Baek Sehee’s words made it possible to say the unsayable. In I Want to Die but I Want to Eat Tteokbokki (2018), her frank, searching account of living with depression, she wrote with a voice at once clinical and confessional.
The book, stitched together from her conversations with a psychiatrist, was translated into 25 languages, and embraced by readers who recognised themselves in its contradictions.
Sehee passed away at the age of 35. Her death was confirmed by the Korean Organ Donation Agency, which also announced that she had donated her heart, lungs, liver, and kidneys — gifts that have saved the lives of five people. The cause of death was not made public.
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Tteokbokki — the dish she helped make known across the world, is a a beloved Korean dish, made of chewy rice cakes simmered in a spicy, sweet red chili sauce, often with fish cakes, eggs, and scallions. In Baek’s telling, it became metaphor for the co-existence of despair and small comforts.
Spotlighted high-functioning depression
The memoir, a fusion of therapy, transcript and self-analysis, captured the torment of high-functioning depression, dysthymia, a condition she had lived with for over a decade. Baek explored the dissonance between how she felt and how she appeared, confronting the subtle, gnawing pain of self-doubt, social performance, and emotional numbness.
Initially self-published through a crowdfunding site, the memoir was translated into English by Anton Hur and published by Bloomsbury in 2022. Tteokbokki sold over a million copies and was translated into 25 languages. It struck a chord far beyond Korea, praised for its vulnerability and its refusal to pathologise pain. “The human heart,” Baek wrote, “even when it wants to die, quite often wants at the same time to eat some tteokbokki, too.”
The title’s reference to tteokbokki, a spicy Korean rice cake dish, symbolised the coexistence of despair and small joys. (Bloomsbury)
The book’s sequel, I Want to Die but I Still Want to Eat Tteokbokki, was published in Korean in 2019, and in English in 2024.
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The performance of living
Born in 1990, Baek studied creative writing in university before spending five years working behind the scenes in publishing. She understood the machinery of the industry, and knew exactly how to bypass it. Her writing spoke directly to a generation fluent in curated personas but starved for authenticity.
Baek often said she hoped her work could offer comfort, or at the very least, recognition. According to her sister, she wanted “to share her heart with others… and inspire hope.” She did. And she does still.
Her passing leaves a silence many readers will feel personally. But her words remain: sharp, strange, brave. A reminder that despair and delight are not opposites. That being broken doesn’t mean being unreadable.
And that sometimes, wanting to eat tteokbokki is reason enough to keep going.
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The title’s reference to tteokbokki, a spicy Korean rice cake dish, symbolised the coexistence of despair and small joys. (Bloomsbury)
