men are always worse.”

Among the women within South Korean society, social pressures created by the Beauty Standards and the top-down hierarchical structure foster antagonistic relationships rather than solidarity. Competition among women works as a motif in this novel that depicts the complicated relationships between women within society.

“It’s nice to finally be working at a ‘10 percent’—a salon that supposedly employs the prettiest 10 percent of girls in the industry—where the madam isn’t blatantly pushing us to have sex with clients for ‘round 2.’”

The quote illustrates the hidden truth about what happens behind closed doors in many of the South Korean room salons. There is a definitive hierarchy, even among the room salons, that uses beauty as a means of upward mobility for women.

“I wanted to reach over and shake her by the shoulders. Stop running around like a fool, I wanted to say. You have so much and you can do anything you want. I would live your life so much better than you, if I had your face.”

While this moment is only a small interaction within the novel that is not mentioned again, the use of the novel’s title If I Had Your Face clues the reader into the significance of the moment. Kyuri, who’s sense of self-worth is intertwined with her physical appearance, sees Candy, an idol who’d used her beauty to become famous and wealthy, and she can’t help but feel jealous. Despite the fact that Candy seems to be upset, Kyuri can’t bring herself to feel empathetic, instead, only viewing Candy as her competition.

“I married him because I was tired and it was already too late for me, even though I was still so young.”

Wonna, who’d married young, represents the cost of entering into a relationship of convenience. Throughout the novel, relationships formed from convenience constantly fail, leading the characters to realize that the things they’d wanted (beauty, money, simplicity, etc.) aren’t what they expected them to be.

“The hate that mothers-in-law harbor towards their daughters-in-law is built into the genes of all women in this country. The bile festers below the surface, dormant but still lurking, until the son becomes of marriageable age; the resentment at being pushed aside, the anger of becoming second in their sons’ affection.”

Wonna, who married her husband because his mother died several years ago, thinks about a different type of relationship between women: mother-in-law and daughter-in-law. Wonna comments that all women, as their sons become men, start to fill with resentment. When mothers lose their connection to their sons, and in turn, their ability for upward social mobility, their jealousy is not placed on the men themselves, but on the women who took away that intimate connection.

“The first time Ara saw my hair she gasped and she hasn’t been able to stop touching it whenever she sees me. I took it for flattery (usually people in the States would exclaim how much they envied my hair) until I saw her shaking her head sorrowfully at Sujin as she ran her fingers through it. So raw, she wrote in her small notepad.”

Miho offers a unique lens into South Korean culture that the other characters are not able to see through. Miho, having spent several years in the United States for college, has been in contact with a culture that has different standards of beauty than South Korea. This is representative through the way that Miho expects Ara to compliment her hair and her subsequent surprise when she comments on the way that it is “raw,” or unrefined. Eastern and Western Beauty Standards are juxtaposed directly in this moment.

“She accused me of feeling superior to her because I was pretty without having surgery.”

Miho and Kyuri represent the juxtaposition between natural beauty and beauty that is created through surgery. The different types of beauty hold different positions on the social hierarchy, fostering competition rather than appreciation. Kyuri, whose physical appearance is very important to her, lashes out at Miho because Miho’s physical appearance is naturally appealing.

“This is really important! I want you to marry Im Ga-Yoon’s son and introduce me to celebrities all the time.”

Relationships of convenience make up a motif that threads throughout the novel. Kyuri lends Miho a very expensive dress in the hopes of forming a mutually beneficial relationship with her; Miho, who is dating the son of a famous actress, can introduce Kyuri to celebrities and other wealthy individuals. The relationship is transactional, seemingly more of a partnership than a friendship.

“Rich people are fascinated by happiness…It’s something they find maddening.”

The novel breaks society into two pieces: those who are wealthy and those who are not. None of the four protagonists are wealthy, but they each interact with those who are in their own careers. In this quote, the distinction of wealthy people as “they” shows how deeply divided by wealth the social world is. It is also interesting to note that the quote is stated by Ruby, Miho’s friend from college who is extremely wealthy herself. Ruby does not consider herself as belonging to that social sphere, but she doesn’t belong in the other either. This moment seemingly foreshadows that something more is happening with Ruby than Miho is able to provide from her perspective.

“Hanbin did say that he thought the funding was more about publicity than about actual need, and that the Silicon Valley investors probably needed Mu-cheon’s connections more than Mu-cheon needed them.”

Relationships are often formed on a transactional basis within this novel. Here, the company would benefit from the publicity and connections that Mu-cheon can give them, and in turn, Mu-cheon will benefit from the multi-million-dollar investment in his company. The relationship formed between them isn’t traditional; it is based on satisfying personal agendas and fulfilling one’s desires.

“For all its millions of people. Korea is the size of a fishbowl and someone is always looking down on someone else. That’s just the way it is in this country, and the reason people ask a series of rapid-fire questions the minute they meet you. Which neighborhood do you live in? Where did you go to school?...They pinpoint where you are on the national scale of status, then spit you out in a heartbeat.”

The metaphor, comparing South Korean society to a fishbowl, allows for readers to understand the way that the social hierarchy functions within the text. Since there is so little room in the “bowl,” a person’s place within it must be quickly decided as to not disrupt the flow of things.

“None of the other girls at Ajax know that I used to work in Miari, and if they knew, many of them would likely never speak to me again. It’s ridiculous—we are all doing some variation of the same work […] But they’d judge me all the same. It’s basic human nature, this need to look down on someone to feel better about yourself. There is no point in getting upset about it.”

Kyuri, throughout the novel, never blames other women for their attitudes and biases. Instead, she blames human nature and the innate desire to feel superior to others. While the women in this novel see each other as competition, they don’t blame each other for their faults, only society for making them think the way that they do.

“He thinks I’m going to school to become a teacher. He is so proud of how he has changed my life, and often, his eyes water when he looks at me. He loves the story that he saved me.”

The difference between a person’s perception and reality is a major theme in this novel that affects each of the protagonists differently. For Kyuri, she attempts to alter other people’s perceptions of her in a way that is both beneficial to her and kind to them. The old man, one of her previous patrons from Miari, has invested a lot of money into helping Kyuri. While he believes that she has changed her life and is becoming a teacher, she hides the reality that she is now employed at a room salon from him to appease him.

“Even though Nami has also moved out of Miari and into a third-tier room salon, she will continue to work until either she kills herself or they throw her away like a used dishrag.”

Kyuri depicts the harsh reality of the room salons, describing the ways in which the women who work there are treated poorly and cast aside. This helps the reader to understand the reason why Kyuri is so concerned with her physical appearance, and it helps to raise the stakes for them.

“I know a girl—she was a few years older than me—who worked at Ajax but quit because her sponsor wanted her to. She got a fancy apartment and had two babies. The last I’d heard was that she lost her mind and was shipped off to the mental hospital.”

Despite getting out of the room salons, the women in this story continue to be treated as less than their male counterparts. While the men interact with these women as their “mistresses,” the women are the only ones who receive the scorn of the public, and in turn, can lose their livelihood, any status or community they originally had, and everything important to them.

“It was so small that it felt like everyone in town knew us: the Loring Center kids. Orphaned, disabled, or delinquent. Our abandonment scared people, as if it might be contagious.”

The novel depicts South Korean society as being extremely concerned with maintaining appearances. Girls from the Loring Center are Othered, and fear and bias against them creates hostility and reinforces the polarization of the society.

“Remorse, that was all I allowed myself to feel. ‘How Loring,’ they would have said if they could see me now, all the girls from the Center. ‘Stop being so Loring,’ I could hear the jeer. because secretly, to each other and to ourselves, even we used that word that way.”

The author uses a literary device called the synecdoche to depict how harmful it can be when a person is defined by only one of their traits. A synecdoche is a figure of speech in which a part is made to represent the whole. In this case, Miho explains the way that her experience living at the Loring Center became a defining factor in her life. This singular part of her life became the only thing others would see and characterize her with.

“She only liked kids who were special in some way because it made her feel good about looking after us.”

Miho and Sujin’s perception of the late Mrs. Loring differs greatly. Miho, who is a talented artist and naturally beautiful, has only fond memories with Mrs. Loring. Sujin, on the other hand, only remembers Mrs. Loring’s harshness. This moment shows that even from childhood, the social hierarchy influences the way people are treated.

“Most of the time, though, the men grew tired of it all first. And when the girls came back, they were older and usually fatter and they had to go on extreme diets and take pills and all that or the madams would shame them ceaselessly. And their hope-filled glimmers would be crushed to powder.”

Kyuri reflects on a common pattern she sees with other girls who attempt to leave the room salons. This moment showcases the severity of the gender bias within the society that the novel depicts; the men can cast aside the women when they become tired of them, and the women are shamed and forced to return to the room salons with less social capital then they had before.

“For a week I hold my breath and live as if I am swimming in a dream. At work, I am bubbly, I am witty, I am effervescent to the point of frenzy […] when I can’t keep still and bounce around, drunk out of my mind. They think I am even greater fun than usual.”

Perception and the way it differs from reality is a theme that deeply influences this novel. Kyuri, who is terrified and whose mental health is impacted, pretends to be happy and boisterous. The men perceive her as being in a good mood, assuming that something good must have happened. In reality, however, Kyuri is struggling internally and is extremely scared.

“Us girls, we have been trained for years […] So the girl gets jailed and fined for prostitution, and vilified in society as someone who does this for easy money. The girls who die in the process—the ones who are beaten to death or the ones who kill themselves—they don’t even make the news.”

Kyuri points out the hypocrisy in the way that public opinion places all blame on the room salon girls and not on the men who patronize them. This moment emphasizes the double standards set by society that allow men to do as they please, but hold women under a microscope. Women are so devalued that if they pass away, their passing isn’t noticed.