The Silent House ?? ?? ?
A Korean Graded Reader for Upper-Beginners (A2) · Sophora Books Korean Classic Reader
Read a Korean literary classic — entirely in Korean, at your level.
Seoul, 2026. Behind the high walls of a Pyeongchang-dong mansion, twenty CCTV cameras watch day and night. In the basement sits Dong-sul, the night security guard — a man who cannot speak and cannot hear, but sees more than anyone. For ten years, nothing in this house has escaped his eyes.
Then Su-yeon, the family's gentle new bride, comes to live in the house. On his silent screens, Dong-sul begins to witness what everyone else refuses to see. And one autumn night, when the house catches fire, the only person who can save the family is the one they threw away.
The Silent House is a modern retelling of ??? ??? (Samnyong the Mute, 1925) by Na Do-hyang, one of the finest short stories in modern Korean literature — rewritten so that an A2 learner can read all 130 pages from beginning to end, without a dictionary.
Why this book is different
Most graded readers simplify a story. This one teaches through it.
Every time Dong-sul looks at the security monitors, the text turns to italics and the tense shifts from past to present — because what happens on a screen is happening now. By the final page you will have read hundreds of past-present pairs (????? / ????), always side by side, always for a reason you can see. You will also hear Korean speech levels the way Koreans do: the gentle wife who says "?? ?," the heir who says "?," the chairman who is warm to one person and formal to the world. In this house, how someone speaks is who they are.
Who this book is for
Upper-beginner learners (A2 / TOPIK I). Teens, young adults, and adults. Anyone who wants to read real Korean literature instead of textbook dialogues.
What's inside
The Story — Prologue, eight chapters (?? ?? ? · ??? · ? ?? · 3? ?? · ?? · ?? · ?? ? · ?), and an Epilogue. Each chapter is divided into eight short sections — one comfortable sitting each.
Before You Read — Introduction, Adaptation Notes (what changed between 1925 and 2026, and why), Characters, and How to Read This Book.
Appendix — The Two Tenses of This Book, Key Grammar Patterns, The Voices of the House, Culture Notes, About the Original, and After You Read (Check Your Reading with answers, plus open-ended questions to sit with).
Key words and footnotes appear on every page, so you never need to leave the story.
Free audiobook included. Scan the QR code inside the book, or visit sophorabooks.com. Read and listen together to build pronunciation and fluency at the same time — and in this book, listening means something more: this is a story about listening.
A note for readers: like its 1925 original, this story deals with serious themes, including domestic violence. They are handled indirectly, without graphic detail — and the story ends in hope.
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