[_list: Books from Korea] Vol.20 Summer 2013

Foreword

Science Fiction in Korea New kinds of novels are emerging in Korea amid a deep-seated tradition and history that has strongly favored literary novels based on realism. These works are hybrids of genres—almost mutants—and resist being grasped by the familiar perspective and language of realism. In other words, so-called genre literature, such as science fiction, fantasy, Chinese martial arts literature, detective novels, and others, are emerging as a new force in the literary scene going head and head with traditional realism. Additionally, the tendency to blur the division between realistic literature and genre literature has grown stronger. Moreover, the number of works that are comparable in quality to mainstream realistic novels continue to increase. The fact that science fiction has become prominent among the genres employed in these hybrid novels deserves special attention.

Generally, the term science fiction refers to a literary genre that reveals a vision of another world through an estrangement from the current world, based on scientific imagination, method, and vision, and that takes a new approach to the criticism and satire of the current reality. Thus far in the history of Korean literature, the space occupied by science fiction has been marginal at best. Be that as it may, it does not mean that Korean science fiction has been irrelevant or absent. In 1907, during the early stages of modern literature in Korea, a group of reformists who had formerly studied abroad in Japan translated Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea, a science fiction novel by Jules Verne.

Although science fiction in Korea had started only as reformist literature, as a part of the greater project of modernizing the nation, interest in science fiction among Koreans did not arrive too late at all.

The works of science fiction, both translations and original works that were published during the colonial period, symbolized the characteristics of modernity in Korea; it was a transplanted modernity. After liberation and the civil war, science fiction in Korea was shaped by the fear of nuclear annihilation during the Cold War and genuine curiosity about technology and civilization.

However, many of these works were frequently children's books. In 1966, Moon Yun-seong wrote the science fiction novel Perfect Society. This work depicts the adventure of a man whose time travel brings him to a utopian society in the future where all inhabitants are women. The world described in Perfect Society is occupied only by androgynous women, and the inhabitants barely need to work. Moreover, all diseases have been cured, and health is maintained by the combination of medical science and a maintenance regimen that are taken from the best of Western and Eastern knowledge; it is indeed a “perfect society.”

The description of the technologically advanced future is both impressive and abundant in detail.

The wave of original creative work arrived in Korea around 1990. The alternate history novel In Search of an Epitaph (1987) by Bok Koh-ill surpasses, in literary achievement, The Man in the High Castle (1962) by Philip K. Dick, a masterpiece of the genre. Bok’s novel asks the question of "what-if," given a hypothetical situation where Japan is not defeated in the Second World War and, thus, Korea continues to be its colony. In Search of an Epitaph is an exemplary Korean sci-fi novel, with extraordinary insights into modern Korea where the vestiges of colonization are still present, even years after liberation. The 1990s saw an increase in the number of writers and works of both translations and original works of science fiction.

This increase was in large part due to the proliferation of online bulletin board system communities, which were centered around common interests in subcultures in Korea. A similar trend has been continuing in the new millennia as well. The new generation of writers, born in the 1970s and raised on children's book versions of Western science fiction, are actively producing works crossing the boundaries and the hierarchies of genres—realism, fantasy, and others. Science fiction has come to be the future of Korean literature.

The summer issue of list contains a special feature with an overview of and an analysis on the state of science fiction in Korea, the future of Korean literature, and the future literature of Korea, by respectively examining the history of Korean science fiction: the exemplary authors and works in different periods, defining authors and works from the 1990s and the 2000s, and science fiction children's books. I sincerely hope that readers outside of Korea have the pleasure of encountering the unique and alien imagination of Korean literature through the unfamiliar worlds created by Korean science fiction.

by Bok Dohoon

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Contents Summer 2013 Vol. 20

Theme Lounge

38 The Twilight Years

The Elderly in Literature: Towards a New Literary Possibility

Reviews

42 Fiction

34

Moonlight Tales Pristine Home 1987 Sunday Philosophy Dialogue of the Forest Pretending Not to Know Oksu-dong Tigers

61 Nonfiction Fashion Is Passion

Eat! Seoul Korean Linguistic Culture Universal Love and Equality Math Odyssey Things That Disappear The Hitchhiker’s Philosophical Journey Robot da Vinci, Designing a Dream The House with a Heart Learning Man On Death

01 04 05 06 08

Foreword Trade Report News from LTI Korea Bestsellers Publishing Trends

Special Section

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Chronicling Korean Science Fiction Postcoloniality and Imagining the Post-human: Bok Koh-ill’s In Search of an Epitaph and Djuna’s The Pacific Continental Express Descartes’s Descendants: The Novels of Bae Myung-hoon and Kim Bo-young Children’s Science Fiction

68 Children’s Books Teru Teru

Princess Pyeong-gang and On-dal the Fool Bicycle: Laufmaschine or Velocipede My Name Is Gugu Sneakers I’m Going To Be Sensitive, Too The Game King Endless Rain

Interviews

Spotlight on Fiction

Korean Science Fiction

22 Literary Critic Kim Uchang 28 Writer Choi Suchol

Excerpts

45 “Bodies” by Pyun Hye-young

Steady Sellers

26 Landscape and Mind by Kim Uchang 32 Bed by Choi Suchol

59 A Stranger’s Room by Choi In-ho 73 Children of Gwaengiburimal by Kim Jung-mi

The Place

34 The Story of Namsan, Gyeongju

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Poetry

67 "Flower" by Kim Chun-soo

Vol.20 Summer 2013 A Quarterly Magazine for Publishers

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Meets Dennis Maloney, Editor/Publisher of White Pine Press

Book Lover’s Angle

77 My Favorite Korean Children’s Book

Overseas Angle

78 The Užupis Republic

and the Place of Korean Literature in Lithuania

New Books

80 Recommended by Publishers

Meet the Publishers

84 Little Mountain Publishing Co. 86 Afterword Encountering Korean Literature:

Kim Seong-Kon

EDITORIAL DIRECTOR

Kim Yoon-jin

MANAGING DIRECTOR

Jung Jin Kwon

EDITORIAL BOARD

Bok Dohoon Literary Critic Kang Yu-jung Critic Kim Ji-eun Children's Book Critic Kim Mansu Professor, Inha University Pyo Jeonghun Book Columnist

OVERSEAS EDITORIAL ADVISORS

Choi Kyeonghee University of Chicago Bruce Fulton University of British Columbia Christopher P. Hanscom UCLA Theodore Hughes Columbia University Kim Yung-hee University of Hawai'i David McCann Harvard University Michael J. Pettid SUNY-Binghamton University Janet Poole University of Toronto Dafna Zur Stanford University

DOMESTIC EDITORIAL ADVISORS

Brother Anthony Sogang University Steven D. Capener Seoul Women's University Horace J. Hodges Ewha Womans University Charles Montgomery Dongguk University Emanuel Pastreich Kyung Hee University

EDITOR-IN-CHIEF

Kim Sun-hye

MANAGING EDITORS

Cha Youngju Lee Chae Eun

EDITORS

Krys Lee Kim Stoker

ART DIRECTOR

Choi Woonglim

DESIGNERS

Jang Hyeju Kim Mijin

PHOTOGRAPHER

Lee Kwa-yong

PRINTED BY

Sinsago Hi-tech

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Special Interview

74 Korean Literature as the Next Wave?

LTI Korea President Kim Seong-Kon

PUBLISHER

A Personal Journey

87 Contributors 88 Featured Authors 91 Index

Date of Publication May 28, 2013 list_ Books from Korea is a quarterly magazine published by the Literature Translation Institute of Korea.

All correspondence should be addressed to the Literature Translation Institute of Korea 112 Gil-32, Yeongdong-daero (Samseong-dong) Gangnam-gu, Seoul, 135-873, Korea Telephone: 82-2-6919-7714 Fax: 82-2-3448-4247 E-mail: list_korea@klti.or.kr www.klti.or.kr www.list.or.kr Copyright © 2013 by the Literature Translation Institute of Korea ISSN 2005-2790 Cover art © Lee Jin-joon Artificial Garden (2011), video installation, LED, air conditioner & fan sound, temperature (18-20 degrees centigrade), grass, soil, polycarbonates

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Trade Report

Korean Style Captivating Asia

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3 1. Encyclopedia of Pregnancy,

Birth, and Parenting

Editoral Dept., Woonjin ThinkBig Co., Ltd. 2012, 576p, ISBN 9788901152530

2. My First Homemade Kimchi Lee Ha-yeun, Woongjin ThinkBig Co., Ltd. 2011, 207p, ISBN 9788901131559 3. Hongdae Style Kim Ae-jin, Woongjin ThinkBig Co., Ltd. 2012, 340p, ISBN 9788901151946

The popularity of Korean nonfiction titles offering up various kinds of tips shows no sign of abating throughout Asia, including China and Japan. The Korean nonfiction boom ranges from childrearing to food and health, to beauty, travel, and lifestyle.

The Encyclopedia of Pregnancy, Birth, and Parenting, offering accesibility and wellorganized contents that is attracting the attention of mothers, is a case in point.

Its Korean publisher recently sold rights to BeiJing XueShiShengYi & Culture Development Co., Ltd. The breakthrough came as a growing number of Chinese mothers are paying more attention to information on hea lthy pregnancies, prenatal education, and child-rearing techniques aimed at raising a smart child.

The Korean book is widely known as the essential guidebook among Korean mothers, and the publisher is pinning high hopes on sales in China.

The master kimchi maker Lee Hayeon was nominated as New Knowledge Worker of Korea (NKWK) in 2010. And her book My First Homemade Kimchi was sold to China's Henan Science and Technology Press. The title introduced

detailed techniques of how to make various kinds of Korean kimchi such cubed radish k imchi, pony-tail k imchi, and water cabbage kimchi. The book is expected to spread the traditional Korean kimchi in China.

Hongdae Style is a travel guide book introducing the undisputed hot spot in Seoul for young Koreans. Rights to the book were sold to Trendy, a Taiwanese publisher affiliated with Cite Publishing Holding Group. The guidebook provides not only information on various festivals and marketplaces in and around Hongik University, but also other alluring details about diverse lectures and unique shops that define the hip district.

Meanwhile, fashion apparel president Kim Song-ha, who made her name on TV programs such as tvN’s “Martian Virus,” is generating great buzz in Japan following the publication of her book Kim Song-ha’s Beauty Story, a collection of tips on beauty and body care. The Japanese version was published by Softbank Creative in 2013.

by Richard Hong

English Rights Sold for Shin Kyung-sook's I’ll Be Right There The rights for I’ ll Be Right There by Shin Kyung-sook, a bestselling The New York Times author and the author of Please Look After Mom, have been sold to Other Press, an independent publisher of literary fiction and nonfiction in the U.S., in March 2013. It will be published in April 2014. So far, I’ ll Be Right There has also sold rights to Italy, Spain, Norway, Israel, Poland, China, and Vietnam. In 2012 it was selected as a Best Book of the Winter in Poland and in 2011 it also received the 21st Century Annual Best Foreign Novel Award in China. The overseas rights for Shin’s Please Look After Mom, have been sold to 33 countries.

Meanwhile, French publisher Editions Philippe Picquier recently bought the rights for Kim Yeon-su’s recent novel If the Waves Belong to the Sea. This is the 4 list_ Books from Korea

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first step abroad for Kim’s novel. Also, Jeong You-jeong’s Seven Years of Darkness and Gong Ji-young’s The Crucible have been sold to China. The rights for Seven Years of Darkness have already been sold to Germany and Thailand, and The Crucible has also sold rights to Japan, Taiwan, and Vietnam. Leadership of Loneliness by seasoned journalist Chun Youngsik, which portrays 60 years of Korea’s first female president Park Geun-hye’s life, will be published in China. SBS Running Man (Vol. 1), an educational comic book which uses characters from the famous TV variety show as its protagonists, was sold to a publisher in Indonesia. The comic book is also in the process of being sold to a Taiwanese publisher.

by Joseph Lee

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I'll Be Right There Shin Kyung-sook Munhakdongne Publishing Corp.

2010, 400p, ISBN 9788954611275

2. If the Waves Belong to the Sea Kim Yeon-su, Jaeum & Moeum Publishing Co., Ltd. 2012, 328p, ISBN 9788954428224

News from LTI Korea

LTI Korea Joins AAS Book Fair LTI Korea took part in the Association of Asian Studies (A AS) annual conference, the largest academic body in North America focused on Asian Studies. It was held from March 21st through the 24th. AAS included a research conference and a book exhibition on Asia. LTI Korea set up its own booth for the book fair, featuring 45 titles that had been published through the institute’s initiative and support. In addition, LTI Korea President Kim Seong-Kon hosted a reception in which partner publishers, translators, and scholars gathered and agreed to cooperate further in the promotion and publication of Korean literature overseas.

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LTI Korea Participates in the 50th Bologna Children’s Book Fair

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LTI Korea joined the 2013 Bologna Children’s Book Fair held from March 25th through the 28th in Italy. At the 50th annual book fair, LTI Korea had its own booth, attracting a number of foreign publishers and professionals in the industry. The booth’s theme was “Korean Style: Korean Picture Book Illustration Techniques.” Four illustration techniques were introduced to visitors: typography; spatial brushing; stamping and printing; and assemblage and collage. Picture books showcasing the four techniques were also on display. Two of Korea’s pioneering illustrators, Park Yeon-cheol and Yoo Juyeon, offered detailed, in-person information about their techniques, helping visitors experiment for themselves. In addition, LTI Korea held video and display events promoting 13 young Korean illustrators and their works.

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LTI Korea Joins the 2013 London Book Fair, Holds Korean Literature Events LTI Korea took part in the 2013 London Book Fair held from April 15th to the 17th at Earls Court. The LTI Korea booth featured 47 titles of Korean literature which have been translated into various languages, as well as books by celebrated Korean writers Jung Young Moon and Ch’oe Yun. LTI Korea also coordinated business meetings with publishers interested in publishing Korean titles in English-speaking countries. Meanwhile, novelists Jung and Ch’oe participated in the Korean Literature Seminar held at the exhibition venue and the event "An Evening of Korean Literature" organized by the Korean Cultural Center based in the U.K. They also attended the Korean Literature Reading session at the University of Sheffield, and interacted with British readers. As South Korea has been designated as the Market Focus country for the 2014 London Book Fair, LTI Korea plans to promote Korean books more actively next year.

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5 Bologna Children's Book Fair 1. works by 13 young Korean illustrators 2. spatial brushing technique event London Book Fair 3. a reading by Jung Young Moon 4. Korean literature readings 5. Korean literature seminar

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Bestsellers

What We’re Reading

"The Future of Silence" (2013 Yi Sang Literary Award Anthology)

Toe Ma Rok: The Records of Exorcism - Sidequel

Fiction Hesperus Hwang Sok-yong, Munhakdongne Publishing Corp.

2008, 287p, ISBN 9788954606417 A boy’s coming of age bespeaks of a nostalgic past.

Writer Hwang’s autobiographical experiences are reflected in this work. The youth’s roving is beautiful because it is the manifestation of a pure yearning for truth rather than mundane, conventional desires.

The protagonist’s wanderings in Hesperus reflect this.

Only Love Song Sok-ze, Human & Books 2012, 300p, ISBN 9788960781542

Song Sok-ze’s first romance novel is a true romance about the one and only love. Song’s novels present a world of laughter filled with humor, wit, and pathos.

Usually his love stories are more like exaggerated rumors rather than serious tales of affection. Not this time. Take a peek at a pure world where love is salvation.

The Sound of the Shallow Water Hwang Sok-yong, Jaeum & Moeum Publishing Co. 2012, 496p, ISBN 9788954428361

Hwang Sok-yong, renowned for his spirited narration and wit, presents us with a new novel.

Published on the 50th anniversary of his literary career, The Sound of the Shallow Water portrays the life of 19th century Korean storyteller Lee Shin-tong during a time of new culture and foreign influence.

This fictitious reinterpretation of a tumultuous time is also a reflection of a master of Korean literature.

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The Humanities, Starting Now

Nonfiction "The Future of Silence" (2013 Yi Sang Literary Award Anthology) Kim Ae-ran et al, Munhaksasang Co., Ltd. 2012, 352p, ISBN 9788970128849

The 37th Yi Sang Literary Award Anthology. The Yi Sang Literary Award offers an opportunity to get a full look at the trends of Korean short stories. Kim Ae-ran is the most lauded young writer in Korea.

Her short story “The Future of Silence” represents a turning point in her decade long literary career. Her questioning of language and existence is noteworthy.

Toe Ma Rok: The Records of Exorcism - Sidequel Lee Woo-hyouk, Elixir 2013, 304p, ISBN 9788954620888

Toe Ma Rok is more than just a bestselling series; it stands for the emergence of a new mode of communication in Korean society during the 1990s: the Internet. Toe Ma Rok features additional stories surrounding the original tale, which was a sensational work of fantasy. On the 20th anniversary of Toe Ma Rok original publication, this new volume features a collection of short stories that revolve around the main theme.

Love, No Matter What Jeon Dae-sik, Gong Gam 2012, 239p, ISBN 9788960652859 Through photography Jeon Dae-sik records the life of Cardinal Stephen Kim Sou-hwan, a respected figure among Korean religious communities.

Following the memorial photo gallery on the third anniversary of the cardinal’s death, Jeon composed this photographic essay replete with quotations from the cardinal.

The Humanities, Starting Now Ju Hyun-sung, BetterBooks 2012, 560p, ISBN 9788998015015 Ju Hyun-sung has categorized frequently encountered themes in the fields of psychology, art, mythology, history, philosophy, and global issues. This book makes the humanities accessible to all readers.

You Are a Good Person Yang Chang-soon, CENTURYONE 2012, 320p, ISBN 9788996746478 A psychiatrist and human relations specialist, Yang Chang-soon consults numerous corporate executives and management specialists on interpersonal skills.

Based on her experience, she highlights the power of praise and respect in human relations.

These totals are based on sales records from eight major bookstores and three online bookstores from January to March 2013, provided by the Korean Publishers Association.

The books are introduced in no particular order.

The Light Inside: An Odyssey of Art, Life, and Law

Candidate No. 3 Ahn Seok-bbong

Dear Friend

Children's Books The Light Inside: An Odyssey of Art, Life, and Law Jeannie Suk, Bookhouse Publishers 2013, 272p, ISBN 9788956056203 Jeannie Suk, a tenured professor at Harvard Law School, offers an intellectual and cultural curriculum of lessons from the humanities, arts, and law that make her who she is. What is true education? What is a self-made life? What is my relationship with Korea, the place of my birth? In this book, Suk shares her personal experiences and insights.

Consumer Trends in Korea 2013 Kim Rando et al., Miraebook Publishing Co. 2013, 399p, ISBN 9788959892075 Consumer Trends in Korea 2013 has been publishing the top 10 market driving keywords since 2007.

Based on this year’s keyword “Cobra Twist,” This book analyzes consumer behavior in Korea. Kim Rando’s essay collection Youth, It’s Painful has already been translated and published into a number of languages.

Special Delivery Service

Sherlock in the Attic

Kim Sun-young, Jaeum & Moeum Publishing Co. 2013, 240p, ISBN 9788954428453 Taebong, a delivery boy, and Seul-ah, a model student and an adopted daughter, are both teenagers who feel that nobody cares about them. They fall into a wormhole by accident as they are riding a Harley-Davidson and travel to a parallel universe in the past. This book delivers a story about understanding the meaning of the present and learning the power of choice and will.

Seong Wan; Illustrator: So Yun-kyoung BIR Publishing Co., Ltd., 2013, 92p ISBN 9788949161648

I Brush My Teeth

Jiwon and Byeong-gwan Series

When Geon opens a detective office in his junk filled attic, goblins ask him to solve a case. Geon visits “This-or-That” goblin town with his clients and takes on the task of recovering the magic wand of the bulbous-nosed goblin. It is a playful detective story for curious readers age 7 to 10. This book is the winner of the 2nd BIR Literary Award.

Kong Se; Illustrator: Wang So-hee Blue Rabbit Publishing Co., Ltd. 2010, 14p, ISBN 9788965040675 This illustrated sound book teaches the children who hate brushing their teeth how fun it is. Friendly animals like a mouse, rabbit, crocodile, lion, panda bear, and hippo demonstrate how to clean the gums and brush the upper teeth, lower teeth, and tongue.

Delightful melodies and happy tunes of teeth brushing are played when you click the button at the top of the page.

Ko Dae-young; Illustrator: Kim Young-jin Gilbut Children Publishing Co., Ltd. 2006, 160p (Vol.1), 9788955820942 (set) This illustrated book series about Jiwon and Byeonggwan humorously shows daily events like taking the subway, getting an allowance, learning to ride a bike, and not biting your fingernails. This eight-volume series is a compilation of books which have sold more than 400,000 copies. Every scene has a picture puzzle to entertain readers.

Candidate No. 3 Ahn Seok-bbong

Kang Full, Woongjin Think Big Co., Ltd. 2013, 56p, ISBN 9788901153728 This is celebrated cartoonist Kang Full’s first illustrated children’s book. On a snowy night, a child wakes up and goes on a small adventure with a cat.

The two grow from their experiences of meeting a large dog, a mouse, and a black cat during their midnight excursion. The charming illustrations and agreeable story are heartwarming.

Jin Hyeong-min; Illustrator: Han Ji-sun Changbi Publishers, Inc., 2013, 152p ISBN 9788936442712 Ahn Seok-bbong is the son of a rice cake maker. By chance he decides to run for school president and thus sets out on a delightful election campaign. He does not excel in any particular way and does not know to step up, but as he speaks for the ordinary children, he gains their support. This book won the 17th Good Books for Children competition.

Dear Friend

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Publishing Trends 1

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1. 2013 Munhakdongne Young

this spring is Princeton professor Chang-rae Lee’s The Surrendered (RHK). Lee, a Korean-American, wrote the book in English. The judging committee for the Dong-in Literature Prize convenes monthly to select outstanding works, and at their March meeting they gave Lee’s book a special mention. The following issue was debated: with a growing number of Koreans living in the diaspora, should works set in Korea written by Korean-born writers be regarded as Korean literature? Although the prevailing view was that these works should not be considered for prizes, the question remains as to what constitutes Korean literature in the global age, and where the boundaries should be drawn.

Writers' Award Anthology

Son Bomi et al.

Munhakdongne Publishing Corp.

2013, 322p, ISBN 9788954621168

2.

Junk Kim Hyena Minumsa Publishing Group 2012, 274p, ISBN 9788937486418

Fiction

Accolades for Young Writers Two young short story writers, Son Bomi and Kim Jong-ok, were budding literary stars in the first quarter of 2013. They were the Grand Prize winners of the Munhakdongne Young Writers’ Award for 2012 and 2013 respectively. They can be called stars because they didn’t just win an award for short fiction, but the Grand Prize that encompasses all genres, and they have managed this feat before publishing their first books. True, it is possible to win the Grand Prize writing short fiction, but past recipients have had books published prior to winning. The previous two award winners were renowned authors Kim Junghyuk and Kim Ae-ran.

This indicates that winners are recognized partly for their career record, and not just for literary achievement.

Son and Kim were the winners of the third and fourth annual awards. They debuted in the annual spring writing competitions for new fiction, Son winning the Donga Ilbo Award in 2011, and Kim the Munhwa Ilbo Award in 2012. Kim Jong-ok won the Young Writers’ Award especially quickly, directly after publishing his first story, “Street Magician.” Stories by both of these authors are featured in the fourth annual collection of award-winning fiction by new writers, published by Munhakdongne this year.

The novel that has received the most attention this spring is Junk (Minumsa Publishing Group), by Kim Hyena. The 31-yearold novelist’s work is as shocking and provocative as the title suggests. The protagonist Seongjae is a gay temp worker, born to an unmarried mother. In the novel, he does not even have the status of a loser; he is treated like garbage to be disposed of. In the book, Kim gives graphic descriptions of gay sex, and provides an inventory of recreational drugs such as poppers, marijuana, and meth, and how to use them. Of course, this kind of writing is on the brink of being classified as genre fiction. But aside from its sensationalism, the work achieves a rare degree of insight into the particularity and meaning of people living in the lower social strata.

Another work that has caused controversy in literary circles 8 list_ Books from Korea

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by Uh Soo-woong

Nonfiction

Philosophy Steps Forward Of the books published early this year, two that stand out deal with different branches of philosophy. The first, Philosophy in Plain Language, is written by farmer and philosopher Yoon Gubyeong, who has established a farm and fishery commune on the Byeonsan peninsula. The other book, Korean Confucianism, is by Korea University professor emeritus Youn Sa-soon, an authority on Korean philosophy specializing in Confucianism. These two books, very different in character, each describe a tradition of independent thinking. In Philosophy in Plain Language, independence is achieved by thinking philosophically, in plain words that are intelligible to anyone. Korean Confucianism, on the other hand, gives an overview of the history of Confucianism in the country, along with the major debates that have taken place.

First, Yoon Gu-byeong’s book is written in lecture form, and is highly readable. In fact, he has included a considerable amount of material from a course he taught in the humanities. His motivation for writing, and a point that he emphasizes repeatedly in the text, is this: why must philosophy be laden with terms like “existence” and “nothingness,” when it could simply state whether things “are” or “are not?” To summarize his argument, whether one understands difficult jargon that few people can decipher has no relation as to whether one can think philosophically.

Rather, jargon is “the language of violence,” spreading ruling class ideology and strengthening the class system. For this reason, too, Yoon left his position as a university professor.

The book is divided into three sections covering the following topics: human mythology and the history of communal living, Western ontology, and the application of critical thinking derived from the ontological tradition to real social domains.

In the second section, he translates the concepts of being and nothingness into Korean and explicates them, a difficult task, but the rest of the material is easy to follow. In order to create a good world where things that should exist really do, and things that shouldn’t don’t, we cannot just live passively. The reviewer is in firm agreement with his conclusion that we are subjective beings who must act according to our own will.

Korean Confucianism is subtitled “Exploring the Particularities of Korean Confucianism,” indicating two things. First of all, the writer sums up what he has learned over his career researching the topic, and secondly, he delineates characteristics specific to Confucianism in Korea.

1. Philosophy in Plain Language Yoon Gu-byeong, Bori Publishing Company 2013, 416p, ISBN 9788984287808 2. Korean Confucianism (2 vols.)

Youn Sa-soon Jisik-sanup Publishing Co., Ltd. 2012, 584p, ISBN 9788942363131 (Vol.1)

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Examining trends of thought ranging from the 2nd century B.C. until the close of the 20th century, Youn identifies several distinctive characteristics. Of these, Youn regards the scholarly Neo-Confucian debates between Toegye and Gobong, and Yulgok and Ugye, arising from 16th century research into free will and divinely mandated fate (cheonmyeong), as very unusual when considered within the tradition of Confucianism in East Asia as a whole.

illustrators, representing 34 different countries. Being nominated itself is an honor, considering that the Anderson Award is for lifetime achievement in the field. Korea’s local branch of the IBBY recommended two of the nominees: Cat School author Kim Jinkyung and Scary Mr. Cock-a-doodle-doo author and illustrator Han Byeong-ho. Kim is notable for infusing his exciting storylines with serious social commentary. Over his career, Han has illustrated picture books depicting emotions and characters that are uniquely Korean. Thanks to the nominations, readers from various countries will have the opportunity to become familiar with their work.

The reputation of Korean children’s literature is growing internationally, and these nominations are part of the trend.

In another example, a Polish illustrator working with a Korean publishing company has won global recognition, recently receiving two Bologna Ragazzi awards. Illustrator Iwona Chmielewska teamed up with writer Kim Heekyung to win the 2011 Ragazzi nonfiction award for A House of the Mind: Maum (Changbi Publishers, Inc., 2010). In 2013, Chmielewska won again, this time in the fiction category, with Eyes (Changbi Publishers, Inc., 2012). Since the inauguration of the awards in 1966, it has been very rare for an illustrator and publisher to collaborate and win twice.

In the past, Korean children’s stories tended to feature traditional narrative structures and obvious moral lessons, but judging by these recent successes at book awards ceremonies, many writers are exploring new territory, and publishers are setting a high value on aesthetic achievement. For this reason, authors and illustrators will continue to be encouraged to experiment with new approaches in the future.

by Shin Soojin

by Kim Beomsoo

Children's Books

Children’s Books Gain Global Recognition The judges on the award jury for the International Board on Books for Young People (IBBY) have been chosen, which is a committee responsible for selecting the winners of the biannual Hans Christian Andersen Award next year. This time the jury comprises of writers, illustrators, publishers, and researchers from 10 countries: Russia, Venezuela, Austria, Cuba, Italy, the United States, Iran, Sweden, Turkey, and Korea. The judges will review a shortlist of candidates for the award and announce the winners on March 24, 2014 in Bologna, Italy.

Kim Sang-wook, professor of education at Chuncheon National University, has become the first Korean to be named to the jury. He was chosen out of applicants from 70 sponsor countries in recognition of his sound judgment and expert knowledge of children’s literature, as well as for his excellent communication skills.

The Andersen Award is given separately to authors and illustrators. In contention for the 2014 prize are 29 authors and 31

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1. Cat School, a multi-volume series Kim Jin-kyung; Illustrator: Kim Jae-hong Munhakdongne Publishing Corp.

2. Scary Mr. Cock-a-doodle-doo Han Byeong-ho, Byulchunji 2010, 34p, ISBN 9788994041261

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Special Section

Korean Science Fiction

Chronicling Korean Science Fiction From the translation of Jules Verne to "Westernization" via Japan, Korean sci-fi has been inextricably entwined with Korea’s complex history.

The Beginning: Eastern Ways with Western Means Science fiction still remains largely in the background of all literary genres in Korea today. Although it has been supported by a broad range of loyal readers in its long history of 106 years, Korean science fiction has been continuously and generally underappreciated. The primary reason for this fact is that translation, rather than creative writing, has been the foundation of Korean science fiction, and until the last 20 years, the field had not yet produced a controversial enough work capable of attracting substantial attention from readers and literary critics. In particular, Korean sci-fi was seen as a type of reform movement more than as a literary genre; later, science fiction was considered, naively, to be either children’s literature or Western literature, which inhibited popular interest and critical study in the genre. Furthermore, Korean science fiction, as well as modern literature in general, has not been free from the paradoxical expectation that it should domestically reform pre-modernity and externally overcome the influences of the West while simultaneously assimilating Western practices. However, the development of Korean science fiction has been led by patriotic students studying abroad, passionate for reform, and writers full of loyalty and enthusiasm for their country; this fact speaks to the peculiarity of the history of Korean science fiction.

The first work of Korean science fiction was The Adventures of Travel Under the Sea, published in Taegeukhakbo in 1907.

Taegeukhakbo was an academic journal founded by a student studying in Japan in August 1906, and the journal began introducing and popularizing Shinkyoyook, or Westernized education, and new scientific knowledge for the purpose of establishing a modern nation-state. The Adventures of Travel Under the Sea was a translation of Jules Verne’s Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea and was co-translated by Pak Yong-hee, Jarakdang, and Mohumsaeng. In the following year 1908, Yi Hae-jo published Verne’s The Begum’s Fortune with the title The Iron World. In this manner, the early history of Korean science fiction is marked either by reformists who were former students studying abroad or the people who believed 10 list_ Books from Korea

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in the theory of Eastern ways with Western means, claiming that they had to adapt to Western scientific technology while following the Eastern spirit and ethics.

Not only is it unusual that the roots of Korean science fiction were planted by the translations of reformists, it is also interesting that all the works translated were Verne’s. Even the third piece of Korean science fiction, translated by Kim Kyo-je and published in Oriental Seowon in May 1912, was a translation of Verne’s Five Weeks in a Balloon. Therefore, it is not a stretch to conclude that the early history of Korean science fiction was influenced exclusively by Verne.

It is difficult to say why Verne’s novels attracted Korean reformists. By using an external approach to the text, an extrinsic explanation may be possible. In brief, the Verne phenomenon would have been a result of the historical and cultural circumstances in the Daehan Empire, the present day Republic of Korea, when the works were translated. As mentioned above, the Western world was seen simultaneously as an entity to overcome and an object to master. During the Daehan Empire, Japan had succeeded among Asian countries in modernizing their society using the principles of Datsu-A Ron, the theory of de-Asianization, and the country itself was Westernized (or a deputy of the Western world). This situation has been reflected in the process of the popularization of science fiction in Korea. These young Korean reformists wanted to modernize their own country and overcome yet learn about the Western world (or Japan) at the same time. To do so, they needed to resist Japanese influence while examining and adapting to it. For that reason, early Korean science fiction was all produced by translating Japanese translations of the original work. In 1905, during this time, the Daehan Empire was deprived of its diplomatic rights; soon after, it was relegated to a colony of the Japanese Empire.

Recent research in comparative literature demonstrates that Korean science fiction has been created in the shadow of modern Korean history. The Adventures of Travel Under the Sea was translated from Daihei Sanji’s Kaiteiryokou, the 1884 Japanese translation of Verne’s Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea. Of course, there were also exceptions. Considering

the translator’s ideology ref lected in The Iron World, the second work of science fiction in Korea, and its linguistic sophistication, it is highly possible that Yi could have translated it from the Chinese translation of Bao Tianxiao, who was a popular novelist in modern China.

On the other hand, the fact that Verne’s novels were translated as strange adventure stories, that is to say, as wondrous tales, reveals the attitude of those contemporary translators towards science fiction. Other than the apparent goal of science fiction to act as a reform movement, translators were also concerned with the inherent purpose of entertaining to improve the circulation of the journal where the works were published. As a matter of fact, science fiction’s identity as a mass reform movement cannot be separated from its desire for popularity; in this sense, reform and popularity are two sides of the same coin. Thus, the origins of Korean science fiction are buried in complex relationships with Western culture shock, as well as enthusiastic reform and popular entertainment; these great forces regulated Korean science fiction throughout the 20th century.

Development: Stepping Stones in a Narrow Creek Just a s ever y pat h in life is dif ferent, t he process of modernization and the development of literature in Korea is not completely analogous to the Western experience. The fact that the development of Korean science fiction was different from that of the Western world or that we were late comers should be no cause of disappointment as there is no such thing as a correct answer or a predefined direction to be taken in the current of history and literature.

After the initial enthusiasm for Korean science fiction, the movement was quieter after the publication of Kim Kyoje’s Airship. In 1925, more than 10 years after Airship was published, sci-fi was reinvigorated again as a proletarian literature movement. This time, the movement again began with another translation: Pak Young-hee, a leader in the proletarian literature movement and a reporter for Gaebyeok magazine, translated and serially published Karel Capek’s play, Rossum’s Universal Robot (1920), with the title Artificial Laborer. Capek’s work marked the first-ever appearance of a robot character in science fiction. Again, Pak’s translation was also translated from a Japanese translation: Suzuki Zentaro’s Robotto (1924).

Since then, the genre of science f iction, which had been both a reform movement and a proletarian literature movement, became literature in its own right. The genre expanded to include publications in literary journals and experimentation by individual writers, though the development was sporadic, advancing like stepping stones.

Publication during Japanese colonization started with Shin Il-yong’s translation of A Trip to the Moon and continued with Kim Tongin’s experimental short story "Dr. K’s Experiment," Yi Won-mo’s translation of Robert Louis Stevenson’s Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, Heo Moon-il’s Dragon Boy of the Sky (1930), and Kim Ja-hye’s "Radium" (1933). In addition, a year after Pak

Young-hee’s Artificial Laborer was published, Kim Woo-jin, the only Korean science fiction critic during Japanese colonization, published “Watching Artificial Laborer at Chookji Theater” in Gaebyeok in August 1926. With these little accomplishments, science fiction progressed slowly through time and history, but barely keeping pace, just like a narrow creek’s flow outside the history of Korean modern literature.

Progress: Economic Development and Science Fiction In 1949, Korean science fiction was revived with Kim Naeseong’s short story, "Secret Door" (1949), a mystery with the motifs and elements of sci-fi. In this new era, Korean science fiction finally left behind its reformist and pure translation roots; instead, it became genre literature in its own right, and both new original writing and translated texts coexisted in the field.

This movement began when Choi Sang-kwon published Dr. Handel in 1952, and the first Korean science fiction graphic novel, Kim San-ho’s Rayphie (1959–1962) followed, consisting of 32 books in four volumes that were serialized and attracted the attention of quite a few young adults.

Additionally, in 1957, H. G. Wells’ The War of the Worlds was translated by Kim Bok-soon with a subtitle describing the work as a science detective novel; after this, world renowned works in science fiction began to be introduced to the Korean public.

The genre became the literature primarily of the First World capitalists. It is not a coincidence that Korean science fiction began to develop as dictatorship-led industrialization and economic development did. In fact, the first Korean creative work of science fiction was Perfect Society written by Kim Jong-ahn, who was selected as the winner of the first detective novel competition sponsored by Weekly Hankook.

In 1968, following the publication of Perfect Society, cultural figures established and led “The SF Writer’s Club,” such as the reporter Suh Kwang-woon of the Hankook Ilbo, cartoonist Shin Dong-woo, and Oh Min-young from the teen magazine Hakwonsa. Until the 1970s, the group a lso published approximately 10 different original works and translations.

For the next 30 years, science fiction was sustained mainly through comic books, translations, and young adult literature.

This had been the case for the 30 years until the appearance of Bok Koh-ill, who, in the late 1980s, opened a new world for Korean sci-fi. While Korea was a developing nation, science fiction was only written for young audiences. The major writers and works of the time were Hahn Nak-won’s Adventures in Venus (1957) and Suh Kwang-woon’s War of the Fourth Dimension (1978). Hahn, a writer who was a former television anchor, wrote both children’s literature and science fiction, and Suh, who had previously worked for the Hankook Ilbo as a reporter and head of the science section and for the Seoul Shinmun as head of their culture section, dealt with science fiction translations and articles related to science. Suh eventually debuted as a science fiction writer and published a steady stream of major works, including War of the Fourth Dimension, Blow Up the Control Tower, and The Last Day list_ Books from Korea

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of the Spaceship, all of which were published by Idea Hweokwan, which specialized in children’s science fiction.

In addition, Ahn Dong-min, who had studied Korean literature at Seoul National University, also worked both as a popular science fiction translator and writer. He was responsible for the novel 2064, Three Boy Musketeers in Space (1972), and the critical essay “The Wonder of Science Fiction” (1968).

The history of Korean science fiction made its way out of translated and children’s literature and entered genre literature when Bok Koh-ill’s alternate history novels began to be published. The works included In Search of an Epitaph (1987), A Vagabond in History (1991), and Under the Blue Moon (1992). Owing to Bok’s effort, from the beginning of the 1990s a newspaper that sought to capitalize on science fiction’s popularity and marketability started a sci-fi contest; in subsequent years many notable works were produced through the contests. As a result, Kim Do-hyeon’s Login (1996), a well-written socially conscious piece of science fiction, was published in 1996, though the work did not attract much attention from readers or critics.

Perhaps the greatest impact on Korean science fiction in over 100 years would have been Djuna. With such works as Battle of the Butterflies (1997), Duty Free Zone (2000), and The Pacific Continental Express (2002), Korean science fiction gained traction as an important genre in literature. Djuna was, indeed, well-received both in and out of the literary world due to outstanding storytelling and a well thought out composition. Additionally, as original science fiction continued to develop and grow into itself, remarkable works were created through research and critical articles in the field, including Park Sangjoon’s Key Person, Key Book, What Is Science Fiction? published by Popular Literature Research Association; Lim Jong-ki’s New Literary Revolutions of SF Tribes: The Birth and Leap of Science Fiction; Ko Jang-won’s The History of World’s Science Fiction; and Kim Jong-bang’s A Study on the Process of Establishing Korean Science Fiction. Furthermore, Happy SF, a magazine specializing in science fiction, began publication and circulation.

The Future It is never easy to predict or foresee the future of Korean science fiction.

One technique employed by science fiction in order to narrate thoughts about the future is extrapolation. The use of an alternate history is based on a drastic subjunctive mood, whereas extrapolation, another technique used to write about the future, originates from hermeneutics and takes its cues by inferring or predicting gaps and parts of the unfolding future by using given data.

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Korean science fiction originally started as a reform movement, and the majority of the genre consisted of translations and children’s literature. Similarly, in North Korea, their experiences with science fiction were not quite that different either. North Korea had begun creating science fiction for the purpose of educating and reforming children in the 1950s; during the 1960s many works from the former Soviet Union, such as the works of Ivan A. Yefremov were translated. Hwang Jeong-sang was a renowned writer during the 1980s and 1990s, and he took an active part in both creative writing and literary criticism, including publishing a volume of critical articles, Science Fantasy Literature Writing (1993).

Recently, publishers specializing in genre fiction have begun translating major Western canonical science fiction works that had not been introduced to Korean audiences.

Although it still remains a small field, young science fiction writers have emerged, such as Bae Myung-hoon, Kim Boyoung, and Bae Mi-ju. Their presence strengthens science fiction’s position in genre literature and provides foundation for further growth. Additionally, writers of so-called "pure literature" like Park Min-gyu have started partially extending the boundaries of science fiction by using settings and motifs from science fiction, strengthening science fiction’s identity in genre fiction.

For the time being, it seems that Korean science fiction will continue to expand with translations of foreign canonical works from specialized publishers. The genre will also work to diversify their means of communication and promotion through online publications and e-books using web portals and blogs. However, it is not likely that science fiction in Korean literature will soon become prominent. The history of Korean sci-fi is not marked with strong achievement (not enough to create an individual anthology, at least), and it would be difficult to produce such a brilliant history. It is most probable that only a few brilliant works will emerge from time to time while much of the genre is still carried on by works that are average or mediocre.

In spite of these realities, however, Korean science fiction will surely continue to amuse audiences with its wild fantasies and continue to make groundbreaking journeys in language with imaginative experiments that cross into different worlds.

by Cho Sung-myeon

Special Section

Korean Science Fiction

Postcoloniality and Imagining the Post-human: Bok Koh-ill's In Search of an Epitaph and Djuna's The Pacific Continental Express Throughout the modernization of Korea, there was little time for the fantastical imaginings that guided science fiction, yet despite prejudice and misunderstanding, the genre broke boundaries during the dawn of the information age through two influential writers.

The Status of Sci-Fi in Korea Gongsang (daydreaming). Until the 1990s, that particular word was the prefix of the Korean expression for the English term, “science fiction.” Of course, it is clearly untrue that Koreans are somehow culturally predisposed to dislike or think less of science fiction. However, for some time, it was true that science fiction works were considered fantastic stories, out of daydreams.

For the past 100 years, Koreans have experienced a string of dramatic changes: Japanese colonization, subsequent liberation, civil war, division of the country, dictatorship, democratization, and industrialization. Considering the harsh realities that Koreans were facing, it is easy to see how stories with robots, space travel, clones, cyborgs, and time-travel seemed like far-off daydreams, lacking a foundation in reality. The Korean people had to soldier on through difficult challenges whose solutions had no connection to the world created by science fiction.

Because of these challenges, it was understandably difficult for Koreans to seriously consider and reflect on the effect of science and technology on their lives.

Although science fiction has remained marginalized in Korean literature, there has been a constant flow of published and translated works. In 1907, parts of Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea by Jules Verne were translated, and in 1925, Rossum's Universal Robots by Karel Capek was translated

as proletarian literature. Under the dictatorship of the 1960s, George Orwell's 1984 became especially popular and was taken as an allegorical criticism of fascism. Aside from these particular examples of widespread appeal, however, science fiction among general readers has been confined to a list of “must-read” books, for lack of a better description. Children are acquainted with the juvenile book versions of the sci-fi canon, including Frankenstein, Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea, and War of the Worlds. As readers mature, while they may continue reading sci-fi novels, their interest is largely replaced by sci-fi movies from Hollywood; in other words, most adults who watch Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey stop there and do not go on to develop an interest in science fiction and read books in the genre. Of course, there are a few readers who continue to appreciate their childhood exposure or end up rediscovering their appreciation for science fiction. This is the audience that will read works from the major canon of science fiction: works by Arthur C. Clarke, Robert A. Heinlein, Isaac Asimov, and others, both in the original language and in translation. Some of these readers will remain avid readers of science fiction; some may begin translating these works; and some may even try their hand at writing science fiction. Those are the readers that form the underpinning of Korean science fiction’s development and its increased accessibility.

In this article, two writers, Koh-ill and Djuna, will be introduced. Both of these writers are examples of the transformation from an aficionado of the genre to a writer of science fiction. Their works of science fiction have made a dramatic impact on modern Korean literature, where realism continues to reign.

Postcoloniality Through Science Fiction: In Search of an Epitaph In 1987, Moonji Publishing introduced a new writer, Bok Koh-

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ill, with the publication of his novel, In Search of an Epitaph.

For the publishing industry of the time, Bok’s debut was unusual. Moonji, one of the major publishing houses in Korea, had never published a work of science fiction before, nor had they published any first-time writer’s novel. Additionally, Bok’s background was also considered atypical. The author was a graduate of the School of Management at Seoul National University and had been working for banks and trading companies. In 1983, he suddenly quit his white-collar office job and began working on his novel. For four years, Bok worked on In Search of an Epitaph. To the surprise of many, the novel used elements from the science fiction genre, which was unusual. At the time of his debut, Bok was already 39 years old. A science fiction novel by a 39-year-old debut writer drew the attention of many readers and writers at the time.

In Search of an Epitaph is a work of alternate history in which the Japanese occupation of Korea continues to the present. While the alternate history motif may not be the essential, definitive element of science fiction, this type of work occupies an important place in the genealogy of science fiction. Major works of sci-fi that also use alternate histories include Ward Moore's 1953 work Bring the Jubilee in which the Confederacy wins the American Civil War, Philip K. Dick's 1962 work The Man in the High Castle in which Germany and Japan win World War II, and Harry Harrison's 1972 work A Transatlantic Tunnel, Hurrah! in which the United States is never founded due to George Washington's premature death.

In Search of an Epitaph was a result of Bok’s interest in Western science fiction, which he must have been seeking and reading on his own.

"One who has never been a slave cannot know what it means to have been a slave. The experience of being colonized is a shadow cast upon the soul of a nation. It is a shadow that can never be undone," Koh writes in In Search of an Epitaph.

In reality, Korea was colonized by imperialist Japan in 1910 and was liberated in 1945 at the end of the Second World War. In 1961, the military dictatorship began systematically suppressing political dissidence even though the democratic movement continued in opposition to the regime. In In Search of an Epitaph, Korea in 1987 is still a Japanese colony. Koreans have completely forgotten their own history and language and live as second class citizens who are systematically discriminated against by the Japanese. The Japanese Empire has been ruled by the military since 1960 in order to maintain colonial control efficiently. Kinoshita Hideo, a Korean, is a poet who has a day job in a large corporation. As he becomes more and more interested in the Korean language and its literature, he is accused of subversion by the Japanese government. Ultimately, he ends up killing a Japanese military officer and flees to Shanghai where there is a Korean government in exile.

What is he in search of? The name that will be engraved on his gravestone. More bluntly, the poet is searching for the freedom to choose which of his two names will be on his 14 list_ Books from Korea

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epitaph: Kinoshita Hideo, his Japanese name, or Park Youngse, his Korean name.

"Freedom and colony are two mutually exclusive ideas. If the people of Joseon are not afforded true freedom, if Joseon becomes a country like the current Japan, the people of Joseon, naturally, must continue their fight for freedom...”

In Search of an Epitaph problematizes two conditions.

One has to do with coloniality and the other, with political dictatorship. Bok thinks of coloniality and dictatorship not as separate issues, but as one integrated problem. What is the ideological orientation that can simultaneously overcome the colonial condition and political dictatorship? In answering this question, Bok's thoughts bypass nationalism to arrive at the ideology of freedom because coloniality and political dictatorship cannot coexist with freedom. In other words, In Search of an Epitaph is a work of science fiction that thinks postcolonialism and democracy are all together.

A Chilling Post-human Nightmare: The Pacific Continental Express By the end of the 1980s, personal computers were widely available in Korea. In the early 1990s, many had joined the Bulletin Board System (BBS), which required phone lines to be connected to a computer through a modem, thus providing a new means of communication. In Korea, the popularity of BBS contributed enormously to Korean cultural history. Various databases were built, containing all kinds of information about non-mainstream cultures and communities, including science fiction and horror movies. People with different cultural preferences were able to exchange information and share mutual cultural convictions. BBS in a Korean context takes on a very important significance in its cultural history. Through the dynamic process of reading what was already written and contributing one’s opinion to the digital bulletin boards, people became engaged, and a phenomenon occurred; active readers became potential writers. While this cultural current tended to converge on the Internet after the mid-90s, in Korea, BBS was the digital cradle for subcultures and the technological foundation that made the tribalization of taste possible. Djuna was one such writer, born from an environment of digital media.

"I picked that name as my ID because I was reading Djuna Barnes at the time," said the elusive Dijuna.

Djuna is an Internet ID. More specifically, it is the moniker of an author that writes both works of science fiction and film reviews. To date, Djuna has remained an anonymous Internet personality: no information exists on Djuna’s name, gender, age, or educational background. Some speculate that Djuna is a woman; other rumors state that Djuna is a creative collaboration between three individuals. Djuna communicates solely via the Internet; email may be used to discuss future assignments or works, and Internet messaging services and chat applications are used for interviews.

In 1994, the author started publishing film reviews and short pieces of science fiction on BBS. In 1997, Duty Free Zone, a collection of short works of science fiction by Djuna, was published. Djuna became widely recognized as an author in 2002 when Moonji Publishing Co., Ltd. published The Pacific Continental Express.

The Pacific Continental Express symbolically resembles the footsteps of a hitchhiker traveling through the galaxy of science fiction. As an avid reader of the genre, Djuna alludes to many works of science fiction. The short story “Cello” arises from Issac Asimov’s Robot series, and “Square Dance” is an attempt to imitate Edgar Allen Poe’s “The Pit and the Pendulum.”

Djuna has stated that some major influences include many other sci-fi writers, including H. P. Lovecraft, Harry Harrison, Erich Kastner, and Jack Finney. The fix-up, a series of short fictions whose storylines unfold independently of one another, that Djuna has published is an homage to and demonstrates an anxiety of influence towards the works of science fiction that the author has read. The works of Djuna are born from the lineage of science fiction and continue the exploration of new, uncharted paths in the galaxy of science fiction.

From "Parasite:" “I know that she thinks that there is no greater injustice than that the humans are at the top of the food chain over her kind. Slowly, the City was developing its own civilization and intellect, surpassing the values of humans.”

In The Pacific Continental Express, “Parasite” and other works express a range of imaginative thoughts on the posthuman. In Djuna's works, there is no utopia of convenience sustained by machines, nor is there a dystopia of human a lienation where machines rule over humans. Unlike other works of science fiction, Djuna does not write about rediscovering what humanity is by overcoming a dehumanizing machine civilization. The author's imagination is not consumed with androids, where machines are incessantly made in the image and likeness of humans, nor are the author’s works filled with cyborgs trying to exceed the limits of humanity by combining machinery and humanity. Instead, Djuna challenges the widely accepted premise that machines, in all circumstances, are created for and exist to serve humanity. In Djuna's works, machines are self-producing, autopoietic, and self-evolving entities in their own right. Machines are not mere tools for human beings; rather, they are a new step or system in the evolutionary process. Djuna’s gaze critically examines the unequal co-evolution of machines and humans. In doing so, the anthropocentrism that dominates our experience slowly becomes less valid, losing ground.

A Source of New Possibilities in Literature Both Bok Koh-ill and Djuna occupy very important positions in the history of Korean science fiction and literature. By writing during a political dictatorship that was approaching 30 years in power, Bok Koh-ill captured his own subconscious political mindset in the plot of his novel. At that time, his

novel asked questions that needed to be asked, questions that sought to understand the coloniality of Korean society and simultaneously attempted to overcome structural political oppression from the standpoint of postcolonial theory. By the 1990s, Korea had achieved democracy, and was quickly maturing through industrialization and developing into an information society. As a writer, Djuna symbolically represents an era when it was common knowledge that science and technology were the fundamental principles that define our lives. Through many works, Djuna presents a world that moves beyond humanity and rethinks the very premise of Western science fiction.

Today, Bok Koh-ill is the doyen of writers, approaching his 70s; Djuna is also a seasoned 40-something-year-old writer.

Between the two writers lie the strata that consist of layers of changes and achievements created by Korean science fiction during the last 25 years. At this point in time, science fiction is an important source of new literary experimentation and imagination in Korea.

by Kim Dongshik

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1. In Search of an Epitaph (2 vols.)

Bok Koh-ill, Moonji Publishing Co., Ltd. 1987, 528p, ISBN 9788932009797 (Vol.1) 2. The Pacific Continental Express Djuna, Moonji Publishing Co., Ltd. 2002, 312p, ISBN 9788932013602

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Korean Science Fiction

Descartes's Descendants: The Novels of Bae Myung-hoon and Kim Bo-young

As science fiction continues to work at gaining respect as a literary genre in Korea, two young writers are at the forefront, bringing imagination and a touch of realism to their explorations of human existence.

Emerging Writers In the Korean literary scene where realism has traditionally dominated, science fiction was, in both quantity and quality, relatively underrepresented. Moreover, at times science fiction was not recognized as literature and cherished only by a small fan base.

In the 2000s, a trend began in the Korean literary scene: the active exploration of fantasy and the future. These explorations led to discoveries of a new reality. A new generation of writers started traversing the line between the fantastic and the real, intermixing elements from realism and fantasy. In novels, protagonists that were aliens, zombies, clones, and "pseudohuman[s]" began appearing. These creatures problematized the humanistic value system and humanity as a race. The settings of these works escaped the familiar reality and expanded into a computer-generated virtual reality, outer space, and postapocalyptic worlds.

In the midst of these changes and developments, science fiction entered into Korean fiction. In addition, readers and literary critics focused more attention on this genre. The young writers who have received the most attention are undoubtedly Bae Myung-hoon and Kim Bo-young. These two authors write science fiction, but their works also span broadly over the genres of fantasy, children's literature, and detective novels.

Nonetheless, the majority of their works, and the ones that received the most attention, are science fiction.

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Bae caught the world’s attention with the book Tower (2009) and the short story collection Hello, The Artificial Being! (2010).

In subsequent years, he consecutively published the science fiction novel Divine Orbit (2011) and Sir Chancellor (2012), a novel with elements of science fiction.

On her part, Kim simultaneously published two collections of sci-fi short stories, Distant Tales and An Evolutionary Myth (2010), and she recently reemerged with Seven Executors (2013), a novel with elements from mythology, eschatology, science fiction, and Chinese martial arts literature.

Bae is prominently recognized as a writer in the Korean literary scene where realism reigns; Kim has received a strong show of support from science fiction readers. In this article, the works of these two writers will be explored.

Bae Myung-hoon: An Experiment on Being Bae Myung-hoon is a young writer that has demonstrated the literary potential of science fiction in Korean literature through the work Tower (2009) and the short collection Hello, The Artificial Being! (2010). The strength of Bae's work lies in his clear and uncomplicated narrative style, witty and ingenious ideas and cognitive supposition, characters with distinct personalities, and his exploration into the ethical side of human relations.

“Hello, The Artif icial Being!” from the short story collection Hello, The Artificial Being! garnered much attention

among critics and the readers. This story unfolds around a strange product, "Pact," that was left to the protagonist by a friend, the exceptional scientist Shin Woo-jeong who had committed suicide. This product is an enigma. Even the reason why it was left to the protagonist is unknown. According to its user manual, "Pact" is the pure being itself that was extracted through Descartes’s statement "Cogito, ergo sum." The protagonist is completely at a loss as to what to do with this thing, and he finally decides to release it into outer space. Only then does the protagonist realize that this pure or artificial being is art, precisely because it has no use of any kind and "what remained of the being entered deeper inside" him when he sent "the being off into outer space." Through this series of events, the protagonist finally realizes that the death of his friend, which he was struggling to understand, was caused because of problems with relationships.

The theme of the problem of relationships is revisited in depth in “Proposal” (Moonye Joongang, fall 2010), a work that captures the essence of Bae's science fiction. This short story is an earnest literary experiment that attempts to address the anxiety and fear caused by the idea of a parallel universe from the perspective of “otherness.” “Proposal” is also an exceptional work that showcases a scientific imagination, an essential element of science fiction, in a precise and exhaustive manner. The protagonist is serving in the army of the United Earth Surface, which is facing suspicion and false accusations from inhabitants on Earth and contending with attacks from an unknown alien armada in outer space. By the end of the story, the unknown aliens are revealed to be the protagonist himself from the future and the community he currently belongs to that encountered through a space-time warp, an event particular to parallel universes. “Proposal” is a work characterized by a rigorous reflection of the self: the alien is one's self that is most unfamiliar and alienated.

Bae’s first novel was Divine Orbit, which derives from the question, "What if God exists physically somewhere in the orbits of the stars?" From this point on, Divine Orbit’s imagination takes off into the far reaches of the universe.

The protagonist, Eun-gyoung, who dreams of becoming an astronaut, wakes up from her cryogenic slumber on the planet Naniye, 150 thousand years after she was charged and sentenced with the crime of aiding the terrorist Baklava.

She discovers that Naniye is an artificial planet built by her father who froze her. While trying to escape the planet, she encounters Friar Namul who bears a resemblance to Baklava.

From there, the two begin their curious adventure, wandering through space.

Despite its extensive scale, Divine Orbit is a captivating read. Not only does it contain elements specific to science fiction, such as the proof of the existence of God, the demise of the human race, and space travel, it also delves into fundamental questions of being human: love, faith, and friendship. The novel is sure to become a milestone in the history of Korean science fiction.

Sir Chancellor, Bae’s most recently published work, tactfully attempts a kind of sociological extrapolation of the future by using versions of actual events that occurred recently in Korean society. The novel depicts, through both positive and negative images, the multitudinous facets of human dealings that are likely possible in the hypothetical future world under the rule of the chancellor. In such ways, Bae’s works extract the most essential elements from the abyss of human existence using extrapolation, intriguing premises, and brilliant ideas.

Kim Bo-young: Looking for Truth As it is the case with “A Tactile Experience” from Distant Tales, one of Kim Bo-young's prominent works, her science f iction stories strongly exhibit the characteristics of a Gedankenexperiment, a thought experiment that is specific to science fiction. Like Bae, Kim plays a variation on the Cartesian cogito, and conducts an experiment that shakes the foundations of traditional assumptions of anthropocentric thinking and senses. However, whereas Bae's thought experiment is an ethical one devised in order to delve into the problems of human relations, Kim's moves in the

1. Seven Executors Kim Bo-young, Polabooks 2013, 560p, ISBN 9788993094831 2. An Evolutionary Myth Kim Bo-young, Happy Reading Books 2010, 336p, ISBN 9788989571667

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3. Distant Tales Kim Bo-young, Happy Reading Books 2010, 504p, ISBN 9788989571650

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4. Tower Bae Myung-hoon, Woongjin ThinkBig Co., Ltd. 2009, 272p, ISBN 9788901096438 5. Divine Orbit (2 vols.)

Bae Myung-hoon Munhakdongne Publishing Corp.

2011, 336p, ISBN 9788954615723 (Vol.1) 6. Hello, The Artificial Being!

Bae Myung-hoon, Bookhouse Publishers 2010, 325p, ISBN 9788956054605

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7. Sir Chancellor Bae Myung-hoon, Bookhouse Publishers 2012, 360p, ISBN 9788956056104 6

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opposite direction. Kim starts from a more philosophical and epistemological questioning and then derives an ethical formula. The reader of her works must first concentrate on their own senses and thought process. Then, and only then, can the reader experience an epistemic shock and be moved by the work.

The story “A Tactile Experience” unfolds in this manner: the first person point of view protagonist receives a clone from Dr. Yu Shi-hun. Is an exchange of sensory perception between a human and its clone in an incubator possible? Can the clone dream the human dreams of its original? Under the premise of our reality, it is not possible. However, the story progresses steadily, overturning that precondition and supposition. The progression of the narrative itself is an intellectual thought experiment. Moreover, the details in “A Tactile Experience” are abundant and meticulous, placing it on the level of some of the great works of science fiction. The story succeeds at what Darko Suvin, the well-known science fiction critic, cites as one of the essential mandatory requirements for a work of science fiction: cognitive estrangement.

After the clone dies because of a virus, the narrator hears about the clone's "dream" from the doctor: "It was not a dream.

It was the first experience. It was an intense sensation of colors and harmony that it experienced for the first time in its life.

The kind we cannot expect to experience ever living in a deluge of sensations. It was as if the storm had hit. The first thing it ever touched... encountered for the first time... someone else's... feeling, it was." Therefore, the first basic sensory experience that the clone had was tactile—one that requires touching another. In this fiction, through touching the human, the clone changes from a passive being that unilaterally accepted human senses, feelings, and intellect and mechanically imitated them, into a being that autonomously thinks and senses.

While Descartes claims that dreams only deceive the cogito's processing of sensory perceptions, what is fundamental in the thought experiments of Kim’s writing are the senses, especially tactile sensations, through the skin, of touching the other instead of cogito, that does the thinking. A similar kind of thought experiment is conducted in the short story “The Fifth Sense” that problematizes the question of the senses in a world where sound has disappeared.

In some ways, the short stories featured in Distant Tales are reminiscent of the exceptional science fiction of the American science fiction writer, Ted Chiang. Additionally, aside from the question of sensory perception, Kim also borrows many familiar devices of the science fiction genre, including the human species, time travel, and a post-apocalyptic world inhabited only by robots, but she manages to create completely unique works from that framework.

An Evolutionary Myth is also a collection of unique works.

Some of the short stories twist Korean mythology, legend, and allegory with Darwin's theory of evolution. In “The Scripter,” published in An Evolutionary Myth, a question is raised: Can it be possible that the subject, the agent that senses and thinks, "is a prank inserted by a genius programmer in order to test his skills?" This is the hypothesis of the evil demon that captivated Descartes. Is the "I" only "myself" or an automaton 18 list_ Books from Korea

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programmed by someone? The novel, Seven Executors, addresses this question.

Seven Executors is a genre bender, containing elements from science fiction, eschatology, Chinese martial arts literature, and detective novels. It is a complex novel that takes a unique form.

The premise of this novel, the hypothesis that parallel universes exist in that a differentiated existence can exist in dissimilar ways in different universes, is exactly the novel form that this work takes. The protagonist Heuk-young is the prince of the kingdom of Budo, and he is sentenced to death six times in six worlds for the murder of his brother, the king. As he travels through the six different worlds through the past, present, and future, he loses his memories and identity in the previous world and assumes the identity and the memory programmed in by the Executors. While he carries on according to the Executors' judgment, the prophecy that controls his life and death, Heuk-young gambles and desperately tries to create his own existence in an incomprehensible world. If the first six of Seven Executors are the evil demons of Descartes, the seventh one is the protagonist himself, standing against such evil genius. In a way, this conforms to the Cartesian cogito but is different in that Descartes places God as his guarantor against the evil genius. Kim's novel is an adventure and experiment that desperately seeks one's own truth only in the very world where life and death, truth and falsehood, memory and forgetting, and self and the other intermingle chaotically.

The Flourishing Future of Korean Science Fiction Bae Myung-hoon and Kim Bo-young are the descendants of Descartes in Korean science fiction. However, instead of following in the footsteps of their predecessor, who conducted the thought experiment of "Cogito, ergo sum," they ask fundamental questions about the world, the subject, and the other by twisting and violating them. Bae's experiment progresses with nimble steps, while that of Kim's moves thoroughly and meticulously. This kind of comparison is no more than a phantasm that arises from the very act of comparison. With these two writers, Korean science fiction, as is the case with all science fiction, shall be the literature of the future.

by Bok Dohoon

Special Section

Korean Science Fiction

Children’s Science Fiction The world of science fiction for children has had a slow start in Korea, but if the spate of recent publications are any indication, this emerging genre is getting ready to take off.

One needs to go back to at least the 1950s to find traces of genuine children’s science fiction in Korea. The first work that contained characteristics of the genre of children’s science fiction would be Noh Yang-keun’s "The Flying Person," published in 1936. However, the true pioneer in this genre is Hahn Nak-won, who identified herself as a children’s science fiction writer and had been working since the late 1950s. Hahn Nak-won wrote Adventures in Venus and The Lost Boy because Hahn wanted to encourage more children to discover the world of science and eventually study it; he also had his science fiction serialized in Yonhap Shinmun and Hakwon.

In the 1970s, a complete collection of children’s science fiction was translated and published. The company, Idea Hweokwan, made plastic model toys, and they translated Arthur C. Clarke’s works into simple, easily readable phrases designed for children and published 60 books as a collection.

The Idea Hweokwan series includes original Korean science fiction works like Suh Kwang-woon’s "The Last Day of the Spaceship" and "War of the Fourth Dimension" and Kim Haksu’s "The Secret of Telepathy."

Though the genre lapsed into silence for a while, Korean children’s science fiction began to reemerge with interesting works at the turn of the millennia in the early 2000s. The promising works actively handled scientific elements alongside an accomplished narration: An Mi-ran’s The Seed Guarding People (Changbi Publishers, 2001) dealt with a seed war in the future, Park Yong-gi’s The Secrets Behind the Number 64 (Baram Books, 2004) discussed the secrets of genes, and Mun Seoni’s The GMO Child (Changbi Publishers, 2005). Around this time, many Korean science fiction writers such as Kim Boyoung and Djuna were published in a collection of short stories for young adults titled In Search of Lost Thoughts (Changbi Publishers, 2007).

The year 2010 was a particularly memorable year because two different bestsellers in children’s and young adult literature were science fiction: Lee Hyun’s Planet of Robots (Prunsoop Publishing, 2010) and Bae Mi-ju’s young adult novel Syncher (Prooni Books, 2011). The success of those two works led to a

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1. Syncher Bae Mi-ju, Changbi Publishers, Inc. 2010, 224p, ISBN 9788936456290 2. Welcome to Our Ark Gu Byeong-mo Moonji Publishing Co., Ltd. 2012, 246p, ISBN 9788932022703 3. Monster Virus City Choi Yang-sun; Illustrator: Jung Ji-hea Munhakdongne Publishing Corp.

2012, 232p, ISBN 9788954617895 4. Planet of Robots (3 vols.)

Lee Hyun; Illustrator: Oh Seung-min Prunsoop Publishing Co. Ltd., 2010 496p (Vol.1), ISBN 9788971846445 (set)

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Special Section

new trend of subsequent high quality works in science fiction.

These works were all either awarded major literary awards or well received by readers: Lee Byung-seung’s The Child Poll (Prooni Books, 2011); Gu Byeong-mo’s Welcome to Our Ark (Moonji Publishing, 2012); Pygmalion’s Children (Changbi Publishers, 2012); Choi Yang-sun’s The Town Hidden from the Map (Changbi Publishers, 2012); and Monster Virus City (Munhakdongne Publishing Corp.); Kim Seong-jean’s How to Use Mom (Changbi Publishers, 2012); Lee Eun-yong’s The Thirteenth Child (Munhakdongne Publishing Corp.); and Sun Ja-eun’s The Second Universe (Jaeum & Moeum, 2012). Bae Myung-hoon, who was already established in the adult science fiction world, finally turned to a younger audience with the publication of Kiyik Kiyik’s Super Mission (Kinder Junior, 2011).

Why have the style and imagination of science fiction begun to appear in popular Korean children’s literature in the last few years? Kim Yoo-jin, a literary critic for children’s literature, claims, “Korean children’s literature attempts to find a new way by deviating from cliché, relying on the genre of science fiction. The genre is also moving forward in order to raise questions about the child as a subject through the issues that science fiction has raised by exploring the autonomy and uniqueness of human existence.” Another reason may be that a fear of the future has greatly settled in the minds of Korean children who grew up in the wake of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant disaster, which was due to the 2011 Tohoku earthquake and tsunami.

Most recent works of Korean children’s science fiction share a dystopian point of view, whereas the early works published in the 1950s through to the 70s portrayed a wondrous utopia, created by scientific technology. The dystopian mood can particularly be traced in lower-grade children’s literature because those works typically do not end depressingly. This allegory about present society is repeated and recreated in many different ways in various works. Children’s book writers seem to think that it is difficult to talk with children about hopes for the future if there is not first a serious self-examination of a society built on science and technology, even at this age. The desperate measures of such writers impose even more weight on the works.

Let us now take a look at several of the most renowned writers and their works inside the genre. First, writer Lee Hyun focuses on the relationships between cybernetics and humans; he published Dreambot (Hankyoreh Kids, 2011) in two parts and Planet of Robots in three parts. Dreambot is set in 2045, in a world where anyone can own a robot. People stop by a robot rental store, Dreambot, where they can rent a robot to suit their needs; the serialized book narrates various episodes of those people. Their masters’ needs and their robots create interesting situations; a memory-assisting robot, Whisper-bot, was rented by an amnesiac, and a brainwave-responding robot, Pretend Play-bot, reads its master’s mind to spring into action.

Other, ordinary robots like housekeeping robots are relegated to supermarkets in piles.

Lee Hyun’s other work, Planet of Robots, comes close to being critical of the reality presented in the movie Avatar. The book deals with harmful actions by humans who appear to 20 list_ Books from Korea

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be acting for the power of a god. It supposes a situation where robots demand equal status as existential beings, and works through possible moral dilemmas that could occur between the robots and humans through child-type androids: Naro, Ahra, and Neda. In this work, there is a robot that struggles over whether or not it is going to cause a war against humans oppressing robots, a human that abhors robots because he believes robots are replacing him at his job, and a hybrid being between a human and robot—a human with robot parts implanted in a portion of his brain.

The story starts from the perspective of a robot. Here, “robot” has a dual meaning; more than simply meaning a machine, the term “robot” also represents a “minority among minorities.” In a society where humans are categorized into classes such as Alpha, Gamma, and Delta, the oppression by Delta humans, from the lowest class, of the lower class robots, resembles the merciless system of social reality, which enables one to survive only by stepping over the disadvantaged. The writer shows how important identity and free will are through the challenges, discouragement, and adventures of the childtype robots living as the lowest class of society. The three robots reject the social norms for a robot and leave to seek their own way, symbolizing autonomous children who leave to chase their dreams without being oppressed by pressure and lectures from adults. In this story, the robots are portrayed as beings that can create hope. Unlike the Alpha-human or Beta-human who have escaped to Sky City, the robots remain to rebuild the earth that others had destroyed and abandoned. The story of lifeless beings trying to revive the living creates a tremendously powerful critical perspective.

Next, we turn to Choi Yang-Sun, a promising new writer who started her literary career by winning the Changbi Good Children Books Grand Prize for The Town Hidden from the Map and a Munhakdongne Children’s Literature Prize for Monster Virus City. The Town Hidden from the Map is a story that traces the relationships between the things thrown away and the apparently random disappearance of people, set in a strange junk shop on Birch Tree Island that is located at the end of the earth. The writer portrays people who are attached to their things and the catastrophes caused by reckless desires through symbolic places like the Babel Shopping Mall and The Junk Shop. The people who disappeared loved their things too much and eventually entered into their possessions and became one with them. When the newly unified thing-human comes into the Junk Shop, it is disassembled. Once disassembled, it becomes impossible to separate the human ever again. The protagonists Bodam and Sora go on adventures to save the lost people before they are disassembled and reassembled into different objects. This story has a distinctly critical social message, predicting the possible consequences caused by desire in a society of surging materialism. The effects are impressive: an intense and phantasmal future and the vivid descriptions of people who are “obsessed with things” and incapable of escaping from them.

Monster Virus City is a story that is set in two places: an elite city of high-technology, Knoxon City, and a village of stragglers, Ghiscanoo. The story discovers the truth about the

mystery virus NMV that only infects children. Knoxon City was believed to have been a perfect safe haven from poverty and disease, and the city is forced to confront a crisis due to the emergence of this mutating virus. The fatal disease only affects children who need to stay in the artificially constructed spaces of Knoxon City, where time and space are completely controlled, and it shows that even the future that was built and designed by the most innovative scientific technology cannot guarantee a perfectly safe place for the living. The lethargic children, having lived without their own time, suffer helplessly from threat of death in the face of the virus. Rea, a girl from the village Ghiscanoo who is losing her eyesight and Bud, a boy who has left Knoxon City to protect himself, go on a journey to return the time the children have lost— the time they have not been able to live out—in order to save them. In this story, the monster virus is an implied warning to humans that have forgotten the nature of life and who are too dependent on the myth of technology. The word “knoxon” has the meaning “rusted” in Korean. It is a metaphor to symbolize the foolishness of humans who are focused too strictly on development and incapable of noticing the signs of destruction around them, even while life is silently breaking down as quickly as a rusted machine.

The winner of the third Changbi Prize for Young Adult Literature, Bae Mi-ju’s Syncher, is set in the future, when the entire earth is covered with ice due to drastic climate changes.

People have built a giant city, Shiahn, and have been sustaining life within it. There is a special domed tourist zone, New Amazon, a reproduction of a tropical rain forest on the Korean peninsula, that gathers animals and plants from all over the world before the Ice Age. It is closed when the planet faces the Ice Age, but a few animals and plants have continued to survive inside the dome. Syncher is a game in which humans connect to their consciousness and experience the senses of the living animals and plants. Some young people who are survivors in the post-apocalyptic period, where the possibility of any new life is no longer guaranteed, fall into the game. They also undergo a dramatic awakening after experiencing the beauty of various living beings through the game. The story suggests that the key to creating hope ultimately lies in an awe and respect towards life, and warns of the future technological civilization that is going too far. The story delivers a message that the future of the earth will only be restored when humans escape from a life consisting solely of competition and regain their play instinct with an appreciation of living.

Lastly, the writer of Welcome to Our Ark and Pygmalion’s Children, Gu Byeong-mo, wrote stories that predict the anxiety and chaos that result from the current competitive educational system that has become one of the characteristics of Korean society. Welcome to Our Ark starts from a hypothetical setting in which a meteorite has fallen on Earth and the survivors at the brink of death build an ark. The only way for the common people to live on this safe ark is to attend Ark High School and rise to a higher social status, and the story portrays the adventures and conflicts of the twins, Mano and his sister, Ruby, who entered the school. Pygmalions’ Children also takes a keen look at how the Korean educational system fences

children into a competitive environment and classifies them by their grades. The story takes place at an imagined future school, the Rosenthal School, where the crises will eventually ensue.

Chung Jae-eun, a children’s science fiction writer, says, “Korean science fiction for children still contains more characteristics of fairy tales than science fiction.” However, as the quantity of quality works of science fiction increases as a genre, adult readers of children’s and young adult’s science fiction are increasing as well. Therefore, children’s science fiction, a genre where there is no shortage of capable, creative, and energetic writers, is expected to grow substantially.

by Kim Ji-eun

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Interview

Literary Critic Kim Uchang

A Giant of the Humanities in Korea Kim Uchang has enormous influence and respect as a literary critic and thinker. In this interview, he discusses the state of Korean literature in translation and the condition of literature itself in today’s media saturated environment.

Lee Kyung-ho: It’s so good to see you. It’s been a while. I heard that you were participating in the Tokyo International Book Fair this July. I understand you’ll be having a discussion on Korean Japanese philosophies with the renowned Japanese literary critic Karatani Kojin as part of the book fair. Karatani has expressed a keen interest in Korean literature, and created quite a stir among Korean critics with his unique view on the “death of modern literature.” What are your thoughts on the view that the traditional sociopolitical role held by contemporary literature is becoming irrelevant or altered?

Kim Uchang: I was fortunate enough to meet him a few times. I would say the “death of modern literature” is a bit hyperbolic, most likely a strategic phrasing. But it is true that the role of literature in contemporary society has been diminishing. The landscape of information is broadening and diversifying, so the role of literature as a source of information is losing significance. This surge of information is one external factor that contributes to the waning value of literature that had a more prominent role until modern times. One major internal cause for this phenomenon would be that commercial motivation heavily factors into producing literature. There is a powerful motivation to produce works that are easy to understand and empathize with, rather than ones that offer profound insights on life. A prime manifestation of this trend would be “airport novels.” These are typically characterized as something gripping one can read on a plane and toss. Literature should not be so easily consumed. Reading should be careful, arduous work.

Lee: Korea is the featured country this year at the Tokyo International Book Fair. You chaired the committee that oversaw all the programs hosted by Korea when Korea was the featured country at the 2005 Frankfurt International Book Fair.

What are some important areas to consider in advertising and disseminating our literature and culture in an international setting?

Kim: The “Korean Wave” and our economic influence have afforded us greater visibility and status among other nations, but it is still difficult to point out the values of our culture and receive recognition. Also, cultural value and influence aren’t built overnight.

Lee: It appears Korean literature that is translated and introduced abroad tends to be concentrated in one area rather than a broad spectrum of genres. Are these books finding their niche among foreign readers?

Kim: I went to an LTI Korea meeting not long ago and advised the staff not to have such high expectations of their contemporary literature translation projects. I said the same thing at the Frankfurt Book Fair—that Germans are not that familiar with their own literature, either, so don’t expect them to understand Korean literature. Truth be told, there are very few writers who remain relevant beyond their era, so it is a tall order to expect a timeless, internationally recognized work to come out of Korean literature.

Lee: In recent years, there has been an increasing number of publishing houses reviving the multi-volume world literature anthologies. But the list of canonical works in these anthologies has not changed much since several decades ago. The amount of Western literature is overwhelming. Wouldn’t you say it’s time for a new approach?

Kim: It seems the overwhelming dominance of Western literature in these anthologies is inevitable due to Western civilization’s great contribution to understanding the history of mankind. President Xi Jinping, who recently became president of China revealed plans for a cultural renaissance in China, and I hope that this entails unearthing and encouraging works that express universal values embodied in Chinese tradition rather than simply reviving and preserving traditional Chinese culture.

Nationalism in Korea makes little effort to be relatable outside the peninsula, to engage with universal values. By the way, these multi-volume world literature anthologies are mainly found in Japan and Korea. It may be a strategy of the publishing industry that Korea picked up from Japan.

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Interview

there was a part where I talk about Assisi, the hometown of Saint Francis, and how I was “surprised to see that it was crowded with tourists.” But the editors at the paper changed this to, “surprised to see that it was so crowded that tourists were standing shoulder to shoulder.” They must have thought that this was a more vivid description, but the fact of the matter is people weren’t standing shoulder to shoulder.

It is important to stick with expressions that stay true to the facts rather than ones that are stirring and read easily.

Lee: I see. Then what are your views on the idea that translation is another form of creation?

literary critics Kim Uchang and Lee Kyung-ho

Lee: Translations produced in Korea routinely receive far worse reviews than journal articles by Korean scholars.

Translation projects led by publishers also tend to provide insufficient compensation. You were involved in a wide range of translation projects. What could be some solutions to these problems?

Kim: I understand why good journal articles are held in higher regard than translations, but translation has a bigger role in our society today in terms of its contribution to the advancement of culture in this country. But an important, often overlooked part of translation is finding a good academic to provide context and notes. I mentioned this once at a classics translation meeting. Translating works of the past is important, but critical contextualization of these works is also important. There are three things that we need for this critical contextualization, and they are (a) the significance of the text in its time, (b) the significance of the text today, and (c) why the text is less relevant today than it was in the past. The translation projects must take this perspective into consideration. Translating old texts word for word is valuable only inasmuch as it provides research material for scholars. If you want to get laypersons to read classical works, you need the critical eye to edit the texts to cater to a certain purpose or theme. And it is the role of the editor or the critic to shoulder this responsibility.

Kim: I once gave a talk on creativity at Korea National University of Arts. I said that it is only natural that we seldom see truly creative works. Teaching creativity through education is not easy. This means being a creative translator is even harder. Edward Seidensticker, the translator of Kawabata Yasunari who went on to win the Nobel Prize, once said, “I should be getting that Nobel Prize.” He was joking, of course, but it reflects his view that his translation was another form of creation. Still, I would say creative translators are rare. That’s why it’s important for translators to stay true to the text.

Lee: You’ve had an interest in the relationship between literature and other related disciplines and have been a pioneer in studying the interdisciplinarity of literature, which has been emphasized since the 2000s. But I can’t help but wonder if various fields have been so quick to embrace interdisciplinarity due to its economic and industrial appeal.

What would be a more constructive approach to studying interdisciplinarity?

Kim: I actually gave a talk on the topic of categorization, imagination, and consilience at the Korea Institute for Advanced Study. It is a challenge to take an interdisciplinary approach, or achieve consilience among disciplines. What this means is that we need to look at our fields within the context of the whole. This approach may translate to an interest in developing individual competence. If you look at Korean poetry these days, for example, there is quite a bit of nonsense. This is the result of poets not spending enough time exploring the factual in life. Even poets need to be trained in scientific perspectives. Einstein invented the atomic bomb, but feared for what it could lead to.

Scientists must also reflect on the meaning of their scientific discoveries on human life.

Lee: Since a while back, the readability and fluidity of the narrative were held in higher regard compared to accuracy and expert knowledge when it comes to translating foreign works into Korean. As a result, some Korean writers have taken it upon themselves to translate foreign works. What are your thoughts on this phenomenon?

Lee: With the advent of the era of digital publishing, the format of publications is shifting from text to incorporation of audiovisual media. To a generation familiar with the Internet or smart phones, this format of textual presentation is already the norm. Marshall McLuhan welcomes this shift from text to digital media as a return to the primitive. What are your thoughts on these changes?

Kim: Korean writers translating foreign works is a good way of exploring new directions for translation. Some time ago, I wrote a column for a paper based in Gwangju. In the column,

Kim: It is true that we are in the midst of a great revolution. I can’t predict the outcome, but I can speak as a person who belongs to a time before the digital era. I also

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own a Kindle. My kids bought me one. I tried it when I was looking things up in the dictionary or searching for certain keywords in books, but it was quite a nuisance to use. It was difficult to navigate between different parts of the book.

But Kindle would be good for reading novels. Sartre talked about the convenience of books that can be read in any state, and digital media has a way of sucking the reader in. Still, physical books will survive. Texts or digital media are all the same in that they relay information, but information has a way of buffering the directness of relationships. For example, if you are murdering with knives, it is difficult to kill a lot of people because it’s too gruesome and tiresome. But if you kill using bombs, you can skip the gruesome experience and so the availability of the option can lead to a great catastrophe. I believe digital media could lead to something similar, to the dehumanization of humans.

Frankfurt Book Fair that there were three instances where Germany invaded the world without using force. The first was music, second was Marxism, and third was philosophy. German music expresses emotions through a wide range of nuances, which come from a wide range of sensual experiences. The foundation of this expression is rationality. People say that math and music are closely related, and Mozart's compositions— while Mozart is Austrian—has these elements of scientific rationality that employs equations to express emotion. Max Weber’s treatise on the rationalization of music is particularly informative as it provides a comprehensive perspective that looks at both the rational and emotional side of artistic expression.

Korean literature needs this deep reflection. I hope to see more works that respect rationality and are written in sentences true to facts.

by Lee Kyung-ho

L e e : From a nc ient t i me s to t he mo der n er a , t he metaphysical world such as the soul or reason was the main area of interest when it came to the religious and philosophical perspective of humans. The physical being was not deemed a valuable part of the discourse, whereas art and academia in contemporary society seems to be putting too much emphasis on the senses and the desires of the body. Early on in your career, you advocated for aesthetic reasoning, a balance between reason as it represents the mental value of life, and the aesthetic as a value that complements the mental and can be experienced in everyday life. How would you evaluate the values of contemporary society from the perspective of aesthetic reasoning?

Kim: The physical is being too stressed as of late. Literature has both sensual and rational appeal. The German writer, Thomas Mann wrote essays on Freud that demonstrated deeper insight than Freud scholars, and D. H. Lawrence, a British writer, is known for his sensual and sexual narratives, but was also able to write articles on American literature that far surpassed any expert in the field in their depth. This is what I would like to see in Korean writers. I said at a lecture at the

Kim Uchang is a literary critic and scholar of English literature.

Born in Hampyeong, South Jeolla Province, in 1937, he graduated from the Department of English Language and Literature at Seoul National University.

He debuted in 1965 by publishing the critical essay "The Example of T.S. Eliot" in the magazine Cheongmaek. He received his PhD from Harvard University for his dissertation on the history of American civilization. Kim was a professor of English Literature at Seoul National University and Korea University, and the dean of Korea University Graduate School. Currently, he is professor emeritus at Korea University. He is the author of Poets in the Poor Age, The Complete Works of Kim Uchang (5 volumes), The Study of Aesthetic Rationality, The World of Politics and Life, and Landscape and Mind. He has also published a number of translations, including Mimesis, and many papers.

The Complete Works of Kim Uchang (5 vols.)

Kim Uchang, Minumsa Publishing Group 2006, 432p, ISBN 9788937410314 (Vol.1)

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Excerpt

Chapter 4

Landscape as the Ecological Sublime

by Kim Uchang Asian art exists embedded in the totality of the cultural life of society or, more generally, in the entire epistemic regime of society or even of the entire civilization. This is so in most traditions, but it appears to be more the case in Asian painting, which did not lead as an autonomous life as it could, let us say, as in Western modernity. This is of course only a relative affair, any art world not make sense except in its cultural context.

But the way it is related to this context can vary. All visual arts have perceptual immediacy as they are always open to the viewer's sensory inspection, but needless to say, the immediacy becomes meaningful in the viewer's mind only as it resonates through the whole landscape of meaning in a specific cultural configuration. A painting or apiece of perceived detail in a painting usually yields its meaning in terms of a narrative or an iconographical tradition, as, to borrow an example from Panofsky1, let us say, a male figure with a knife, in the Renaissance painting, would: he represents St. Bartholomew, traditionally one of the Twelve Apostles who is said to have done his missionary work in India until his martyrdom in Armenia. While perceptual realism is, especially to the Asian eye, what really marks Western paintings as a whole.

One is surprised by narratives that saturate them- classical, Christian, or historical narratives or tableaux from the life of nobility. (The existence of narratives outside the pictorial frame might have allowed the concentration on perceptual realism, which eventually led to the complete autonomy of pictorial art in the modern age.) In contrast to these allegorical narratives that complete the meaning of the perceived details of a painting from outside the pictorial frames, we find in the Asian tradition, except Buddhist murals, the paucity of larger allegorical stories, of which paintings illustrate some episodes decipherable in a given diegesis. It does not mean, however, that there are no cultural thematics framing, in broad nondiegetic scenarios, significant motifs: let us say, four plants representing the princely man's virtues or configurative designs of landscapes, with mountains, rivers, trees and rocks as places of contemplation and habitation. Yet within this cultural thematics, an Asian painting normally completes its meaning within itself - not, of course, divesting itself, as in modern painting, of allegorical and representational references to reality or its narrative unfolding; but retaining, of these, at least the representational reference. The representation will be

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to the totality of the world, which is taken to constitute the ground of meaning. It is in this connection that landscape takes its precedence in the hierarchy of pictorial genres in the Asian tradition, as it purports to approximate this totality as the ground of meaning in place of a diagetic reference; it I as if the meaning-giving narrative is contained in the whole of the pictorial tradition, which is then represented by landscape.

The unemphatic nature of the allegorical or diegetic element s in t he A sia n t rad it ion of pa int ing a nd t he supplementary importance of landscape as the master narrative of pictorial representation - this is not entirely, of course, due to artistic reasons, though techniques and institutions of art must have played a part in it. Explanation should be the other way around. it has ideological origins. The importance of landscape painting was recognized early in the East Asian tradition, for example, as early as in Tsung Ping(375-443)'s preface to "Painting Mountains and Waters" where he speaks of the benefit of "a landscape painting through which he can engage in exploration of the four corners of the world, and come, without let, face to face, with the uninhabited fields."2 But we can say that in Korea, the predominance of landscape painting becomes definite after the Confucian revolution that established a new regime in the fourteenth century. Whatever the chronology may be, it is safe to say that landscape painting has a great deal to do with the kind of secularism as represented

by Confucianism, which saw, along with Taoism, in nature the supreme matrix of creation, not in some transcendental realm. For the totality of nature as an object of this creative source is best represented in pictorial terms in a landscape covering as large an expanse of space as it is possible. While other representational topoi taken from nature maybe said to constitute episodes from this landscape as all that there is.

To say this is to attribute spiritual significance to landscape painting - or the experience of landscape, which could be either in pictorial forms or in actual peregrination in the wilderness. Travelling in scenic mountains and waters, and recording the experience in paintings, poems and essays were wide spread among the pre-modern Koreans.3 The experience had, if not religious, at least quasi-transcendental significance.

The special appeal of landscape as a transcendental substitute was similarly there in the idea of the sublime in the Romantic Europe. The Romantic artists of Europe, faced with certain aspect of nature seeming to transcend the compass of the cognitive faculty of reason, made use of the aesthetic category of the sublime to describe their experience. The sublime was felt to be present when nature was approached in its great size, power and majesty. A sense of religious awe as in the presence of something divine as often the resulting affect. What is represented in numerous Asian landscape paintings can be said to be a variety of the sublime. It had to be given emphatic repetition, for in the non-theological cosmology of TaoistConfucianism, as noted in above, nature as a whole was to serve as the final determinants of human existence.

The practice of landscape was important, as observed, in the spiritual life of the pre-modern Koreans. It was literati, par excellence, who were, as the upholders of the spiritual values of society, to be the more authentic agency of pictorial

truth than the professional painters. Re-creation of nature in a landscape of scale, as in the conventionalized topoi of natural life, birds, flowers and other emblematic plants, was to have in their hands the real meaning of spiritual exercises in natural piety. Emphasis on conventional procedure in execution and techniques can be also placed on this cosmological status of mountains and water, as one could not be expected to depart from the hallowed regimen of spiritual exercises. Everything was to be governed by this spiritual mission of the painting.

How does nature come to have meaning? If the main concern of landscape painting was the experience of the mountains as the site of the sublime or the transcendental, what mattered was the meaning of landscape as a whole, not the details that make up the whole scenery, one might say.

But, of course, the whole must be built up from parts. It was, in landscape painting, not only a technical necessity, but part of the message to be conveyed. For the meaning of landscape was derived as much from its anchorage in the concrete reality of the physical world and life lived in it, as it was to be guided by what is perceived. We may then start from an examination of the details that built up to the whole of landscape. As we have observed in the above, pictorial details often derive their meaning from the narratives supplied from tradition. Thirteen men sitting around a table in a certain arrangement would not be recognized as a depiction of The Last Supper by Australian Bushmen, as Panofsky points out4 that is, if they are completely without proper biblical knowledge in the Christian tradition.

But if nature and its pictorial rendering in landscape painting is to have meaning, without too much help from iconographical traditions, how is it effected? [∙∙∙] What is most interesting is perhaps the way pictorial techniques, while they appear to have been deductively derived from the overall thesis of nature as the totality of the world, rely on the details of the objects perceived from afar or close at hand. In some prescribed techniques, the execution of pictorial details prepares the building blocks in the patterned ordering of the world. The Chinese are perhaps most careful in inventing, accumulating and preserving technical progresses in pictorial representations. Manuals of painting abound in advices on how to render leaves of trees or shapes and ridges of mountains in carefully executed techniques. Significant are the figurative terms by which these techniques are explained. The branches of trees are, for instance, to be drawn in the shapes of deer-horns, crab claws or flames.5 The leaves could be drawn like foot prints of mice or scattered mustard seeds. Their shapes could be abridged into some typical foliate patterns: water plants, chrysanthemums, drooping wistarias, plums, cedars, pine-nut trees or pines. The way the leaves hang on the trees can be drawn like heads held straight, hanging down or looking up. More interesting is the way trees are drawn standing together as they can be made to embody fraternal morals or humans. Trees could stand together looking as if a young person is helping the aged, an adult assisting a child or a host meeting a guest. Mountains are also to be depicted in

certain styles that could be rendered in metaphorical terms: they could be like hemp fibers in various conditions, that is, spread-out, tangled in disorder, or low-lying like young sprouts.

Formations of mountain slopes could have shapes of ax-cuts, large or small, or shapes of lotus leaves.

The figurative language of pictorial technique might have been only a pedagogical expediency, but it must have to do with an intuitive hermeneutic of analogies applied to the world.

An important point in this hermeneutic is that analogies are mostly between the grand geomorphological features of mountains and streams on the one hand and familiar vegetative forms and things used in earthier activities of life, such as hemps variously processed for human use or axes employed for wood-cutting, on the other. The mystique of swift and facile execution also reveals this curious conjunction of the familiar and the sublime. In painting and calligraphy, the agility and speed in the use of brush to produce desired effects was highly appreciated. It has to do with the belief that the artist could easily incorporate the creative processes of nature by the mastery of their analogical grammar. Humans and the guiding spirit of the cosmos are one. But this convergence can come together in the practice of mundane crafts, not only in philosophical contemplation or high art, and painting was craft as much as high art.

1. Erwin Panofsky, "Iconography and Iconology: An Introduction to the Study of the Renaissance Art." in Meaning in the Visual Arts, Hammondsworth, Middlesex: Penguin Books, 1970, p.51.

2. Quoted Yi Sungmi, "Hangug-in-gwa sangurim [The Koreans and Mountain Painting]," Choi Chengho(ed.), San-gwa hangug-in-wui sarm [Mountains and Korean Life], Seoul: Nanam, 1993, p.151.

3. Ko Yeonhi, Choseon hugi sansu kihaeng yesul yeongu [The art of nature travels in the Late Choseon Period](Seoul:Ilchisa,2001) is a study of the practice and institution of nature travels in seventeenth and eighteenth century Korea, which promoted, in combination, travel, literature and painting.

4. Erwin Panofsky, op. cit., p.61.

5. The figurative terms of pictorial technique here are taken from An Dongsuk(ed.), Jeongtong dongyanghwa gibeop, 6&7, sansu pyon, sang&ha [True techniques of East Asian painting, 6&7, Landscape, 1&2](Seoul: Mijosa, 1981), but An's books rely a great deal on the traditional Chinese manual of painting, The Mustard Seed Garden Manual of Painting.

translated by Kim Uchang

Landscape and Mind Kim Uchang, LTI Korea, 2005, 185p, ISBN 8984984965

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27

Interview

A Seeker of Truth Writer Choi Suchol

Writer Choi Suchol continues to challenge readers and keep them awake with his unconventional short stories and novels.

Author Han Eun-hyeong sat down with Choi to talk about writing, love, and his readers.

From Mind to Body, from Form to Story Han Eun-hyeong: How do you spend your time when you’re not working on a novel?

Choi Suchol: Recently, I’ve taken a great interest in the “Alexander technique,” also known as “meditation of the body,” and have been studying and practicing it in my own way. I’ve also been playing table tennis whenever I can for several years, and plan to continue. As a writer, I’ve focused on the issues of the mind, but now I think I can awaken my body through the Alexander technique and table tennis, and come to encounter a new self through communication between the mind and body. I expect that my works will continue to change as a result.

Han: I’ve read your recently published short story, “Journals of a Madman.” I felt that it was an integration of your past works, which deal with characters that suffer from diseases and symptoms, or are exceptionally sensitive.

Choi: I write novels in order not to be numbed by daily life. My characters are sensitive because they’re aware that they’ve become numb. They make an effort to free themselves of that state, through their senses or consciousness. Ordinary people are awake to a degree, and numb to a degree, but a madman is overly awake. You’re right. My characters have always had a streak of madness to them, and I try to take it to the extremes in order to find, in daily life, a revelation on existential life.

Han: It occurred to me that your short stories are like the 28 list_ Books from Korea

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Mobius strip. Their beginnings and endings are unclear, and they’re structurally entangled. When I read your short stories, I feel as if something’s wrong with my senses.

Choi: I intentionally create a labyrinth with stories that are like the Mobius strip in form, and have the characters and readers take part in an adventure together. When that happens, the senses become confused, or deranged, even, but eventually you figure out a way to get out of the labyrinth. In a way, a derangement of the senses is the most effective way to resist the conventional world, because what’s normal is bound to be conventional. I’ve also been influenced by poets like Rimbaud and Baudelaire. When you get out of the labyrinth, you’re finally awakened from numbness.

Han: You’ve translated five novels by Le Clézio. He seems to be an author who has a literary goal or path similar to yours.

Choi: I was mesmerized by Le Clézio’s early works. Le Procès-verbal and Le déluge are works that represent nouveau romans. But since Terra Amata, Le Clézio began to publish lyrical novels that were easy to read. I felt betrayed, in fact. I hosted a reading for him once, and asked him what had led to such changes. He said the changes just came about naturally.

Now I think I can understand how he felt. In fact, I’m in a process of transition myself, moving on from experimentation on the form of writing to a world of fascinating stories.

Han: Bed seems to be in a different category from the novels you wrote in the past. In the past, the character’s senses or sense of identity were at the center of your works. What led you to write a novel like this?

Choi: The story is very important in a novel. In the past, I decided that the two axes forming a novel were reality (or concreteness) and symbolism, and tried to combine the two to find my own story. I went through a lot of changes in the

Interview

"Love is the ultimate state of true communication."

writers Han Eun-hyeong and Choi Suchol

process. I once wrote a novel titled Cicada, that veered more towards symbolism than reality, and was somewhat allegorical in nature. The novel I wrote after that was Pest, which served as an important turning point for me. I was able to bring reality into relief within the philosophical theme of death. In Bed, I focused on creating a more diverse and compelling story than in Pest. I tried to reenact within a single framework the many human affairs that take place around a bed. I enjoyed the writing process, too. I think in the future, I could write a novel that’s simply a story.

Communication Requires Inconvenience Han: Seo Sang, a writer in Pest, says, “He said he’d never written a novel of manners, nor did he ever intend to, being too proud.” What kind of a novel did you want to write?

Choi: Actually, all novels reflect the social conditions of the times. But from early on, I tried not to write stories of people’s lives as novels. In other words, I sought to raise objections to the conventional world view we have by provoking and confusing readers, rather than move their hearts. As I did, my novels came to have a stronger and stronger tendency to dissect and analyze reality. Then I wrote a novella titled “Smashing the Channels” after which I fell into despair. The story was completely shattered. I was kind of lost after that for four or five years. And I came to realize that integration, more than dissection and analysis, was necessary, and devoted myself to writing Pest, which took almost six years.

For some time, the key figures in my novels were men. To be more precise, they were neutered beings called “humans.” But as I wrote a novel about death, a strong female protagonist was brought to life from within myself, probably because the power to stand up to this terrifying mystery called death lies more in femininity than in masculinity. Through this heroine named “Myeong-in,” I embraced and integrated a divided world, and found great joy in the process. And to my surprise, the heroine was myself exactly. Through Myeong-in, I discovered the femininity within myself, and experienced a merging of the femininity and masculinity in myself. I was able to create many important heroines in Bed. I even fell in love with some of them (laughs).

Han: Pest reveals all kinds of motives for and methods of suicide. Did you come to any kind of a conclusion about death after writing this novel?

Choi: As times change, opinions on suicide change as well. Suicide isn’t an object of affirmation or negation, or of judgment as to whether it’s a crime or not. Suicide is merely an important phenomenon that occurs in life, one that’s growing increasingly serious. You could say that suicide is one of the many ways in which we meet death. The only thing is, nearly all human actions arise from the fear of death, but paradoxically, suicide, too, has its roots in the fear of death.

It could be compared to the act of slashing one’s wrists before being executed. Pest seeks to objectify and make our fear of death relative so that death may be reconsidered.

Han: In Pest, a woman is depicted as a main character for almost the first time in your works. This seems to be one of the changes that came about in your works.

Han: We all live in different worlds. You could say that this perspective is maximized in your novels. You come to the conclusion, “Hell is other people,” as Sartre said.

Choi: As you know, Pest is a story about people in a city hit by the wind of death, sinking into the madness of suicide.

Choi: The most important theme in my novels, which appears consistently, is a search for the possibility of true

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communication. In order to allow true communication, you must go beyond conventional and superficial communication.

To do so, you must be acutely awake. But people who are keenly awake make other people uncomfortable. So they’re excluded or persecuted, or even martyred, and my novels often end in this way. But it’s quite meaningful to continue bringing to mind how important, and at the same time how difficult, it is to have true communication in our lives. Besides, the novel is fundamentally a tool and a venue for deeper communication between people.

Love Came After Communication Han: A place called Mumang often appears in your works.

What does it mean?

Choi: You could say that Mumang is the prototype of the city in my heart. I know all about the city, and have ambivalent feelings about it. I’m from Chuncheon, which is the seat of a provincial government, but a simple, quiet, and beautiful place. Growing up in Chuncheon, I dreamed of a place that was different, and in that respect, Mumang could or could not be Chuncheon. As a side note, I like the word mumang. It corresponds to my identity. The word has several meanings, such as to not forget, to wish fervently, and to go wild, and as a writer, I wish fervently to write good works without forgetting anything, and often go wild. (laughs)

that since then, the ideal reader and the real reader have been growing closer together.

Han: What could you tell us about your next novel?

Choi: My novel is being serialized in a monthly literary journal. The novel is titled Love Despises the Lazy, a line from Ovid’s poem. It’s a typical love story in which a man and a woman, unable to adjust to reality because of their peculiar tendencies, come to save each other through love. I’ve been using the motif of a chair, instead of a bed, throughout the work, and have been told that the story has become richer as a result.

by Han Eun-hyeong

1. Bed Choi Suchol, Moonji Publishing Co., Ltd. 2011, 582p, ISBN 9788932022130 2. Pest (2 vols.)

Choi Suchol, Moonji Publishing Co., Ltd. 2005, 364p, ISBN 9788932016627 (Vol.1)

1

Han: In your works, men are always fighting, often over women. It seems that it’s love they seek to gain through fighting. What does love mean to you?

Choi: Love is the ultimate state of true communication.

So love, too, is the most important and difficult theme for me. That’s why I kept putting it off, and talked instead about communication between people, preparing myself to talk about love. Then finally, I was able to say “I love you” in my novel, and since then, I’ve been dealing much with the theme of love. This is what I think love means now: to place not yourself but someone else at your core, and thus discover yourself through that person.

Han: What do you think of your readers?

Choi: I once gave a lecture, during which one of my readers said that my novels weren’t easy to read and asked, “What in the world do you think readers are?” I said in retort, “What in the world do you think a writer is?” Everyone burst out laughing at that, and I barely managed to get myself out of a sticky situation. Then I added that writers have an ideal reader in mind, and in a way, I place more importance on the ideal reader than a real reader, and that by doing so I attend to the real reader. A writer could neglect his duty by making his novels just fun and easy to read, when he could be writing with greater intensity. But after a while, my ideas began to change. I wondered if I myself weren’t staying alone in a lofty and isolated world where the ideal reader lived. You could say

2

Choi Suchol was born in Chuncheon, Gangwon Province, in 1958.

He completed a BA and MA in French Language and Literature at Seoul National University. He made his debut in 1981 when his short story “Blind Spot” won the Chosun Ilbo New Writer’s Contest. He is the author of several short story collections including A Castle in the Air; Montage; and Short Nap by the Roadside, and the novels including In the Stomach of a Whale; An Anarchist’s Love; Cicada; Pest; and Bed. He is also the recipient of the Yun Dong-ju Literary Award and Yi Sang Literary Award. Currently, he is a professor of creative writing at Hanshin University.

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31

Excerpt

An Excerpt from Bed

by Choi Suchol

There was a troubled region of the world that was once one people, one nation, but became divided in two and waged in a fierce warfare. This is a story about something that happened in a prison camp there. Outside the camp, the war was coming to an end. But sporadic battles were going on, more intensely than ever. Rumor was going around that soon, a ceasefire would be called, so both sides were fighting desperately to be at an advantage at the ceasefire agreement.

As a result, the prison camp was full of tension. The prisoners were largely grouped into two camps as to which position they would take after the ceasefire. They could choose either of the divided nations, the south or the north.

They were to be given the right to choose a third nation, but it was expected that not too many would do so.

The head of the prison camp was a field grade officer belonging to the peacekeeping force dispatched from abroad.

The head, who from the beginning had upheld the cause of mediating a war between the same people, tried to take as neutral a stance as possible. But to that very degree, he failed to get an accurate picture of what was going on. It was too much to expect him to be thoroughly prepared for something that could happen at any moment.

The more time passed, the greater became the division and conflict among the prisoners, and things were strained to the breaking point. The head of the camp was aware of this.

At first, he had the lights go out and the prisoners in bed at an early hour to limit their time and actions. Forced sleep, however, stirred up nightmares. The nightmares became reality in the darkness of the camp. Reckless killings took place during the night, and many died on their beds in the barracks. Night came early in the camp, but no one went to sleep. Night required clarity of mind, more so than during the day. In order to survive, no one could sleep.

There I was, an old and shabby bed near the entrance of the central barracks. I was separate from the other beds, so the head of the barracks had claim on me. He was called Jang Gang, but no one knew if that was his real name, or a nickname. His soldiers whispered that he had once been in a circus, and did not rank very high, either. It was undeniable, however, that he had incredible strength, as well as leadership,

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so no one dared challenge his authority.

He had spent more than a month on me. But he rarely ever opened up to me. Jang Gang was a person who kept a tight grip on himself, both within and without, even while sleeping. But he knew better than anyone that the worst was soon to come, and fell deeper and deeper into anguish and despair. He had no intention of siding with either camp. He only wished desperately that the violent antagonism would come to a stop and that they would be able to coexist. He was horrified that his fellow soldiers went to bed early to make plans to kill their old comrades in the other camp, and that the bed, which should be a place of comfort and rest, though old and shabby, had become a place for conspiracy to kill. I was even more horrified, being a bed myself.

One day, he asked to meet with the head of the prison camp, with the permission of the leadership of the camp.

The head of the camp was also aware of what was going on within the camp, so he willingly met with him. The head had received a report that people were getting injured one after another during their tasks, some even to the point of death, and had been agonizing over what measures should be taken.

On top of that, patients suffering from fever and stomach f lu were dying and black smoke was rising everywhere with corpses burning, making the camp no different from Auschwitz.

While talking to the head of the prison camp about this and that, Jang Gang suddenly requested that the lights be turned out later, and that they be allowed to dance instead.

“Dance instead of sleep.”

The head of the prison camp was surprised at the unexpected words. But Jang Gang must have been just as mystified. It was my idea to propose that they be allowed to dance. Wouldn’t it be better to dance than to think of ways to kill each other without being able to sleep? While Jang Gang lay on top of me, confused with anguish, I had made my way into his heart and planted the thought there.

Jang Gang went on to say, “Dreams are like eggs laid by beds. The beds can no longer lay eggs, shocked into a state of sterility and infertility by the sound of cannonballs, so we should dance instead of dream. The beds will come back to life if we do. Then we can stop the war.”

There was silence for some time between the two. Jang Gang himself was deep in thought over what he had just said.

Then the head of the prison camp, who had an unusually prominent crown, slapped the table with his hand and said, “Good, good, that’s a great idea.”

He felt that it would be good to let go of the past by having everyone dance together, for the time had come to put an end to the long-standing conflict. The head of the prison camp added that there would be time set aside after dinner for dancing, after which the prisoners would have some time to enjoy themselves, and that drinks would be provided as long as they didn’t make a fuss. It was decided on the spot that the

kind of dance of choice would be the waltz.

From the next day on, the entire prison camp grew as bright as day when night deepened, and everyone had to come out to the empty lot to dance. As it happened, there was a good dancer among the prisoners, and he volunteered as an instructor. Lively, colorful music from abroad came flowing out of the loudspeakers every day, and the prisoners waltzed to the sound of the music. And when everyone began to relax and grow tired, the guards sent them back into their barracks.

The leadership was divided as to Jang Gang’s dogmatic behavior. But it was decided that he could serve as a kind of spy, and that they should wait and see what happened.

The prisoners had to dance every day, so dancing became labor at times, and drudgery at times. Still, the prisoners became better and better at dancing. They could do many things while dancing with ease. They talked to each other, smoked cigarettes together, discussed what they would do the next day, and at times, still whisper conspiracies. Sometimes, they couldn’t tell if they were dancing, or sleeping and dreaming that they were dancing.

But more than anything, they could, while dancing, get the sleep that they so lacked. They no longer had to tremble with fear that they might die in their sleep. While they danced and slept, they also dreamed. As dance and sleep and dream came to them all at once, the tension among the prisoners subsided somewhat. They looked less fierce, and they spoke with more courtesy. Witnessing the changes, the head of the prison camp felt great satisfaction. Jang Gang brightened up as well. He didn’t let himself relax, though. I felt uneasy, but I, too, enjoyed the different feeling that had come upon the prison camp.

Oh, but I had been foolish. Sleep substituted by dance, though it wasn’t sleep forced through darkness, held within it an unexpected, fatal danger. Within the sleep of dance, which required movements of perfect order, they once again began to harbor seeds of collective behavior towards slaughter.

One day, an order came down from the leadership to Jang Gang. A dance would be held the next day, with all the prisoners participating to show what they had mastered, so Jang Gang was to invite the head of the prison camp. Jang Gang conveyed the message to a guard, and the head of the prison camp relayed that he would watch the dance at the front gate, since he couldn’t go inside the camp itself.

The next day, most of the prisoners lined up in the empty lot, and the head of the prison camp, dressed in formal attire, appeared and began to walk towards the gate. At that moment, the prisoners suddenly moved. They pushed down the gate with a pole and at once took the head of the prison camp hostage, and pushed forward with great force, shouting.

The prisoners took in their hands anything that would serve as weapons. It all happened in an instant, and the head of the prison camp served as a shield, so the guards at the second guard post drew back, unable to stop the prisoners.

Everyone was swept up in the vortex of the riot. Jang Gang could not believe what was happening before his eyes.

It shocked him that he alone had not known about the revolt that everyone else was in on. At that moment, a man raised a club and struck down on the head of the prisoner who had been in charge of dance instruction. At the same time, someone thrust a pickax at Jang Gang’s back with all his might. Only then did Jang Gang realize that he and the dance instructor had been sentenced to death by the people’s court for being reactionaries. He had been thoroughly used.

His spine broke with a snap. In that state he crawled over to me. Soon his body, a big lump of flesh and bones, collapsed down onto me. Thus the history of a man, who had lived as a human bed, doing all kinds of unpleasant tasks, came to an end. The human bed that had tried to hold up the world like Atlas, not fearing cannonballs and bullets, finally broke.

But he felt a degree of satisfaction at his end. He thought that maybe with this, atonement had been made. Life and war, it was all a circus. Before breathing his last, he saw fractured human bones flying up into the air, crashing into each other, making noises and dancing. It was the very dance of death he would now have to dance. translated by Jung Yewon

Bed Choi Suchol Moonji Publishing Co., Ltd. 2011, 582p, ISBN 9788932022130

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The Place

In a country carved by innumerable peaks and valleys it is no wonder that mountains hold a sacred place in the Korean identity, and no other mountain captures the essence of the South Korean national spirit as Namsan Mountain located in the ancient Silla capital of Gyeongju. Dozens of Buddhist artifacts still remain throughout the mountain where hikers and day-trippers can experience this living outdoor museum designated as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2000.

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Koreans are known for their strong patriotism, due to the experience of their country being colonized in the early 20th century. The drive that propelled Korea through industrialization and democratization much more swiftly than other newly independent nationstates that emerged out of World War II, and firmly established Korea as an exemplary republic, had its source in this temporary loss. Still later, Koreans came together to revive the national economy by donating gold during the IMF financial crisis of 1997 and the passionate cheering squads during the 2002 World Cup, otherwise known as the Red Devils, made a lasting impression on foreigners. These are good examples of the Korean brand of patriotism.

The second verse of the Korean national anthem goes: The steadfast pine on Namsan, / unchanging through wind and frost / as though in an armor of steel, / is our spirit. “Namsan” here refers to “a mountain to the south of the village,” but in a country such as Korea where mountains and hills take up the better part of the territory, “Namsan” also carries the symbolic meaning of the “mother mountain” that protects villages. Considering the history of Korea where fortresses, not citadels, were built on mountains to protect residential areas, the name “Namsan” embodies the religious wishes for a peaceful life and prosperity. Therefore, many major Korean cities have mountains called “Namsan.” Namsan the tourist attraction in Myeongdong, Seoul, is one, and Namsan in the old capital during the Silla dynasty is another.

And as the national anthem reveals, every Namsan has pine trees.

Pines have long symbolized the unyielding, characteristically Korean national ethos. Pines, especially red pines, are the most common tree in Korea. The fantastic pine forest in the photograph taken by photographer Bae Bien-U and owned by singer Elton John is part of Namsan in Gyeongju. To be precise, it is a pine forest adjacent to the royal tomb

Yongjangsa Temple Three-story Pagoda

The Place

of King Gyeongae, located on the mountainside of Namsan, Gyeongju. Bae Bien-U took many pictures of the pine forest near the trails of Samneung Tomb, the tomb with the largest collection of Buddhist cultural treasures.

Although the Korean pine cannot grow straight, its height gives it the look of confidence and poise. As an evergreen, it stays unchanging throughout the year. The endurance and strength of the tree that grows to be so tall and big in spite of the winds twisting its boughs and trunks this way and that reminds one of the Korean language, which serves its communicative purpose in a wide range of situations through inf lection. The charm of the pine tree contains both the masculine virtue of adhering to one’s beliefs especially through difficult times, and the feminine sacrifice of embracing a life of writhing agony in order to sustain life and to grow. Koreans have protected their land and lives with the same unchanging strength and passion for life, and preserved the history of the community. Where there are royal tombs, there are always pine groves nearby. Koreans revere and worship pine trees, which coexist with all living things that seek to carve out a place for themselves on the periphery of history, as a symbol of a proud Korean heritage.

There is a Namsan Mountain in Seoul, complete with pine trees, but when one thinks of Namsan Mountain as a symbol of the nation, the one in Gyeongju comes to mind.

Compared to the relatively brief history of Seoul Namsan, Gyeongju Namsan is the birthplace and archive of Korea's cultural heritage, embodying a thousand years of history and culture of the ancient Silla dynasty.

rock cliff Buddha

The Gyeongju Namsan is a small mountain, spanning only four kilometers from east to west and 10 from north to south, with two peaks, Geumobong Peak (468m) and Gowibong Peak (494m). But in the folds of its 40 or so valleys and ridges, there are 140 temple sites, 118 Buddha statues, 96 pagodas, and 37 tombs—truly the birthplace and museum of Buddhist culture in ancient Korea with its vast cultural legacy. In 2000, Gyeongju Namsan became a UNESCO Cultural Heritage Site. The well where legends say that the progenitor of the royal Silla line King Pak Hyokkose was found as an egg, and the site of the first palace of the dynasty, are in this mountain.

The four mountain fortresses, including Namsanseong Fortress and Poseokjeong Pavillion shrouded with the suffering of the end of a dynasty, and the tombs of countless kings of the dynasty, truly attests to this mountain as the companion of a thousand year Silla history.

Many Buddha statues and pagodas from the Silla dynasty remain in Namsan Mountain. It was around the 7th century that symbols of Buddhism were first built in Namsan. Most of the early structures were stone Buddhas and stone pagodas, and there is a particularly great number of ma-aebul, or rock cliff Buddhas, which are images of Buddha carved into rocks. The granite in the mountain can be one reason for the abundance of stone Buddhas on Namsan, but another reason may be the rock worship of early folk religions. Cheongma Yu Chi-hwan, a renowned poet from 1930s Korea, once said, “The stonemason does not carve a Buddha out of stone, but finds Buddha in the stone.” The ancient Silla people accepted Buddhism as a nomos of life rather than as a metaphysical religious doctrine. They believed that the spirit of Buddha came down from above and dwelled in the rocks. When the time came, Buddha would reveal itself as a blessing and comfort for the suffering masses. Partly owing to the marriage between Buddhism and Korean folk religion, the stone Buddhas in Namsan all have warm, friendly expressions reminiscent of cordial country folk. The Seated Stone Buddha of Bulgok Valley, presumed to be the oldest stone Buddha in Namsan, wears the smile of a mother welcoming home her children who are visiting their hometown after being away, and the Stone Maitreya Triad of Jangchanggok Valley, Stone Buddha Triad of Seonbanggok Valley, and the Buddha of Samhwaryeong Ridge referred to in the monk Chungdamsa’s song, "Anminga," is well-known for its bright, innocent smile.

Chungdamsa is a monk famous for his mastery of the Silla poetry form, hyangga, but he is also celebrated as the pioneer of tea culture in Gyeongju. Even today, Gyeongju residents hold a ceremony on the third day of March on the lunar calendar offering the Buddha of Samhwaryeong Ridge tea in remembrance of the writer of "Anminga" who criticized the corrupt king for the sake of the people.

When Gyeongju people began making Buddha reliefs and statues in the 7th century, it was with the hopes of making their homes their ideals with the help of Buddha. Chilburam Hermitage, a popular attraction among Gyeongju citizens and out-of-towners alike, is a prime example. Chilburam, literally translated, means hermitage of seven Buddhas. The three Buddhas on the large boulder in the middle are the

the twisted pines of Namsan Gyeongju

Buddha Triad and the Buddhas on the four sides of the rock called the Four-direction Buddhas perched on top of a stone base were built when the hermitage was built below it. One cannot help but be amazed by the dedication and passion of the Silla people who saw the rock cliffs deep within the deserted mountain ridge as heaven where Buddhas live, and sought to make an ideal home that replicates the world of Enlightenment on earth by carving Buddha reliefs into stone.

Their faith blossomed into art, whose passion erected a temple in every valley, sculpted Buddhas on every rock, and built so many pagodas that transformed Namsan into one great land of Buddhism.

The strong faith of the ancient Silla people is reflected in pagodas as well. The three-story pagoda in the Yongjangsa Temple in Yongjanggol Valley has a stone peak over 200 meters tall as its base. Another stone base is placed on the peak and the pagoda and stone roof is perched on the top where it looks over the vast fields of Gyeongju. The prayer that Buddha’s blessings would be bestowed upon all those who live in Gyeongju and beyond, whether they be rich or poor, is represented by the pagoda. The Yongjangsa Temple of Yongjanggol Valley is also known as the very place where Tales of Geumo, the first ancient novel in the history of Korean literature, was drafted by the brilliant 15th century Joseon writer, Kim Si-seup. Tales of Geumo is considered a paragon of fantasy fiction in pre-modern Korea. It depicts the love stories of free-spirited characters that rejected the Confucian tradition of family marriage, and strove to be with the ones they loved.

Just as Kim Si-seup himself was a wandering bard at odds with the reality of his times, the themes of Tales of Geumo is one of a timeless, universal strife and the search for the ideal.

The otherworldly atmosphere of Namsan goes well with the message of the book.

The true values of Buddhist artifacts in Namsan are harmony with nature and diversity. Flat rocks are for carving Buddhas, tall peaks are for building pagodas, and f lat clearings are for constructing temples, but harmony with nature was never neglected. There are many mountain paths in Namsan. There are over 70 official trails. The trails are

tangled like spider webs, but all paths lead to Gowibong Peak and Geumobong Peak. The most recommended hiking course is one that begins in the Samneung Valley with the highest concentration of artifacts, then up to Geumobong, and down the Yongjanggol Valley with the highest concentration of temple sites. On this course, hikers can see all the major artifacts in the area such as the Najeong Well from Silla King Pak Hyokkose’s creation myth, the tragic Poseokjeong Pavilion, the Standing Stone Buddhist Triad of Bae-ri, Samneung Tombs, Stone Avalokitesvara Buddha of Sanneunggol Valley, and the Relief of Seated Sakyamuni in Samneunggol Valley in the Sangseongam Hermitage. A 6.3-kilometer hike, the trip takes about three and a half hours.

Many Gyeongju residents have formed groups to go on regular expeditions to Namsan Mountain. One of the more popular hikes is one that involves navigating through the mountain with flashlights under the full moon. Hikers walk slowly through the deep, dark woods and see the moonlit pine groves, tombs, and Buddha, and turn to see the breathtaking city lights of downtown Gyeongju. The harmony of the sacred and secular, the world of soft moonbeams and dazzling electric lights, is itself a gift, but the realization that Buddha’s world of enlightenment is not a faraway place but sits quietly within our hearts will also be a rare and precious experience.

by Cha Won-hyun

royal tombs

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Theme Lounge

The Twilight Years from the wall sculpture, War & Women's Human Rights Museum

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The Elderly in Literature: Towards a New Literary Possibility What does it mean to be old? The elderly live in weak bodies that are biologically incapable of reproduction, do not participate in the economy due to their loss of productive capacity, exist as surplus beings that await aging and death, and have grown all too familiar with feelings of isolation and loneliness. Perhaps this is why they have remained in the background instead of taking the center stage in Korean literature. The elderly have been portrayed as peripheral figures and treated like objects. This socially disadvantaged group needs protection from their family and society. In literary works, they often lack a sense of identity and serve as mere props that illuminate the problematic reality around them, or as objects deprived of the right of self-determination. As a result, the elderly have existed as objects and not subjects both inside and outside of literature.

Since the 2000s, writers who began writing in the 1950s and 1960s grew older, and Korean literature began featuring the elderly as narrative subjects. These characters are an autobiographical reflection of the writers themselves, and offer an intimate look at the ecology of old age. At the same time, these writers are fully aware that they are peripheral figures isolated from society. Because they have acknowledged the fact they are no longer at the center of society, they are able to deliver a more realistic view of the problems faced as marginalized beings. What allows them to adopt a more comprehensive approach is that they have lived through turbulent times including the Japanese occupation, the Korean War, the April 19 revolution, October

Yushin, and the Gwangju democratic movement. As such, the elderly can provide insights by bringing a modern perspective to the past or applying traditional principles to the future.

With their vast experiences and multifaceted approaches, Park Wansuh and K im Won-il are prominent writers of literature concerning the elderly. The two writers are particularly interesting as their works are an inquiry into the problem of elderly women. The existential condition of being female and old holds special meaning in Korean society, which is still deeply influenced by its history of wars. A young girl dragged off to the battlefield and forced to become a comfort woman, a wife who is widowed after losing her husband in war, a woman who sells her body to foreigners to make a living in a place where men are left dead or paralyzed—these are women who have been colonized

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1. Kindhearted Bokhee Park Wansuh, Moonji Publishing Co., Ltd. 2007, 302p, ISBN 9788932018140 2. The Loneliness of You Park Wansuh, Changbi Publishers, Inc. 2000, 303p, ISBN 9788936436520

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3. An Illustration of a Dim Day Park Wansuh, Moonji Publishing Co., Ltd. 2002, 356p, ISBN 9788932013312 4. Summer of Revenge Park Wansuh, Munhakdongne Publishing Corp.

2006, 470p, ISBN 9788954601931

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Theme Lounge

Memories of a Sad Time Kim Won-il, Moonji Publishing Co., Ltd. 2001, 312p ISBN 9788932012667

War & Women's Human Rights Museum

by Korean men, in addition to enduring Korea’s history as a colonized nation. A literary survey of elderly women who have survived the Japanese occupation and years of war will allow a physical embodiment of the ironic reality in a private, public, and historical manner. Park Wansuh and Kim Won-il, both with their unique styles, have examined the past and present of Korean society by dealing with the status of elderly women.

Since early on, the late Park Wansuh (1931~2011) attached importance to elderly women in her novels. In "A Pasque-Flower on That Bleak Day" (1977), an old woman voluntarily enters prostitution when the U.S. soldiers who invade the town demand a young bride to fulfill their sexual desires. It tells the story of a wrinkly old woman selling her body to soldiers in order to protect the virginity of young girls and to maintain gender order. The book reflects the tragedy of the Korean War on the surface, but upon closer examination, we find a crude message that exposes the wretchedness of an old woman’s body. This was followed by "Grandma Judy" (1981). The protagonist, Grandma Judy, is an attractive lady “with white and still full breasts, and a lascivious line running from her legs to hips.” Moreover, she enjoys a high social status, is happily married, and is a mother to a successful son. But in the end, she is revealed to be a concubine, and her attractive body becomes the subject of mockery. In her early novels, Park represented elderly women as possessing overly grotesque bodies to depict the tragedy of war, or through them, attacked the false consciousness of middle-class women who were financially well-off but unrefined.

Park moves on from using elderly women as a means of exposing hierarchical and generational conflicts to placing them as the narrative subject in her collection of short stories, An Illustration of a Dim Day (1991). The autobiographical content in An Illustration of a Dim Day brings to mind the actual experiences of the writer. The book features a list of minor episodes, such as

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the everyday life of an elderly couple, the generation gap between young and old, and the self-deceiving bourgeois mindset of the middle class. She continues her everyday style of writing in The Loneliness of You (1998) and Kindhearted Bokhee (2007), but at the same time, describes elderly women’s new self-awareness of sexuality and memories of the tragic past that haunts them in their daily life from their point of view.

The two books can be said to be an urban ecological investigation told from the perspective of a writer who has entered old age herself. The women, belonging to the middle class, lead relatively stable lives but soon must face the reality of their identity as elderly women when they encounter unexpected change (such as developing an illness or moving to a new place).

In this process, these elderly women rediscover their sexuality and gain a new understanding of reality.

In Kindhearted Bokhee, “For Longing” depicts an elderly woman who takes a break from her dreary life in the city and remarries an elderly man she meets on an island, thus growing to value the vitality and beauty of health. Given Korean society’s emphasis of Confucian values, elderly women have been regarded as sexless beings without any desire. Of course, Park’s work does not directly cover the topic of sexual longing. Through the everyday life of the female protagonist, the writer subtly stresses that she recalls the vitality and sexual energy of youth, and that she is capable of contemplating reality from a different perspective. Instead of disregarding the unethical acts of the middle class and their false consciousness, Park admits that there is still some element of truth in such a lifestyle, which she says may be essential to maintaining the internal order of reality.

The elderly, unable to find new meaning in their present reality, attempt to justify their existence based on memories of their youthful days. For those who are closer to death, new meaning is not in the future but in the sweet dreams of the past.

Their youth is gone, yet it comes alive beyond reality. Kim Wonil’s Memories of a Sad Time tells the story of elderly women who verify their existence with memories of the past. Actually, Kim has rarely used women as the main voice in his works. He has mostly told stories of war, ideology, and the division of Korea through male characters. It is notable how, since the 2000s, he has shifted to using the voice of elderly women in addressing the problems of society and the nation’s painful history.

The four elderly characters living in a nursing home in Kim Won-il’s Memories of a Sad Time question the truth of their existence as they face death. These questions are formed through reflections on their individual private pasts. What’s interesting is that these reflections are delivered to readers in a rhetoric of selfdeceit and concealment. In “Who Am I” and “I Know Myself,” the two female characters are stuck in the self-contradiction of disclosure and secrecy. Their statements are thus no more than hypocritical acts that lack authenticity. However, the problem does not lie in the two characters but in the ordeal that their bodies were subject to. As can be seen from how Han Kyungja changes her name to Keiko and then to Anna, she was forced to serve as a comfort woman and a prostitute for foreigners.

She claims to be a noblewoman in order to forget the past and gain some self-respect. After developing dementia, she reveals her true identity by unknowingly bringing up her horrific past.

“Who am I? Who the heck am I?” she asks herself on the brink of death. This question suggests the character’s acceptance of her innermost memories and confirmation of her identity.

As described above, Kim Won-il introduces multiple layers to historical memories through disorderly testimonials given by elderly women who were sexually and physically abused. These personal and at times humiliating statements not only invite a multi-dimensional approach to history, but also broaden our horizons in life. This is where we can see the possibilities of literature about the elderly. It is the elderly, with their sensual and physical experiences accumulated over time, who adopt a fundamentally different approach to create new opportunities in life. Through the perspectives of these writers, the spectrum of Korean literature will undoubtedly gain breadth and depth.

by Shim Jinkyung

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Reviews Fiction

Reviews Fiction

Ways To Love This World Moonlight Tales Shin Kyung-sook, Munhakdongne Publishing Corp.

2013, 212p, ISBN 9788954620666

What do we associate with fiction? To some, it is a somber story; to others, it could be a moving tearjerker. It could also be a remarkable tale of great people, or ever yday stories about ordinar y folks. Although we each have differing ideas of what a novel is, it would not be farfetched to surmise that we all want a similar experience from reading a novel. That is, to be moved by a new experience of a world that we have not yet encountered—couldn’t that possibly be what we, as readers, are after?

In her ne w c ol lec t ion of shor t stories, Shin Kyung-sook provides that moving emotional encounter through the seemingly trite and ordinary. Her work thus far has been weighty, sincere, and serious. Her readers have kept hoping that she would write a book that was a little more humorous, fun, and lighthearted. In this new collection, Shin has revealed a humorous side that she has carefully guarded since her debut as a writer several decades ago. But this does not mean that Shin has discarded her usual writing style altogether. For she has retained her discreet gaze and cautious perspective of people and the world in this collection of down to earth stories that will bring a smile to those readers who are not accustomed to somber stories.

The author attests to the joy of the creative process in writing this collection: “There were times when I couldn’t stand

being a human being whenever I read or heard about horrifying incidents in the newspapers or on TV. But I felt the opposite when I was working on Moonlight Tales. When I came across the luminous moments of people who live their lives, being faithful to who they are, I felt the joy of being human.”

In Moonlight Tales, there are 26 short stories that present portraits of many different kinds of people living in this era. For example, there is a Protestant minister who persistently asks a Buddhist monk to attend the Sunday service at his church that is in a small village; a person who muses over a lightning-fast cat that filches a magpie’s food; an aunt who tells the life story of Vincent van Gogh to her niece who wants to become an artist; and then there is the story of a childhood friend who confessed to have traded the lunch that her mom had packed with tender care for cheaply made cornbread, which wa s freely distributed at lunch during the povertystricken days of Korea; a daughter who had always responded to her mother’s telephone calls in a half-hearted manner, but calls her mother for the first time and chatters away about a TV drama in order to glimpse some deeper aspect of her mother; and a man who has a habit, whenever he gets drunk, of revisiting the old house where he used to live with his older brother.

The author describes these stories

as “those I want to tell the moon,” or “tales that would make the moon grin,” if not “stories that the moon could relate to wholeheartedly.” If they could make the moon, high up in the sky late at night, grin happily, then they are bound to please readers. Shin defines the reader who is going to read this book in this manner: “You are the reader who has read the same heartbreaking book I once read.” Like the movie, Love Actually, the collection depicts all kinds of human relationships, and like Aesop's Fables it conveys a sharp lesson through allegory. The book is also a testimony to the author’s remarkable ability to create a beautiful story from ordinary occurrences. The artist Vincent van Gogh said, “The best way to realize God is to love many things,” which is the wisdom of life that we can obtain from this book. We, the readers, whom the author addresses as “Thou,” will have a heartwarming experience from these stories that shine like the moonlight that will lighten our hearts.

by Jung Yeo-ul

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Reviews Fiction

Constructing Dreams Pristine Home Jung Chan, Moonji Publishing Co., Ltd. 2013, 275p, ISBN 9788932023397

Pristine Home is a collection of eight short stories by Jung Chan, a novelist who has been writing for 30 years and has written more than 10 novels and books. For a long time, Jung has been pondering over the issue of how to deal with the problems of reality in the literary genre called fiction.

In “The Song of the Siren” and “The Reed Pen of a Troubadour,” the image of the novelist, weighed down by the burden of finding an answer to a question that exists between reality and fiction, overlaps with that of a wandering minstrel in ancient Greece.

Jung has mulled over the fundamental questions of human existence for decades, and he has perhaps come to a simple riddle-like realization that “the more you know about human beings, the less you understand them.”

Pristine Home repor ts about a nd laments the bloodstained history of human atrocities, such as relatively recent events like the inhumane, systemic violence in modern Korea, the massacre of civilians in China

The Past Told in the Present 1987 Ha Chang-soo, Ries & Book 2013, 648p, ISBN 9788990522818

Is 1987 another “after-the-fact” novel?

Most likely not. Like many historical novels, this book is set in a certain time period; it, however, does not prescribe to the rules of the genre. Unlike most historical novels, in which the main goal of the narrative is to historicize the past with a belated insight into past events, 1987 is told in the present tense. In other words, the author focuses more on dramatic mimesis instead of a narrative mimesis.

But while the ordinary dramatic mimesis is akin to an omniscient narrator, 1987 uses the present tense to tell the entire sequence of events that takes place for all the diverse characters that were involved in the historical events beginning with the colonial period up to the 1990s. Why is that? Perhaps it is the author’s intention to show how this kind of mimesis is a crucial device in disclosing the internal structure 44 list_ Books from Korea

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of modern Korean history as well as the relationships of the different characters that serve an important purpose in the latter half of the book.

The theme of this novel is revealed in the dialogue of the protagonists, such as the writer, Yun Wan, and the detective, Min Young-hu, who assert how life, society, ideology, history, and art need to be recreated by literature in order to be rendered meaningful to humankind. That seems to be the most important message of the book. But what will determine the success or failure of this book depends on not how the author has framed this idea but on what kind of mimesis he resorted to. To sum, the author has chosen the more effective present tense means of mimesis that offers a moral lesson to be learned, rather than creating distance from the historical events. He does this all while delineating the events through an omniscient point of view. By way of a synchronic method of presenting the matrix of human relations rather than

by the Japanese during the Second World War, or horrendous battles that took place thousands of years ago.

“There is a plethora of languages to the point of giving me a headache that describe God but I could not find one that showed aspects of godliness, which is what I was most curious about. I even suspected that language was a pretext to hide and not show God.” It is through language that humans beckon God, seek salvation, and despair over inhuman conditions; however, it is nonetheless a very impotent linguistic act.

But just as the protagonist of “Old Daydream” dreams of becoming Chuangtzu’s butterf ly in order to transcend the repetition of historical tragedies, the writer too will not stop his dreaming by way of his novels, nor by way of language. “Longing beckons reverie. I have begun to daydream.

Daydreaming will transform me into Chuang-tzu’s butterfly.” The point where the historical tragedies end surely must be the point of the deepest dream that Jung Chan’s stories yearn for.

by Yi Soo-hyung

the cause and effect relationships in Korean modern history, the author has successfully presented his perspective. Ha Chang-soo was a promising young writer in the late 1980s who had received much attention from the literary establishment of Korea, and he has returned once more with a powerful book.

by Cho Kang-sok

Spotlight on Fiction

Bodies

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by Pyun Hye-young translated by Sora Kim-Russell

* a short story from AOI Garden, Moonji Publishing Co., Ltd., 2005

Bodies

The phone call came about a month after his wife had gone missing. A body part appearing to belong to a woman had been discovered in a ravine. It was the same ravine where his wife was presumed to have drowned. He told the officer he would leave first thing in the morning and hung up. It was a five-hour drive to U City, not counting the time it would take to stop at a rest area for a bowl of udon noodles. Even if he left right away, he would not reach the police station that was handling the case until after two in the morning.

A right leg had been found. He would have to confirm his wife’s death from nothing more than a right leg. The length of the average adult leg is about half the total height of the body.

His wife was 160 centimeters tall. So her leg, he mumbled while spreading his arms eighty centimeters apart, is about like that. He pictured her body in four pieces, as if sketching it, from the bottom of her feet to her kneecaps, from her kneecaps to her genitals, from her genitals to her nipples, and from her nipples to her head. The rough outline of a female body took shape in his mind. He couldn’t tell whether it was his wife’s body or the body of some prostitute that he had slept with.

He strained to remember what his wife’s right leg looked like. He recalled that she used to complain all the time that her legs were fat. But were they really that fat, and if so, how fat were they? Were they only fat in comparison to her unusually long and slender arms, or fat compared to other women her age? He couldn’t even remember whether she shaved her legs or not. He began to question whether he had ever in his life touched his wife’s right leg. He ran his hand over the air as if stroking the contours of her leg. He could not for the life of him recall whether she had thick calves or whether they were sleek and smooth, and whether the ankles hidden inside her long skirt were slim enough for him to wrap his hand around or so thick that they merged right into the calves. He lay down and tried to erase the imaginary woman.

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But instead of disappearing, the woman raised her right leg and rested it on top of his head.

As the leg bore into his brain, he finally remembered something about his wife’s leg. She had a small skin tag on her leg. That would tell him whether the unidentified leg was his wife’s or not. It was no bigger than a grain of rice. But to his wife, it was a lump the size of a fist. She had said that she sometimes felt like her body was nothing but leg, and it was all because of that skin tag. Someone had told her that if she wrapped a strand of hair around it, it would fall off on its own. Since her own hair was too short, she had used a thin strand of black thread instead. The thread cut off the blood supply and, after a while, the tag dried up and turned black.

But it did not fall off. That blackened and withered fibroma dangling from her leg would be the clue that determined what had happened to his wife.

She had gone missing and was presumed to have drowned to death. Someone had witnessed her f loundering and screaming for help in the watery ravine where she had fallen.

To be precise, the witness did not see his wife but rather a woman. The witness could not recall his wife’s clothing or the length of her hair or any distinguishing facial features. He merely said that he saw a woman floundering in the ravine.

The detective in charge of the case had concluded that it was most likely his wife but they could not be certain.

He pictured the imaginary leg again in order to add the skin tag to it. But then it hit him that he did not know which leg the tag was on. If he did not know that, then he could not very well tell the detective there was small, black fibroma clinging to his wife’s right leg. His uncertain speculation might leave his still-living wife for dead. Or his long-dead wife could go missing forever. The leg fell on his head with a loud thump. He felt like a detective who had let a criminal slip away right before his eyes. He felt baffled, too. He realized that what bothered him the most was the uncertainty: the police were sure she had drowned and yet, because there was no body, they were handling it as a missing persons case. She was neither alive nor dead, and that bothered him. It bothered him because her state was not so different from his own. He, too, was not so much living as dying. He was so pathetic.

How could he not remember anything about his wife’s body after living together for more than a decade? He stomped out of the house and left immediately. He would see for himself the right leg that had been fished out of the ravine. Then maybe he would know whether it was his wife’s or not.

* On the way to U City, rain, which had not been forecast, began to fall. He hurried to turn on the wipers. They sluggishly began to move, but the left side stopped before sweeping any of the rain away. Raindrops slid down the left wiper, while the right side thumped away slowly. He almost let go of the steering wheel in shock. Laboring along on its own, the wiper looked like a woman’s right leg. He wanted to turn them off, but the rain was coming down too hard. His wife’s right leg, which he was incapable of identifying, wiped the rain from the windshield for him.

* The detective was not at his desk. The man sat on one of the chairs in the waiting room. He thought he would just take a quick nap. At at the sound of someone coming down the hallway, his eyes snapped open. A black shadow was tramping towards him, dragging heavy rain-soaked shoes. As the shadow drew closer, a raw smell filled the air. It was the same smell that came off of his wife, who had handled fish for a living. He kept his eye on the black shadow. It was his wife.

She was struggling to walk towards him on one waterlogged leg. Her right leg looked like a thick wooden stump. Startled, he tried to get up, but she swung the stump at him like a club. He cowered to avoid the blow and suddenly awoke. The detective was shaking him by the shoulder. The detective did not ask why the man had come down to the station after saying he would come the next day. If he had, the man might have panicked and blurted out the story about his wife’s skin tag, even though he wasn’t sure of it yet. He might have even

blurted out something about his dream, in which his onelegged wife kicked him with her stump.

The right leg was lying with the other unidentified bodies in the morgue. The detective pulled open a metal drawer.

Resting in the middle of the long iron tray was the stiffened leg. It gave off a smell of formalin, solvent, and antiseptic.

Even the drawer smelled metallic. The man could not hold back his nausea. But it was not the smells that made him gag.

The leg was so rotten, the flesh black and blue, that he could not believe it belonged to a person. Tattered muscle tissue hung like loose threads around the exposed femur. The bone looked solid in contrast, as if it were part of an anatomical model. It glowed fluorescent within the black, rotting flesh.

The kneecap that protected the knee joint looked as strong as ever, and the tibia glimmered whitely where it connected to the femur. The skin and flesh were clearly that of a rotting corpse, but the bones belonged to someone living. The toes were crushed beyond recognition, and he even thought maybe there were no toes there to begin with.

Who did this leg belong to? He tried to picture the unidentified woman from whom this leg, now dead and black as charcoal, had hung. The woman probably never imagined she would end her life in the deep waters of a ravine. Before it became rotten and disfigured, the leg might have belonged to a busy college girl who rushed from place to place on foot. It might have belonged to a saleswoman in a department store who massaged her tight calf muscles, stiff from being on her feet all day helping customers. Or it could have belonged to a track and field athlete who tensed her muscles with every jump, trying to leap higher. The leg might have been used to tread a dance floor over and over, dancing itself to exhaustion, or to bend beneath a wedding dress, bowing in deference to a new bride’s in-laws. The leg could belong to every woman, but it would never be his wife’s leg.

He stared dumbly at this thing that was nothing more than part of a dead body. The leg proved its own death by ruthlessly continuing to decay. Leeched of organic matter— moisture, protein, nucleic acid—it was but a lifeless object, a long way from anything like life or the world of the living.

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impressed upon him the fact that the human body was just a lump of protein, easily putrefied. The urge to search his body, to examine every part of it to make sure nothing was rotting, came over him. Given the choice, he would swallow a fistful of preservatives before dying.

He trailed his eyes over the decaying flesh in search of the skin tag. The mottling was especially bad around the knee.

He couldn’t tell whether he was looking at a skin tag or just torn skin. He shook his head at the detective.

This is not my wife, he stammered. She has all of her toes.

The detective shrugged and said, So does this leg.

The detective pointed at the mangled tip of the foot.

Snow-white bones rose like milk teeth from between the torn lumps of flesh. The detective explained that the toes had been eaten by fish. The man countered that his wife’s legs were not that fat. The detective said the leg was not fat, just swollen with water. At that, the man vomited. The udon noodles he had eaten on the way poured out of him. The vomit was congealed and blackened from the roasted seaweed garnish. It looked like part of the rotted flesh resting on the metal pan.

His stomach lurched again, as if he had eaten his wife’s toes himself. The detective silently closed the metal drawer.

The right leg had been found at the lower end of the ravine. A fisherman had reeled in a shredded leg. There was no clothing or other body parts. The detective asked the man if his wife had ever had surgery on her leg.

No, never.

Only after answering did he realize that he had no idea whether she’d had surgery as a child or before they started dating. He corrected himself and said he did not know. The detective told him that suspicious marks were found on the bones, the kind that were not likely to have been caused by breaking against rocks or being bitten by fish. He said it looked like the leg had been severed. When he looked puzzled, the detective added that it could also be scars from routine surgery or a dislocation.

Bodies raise all kinds of questions, the detective said.

He nodded slowly.

His wife had gone missing during their first fishing trip.

She stood on a mossy boulder. He kept telling her to stand 48 list_ Books from Korea

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somewhere safe, but she had refused, saying that the water where she was standing was shallow and still. She did not know the water was deeper than it looked, due to heavy rain some days before. He, too, had no idea how deep the ravine was and how fast the water was moving. When his wife fell in, the water carried her off in an instant. The witness who said he saw a woman drowning was fishing downstream, but he did not jump into the rain-swollen gorge. The man was not confident he would have jumped in either if he had been the one to see his wife drowning. The water looked as sharp as blades, like it would pierce him through to the heart at the slightest touch.

The police had interrogated him about his wife’s disappearance. He repeated over and over that he did not shove his wife into the gorge. Nobody believed him. There was no one who could testify that he left his wife alone by the water while he wandered upstream. But no evidence was found that he pushed her either. Though she was presumed to have drowned, without a body to confirm it, the detective had to treat it as a missing persons case. She might have disappeared into the water, or in some deep ravine, or been swept away to a distant city that he would never find.

Only the gorge with its razor-sharp water knew his wife’s whereabouts.

Actually, they were in no position to be out fishing and enjoying themselves. It was a bad time to take a vacation.

The considerable deposit they had put down to buy a new storefront had vanished into thin air. Dozens of other victims had formed a committee to try to get their money back, but he had dismissed it as a lost cause. It would have been better for him to stay and try to retrieve their lost deposit with his wife. If he had, she might still be alive.

His wife was the one who suggested U City. It was a long way from where they lived. For a couple now bankrupt, it was much too far for a weekend trip to blow off steam. It was a five-hour drive just to reach the tollgate. Then they would have to drive further, along a winding cliff, to reach the ravine. But his wife said it had to be that ravine. She told him the water was deepest in U City, that waters more secretive than the ravine itself ran cold and sharp as knives through

that deep gorge, and that the water was so clear you could see all the way to the bottom. The clearer the water, the deeper it might be, so deep as to be unfathomable.

They reached the ravine and drove upstream a long ways, far past where the paved road ended. Along the way, they saw parked cars and figured others were out fishing. The ravine wound on and on. It seemed they could have driven until sunset without reaching the end of it. They picked a relatively isolated spot. Though it was their first time fishing, his wife had no problem with the maggots they used for bait.

She handled raw fish for a living, so there was no reason for her to shrink away from maggots. She stirred the squirming maggots around and chose an especially fat one. Suddenly he felt angry. He thought maybe it was his wife’s fault they were penniless, because, to her, nothing was too disgusting or dirty. For all he knew, she might have served their customers rotten fish, too reluctant to toss it out, or fed them fish eyes.

He set down his pole and watched his wife out of the corner of his eye. She was threading a plump maggot onto a floater.

It was not her fault they had to close the restaurant. He was the one who lost their deposit. But the desire to beat her with the fishing pole was overwhelming. He imagined shoving her into the deep ravine below. He clenched his fists to quell the urge. He left his wife where she was hooking the maggot and returned to the car. When he looked back, his wife was casting the floater into the water.

He decided to take a drive to calm his anger and find out where the ravine ended. But the road kept going. He went around one curve only to find another, as if he were driving in circles around the same spot. Exhausted, he turned the car around to return to his wife. But it was no easier finding his way back. He drove in circles for hours and returned to find the maggots had escaped from their canister and were crawling everywhere. His wife was gone.

On the way back from the police station, it rained again.

He turned on the windshield wipers, which were still broken, and pictured the decaying right leg he saw at the station.

Thinking about it now, the leg was thin and bony. His wife had sagging breasts and a thick waist. The leg was far too thin to be his wife’s. He muttered just as he had to the detective

that it could not possibly be his wife’s leg. Somewhere in the raging waters of the ravine, his wife’s right leg was slowly decaying and turning to silt. It would feed the fish and later whet the appetites of the fishermen. The remaining left leg, torso, arms, and head would meet the same fate. His mouth watered. He opened the window and spit into the rain. The falling drops were as thick as the maggots they had used for bait.

* The building was a dump. It looked like it had been hit with the wrecking ball, though demolition had not yet begun, despite the fact that the shops had long gone out of business.

When it was first built, they said the building was so well constructed that people in the neighborhood came just to take a look. It was the only building in the area with an elevator.

Children would try to play inside of it, forcing the doorman to keep a closer eye on the elevator than the entrance. That was forty years ago. During that time, the building had grown weak and begun to fall apart. But the falling apart did not take place gradually over the course of four decades. It happened suddenly. Like water rising in a ravine during an unforeseen downpour, like being sucked down into the depths and swept away by a raging current, like water rushing into your windpipe the moment you go under, it happened in an instant.

The first symptoms were spotted right after it was announced that two different companies had bought the empty lots on either side of the building and were planning to build high-rise residential-commercial complexes. The vacant lots filled with people. High metal fencing was erected to the left and right of the building by the big construction companies. The fencing had a picture of a forest on it. The picture was elaborate and detailed. It was easy to imagine birds flying into the fence by mistake. Next to the fake forest, the building with its heavy concrete walls looked like a giant garbage can. The fence blocked the entrance of the building from view, so even the few customers who were left stopped list_ Books from Korea

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coming. The building began leaking tenants. The owner had no choice but to go to both of the construction companies to try to sell the building. If he’d sold it earlier, he might have made some money. But because construction had already begun, he had no choice but to sell it below the market rate.

Demolition was to begin in earnest the following week.

Their restaurant would be reduced to piles of cement and shards of glass and steel, along with the rest of the building.

He and his wife had owned a cheap fish restaurant on the ground f loor. For the last ten years, the restaurant was the only living thing they cared for. They had nursed the restaurant through the first years, but later the restaurant nursed them. It made them laugh, gave them a chair to sit on when their heads ached, and kept them from arguing with each other even when they were angry. He did not find out until later, but the store also kept his wife in fish eyes. His wife plucked the eyeballs out of the fish that she grilled and simmered for customers. It wasn’t difficult to do since nobody really cared whether the fish had their eyeballs or not. His wife’s favorite food was simmered fish eyes. It was her main source of protein, as she did not care for meat.

He rolled up the metal security shutters and opened the door to the restaurant. The smell of rotting fish stung his nose. The smell had been seeping out even before he lifted the shutter. He had not been back since his wife had gone missing. All of the fish inside the restaurant was bought before they left for U City. He plugged his nose and opened the freezer door. Once the electricity stopped, everything inside had begun to stink and fester. The decomposing things all jumbled together were unidentifiable as flounder or sole or pike or mackerel. He put on a pair of rubber gloves and pulled everything from the freezer. A black liquid was leaking out of the spoiled bellies. As the rotten fish hit the floor, water spattered against his pants, leaving black stains that looked like mottled flesh.

He found a plastic bag filled with fish eyes in the freezer.

His wife had been saving them. A teary black discharge was seeping out of the eyes, which had been rotting along with the bodies. He turned on the tap. Nothing came out. The water had been cut off along with the electricity. He used some 50 list_ Books from Korea

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barley tea that was still in the refrigerator, and which was clearly spoiled, to wash the bagged eyes. Most of the eyes had already decomposed. He picked out one that was still mostly whole and put it in his mouth. The vile smell of fish and scent of rot spread through his mouth. Each time he took a breath, a fishy smell rose from deep inside him. He thought maybe it was the smell of his internal organs dying. He took his time, slowly sucking on each of the rotted eyes. Only then did the tears come. Suddenly he was certain his wife was dead.

* A few days later, he got another phone call from the police station in U City. The detective spoke slowly, sounding embarrassed.

I’m sorry but you’ll have to come back to the station. It’s nothing urgent. You can come by any time, but we think it would be better if you came sooner rather than later.

He waited for the detective, who was beating around the bush more than usual, to finish and said he would leave right away. But just before he was about to hang up, something occurred to him.

What did you find... this time?

The detective was quiet for a moment. He regretted asking such a pointless question.

I guess you’ll find out anyway when you get here.

The detective told him what had been found.

It’s the left arm and hand. We’re having trouble getting fingerprints off of it.

After they hung up, he stared at his left hand. The hand was connected at the base to the strong, thick wrist via blood vessels, nerves, and muscles wrapped in fascia. At the other end stretched five fingers, each with their own bumpy knuckles. His fingers were short and stubby, but the skin was a healthy color because of the even supply of blood they received from the straight blood vessels. The veins bulged, as if to prove it was the hand of a living person. The hand and arm was definitely his. He closed his eyes and tried to remember what they looked like. He pictured his big, coarse-

looking knuckles, then the wrist, too thick to wrap his hand around—but that was as far as he got. Had the detective ordered him to describe his own hand, he was not sure he could have done it.

He could not even picture his wife’s face clearly. He could only see the sharp, cold line of her mouth. If he could not remember her face, then there was no way he would remember her left hand. He thought about the ring she always wore. They had bought it together several years after they got married. It was a plain, slender band with a tiny diamond, a common design that could be found anywhere. The tiny protruding diamond was covered in scratches visible even to the naked eye. The ring had gone into the water with his wife but fortunately not without leaving its impression behind on him. He could only hope that the hand still had its fingers, and that one of those fingers wore his wife’s ring.

This time he did not stop to eat anything on the way. He did not want to look at a tattered hand and heave up black chunks of seaweed like last time. On the way to U City, he got a phone call from the landlord telling him that if he did not remove the tableware from the restaurant by the next day, it would all be demolished along with the building. He said he would separate out the things he would take from the things he would leave behind as soon as he got back. Not that there was anything to take. All of it could be thrown away. Still, he wanted to get his wife’s knife. She always used the same knife, whether she was slicing fish, chopping them up, gutting them, or scraping off the thin scales. It was a long, thin sashimi knife made from carbon steel. It wasn’t the right knife for grilled or simmered fish. She should have used a heavy cleaver like the kind used by chefs in other restaurants to chop and gut fish. His wife was good at scaling and deboning fish. But she sometimes cut her wrist. The blade of the knife was long and the tip sharp. The tip of the knife often grazed her wrist when she used it to gut fish. The cut was never fatal. She said it felt like being poked with the blunt end of a needle. But it bothered him because it looked like she was trying to sever an artery.

If the left wrist had knife scars, it could be proof that it was his wife’s. The man felt thrilled to have finally found an

identifying feature of her body. He decided that if his wife ever came back he would inspect her body thoroughly from top to bottom. He would learn everything: which of her molars had fillings and how many; the approximate length of her nose hair and whether they were thick or protruded from her nostrils; the shapes of her earlobes; the relative softness or hardness of the cartilage in her ears; which way her nose bent; whether her hair was stiff and rough or whether it was soft; and the location of every mole on her body. He swore he would remember the length of the hair that covered her private parts and whether it was darker than other women’s, as well as the shape of her labia. If he could, he would even memorize the size of her uterus inside the pelvic bones. He would know whether his wife’s uterus, which had never once carried a child, was really as small as a fist, and whether it really did curl in like the mouth of an old woman. That way, even if she were torn from limb to limb one day and he had to confirm her identity from a body part fished out of the water by chance, he would be able to tell the difference between what was his wife and what was not.

* The detective apologized to him. He was sorry to put him through so much trouble again. The man did not respond.

He swallowed his words before he could say he hoped the wrist that had been found this time was his wife’s. The wrist was swollen with water and blue with putrefaction, just like the right leg. The flesh, which was missing a chunk, looked like ragged strips of paper. The tips of the fingers were bitten off. The blood vessels were split into dozens of pieces like a snipped wire. It might have been his wife’s hand that had picked out the plumpest maggot to use for bait, the hand that scaled, gutted, sliced, salted, and roasted fish. It could also have been the hand of a typist who could type 600 characters a minute on a computer keyboard, or the hand of a musician who performed a concerto on the violin. He asked the detective if they had found a ring.

There was no ring. list_ Books from Korea

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The detective looked stumped. She might have been wearing a ring… If you look closely, the base of the finger does look paler there. But we can’t be sure whether that’s from a ring or from the water.

This time, as well, the man said he did not know whether it was his wife or not. The detective nodded slowly, as if to say he suspected as much.

It’s always hard to determine the identity before the head is found.

Nose torn off, teeth cracked off at the roots, cheeks puckered with water and plucked out, eye sockets stuffed with waterweeds.... The man got goose bumps picturing his wife’s detached head. He pointlessly started to say, if only there had been a ring. The detective apologized again.

That ravine gets a lot of drowning victims. People slip on the moss between the rocks and fall in, or go swimming and get caught in the rapids, or get swept away by the current while dipping their feet in the water. Sometimes, people go there for fun but wind up shoving a friend or family member into the water in a fit of anger. And there are a lot of suicides.

If they don’t leave anything behind, they are listed as missing forever. The ravine is so long and deep that it makes searching for anyone impossible. The people of U City don’t go there unless it is to fish. It’s very well-known, and there is even a rumor that it’s haunted by a ghost who drags people down into the water. People tell stories about it, and it’s even been in the news a few times. Have you seen it?

The man slowly shook his head. The detective pulled off his gloves.

They say fishermen come from all over the country to fish there, deep into the mountains where the roads aren’t even paved. They say the fish that are caught there taste better.

Because of all of the people who have drowned.

The detective finished by asking the man why he and his wife had come all that way for a vacation.

If they found the body, he would have to return again.

Eventually he would be asked to identify a head or breasts or buttocks. The whole time the man was listening to the detective, he was thinking about his wife’s hand. The hand that had stroked his cheek, the hand that cooked for him, the 52 list_ Books from Korea

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hand that kneaded his penis, the hand that dug out fish eyes and pulled out crimson fish organs, the hand that sparkled in the light when it was covered in fish scales, the hand that smelled of hot spices, the hand that raised and lowered the security shutters thousands of times, the hand that wiped away tears after they closed the restaurant, the hand that punched him when he came home after losing their deposit, the hand that picked out a maggot, the hand that floundered in the waters of the gorge. Of all of those hands, not one was left. What he saw in the police station was just a piece of a limb that not even maggots would eat.

Without electricity, the restaurant was dark. He took the bag of eyes from the fridge where he had left them last time.

They had rotted more since then. He threw the rest out. The smell in the restaurant was so strong that he kept gagging while emptying the freezer and refrigerator.

Each time he saw something rotten, he pictured his wife’s sunken body decomposing underneath the water. Her body would have been smashed, bones broken against the jagged rocks as she was swept down the deep gorge. Her shattered body would have been carried away by the strong undertow while bloodthirsty fish tore her f lesh to pieces. They say hearing is the last of a person’s senses to die. As she was swept away, his wife would have heard her own screams mixed with the raging current and the f lutter of sharp-toothed carnivorous fish approaching, her bones cracking each time she smashed against a rock, and gadflies’ wings fluttering as they sensed death and swarmed nearer. She would have heard countless fishing lines bobbing in the current and the laughter of fishermen reveling with no regard for her as she died. She might have wanted to reach her arm out and grab their lines.

Just then he heard a sound coming from the kitchen. A black shadow wavered before his eyes. The shadow was slicing a rotten fish.

Is that you, honey?

He had not spoken in so long that his voice was hoarse.

His wife sliced the fish with her left hand, which was blackened and shredded from being nibbled at by fish. Her body leaned a little to one side, as if standing on one leg; she was using the decaying right leg that he had seen in the

police station in U City as a crutch. She did not turn around.

She was absorbed in the task of holding the fish down with her left hand and scooping out its eyes with the thumb and forefinger of her right hand. A long blood vessel dangled from the eyeball. The tips of her fingers were dark with blood. He watched helplessly as his wife gulped down the eyes of an uncooked fish that might have been swimming with parasitic larvae or Vibrio bacteria. With the eye still in her mouth, his wife glanced back at him then disappeared from view.

As soon as the black shadow vanished, the restaurant grew a little darker. He took his wife’s knife from where it glimmered keenly between rusted metal bowls. The handle was warm, as if someone had just set it down. He picked up a rotten fish eye from the cutting board and put it in his mouth.

The sour smell of fish spread deep inside him. He wiped the dark blood off on his clothes. He would take the knife home.

All the rest could be thrown away.

* In mere moments, the building would be demolished without a trace. The man felt like his bones were cracking each time the metal ball that swung from the crane struck the walls.

The shop that he and his wife struggled to raise and that had been like a child to them, the shop that gave them food to eat and chairs to sit on and money and eyes, was turning into scrap. He buried his wife and their shop beneath the debris.

He thought of something he saw on TV once, a funeral for some tribe in southern Africa. They said that when someone died, they would pull the roof down on top of the body and then leave the place without any special ceremony. His wife and their shop lay beneath the earth with a cement heap for a grave mound. The long sign for their restaurant fell. The glass door shattered into tiny pieces without a sound. Just then, the phone rang. It was the detective again. It had been less than ten days since the last phone call.

I’m sorry to bother you, but you’ll have to come back.

The detective sounded calm. The man did not want to try to identify another body part. They might all be parts of his

wife, but since she was already gone, they were just inanimate objects that had nothing to do with her. He said that unless they found the head this time, he did not want to go. For all he knew, it would be the right arm, and then the left leg, the limbless torso, then the right leg. The fishermen could bring up as many body parts from the deep, secretive water as they wanted. He did not want to go back and forth identifying all those parts.

That’s why I called. We found a head this time, and we believe it is your wife’s. We checked it against the facial features of our recent missing persons, and it bears the closest match to hers.

His heart thumped wildly. At last they had found her head. It was the decisive clue that would change her status from missing to deceased. He would not have to identify any more body parts. He thought it over for a moment and then asked how his wife’s face looked. The detective hesitated before responding.

Drowned bodies are rarely found intact. Most are found floating face down with the head and limbs submerged. As a result, the blood settles into the head, face, and throat, which speeds up decomposition. The face swells so much that the features can be hard to recognize. Of course, it’s not often that we find only the head.

The detective was beating around the bush, telling him that his wife’s head was spoiled beyond recognition. The man said he would leave right away and hung up.

When the man first heard that a witness saw a woman drowning in the gorge, he had stared at his hands for a long time. Hands that were made up of fourteen bones in the fingers, five bones in the palm, and eight bones in the wrist, all more fragile than any other body part. Hands that flinched, reacting immediately whenever the thousands of nerves registered pain such as hot, cold, or stinging sensations.

Hands that might have pushed his wife into the gorge. Hands that might have sensed the agony that flared up inside him when he saw the maggot wiggling in his wife’s hand and unconsciously shoved her.

The man’s hands hung limp as he returned home to pack his wife’s knife. He had to hold a funeral with only his list_ Books from Korea

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wife’s head. Her eyes might be wide open and glaring. The waterweeds plugging her eye sockets would make it look like she wept black tears, and the maggots writhing inside her blackened lips would maker her look as if she frothed at the mouth. She might be too swollen from the water to fit inside a coffin. All of her parts, except her head, would be stuffed with cotton and dressed for burial. He planned to set the knife on his wife’s chest. The sharpened knife would never rot and would serve as his dead wife’s spine, as her femur, as the soles of her feet. The knife was the only thing she would take with her.

* On his way back to the police station, the man took a detour to the ravine where his wife had fallen to her death. The sun was on the horizon. Each time he thought the road would end, another curve appeared. The further upstream he drove, the fewer fishermen he saw. Where was the spot he had gone to with his wife? He only recalled the endless drive and could not remember exactly where they stopped. He went around another curve and was heading further up when he saw a group of fishermen standing close to the gorge. The men all looked alike and were crowded together in one spot, casting their floaters and pulling in their catch. They were excited about something. The fish seemed to be biting more there.

He parked the car and walked over, as if drawn to the spot.

Though it felt like he’d been driving along that winding road for over two hours, the road continued on as if the end would never come into sight. He had no idea how much further he had to go to reach the end, or how much farther was the spot where his wife had disappeared.

The water was translucent and lapped gently; it looked ankle-deep. But he remembered that his wife had said the clearer the water, the deeper it was. Was this where she fell in and was swept downstream while her head was torn off, legs ripped apart, and wrists severed? The icy water swirling in the shadow of the trees must have been extremely cold. If the water were warmer, she might have survived a little longer.

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Even so, she would not have lasted more than half an hour before dying.

The man moved a little closer to the fishermen. They fished together in silence. No one was bragging about landing a big one or grumbling that it was barely a minnow. They looked like they were toying with the lines, bobbing them up and down. They looked skilled. They kept reeling things in.

The man went closer to take a look and let out a shriek. One of the men was pulling up an arm dripping with black blood.

The man next to him reeled in a pair of buttocks, the white of the bones exposed. Blood trickled from where chunks of flesh had been torn out. Another man rejoiced as he raised an eyeball the size of a ping pong ball with a clotted capillary stuck to it. A head with the tongue lolling out of it. Blackened toes. Hair clumped together like waterweeds. Glossy blue intestines jiggled from a hook. One man brought up a winged torso. The body had blue markings, and the face had a red and white beak. Several of the anglers worked together to haul in something heavy. With great difficulty, they pulled a grotesquely swollen torso out of the water. Covered in fish scales, the torso sparkled and shone.

The body parts took the bait that the fisherman cast. They were using maggots, plump and large as worms. One man, too busy to attach fresh bait to his line, pulled a handful of squirming maggots from his pocket and tossed them into the ravine. When they landed in the water, the maggots did not spread out but clumped together. The water stood still and did not move. Torn limbs and body parts swarmed around the maggots. Shocked, the man took a step backwards and lost his footing. He grabbed for the exposed root of a dead tree to keep himself from falling into the water. A slimy mass landed on his head with a thump. The moment it touched his head, the mass broke into pieces and spread all over his body.

He let go of the root to try to brush the things off of him, and fell into the ravine.

The sun had set, and the water was so cold it seemed his organs would freeze instantly. The current did not move but tightened around him. He grabbed at the fishing lines in the water, struggling not to be swept away. His legs were spread out in the water, making him look like a black waterweed

with its roots swaying around. He could not make out the shapes of the fishermen in the dark. He shouted for them to pull on their lines. The fish were coming towards him.

They were already nipping at his toes. Someone cast his hook towards him, and it snagged the top of his head. The floater rose, slowly peeling back his scalp. The maggots in the water burrowed into the openings in his flesh. He was slowly pulled up on the fishing line. After they reeled him in, the fishermen tossed him into a large net along with the other bodies they’d fished out. His skin chafed against the ground and peeled away. His body was torn and bitten all over.

The ground was damp with dew and gave off a soft smell.

He lay with his battered body against the earth and listened to the sounds of the ravine at night. He heard dry leaves rustle in the wind and fall softly onto the fishing net. He heard the glistening white maggots contract and expand their bodies as they crawled towards him. Each time the fishermen cast their lines, the water splashed sharply as if struck with a whip. The stagnant water droned and eddied. It sounded like his wife sobbing. The maggots swarmed the fishnet, crawling over his body, and began marching up the trunk of the dead tree.

They climbed in single file, like a white line being carved into the bark. They reached the top and flung their bodies lightly into the air. Maggots poured down on him like rain. He was buried in the pitch-dark night of the ravine.

AOI Garden Pyun Hye-young, Moonji Publishing Co., Ltd. 2005, 266p, ISBN 8932016208

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About the Author Pyun Hye-young was born in Seoul in 1972.

She graduated from the Department of Creative Writing at the Seoul Institute of the Arts and from the Hanyang University Department of Korean Language and Literature graduate program. She made her debut in 2000 when she won the Seoul Shinmun New Writer's Contest. She has published the short story collections AOI Garden, Toward the Farm, Evening Courtship, and the novel Ashes and Red. She is the recipient of the Hankook Ilbo Literary Award and Dongin Literary Award.

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Reviews Fiction

How the Lonely Coexist Sunday Philosophy Jo Kyung-ran, Changbi Publishers, Inc. 2013, 276p, ISBN 9788936437244

Sunday Philosophy, Jo Kyung-ran’s sixth collection of short stories, delves into the meaning of an individual’s existence and the problems of communication.

Beginning with her first novel, French Optical, Jo has experimented with diverse approaches to unraveling the nature of alienation in modern society. Her novels show a unique narrative technique of transferring a subtle description of objects to the internal psychology of the characters.

What stands out in this collection is the use of family and home as motifs to show the problems of communication and relationships among people. In the autobiographical work “The Phantom of Bongcheondong,” the author tells the story of a protagonist that has become independent from her family through having a room of her own. It is a depiction of how t he cha rac ter ha s out g row n her preoccupied adolescent sta ge of daydreaming and has learned to situate herself among diverse people for a more

Love for Survivors Dialogue of the Forest Jeong Jia, Eunhaeng Namu Publishing Co. 2013, 352p, ISBN 9788956606729

In her new collection of short stories, Jeong Jia writes warm depictions about people who barely manage to survive on a daily basis. While they are trying their best, they’re still far from achieving their dreams. Even though her characters endure each day with great effort, they have an inner light that no one can extinguish.

All of Jeong’s characters live their lives burdened with serious conflicts and unbearable pain, but they do not give up their hope of someday being accepted and understood. Jeong does not write about those who strive for success and recognition in life but on the subject of humble people that live their lives with dignity and integrity.

I n “ T h e K e y t o H e a v e n ,” t h e protagonist is a severely handicapped person but even so she not only looks after her alcoholic father but also her neighbor,

who is physically abused by her husband.

“Spring A f ternoon, T hree Widows” introduces three old women reminiscing over their past; they still call each other by their names from the Japanese colonial period: Ei ko, Ha r u ko, a nd Sad a ko.

“Dialogue of the Forest” is about the heartbreaking unrequited love of a man for his wife who lived all her life unable to forget her first love, a son from a wealthy family who left to become a freedom fighter. “Bravo, Lucky Life” is a story about a mother and father who refuse to give up nurturing their son who is in a coma after a car accident. “Bloodline” is about a father-in-law who is glad about the birth of his grandson by his Vietnamese daughterin-law, yet has a difficult time coming to terms with the baby’s dark complexion.

“Public Bathhouse Day” is a heartfelt story about an old mother, who has sacrificed her life for her children, and her very first visit to the public bathhouse with her two daughters. “Haehwadong Intersection” tells the story of a friendship between

mature approach to life.

In her work s, the characters that reassure themselves about the meaning of life in the most despairing situations, ma nifest t heir pa r tia l recover y a s a reclamation of the bodily senses. In the “Life of Tutelage,” the protagonist, placed in an alien setting, takes up a track and field event, the shot put, as a way of trying to regain his sense of life. In the simple but beautiful gesture of picking up the heavy metal ball and hurling it, one can experience the dynamic energy of life in motion.

“Sowing” is the most noteworthy story in this collection. It is a remarkable work in which the author delineates the joy of a relationship and communication that takes place in everyday life. With the utmost sincerity, the author conveys ways in which individuals can coexist that ring true.

by Baek Jiyeon

Park who worked in the U.S. Army right after the Korean War, and Choi who was a freedom fighter, along with Kim, who is a student of Park’s, and their half-century long relationship. “Climax,” delineates the desperate struggling of the main character, Kim, who is a homeless person struggle not to remain as one for the rest of his life.

by Jung Yeo-ul

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Reviews Fiction

I’m a Ghost Pretending Not to Know An Boyun, Munyejoongang 2013, 290p, ISBN 9788927804154

A 20-year-old man smashes his mother’s head with a bowling ball, killing her in his own home. What happened to In-geun, who grew up with the label “gifted,” who used to act haughtily, who was raised by a father who worked as an honest accountant and a mother who was immaculate and tidy?

One day, suddenly, his father passes away and leaves his family with a mountain of debt. Afterwards, In-geun’s mother loses her will to live. And as if it were his father’s dying will, In-geun remembers his father’s last words, telling him to go to his younger sibling and hold hands. Soon Ingeun’s family moves from a clean, modern apartment project to a low-income housing complex that looks like it is falling apart, situated just across a pedestrian overpass from where they used to live. There, Ingeun frequents a temple called Jeongbeop and joins a group of people who subsist on money made from insurance fraud. As In-geun’s body begins to break down, he is slowly forgotten at home and school.

More and more, he becomes a kind of ghost. Thanks to In-geun’s sacrifice, his family is able to sustain a decent lifestyle, though barely, and his younger brother eventually leaves the low-income dwelling.

But In-geun’s mind and body slowly begin

The Neighborhood Makes the Name Oksu-dong Tigers Choi Ji-un, Minumsa Publishing Group 2013, 233p, ISBN 9788937486593

In South Korea, the name of the district you live in is not merely a name. It is a mark of one’s rank and a manifestation of one’s class. That is the reason why people are obsessed with the image of their neighborhood. There are those who will work their whole lives in order to obtain a certain address.

Oksu-dong Tigers, a novel by Choi Jiun, uses such facts about social status as a backdrop. The author has depicted the fictional space of “Oksu-dong” as a place where aff luence and poverty, the upper and lower classes, and pretentions and truths, are all intermixed. Oksu-dong, which had been a poor neighborhood, has a demarcation line, that is, before and 58 list_ Books from Korea

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after redevelopment. In fact, the residents of the reconstructed area claim that they will not even share the same name. They want to quickly eradicate all traces of any remaining stigma of poverty.

The author describes to the reader two virtual schools, Yonggong Technical High School and the Joongang Foreign Language High School, which highlight the realities of class difference, as they exist by way of spatial differentiation.

If t he hou se s where g row n-ups live indicate their class, then the labels for their children’s schools, “technical” and “foreign language,” are also marks of discriminatory significance. The strange logic that a foreign language high school is superior to a technical high school is not only applicable to Oksu-dong.

Through humor and allegory, the author has transformed this serious social

deteriorating. This is not only true for Ingeun. We meet characters in this book who only have their own bodies as an asset and their only means of survival is by crushing their bodies or spilling blood.

Who made In-geun into the ghost he becomes and, in the end, a horrific murderer? To say that In-geun went astray is too simple. In the chapters describing In-geun’s inner turmoil (titled “Digging”), his fears, anger, and hopelessness aren’t fully articulated in the writing, amplifying In-geun’s pain. If we could have heard his feelings communicated, we would understand the unwitting tragic act that Ingeun commits to: by destroying the family who turned him into someone he was not, a ghost, In-geun tried to validate his existence in the world one last time. Author An tells us, painstakingly, in Pretending Not to Know, that turning a blind eye to someone’s misfortunes is all too easy and might lead to terrifying consequences.

by Cho Yeon-jung

issue in the form of questions. The author’s view of Korean society, which is dominated by the status derived from one's family lineage, regionalism, and educational credentialing, is quite critical. Choi Ji-un’s original and experimental style, combined with suspenseful storytelling, makes this debut stand out.

by Kang Yu-jung

Steady Sellers

A Modern Classic A Stranger's Room Choi In-ho, Minumsa Publishing Group 2005, 426p, ISBN 9788937420092

Choi In-ho first began writing when he turned 17 in 1963. Considering how he was only a high school student, there is no doubt of his brilliance. This is evidenced by his remarks on his two short stories, “The Boozer” (1970) and “A Stranger’s Room” (1971), wh ich ea rned h im a reputation as one of the most controversial novelists of the 1970s. According to Choi, “The Boozer” was completed in a mere two hours, while “A Stranger’s Room” was written overnight for the first issue of

Literature and Intelligence.

Choi has been astonishingly productive both inside and outside literary circles.

He started out as an outstanding writer of short stories, and today, is popular for his novels. In addition to writing, he has also worked as a film director and scriptwriter, and a plethora of Korean movies are based on his books.

It is impossible to summarize Choi’s vast experiences as a writer over the past 40 years, but if we focus on his short

stories and novellas, his literary ideology can be described as “the exploration of Korean modernity.” This is also the reason why he is noted as an important figure in Korean literature of the 1970s, which is a time represented by keywords such as urbanization, industrialization, a nd modern i z at ion. Choi wa s most sensitive to the everyday, psychological changes experienced by Koreans under the 1970s urban culture. His short story, “A Stranger’s Room,” is a good example.

“A Stranger’s Room” is a stor y of metamorphosis with a simple plot. A man returns from a business trip. His wife, seemingly greedy, lies to him in a letter and leaves the house. For no particular reason, the protagonist gradually transforms into an object. The plot consists of many objects including a bathtub, dining table, spoon, socket, a loaf of bread, shower head, clothes, lights, mirrors, chewing gum, and lipstick. It is rare for a short story to contain such a long list of everyday objects.

Then, all of a sudden, these objects begin speaking to the man. What is unique about this story is that as the objects become more active, the man stiffens up as if he were something non-human. In the end, he degenerates into an object himself.

When his wife returns home she sees not her husband, but a strange object that she would soon get sick of and throw into the attic. The charm and horror inherent in the objects and the psychological anxiety of the protagonist is depicted in a style that was ahead of the times for fiction in the 1970s.

For Korea, the 1970s was a period of rapid modernization accompanied by national violence. It is appropriate to interpret the apartment in “A Stranger’s Room” as an allegory of Korea. The room’s owner changes in the story. The objects are given life while the man turns into a thing.

In other words, the owner of the room is the objects, and the man is the tenant.

It was around this time that alienation and materialism—unique to the tragic circumstances of a modern society— surfaced as important literary themes in Korea. This is what makes A Stranger’s Room a Korean classic.

by Kim Hyoung-joong

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Reviews Nonfiction

Reviews Nonfiction

Changing the Face of Fashion Fashion Is Passion Lie Sang-bong, Minumsa Publishing Group 2013, 284p, ISBN 9788960173361

Lie Sang-bong is one of Korean’s best known fashion designers. He made his debut in 1980 and launched his own brand, Lie Sang-bong Boutique, in 1985.

Since then his Korean-inspired designs have achieved considerable recognition.

His collection inspired by the Korean alphabet, Hangeul, made international news in 2006. This book explores Lie’s philosophy of fashion, his working process, and his life as a designer. It includes 60 photographs taken from the designer’s fashion shows.

Lie Sang-bong has used such motifs as Hangeul, dancheong (traditional coloring on wooden buildings), jokakbo (patchwork), and taeguk (yin-yang symbol) in his work. His motto is “design that globalizes Korean culture.” Poorly executed, such an attempt could have resulted in designs lacking in universal appea l. Lie’s designs, however, are considered a successful mixture of local Korean culture and universality.

His most suc c e ssf u l c ol lec t ion has been that inspired by Hangeul, which drew upon the beauty of Korean typography. Lie admits that he was unsure of himself in the beginning.

He gained confidence, however, with the success of his Hangeul collection at the Paris Fashion Week in 2006. In this day and age it is not enough to be merely inspired by Korean culture. The product needs to sell. Lie showed that

Korean-inspired designs could also be a commercial success. Lie says, “It is no good if you make a movie and nobody watches it, or write a song and nobody listens to it. It is the same with fashion.

Fashion should be wearable and design should reflect what people want today.”

Lie believes that a designer should be “like wind or water.” Water takes on the shape of whatever vessel that holds it. Wind can go anywhere in the world at a moment’s notice. And so a designer’s style and spirit should be as free as water and wind. In accordance with this philosophy, Lie says that he does not have a signature style. What is important is not a distinctive style but what interests and moves him the most at this very instant. “Observe the things you like, the things that interest you, the things that move you,” he says.

“A designer cannot be creative with a stagnant spirit. A designer should always be open-minded, and not build walls around himself. He needs to be receptive to new stimuli, new emotions.”

Thanks to the Korean singer PSY, Korean pop culture has gone viral.

Could fashion be the next Korean Wave, after Korean pop music, dramas, and movies? Lie Sang-bong believes that fashion will become one of Korea’s most powerful exports within the next five years. Asia is already the center of the global fashion consumer market, he says.

Will Lie Sang-bong’s prediction come true? Will he be at the forefront of the Korean wave of fashion? Lie himself is silent about these matters. Everything in this book, however, indicates a potential yes.

by Pyo Jeonghun

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Reviews Nonfiction

The City Through Food Eat! Seoul Hwang Kyo-ik, Jung Eun-sook, Tabi Publishing Co. 2013, 432p, ISBN 9788998439019

Seoul is a modern metropolis of over 10 million people. Its history as the capital of Korea goes back over 600 years. Today modernity and tradition coexist. The history of its cuisine, the subject of this book, is no exception. This book is about the kind of food people living in Seoul eat daily and the cultural and historical background.

Not all of the dishes enjoyed by the citizens of Seoul originate from the city itself. The capital is comprised of the descendants of people from all over the country that flocked to the capital during the industrial boom. And so the cuisine of Seoul is a mixture of nearly every kind of regional cuisine. Its diversity reminds you of that of New York City.

Seolleongtang, bindaetteok, soondae, tteokbokki, budae jjigae, and gamjatang are some of the dishes introduced in this book.

Knowing about these foods as a foreigner is sure to impress any Korean. Out of these

dishes, gamjatang, a stew made by boiling chopped up pork spine, ribs, and potatoes with spicy seasonings, is believed to have originated in Seoul.

The author speculates that gamjatang must have been a nutritious treat likely to have been ser ved with a lcohol. It would have been a cheap dish enjoyed by those who migrated to Seoul from the countryside after the Korean War. So much histor y of Korean hardship and what Koreans did to rise above their circumstances is condensed in this dish.

One is very much reminded, that “you are what you eat.” Readers are sure to glean valuable insights into Seoul and Korea by reading about the dishes described in Eat! Seoul.

by Pyo Jeonghun

Why Do Koreans Say That?

Korean Linguistic Culture Jeong Kyeong-jo, Jeong Su-hyun, Samin Books 2013, 208p, ISBN 9788964360606

Korean people often greet each other with the words, “Have you eaten?” This custom was considered odd by the first Westerners that visited Korea in the late 19th century.

They observed that instead of simply saying hello, Koreans greeted each other by asking whether they had eaten. This reflects Korea’s history as an agricultural society where everything depended on the rice harvest. So the expression, “Have you eaten?” refers to whether the person has eaten rice, the staple of Koreans. Whether or not the person in question had access to rice was the readiest way of measuring their state of well-being.

The historical and cultural background of t his a nd ma ny ot her expressions, obscure to most foreigners, are described in this book. Another uniquely Korean expression is to refer to dying as “going back.” It is almost certainly the only

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language in the world in which death is described as “going back,” an expression that reflects the Korean belief that death is returning to where one originally came from. This in turn points to an organic view of death in which death is not an isolated incident separated from life, but another stage or continuation of life.

Death is frequently referenced in many Korean expressions. For instance, a Korean describing someone of great beauty by saying he or she is “drop dead” gorgeous.

This, of course, is not to be interpreted l it e r a l ly. I n a w ay, s u c h l i n g u i s t ic preoccupations with death emphasizes how much Koreans value life.

Many such Korean expressions are explained in this book in relation to English expressions. The book examines the culture, customs, a nd menta lit y behind Korean expressions, and explores

the differences between East Asian and Western traditions.

by Pyo Jeonghun

Reviews Nonfiction

Love for All Universal Love and Equality: Hong Dae-yong’s Social Philosophy Park Hee-byung, Dolbegae Publishers 2013, 448p, ISBN 9788971995273

Universal Love and Equality reevaluates the social thought of Hong Dae-yong (1731~1783), one of the great minds of the late Joseon era. Intellectual thought during the late 18th century is regarded as a transition period with the emergence of new ideologies, including the emphasis on practical studies by the Northern learning school. Despite such developments, the school of Zhu Xi remained dominant.

At that time, Joseon was the most active follower of the school of Zhu Xi. This was because it had been invaded repeatedly by the neighboring states of Japan and Qing in the late 15th and 16th centuries and was not torn apart. The ruling class regarded the country as the last guardian of Zhu Xi in East Asia.

Among the guardians of the school of Zhu Xi, Hong belonged to the most prominent family. He had a unique world view. There was civilization and barbarism outside, and strict enforcement of the caste system within. The essence of Zhu Xi’s teachings was to strive for individual mat u rit y i n ste ad of suppor t i ng t he dynamic development of society. However,

Hong boldly denied the ruling ideology of his own rank within the Zhu Xi guardian class.

In t his book, universa l love is presented as one of Hong’s key ideas. This was developed from Mozi’s concept of general love. Hong’s universal love was in opposition of the caste system, going as far as arguing for the freedom of slaves.

Moreover, its ecological imaginative power was capable of breaking down boundaries between humankind, animals, and nature.

In a society lacking class distinctions, he claimed that even aristocrats had to do labor.

Hong was an important figure in East Asian thought because he derived his own ideas through interaction with China and Japan. In contrast to the general atmosphere of the Joseon era, he even saw Japanese thought in a positive light.

by Bae No-pil

Mapping Mathematics Math Odyssey (2 vols.)

Lee Man-keun, Book21 Publishing Group 2013, 372p, ISBN 9788950946630 (Vol.1)

Why do so many people struggle with mathematics? Is there any way to make the subject more interesting? This book takes all of the negative stereotypes concerning mathematics and turns them upside down.

Part mathematics, part history, and part travelogue, Lee Man-keun traveled around the world to study how mathematics was born and how it has influenced humanity.

Math Odyssey collects his writings from this trip that appeared from 2012 onwards in the daily newspaper, the Dong-A Ilbo.

The two-volume book follows Lee’s journey from Egypt, the birthplace of mathematics, to Israel, Greece, Italy, France, Germany, and England. Readers will encounter the “living ideas of dead mathematicians,” from those of the ancient Egyptians who created the calendar that formed the basis of the one we use today, to those of the people of Arabia, who themselves did not use Arabic numerals.

Plato and Aristotle, who were philosophermathematicians; Fermat, who was a judge but more adept at mathematics than most mathematicians; Napoleon, who loved math and mathematicians; Leibniz, who was accused of plagiarizing his theory of infinitesimal calculus from Newton; and many more join the adventure. These stories, accompanied by photographs taken by the author, furnish a rarely-seen look into the real world of mathematics. This journey exploring the deep influence of mathematics on human civilization will doubtless cause many to wonder in awe and amazement, “What if mathematics never existed?”

by Richard Hong

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Reviews Nonfiction

Gone but not Forgotten Things That Disappear (2 vols.)

Kim Yol-kyu, Moonji Publishing Co., Ltd. 2013, 209p, ISBN 9788932023854 (Vol.1)

The world changes every day. One cannot stop the world from changing, but one can lament the things that disappear. Kim Yolkyu, the renowned Korean studies expert, writes about ways of life that are no more.

In the first volume, subtitled “Lingering Memories, Full of Longing,” the author recalls things that he remembers with a deep and poignant fondness, such as sotdae (poles with wooden birds on top), jangseung (shamanistic totems), naru (small ferry docks), and aretmok (the seat closest to the fireplace), and dwellings that have disappeared, such as small villages, village codes, and thatched houses. He also remembers nostalgia foods and snacks such as nurungji (the burnt rice crust at the bottom of the pot), gaetteok (rice cakes with mugwort), and misutgaru (a drink made by mixing powdered roasted grains with water). The author describes all of these things are “like a mother’s embrace, things that cannot be forgotten because they are rooted so deeply in our hearts.”

In the second volume, subtitled “The Good Old Days, Bygone Snapshots,” the author reminisces about bygone sounds and smells such as the sound of threshing rice by hand, or the Korean style of ironing

by pounding cloth with wooden sticks. He looks at customs that are now disappearing such as paying respect to one’s elders on Lunar New Year’s Eve, roasting chestnuts in clay braziers, and burning torches to signal danger. He remembers old games such as yutchigi (breaking hard taffy in half and seeing whose side has the most and biggest holes), donchigi (a game of throwing coins), and jegichagi (a small toy one has to keep in the air by kicking it with one leg). Then there are trusty tools that are no more, such as ttwari (a coil of rope stitched together that protects the head when carrying things on one’s head), water jars, pokers, and coal shovels.

Certain types of merchants have ceased to exist as well, such as traveling merchants selling things from a bundle carried on their backs, candy sellers specializing in taffy, water sellers, and junk men. Driven out of existence by rapid industrialization, all of these things “are gone but not forgotten; they linger ever closer to the heart because they are gone.”

by Jang Dongseok

Transforming a Socialist The Hitchhiker’s Philosophical Journey Yi Jin-kyung, Humanist Publishing Group 2013, 560p, ISBN 9788958625858

The author Yi Jin-kyung is a scholar who has taken a unique intellectual journey through Korean society for the past 20 years. He became associated with Social Formation Theory and Social Science Methodolog y, published under an alias in 1987. His book shocked the nation by placing socialism, practically extinct following the Korean War, in the form of scientific methodology at the forefront of social transformation. At that time, he was forced to hide his identity under a pen name due to the political climate, and he has kept up the pen name for more than 20 books ever since.

In the 1980s, the leftist sympathizers of Korean society were regarded by the international community as the Galapagos of socialist ideology. After the Korean War, Korea’s leftist movement had been 64 list_ Books from Korea

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completely severed from the outside world due to the widespread suppression of socialism. The situation was the same for South Korea, which set forth anticommunism as its national policy, and North Korea, which adopted the Juche ideal.

Repulsed by the fascist ethnocentrism a nd pseudo-religion inherent in t he socialist regime of North Korea, leftist forces raved over the motto of scientific socialism. Yi’s Social Formation Theory and Social Science Methodology was the gospel that organized this declaration in a systematic manner.

With his rise as a well-known theorist in the anti-North leftist movement, Yi was imprisoned for his beliefs in 1990.

Ironically, he watched the collapse of socialism behind bars. He then abandoned socia lism a nd converted to a deeper immersion in Western ideology, which had given birth to Marxism.

This book deals with the development of philosophy in three chapters: the

rationalism of Descartes, Spinoza, and Leibniz; the empiricism of Bacon and Locke; and the German idealism and m ater i a l i sm t h at le a d to M a r x i sm.

The fourth chapter introduces Freud a nd Nie t z s c he i n or d e r t o e x plor e new possibilities of a critical spirit in deconstructing Western rationalism.

by Bae No-pil

Reviews Nonfiction

Robot Dreams Robot da Vinci, Designing a Dream Dennis Hong, Samtoh 2013, 344p, ISBN 9788946418370

The world now has its attention turned to robotic scientist Dennis Hong. He was honored by the world-renowned science magazine Popular Science as one of their 'brilliant 10' exceptional young scientists, dubbed the 'the Leonardo da Vinci of robots' by the Washington Post, champion at the Robot World Cup (RoboCup) for two years running, was a speaker at the TED 2011 conference, and is a professor of mechanical engineering at Virginia Tech.

Having developed the first car that enables the visually impaired to drive for themselves, he is now working on developing a humanoid robot for fighting fires and a robot for use in disaster relief.

In this book we are introduced to Hong’s distinct philosophy of robots for humans, while the same time given insight into Dennis Hong as a person. He once said, "For me, robots are not cold machines, but machines for the benefit of people.

Research into robotics is not just the development of technolog y, it is the process of creating knowledge and useful

Housed with Emotion The House with a Heart Goo Bon-joon, BookSea Publishing Co. 2013, 352p, ISBN 9788974835910

Houses are built for practical purposes, but they can also be works of art. More impor t a nt ly, in Korea, hou se s were appreciated for their propert y value.

For decades, apartments were the most powerful means of increasing wealth. As the property bubble burst and housing prices started going downhill, houses ceased to be good investments. People are beginning to wake up from their illusions and redefine houses as places to live in and enjoy.

Goo Bon-joon is one of these people in Korea who began to redefine the house.

In his previous book, A House for Two, he proposed the duplex as an alternative housing form. His latest book, The House with a Heart, builds on the message of his previous book and tells the stories of houses as objects of enjoyment and appreciation. In particular, the book

describes the essence of houses through structures of a more universal and public nature, such as cathedrals, memorial halls, and libraries.

According to the author, structures carry all kinds of human emotions since they are human inventions, and they are also spaces with time, and containers for memories and stories. Therefore, a house is not about the glamour of its outer appearance. To see a house for what it really is, we must listen to the stories it tells.

T he L eeJi na h Memoria l L ibra r y situated within Seodaemun Independence Park in Seoul was built and donated by a man in memory of his daughter who died at an early age. Even though his daughter is dead, the library built in her name is alive and helps nourish the dreams of many young people. This is a structure

new skills that we can use as tools."

Hong first dreamed of becoming a robotic scientist when he saw the film Star Wars at the age of seven, and is now working to make each of the imaginary robots he saw in that film into reality. He is being applauded from all over the world for his courageous endeavors to create robots that benefit humankind and the world we live in.

How is it that Dennis Hong has been able to achieve his dreams? He explained, “Put your dream before everything else, plan specifically towards it, and direct all your efforts into making your dream come true.” Dennis Hong is someone who knows how to look at the world with the eyes of a child and embrace it with the heart of an adult, and the story of how he is changing the world for the better is sure to inspire people from every corner of the globe.

by Richard Hong

that turned the sadness of losing one’s child into the joy of sharing with others.

On the other hand, the Sydney Opera House was called the house of rage at the time of construction because of the feud between the owner and the architect. This book includes many other such interesting episodes telling us that the houses we build and live in are, after all, containers for our lives and memories.

by Han Mihwa

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Reviews Nonfiction

Creative of Learning Learning Man KBS Documentary Production Team Wisdomhouse Publishing Co., Ltd. 2013, 360p, ISBN 9788959137213

Learning Man emerged from a KBS special global documentary feature. Like all TV programs, much of the discoveries and insights gained in the process of putting together the show had to be sacrificed for t he sa ke of ef f icienc y. Lear ning Man was published with the intent of communicating to an audience beyond the documentary in order to provide a wealth of information and a variety of perspectives on learning.

W hy do we study? Learning Man begins as a sober investigation of the students who are left behind in the fierce academic competition in Korean schools, often referred to as “entrance exam hell.”

The book provides a multi-dimensional view of the difference between learning styles and motivations in the East and West through interviews, experiments, and expert analyses.

A new school of thought argues that motivation for learning comes from a relationship-based culture from the East and an individualistic, independent culture

Death Is Life’s Mirror On Death (2 vols.)

Shinhee Kim; Illustrator: Hyuno YOUNGCOM, 2013, 328p, ISBN 9788996885160 (Vol.1)

from the West. Students from Eastern cultures study so they can contribute to their families and countries, and often perform brilliantly in the most prestigious schools around the world. But learning for success may blind these students to the true purpose of learning—the pursuit of truth—and entrench a culture of excessive competition in them. Learning in the Western context, however, has its roots in the pursuit of individuality and therefore has its emphasis on personal preference and intellectual curiosity.

Learning Man is a fascinating book that reminds us of the joys of learning and evokes the first line of the Analects by Confucius: “To learn something new and to review what you have learned—is this not a joy?”

by Lee Taekyong

of death. This is not to say the artwork is completely surreal. Everyday objects such as small tables, canned drinks, or the cigarettes the god likes to smoke are good for a quiet chuckle. They seem to say that death is but something ever-so-slightly removed from life.

by Yi Myung-suk

Is there life after death? Every religion seems to have a different explanation.

Heaven or hell. Atheists say that there is no afterlife, that nothing exists after death.

Most of us have difficulty ascertaining one or the other. We are still alive, after all.

One thing that is sure: if we knew what awaits us after death, we would not be living our lives the same way.

On Death suggests that there is a rite of passage after death that enables us to look back on our lives. Each episode begins with someone opening their eyes after dying from whatever cause. They are then approached by a bearded man. The man says he is a god. He does not judge souls or send them to heaven or hell. To those that weep and plead for one more chance, he says, “There is no other chance.

You’re dead. You only get one shot at life.

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another chance.”

The god does, however, listen to their stories. The young man who hung himself out of despair and poverty, the old man who cannot bear to move on to the next world without paying for leaving his children behind, and the child who has no idea why she is there. After listening, the god shows them the most critical moments of their lives. Brief as these instants are, they are loaded with a lifetime’s worth of significance. The dead accept that this was their lot in life and move on to embrace death as well.

Most of t he series is drawn in black and white lines, with almost no background objects or scenery. It may strike those used to the highly detailed, flamboyant style popular in comics today as somehow lacking. The empty space, however, perfectly embodies the emptiness

Poetry

Flower Before I called her by name, She was nothing but a gesture.

When I called her by name, She came to me, a flower by me.

As I called her by name, I would have someone call me by name as befits This color, this fragrance I would go to him, his flower by his voice.

We all yearn to become an unforgettable meaning, You to me, I to you.

photo provided by Hyundaemunhak

Kim Chun-soo was born in 1922

by Kim Chun-soo translated by Kim Uchang

in Tongyeong. He studied at the Art Department of Nihon University in Japan. He has been a professor at Masan University and Kyungpook National University. He received the Asia Freedom Literature Prize and Korea Literary Prize, among others.

His poetry collections include Clouds and Roses, The Swamp, Flag, Death of a Boy in Budapest, Possessed by Dostoyevsky, and the collections of selected poems The Snow Falling on Chagall’s Village and The Selected Poems of Kim Chun-soo. His most noted works are “The Flower,” “An Introductory Poem for a Flower,” and others.

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Reviews Children's Books

Reviews Children's Books

The Magical Theater Teru Teru Park Yeoncheol, Sigongsa Co., Ltd. 2013, 36p, ISBN 9788952768193

A red naked man is dragging the tail of something long. What is it? It is covered with what looks like scales. Open the book and suddenly, the head of this long thing is on the back cover. Is it a snake or a dragon? Who is this red man and why is he naked? What’s more, why does he look like some of his skin has been peeled off? Both his face and buttocks are full of scars but it doesn’t look like he’s in pain. In fact, he looks as though he doesn’t care at all. Where does such a look come from?

Simply looking at the cover of this book brings out so many questions.

W hen you open t he book, a sta ge appears. Does the story come from a play by any chance? Yes, it is taken from part of a Korean traditional puppet play.

The animal on the cover is an imugi, an animal that looks partly like a snake and a dragon. It appears often in Korean folk tales and is a character that holds a great grudge because it could not become a dragon. This imugi eats up an entire family—an old man, his wife, his daughter, and even his grandson! When the old man is about to be swallowed, he

calls out to his nephew and asks for help.

This nephew is none other than the “red man.” The elderly man keeps begging for help and the red man finally fights the monster and kills him. He then drags the dead monster away, saying that he will be rich when he sells it. Though his nephew has saved his life, the elderly man gets jealous of the young man’s fortune and vows to take everything away from him.

The puppet play is k nown a s a popular art form that satirizes the nobility, exposes human falsity, and brings out people’s instincts to have fun.

Author Park Yeoncheol is interested in recreating Korean traditional culture and wants to introduce it to children.

Comical characters, an incident that is full of wild tension, and a rhythmic text are enough to deliver the spirit of art.

Park adds his own touch to this traditional artistic spirit. He entered the field of sculpture, with which he is not familiar, and stubbornly made wooden figures of all the characters in the story.

He used natural materials to dye the fabric and sewed the clothes himself to

bring out their individual character. It took three years to complete this project.

Park doesn’t publish many books because he uses a new and difficult technique with each one. However, his books receive a lot of attention every time they are published. His first book won a well-known award for picture books in Korea and his second book was selected for the 2007 Bologna Illustrators Exhibition. His books are widely known for being both loved and feared by Korean children.

His books are also loved by adults in the world. At the 2013 Bologna Children’s Book Fair, he held a workshop with the figures he made. “Teru Teru” is a meaningless exclamation uttered to attract people’s attention before the start of the puppet show. The words “Teru Teru” was heard being uttered in Bologna throughout the book fair.

by Kim Inae

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Reviews Children's Books

Tale of a Male Cinderella?

Princess Pyeong-gang and On-dal the Fool Song Sok-ze; Illustrator: Kim Se-hyun BIR Publishing Co., Ltd., 2012, 34p ISBN 9788949101361

Those who grew up in Korea would have heard the story of Princess Pyeonggang and On-dal the Fool at one point or another as children. Princess Pyeonggang, the daughter of King Pyeongwon of Goguryeo, often cries as a child. In an effort to stop her crying, King Pyeongwon threatens, “If you don’t stop crying, I will marry you off to On-dal the Fool.” Years pass, and the King’s threats turn into a self-fulfilling prophecy when Princess Pyeong-gang, now 16, insists on marrying On-dal the Fool instead of a son from the Goh family with noble lineage. The King, livid, banishes the princess from the palace. Pyeong-gang marries On-dal, teaches him reading, writing, and martial arts, and transforms him into a great, wellrounded leader.

This well-known tale is retold through the rhythmic prose of Song Sok-ze, a born storyteller, and the collage illustrations of artist Kim Se-hyun, who is known for his bold lines and use of negative space. Painted hanji (traditional Korean

paper) is used for the collages, and the lines of mountains and attire inspired by Goguryeo cave paintings are beautiful.

The story of Pyeong-gang and On-dal is summarized as one of a mediocre man rising to prominence with the help of his brilliant wife. One may even say that Ondal is the male equivalent of Cinderella.

But a closer examination of the story reveals the power of words. The King was teasing when he said he would marry his daughter off to On-dal, but hearing this so often as a child, Pyeong-gang grows up to be incapable of picturing herself as anyone’s wife except On-dal’s. Another message of this story is the role of a true partner. This storybook teaches important lessons to a generation of people who are quick to judge based on the superficial.

by Eom Hye-suk

Run, Bicycle, Run Bicycle: Laufmaschine or Velocipede Jung Ha-seop; Illustrator: Jo Seung-Yon Borim Press, 2013, 48p, ISBN 9788943309060

Bicycle: Laufmaschine or Velocipede has almost everything there is to know about the bicycle, from its structure and operating mechanism to the history of its invention and development, and many historical episodes surrounding it. If you are a bicycle lover, you will love this book. Even if you think that the bicycle is no more than a simple means of transportation, this book may still be interesting to read.

Discussing the bicycle isn’t much d if ferent f rom d iscu ssing hu ma n history from 1790 when the bicycle was invented. The world needed the Industrial Revolution and the French Revolution before it could see the first two-wheeled vehicle propelled by a rider pushing along the ground with t wo feet. A woman on a bicycle became the symbol of free womanhood.

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The history of the bicycle in Korea, from its introduction to becoming a popu la r mode of tra nspor tation for common people until it lost out to the automobile, also reads almost like the brief history of Korea throughout the years of Japanese rule and rapid industrialization.

Re ad i ng about ma ny i nventors a nd technicians who have contributed to shaping the bicycle into its current form, and the many social and economic changes that have been made from when the bicycle lost its appeal as a means of transportation until it returned to the spotlight later as a symbol of the green movement, will touch your heart like an epic history.

Bicycle: Laufmaschine or Velocipede is in the format of a large illustration book, but as each page also supplies a fairly large amount of information, turning the pages will be quite a satisfying experience. As a source of knowledge and information, this book also features illustrations based on extensive research and historical evidence.

The last pages of this book are practical

tips for children: safety rules for riding a bicycle. By the time you close the book, you will feel like taking out your old bicycle and going outside.

by Kim Min-ryoung

Reviews Children's Books

Turning Lemons into Lemonade My Name Is Gugu Sneakers Kim Yu; Illustrator: O Jung-tac Changbi Publishers, Inc. 2013, 92p ISBN 9788936451394

My Name Is Gugu Sneakers was selected as “Changbi’s Good Children’s Book,” one of the most prestigious fiction book awards in Korea, in the early elementary school children’s books category. The author, Kim Yu, surprised authors in her field and was lauded for producing this award-winning work after only six months since leaving her job at a publishing company. But it wasn’t just the author’s experience as editor that helped her make this book. Kim Yu lost her parents suddenly in an accident when she was only seven years old and was raised by her sisters. This work is the artistic rendition of the author’s painful past told with optimism.

Gugu, the main character in the book, loses his parents in a car accident and becomes an orphan. But the boy remains strong by believing that his parents are free and are on a journey. One day, Gugu’s distant relative visits him. Gugu goes to this relative’s house that has an attic, and he lives happily there with a dog called Mongdoli and his newfound friends.

Then one day, out of a “Sponsor’s Night” event held to help less fortunate neighbors, Gugu becomes the beneficiary of a CEO who runs a sneaker company.

But the CEO doesn’t have any interest in Gugu. He simply needs some pictures of himself and his beneficiary. The CEO brings a pair of defective sneakers and gives them to Gugu. Gugu invents a story in his mind that the discarded pair of sneakers is the only pair of sneakers in the world. He then becomes the person who has “discovered” sneakers and goes off on a journey. Gugu dreams that maybe one day he’ll meet his parents, who in his mind, have set off to travel around the world. This story of overcoming the pain of losing one’s parents will comfort many children who have experienced loss.

by Yu Youngjin

Return of a Lovable Character I’m Going To Be Sensitive, Too Yoo Eunsil; Illustrator: Kim Yoo-dae Sakyejul Publishing Ltd., 2013, 64p ISBN 9788958286622

I’m Going To Be Sensitive, Too is written for children ages seven to eight years old. To appeal to this age group, the author Yoo Eunsil writes in a language that is spoken only by children. The author is famous for going to great lengths to achieve authenticity in her books, for example, by transcribing an actual child’s diary.

In her previous book, I’m Going To Be a Picky Eater, Too, Yoo created a child character named Jeong-i who eats such a well-balanced diet that she is happy and healthy. In I’m Going To Be Sensitive, Too, this lovable character makes her appearance again.

In this new book, Jeong-i’s brother Hyeok-i, is a picky eater, in poor health, and so sensitive that he is unable to sleep.

Their mother resolves to buy a bed for Hyeok-i. Jeong-i wants a bed, too, but her

mother insists that she has no problems sleeping on any surface so Jeong-i doesn’t need a bed. This makes Jeong-i want to become sensitive also. Will Jeong-i be able to accomplish her mission to become sensitive?

“Thank You DNA,” the second story in the book, tells the story of what happens when Jeong-i goes to visit her father’s house in the countryside. There, she is told that her face and forehead are big and her nostrils flare; this makes Jeong-i angry, so she leaves home and ends up getting lost.

Not knowing where she is, Jeong-i wanders around, crying, before an old woman finds her. The old woman immediately guesses who Jeong-i’s father is because of Jeong-i’s striking resemblance to him.

The third story “Kkobung-i Tastes Good” is about Jeong-i eating a chicken named Kkobung-i that is raised in her father’s house on the farm. Hyeok-i calls Jeong-i a savage and refuses to eat the chicken and leaves the house. It’s not easy for Jeong-i to eat the chicken, either,

but she is unable to ignore her appetite.

Jeong-i, who is healthy and happy, is incredibly loveable in these stories.

by Yu Youngjin

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Reviews Children's Books

Lessons from Games The Game King Sun Ja-eun; Illustrator: Naomiyang Moonji Publishing Co., Ltd., 2013 184p, ISBN 9788932023816

Seo Min-ho may be an ordinary fourth grader at elementary school, but he is the best in his class when it comes to computer games. His classmates call him the Game King. However, he falls asleep at school because he plays computer games all the time, forgets to attend his after school classes because he is playing games in PC rooms, and spends a lot of money buying games using his mother’s cell phone. His mother finally decides to send Min-ho and his friend Du-jin to Game Addiction Treatment Camp. However, Min-ho gets on the wrong bus and goes to a place where they are carrying out beta testing on a new game that is similar to reality.

Here, Min-ho enters five rooms— Step by Step Room, Pa r tner Room, Killing Room, Hiding Room, and Testing Room—and plays five games. In the Step

by Step Room, he must solve problems on his own, whereas in the Partner Room, he must solve problems in cooperation with a partner. He must kill a counterpart in the Killing Room and has to catch a small

dragon that is hiding in the Hiding Room.

The last room, the Testing Room, presents Min-ho with three questions regarding his homeroom teacher, his mother, and the animals which the sticks of yut nori (traditional Korean game) signify.

Although he has a strange experience by getting on the wrong bus, it turns out to be a meaningful one for Min-ho. He makes new discoveries about himself, his friends, his surroundings, and comes to understand how much his mother loves him.

Games are a part of play. Children today are absorbed in virtual reality games and forget about playing in real life. The author is pointing out this unbalanced state because a monotonous life cannot be overcome simply by playing games.

by Eom Hye-suk

The Rain Eventually Ends Endless Rain Oh Moonse, Munhakdongne Publishing Corp.

2013, 264p, ISBN 9788954620413

The main character in Endless Rain is 19-years-old, but he doesn’t have any facial hair yet. His mother’s death, the severed relationship with his father, and his brother’s suicide are all too much to bear for the protagonist, spurring him to leave home with just some money and a razor his brother once used.

The city where the main character first arrives feels unfamiliar to him, and there he meets the girl he shared a desk with when he was a boy in school. Afterwards, he meets a street musician, an old woman who is losing her mind due to dementia, and a minister who gives teenage runaways a place to sleep.

The main character meets all these people by chance, and his time with them is short but they all inspire him to reflect.

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his childhood, the main character leaves the city. Wherever he goes, the rain gently falls. You can even feel the rain in the writing. And that is why, as you read this book, you feel as though you are walking through the rain wearing wet socks.

After leaving the city, he arrives at the mountain where his mother and brother’s ashes are scattered. The young protagonist goes up the mountain in the pouring rain.

Once he reaches the top, he comes to a realization: the rain eventually stops. His journey soon comes to an end, and he uses his brother’s razor to shave the dark mustache that has grown on him.

Books for young adults in Korea have been using a cinematic structure to draw in readers for some time now. Although this novel reads like a road movie, the writer stays faithful to the traditional literary storytelling method. You might not be able to read the entire book in one sitting, but it will make you stop at moments and think.

It is this ability to make readers ref lect through the process of self-discovery that is

essential in a mature novel; it is the power of literature. This novel was the recipient of the third Munhakdongnae Young Adult Literature Award precisely because of this reason.

by Yu Youngjin

Steady Sellers

A Meal with the Poor Children of Gwaengiburimal Kim Jung-mi, Changbi Publishers, Inc. 2001, 274p, ISBN 893643344X

In 2012, the world was delighted by PSY’s music video for “Gangnam Style.”

Gangnam is now recognized as a cool spot filled with beautiful men and women, trendsetters, “it” items, and the hottest entertainment. Many people around the world say they would love to visit Gangnam. Without a doubt, it is the hip place to be. But just like any other country, for every place where the sun shines, there is another that lives in the shadows. Children of Gwaengiburimal leads

readers to a village that is the opposite of Gangnam. Even though it is nothing like Gangnam, the village of Gwaengiburimal is a place that remains closer to our hearts.

First, let’s go to Incheon, a fairly large city that can be reached by a twohour subway ride from Gangnam. We’re heading for Gwaengiburimal, the poorest slum in the area. On closer examination, we can see a few rundown houses. Those who live there reflect the history of this poor village, and can be said to be Korea’s

true native population. If you come across the twin sisters, Suk-hee and Suk-ja, do drop by their house. They live with their mother and their aunt Myung-hee. The twins are not related to their aunt by blood; she teaches them at the elementary school. She too was born and raised in the village, but managed to beat poverty and joined the middle class. So why is she living in this house?

In the house next to the twins, there are four boys: the 20-something Yung-ho, the brothers Dong-su and Dong-jun, and Myung-hwan. The boys share everything with the twins, more like a big family than merely neighbors. If you ask how they got to know one another, they will smile quietly and reveal their story. They were not total strangers from the start, but far from being close friends. The orphaned Yung-ho, whose parents passed away when he was young, started taking care of the runaway boys when he was high on drugs and became their only family. Myunghee hated living in poverty but became acquainted with the t win sisters and returned to Gwaengiburimal, where she says she can truly be herself. They wouldn’t mind if you joined them for dinner.

The word “family” is known in Korean as “sikgu.” It refers to people who eat together, regardless of whether or not they are related by blood. Having a meal with the poor and lonely, overcoming addiction and settling down to an honest life, hoping to be a good parent someday are small and simple, but definitely noble dreams. When you get on the subway back to Gangnam, your eyes and heart will view the world in a different way. You will find a more accurate portrayal of Korea and Koreans.

Named as a must-read for all Koreans in 2001, Children of Gwaengiburimal has become a bestseller and steady seller. The writer Kim Jung-mi, who wrote the novel based on her surroundings and the village community, are still struggling yet living happily in their own way. They are under threat of being chased out of the very place in which the book is set. But as long as they are together, wherever they go will be Gwaengiburimal.

by Park Suk-kyoung

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Special Interview

Korean Literature as the Next Wave?

LTI Korea President Kim Seong-Kon Meets Dennis Maloney, Editor/Publisher of White Pine Press

Dennis Maloney

Editor’s Note: White Pine Press is celebrating its 40th anniversary this year and holding poetry readings around the United States, commemorating the event. White Pine Press has also been selected as one of the three recipients of the Distinguished Service Award to be given by LTI Korea this year. Kim Seong-Kon, President of LTI Korea, met Dennis Maloney, poet, editor, and publisher of White Pine Press, in San Diego in March, signed the MOU for publishing the Korean Voices Series, and interviewed him about the promotion of Korean literature overseas.

Kim: This year you are celebrating the 40th anniversary of White Pine Press. Forty years means that you have devoted your whole life to publishing books, especially books on Asian and Latin American literature. What made you establish a publishing house and what prompted you to be interested in Asian and Latin American literature in the first place?

M a lone y : T he ide a beh i nd W h ite Pi ne Pre s s germinated in the spring of 1973 while I was spending my final semester of college in Kyoto, Japan, on an independent study project. My degree is in landscape architecture and I 74 list_ Books from Korea

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was studying Japanese gardens, but I was also writing and translating poetry. While in Kyoto, I met the expatriate American poets Cid Corman and Edith Shiffert. Their work, highly influenced by Asian culture, impressed me so much that I decided that after college, I would begin a small publishing house and bring their work to an American audience. I was also interested in bringing voices from other cultures into the American conversation.

Very little international literature was published in the United States prior to the late 1950s, early 1960s, when well-known American poets began translating and publishing poetry from other languages. One of my early poetic influences, Robert Bly, was a pioneer in bringing international voices into American culture during a time when American literature was very self-reverential. His work as a translator led me to start translating Pablo Neruda and Juan Ramón Jimenéz, and his work with the Sixties Press, which published both a literary magazine and books, was an inspiration. For the first time, American readers could access the literary work of poets from around the world, including Asia. My other main poetic influence at the time was Gary Snyder, whose work led me to classical Chinese and Japanese poetry. During and after college I read a great deal of Asian literature in translation.

I established White Pine Press later in 1973 as a nonprofit literary publisher of poetry, fiction, and literature in translation. Our mission was to develop and promote cultura l awareness and understanding through the publication of literature from the American mosaic and from around the world. To date, we have published work from over 20 languages—ranging from Spanish and French to lesser-known languages such as Slovenian and East Greenland Eskimo. We are proud to have published the first work in English of many fine foreign writers, thus introducing them to a larger audience.

Kim: Because the younger generation tends not to read paper books any more, do you think we have to heavily lean on online media in the future to promote Korean literature overseas? These days, indeed, young people share many things, using electronic devices such as iPads and smartphones and SNS such as YouTube, Facebook, and Twitter. As a result, all boundaries are rapidly and radically dismantling, disintegrating, and collapsing. And crosscultural activities are actively pursued every day on the

Internet. What, then, do you think of the importance of e-books, online games, and social media in promoting Korean literature?

Maloney: I think that the world of books and how we encounter texts is changing, particularly with the younger generation. In the U.S. there has been a huge increase in the sale of e-books in genre fiction and nonfiction but less so with literary fiction and poetry. I expect that will change over the course of the next few years as iPads and other tablets grow in popularity. Students will increasingly read their college texts on e-books as opposed to carrying around a lot of textbooks. It is easy to see college professors, who presently make Xeroxed copies of portions of various books to create their course text, developing an e-book version for their students. My understanding is that in Japan there have been short novels written and published on cell phones, so this may be one wave of the future. On the other hand there is also a reverence for the book itself among many, and I don’t see the book ever disappearing as a medium for reading.

We are increasingly seeing social media as a venue to promote books and reading. Many of our U.S. authors now have their own blogs which promote their work. There are also many literary blogs and online journals where people review books and readers can discuss them. This is an important review venue, particularly with the decline of print review media.

Kim: When a book of Korean literature comes out by White Pine Press, how would you utilize Korean Studies professors at American universities in promoting the book?

Currently, we have approximately 30 American or KoreanAmerican professors who teach Korean literature at various universities in the States. In addition, what other means of promoting books on Korean literature do we have? Do you think, for example, that the writer/author’s promotion tour would significantly help promote the book?

Ma loney: We would like to develop a stronger relationship with the professors of Korean Studies in this country in the coming year. As we look at expanding our Korean Voices Series, we plan to work with this network of professors both to promote the titles we are publishing for use in their courses and also to ask their advice on what

Kim Seong-Kon

type of books they feel are missing in English translation.

It is the goal of our Korean Voices Series to publish a diverse cross-section of contemporary and classic Korean literature, both fiction and poetry, and we welcome input. We also plan to advertise more in academic journals to alert the wider audience of Asian Studies professors to our series.

In the past, we have had some success with touring authors who have visited various Korean and Asian Studies programs. The author must be fluent in English or, as has happened in some cases, travel with a translator. We would like to build on this and expand their presence to academic conferences, where the authors can interact with a greater professional audience.

Kim: Hallyu or the Korean Wave has been recently so popular all over the world. For example, Korean soap operas such as “Daejanggeum” and “Winter Sonata,” Korean film, and K-pop have been well received by the international community lately. The huge success of PSY’s “Gangnam Style,” too, played an important role in introducing the world to South Korea. As Korean television dramas and K-pop spreads across Asia, Middle Eastern countries, and even some parts of Europe, however, some Koreans have list_ Books from Korea

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Special Interview begun asking, “Does Korean entertainment represent true Korean culture?” In the past, however, we tried without much success to bring our high culture to the world, but we were not successful until Hallyu made inroads into other countries Do you believe that it is time we actively promoted Korean literature overseas, using the paths that Hallyu has prepared?

Maloney: Clearly, the Korean Wave has opened the door for Korean culture. The trick now will be for Korean literature to find a way to walk through that door. Thus far, it seems to be mainly younger audiences who are initially embracing Hallyu, but it eventually encourages the spread of Hallyu to older generations. Consequently, I think an initial focus on very contemporary authors whose work will resonate with younger American readers would be beneficial. Targeted promotions, perhaps advertising in "hipper" publications, would be worth exploring. I also perceive a building interest in classical Asian literature among U.S. readers whose interests include Eastern traditions. To date, Chinese and Japanese classical literature seems to have established a strong foothold in the U.S., while the rich literary history of Korea remains virtually unknown. I think targeted promotions of the classical Korean literature published in the U.S. would create awareness and build an audience for this literature.

It is difficult and costly for individual publishers to cover the various outlets that would be effective for promotion. Consequently, I wonder whether it is high time for the launch of a major initiative, both in print and online that would include all the U.S. publishers currently producing volumes of Korean literature. This would serve as a sort of complete catalog of Korean literature in translation available in the U.S. It would need to be updated to coincide with U.S. publishing seasons.

Presenting a large block of books available would seem to give Korean literature a greater presence and impact than can be achieved by each publisher’s individual marketing efforts. Once you have this initiative in place, it might make sense to hire a professional book publicist on a trial basis to see if that would raise the profile of Korean literature in the U.S. I believe the Korean Wave has raised the profile of Korean popular culture in this country. K-pop has spread to this country and there have been festivals and many K-pop concerts. PSY’s worldwide success has extended here to the point where he is now appearing in American commercials.

But I don’t know that Korean popular culture has any more relation to Korean literature than American popular culture does to American literature. Literature appeals to a much smaller audience than most popular culture so I don’t know if it will translate well to try and follow the commercial pathways.

Unfortunately the most Korea-related news in the U.S. media these days stems from the antics of your northern neighbor.

Kim: What is your future plan for the Korean Voices Series? In the past you have published mainly books of Korean poetry. Are you planning to publish Korean novels or anthologies of Korean literature in the future?

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Ma lone y : Wit h t he help of LT I Korea we a re expanding our Korean Voices Series in the near future to two volumes per year and will increase our publication of contemporary short stories and novels. We are particularly interested in adding the work of younger writers and voices to our series, and we believe a well-edited anthology of fiction by younger Korean writers would be an excellent way to introduce their work to an American audience. I also think it is essential that LTI Korea continue to send authors to major international festivals and academic conferences as these contacts build the profile of Korean literature. LTI Korea might also undertake to develop social media sites in different major languages to promote its activities and that of Korean authors overseas.

K im: W hat do you expect from LT I Korea in the future? What do you think are the strengths and weaknesses of LTI Korea?

Maloney: I hope to continue our long-term partnership with LTI Korea to expand and further develop our Korean Voices Series. In addition to increasing the number of publications to two per year, we plan to work with LTI Korea to create e-books for the entire series over the next two years. We also plan to launch a major advertising campaign in academic and literary journals to promote the series.

LTI Korea has one of the most active programs of any country I know of to promote their country’s literature around the world. The support provided to translators and publishers is clearly a strong point. I think that LTI Korea is undertaking many activities already to promote Korean literature overseas. The main programs, which provide generous grants to translators and publishers, are essential and one of the best programs of its type in the world. Many other countries offer grants for translation but not for publication, and both are essential to raising the number of Korean works published in major languages.

I believe that more attention needs to be paid to ensuring that the work that gets published is very well translated and edited and that cultural references are noted and explained when necessary. In addition to the many important programs LTI Korea undertakes, I would suggest that you increase the number of Korean authors you send abroad to literary festivals and academic conferences to make audiences aware of Korean work and increase the professional contacts between authors and academics as well as general audiences. In addition, more investment in marketing will yield long-term benefits in promoting Korean literature in other major languages.

Book Lover's Angle

My Favorite Korean Children’s Book My interest in Korean children’s literature began in 2007, with the birth of my second child. I was struggling to come up with a topic for my doctoral dissertation. My older son was two and a half, and began to request that I read longer books to him at bedtime. Back then we were living in Canada, and the books I owned and borrowed from the library were the ones I had read as a child.

At that time I had been reading Korean literature for almost 10 years, but I suddenly came up with a new question: What do Korean children read? My question surprised me because I had never asked it before. But thanks to my children’s growing interest in books, my curiosity about the Korean children’s book industry grew. Having been raised in a house full of books, I asked some of my Korean friends and peers what they had read as children. I was surprised when many could not remember a favorite book, or when they mentioned biographies of Western characters, or Aesop’s and Anderson’s tales. Where, I wondered, where are all the original Korean stories?

It was this question that started me on a quest to discover the origins of Korean children’s literature. My research took me back to 1908 and the publication of Choi Namseon’s magazine Sonyeon, and drew me into an investigation of the children’s magazines published in the colonial period including Eorini, Byeollara, Sinsonyeon, Sonyeon, and Sonyeonsegye, and others.

In all of these magazines I found fascinating essays, wonderful short stories, amusing illustrations and moving poems, and it is these that I used to teach my courses on Korean children’s literature at Keimyung University and now currently at Stanford. My focus of the last few years, then, has been primarily on the prewar period.

Of all the works I have researched in the colonial period, no voice resonates in my mind as prominently as that of writer Hyeon Deok (1909-?). Hyeon Deok, who published short stories in the late colonial period, was very much forgotten until Won Jong-chan brought him back to light through his research, and through publications such as I’m Not Playing With You (1995). This book is a collection of roughly 40 vignettes and short stories published by the writer throughout the late colonial period. And it is one of the only children’s books that I have read so far that has moved me deeply.

Hyeon was a great writer for several reasons. First, in his works he introduces delightful yet complex characters. They are not wholly good or wholly evil, as was typical of children’s literature since its inception at the turn of the 20th century.

They are children, but they are also capable of a range of human emotions including anger, jealousy, pettiness, as well as love and hope. They are not caricatures, but rich individuals in which any reader can find a little bit of him or herself.

Second, he does not teach; he shows. One of his deep

concerns is with the social and economic inequality caused by the colonial capitalist system. But rather than use the children as mouthpieces, or deliver a didactic speech on the subject, Hyeon tells stories in which the wealthy child refuses to share his snacks; in which an impoverished boy wants a toy so badly that he sees the toy in every inanimate object around him; in which children mimic the market exchange by exchanging mounds of sand, a game that emphasizes the inherent paradoxes of capital exchange. Hyeon’s texts are not only emotionally rich but they are linguistically rewarding.

His language is both lyrical and colloquial—the reader can hear the children’s voices, and laugh at the nuances of their speech—with repetitions and attention to details that reads poetically.

My research has so far kept me reading works mostly from the pre-1950s period in Korea. At a time when book markets are concerned with new talent and publishing houses depend on sales, not many would look to Korea’s early publishing history for compelling literature. However, Hyeon Deok’s works promise great rewards to those who make time to read him. I would like to suggest the reading of Hyeon Deok’s 40 vignettes and their inclusion in the classroom syllabus (a sample of one of his stories, “The Sky,” can be found in Azalea 2012 along with the original illustrations by artist Jung Hyunwoong). His readers will not be disappointed.

by Dafna Zur

*Dafna Zur is an assistant professor at Stanford University, where she teaches courses on Korean literature, popular culture, visual culture, and Asian children’s literature. She is currently working on a manuscript which examines the imagined reader in colonial period children's magazines.

Her translations of Korean fiction have appeared in wordswithoutborders.org.

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Overseas Angle

The Užupis Republic and the Place of Korean Literature in Lithuania The Užupis Republic Hailji, Minumsa Publishing Group 2009, 294p, ISBN 9788937482557

Užupio respublika Hailji, Romanas 2012, 227p ISBN 9789986397359

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Literature is facing a serious problem of getting back its readers in today’s modern society where electronic means of communication are developing rapidly. Surely, the case of Lithuania is no exception.

Lithuanians living in a country which boasts to have the fastest broadband Internet in the world prefer digital media that allows information from all over the world to be transmitted within a few seconds.

That is why the biggest problem and primary goal of all publishers is getting readers back.

The situation of Korean literature is even more serious. Due to historical reasons, Chinese or Japanese literature is well-known not only in Lithuania, but throughout Europe, so the introduction of modern Chinese or Japanese writers is not so difficult. On the other hand, the lack of specialists in the Korean language has caused not only Korean literature, but also Korean culture, to be almost unknown.

Surely, due to the Hallyu phenomenon the number of Lithuanians interested in Korean culture has

increased significantly. However, the majority of Lithuanians who do show interest in Korean culture belong to the younger generation, so they usually seek out Korean dramas or Korean music on the Internet rather than read Korean literature.

Having this in mind when it comes to Korean literature in Lithuania, the recent publication of Hailji‘s The Užupis Republic in the Lithuanian language might become a good opportunity to introduce Korean literature to the general public. First, the title of the novel includes the word ‘republic.’

Looking at it from this point of view, even the title of the novel becomes an advertisement itself. The majority of readers will start reading the novel simply from interest in knowing what Koreans think of our country and how it is depicted in the novel.

Needless to say the novel is fiction and not a documentary representing reality, but the Lithuania depicted in The Užupis Republic is not so unfamiliar for Lithuanian readers. The dialogue between protagonist Hal and the border defense officers, the scenery around the Vilnius International Airport, the entangled streets of the Old Town of Vilnius, and even the scenery of Adutiškis village totally covered by snow more or less resembles reality. All the people appearing in the novel have their real models, so they are easily recognizable for Lithuanian readers. For sure, there are details that aren’t completely accurate, but one always remembers that fiction is never an exact representation of reality.

However, Lithuanian readers who start reading the novel just because they are familiar with the neighborhood Užupis in Vilnius, will soon discover that universal codes are easily recognizable to all readers regardless of nationality. It is about homeland and the search for a lost motherland. The author, or rather the reader searches for the lost Republic of Užupis together with the protagonist Hal who keeps asking himself about the real Republic of Užupis, not the one existing in Vilnius that seems to be just behind the door, even though Hal cannot find it. Does the Republic of Užupis really exist? Since no one remembers the Republic of Užupis, might it be that the Republic of Užupis is just a figure of Hal’s imagination?

Looking for the answers to such questions, one might unconsciously start thinking of a spiritual homeland. Maybe the Republic of Užupis, which Hal cannot find even after a long search, is just his spiritual homeland? Maybe the citizens of the Republic of Užupis, which Hal meets accidently here and there, are his soul mates? Looked at from such a perspective, The Užupis Republic might be even more interesting to modern readers experiencing a crisis of religion and ideology.

Looking at it from another point of view, The Užupis Republic, rich with Buddhist philosophy, might be even more appealing to Western readers who have been raised with Christianity. Life goes in a straight line, experience is the best teacher. Such things are known by everyone since primary school. So why are the characters in The Užupis Republic repeating the same mistakes? Why can nobody notice that the room in the picture and the room they are in ideally match? There are readers who want to enter the novel, hit the characters with a slipper and scream, “Hey, wake up!” But is it really so strange that one does not notice things right in

front of one’s eyes and seek treasures far away? And cannot the repetition of one’s own mistakes be called normal human behavior? And one remembers the old proverb that history always repeats itself. So maybe Hal is just locked in the eternal circle of Samsara and is meant to perpetually look for his homeland for no reason, mimicking Buddhist philosophy?

Readers asked such questions directly to the author during the presentation of the novel, which took place in Lithuania this February, but the author did not reveal the answers. Maybe he did not know himself, or maybe these questions must be answered by the readers.

Due to such universal ideas The Užupis Republic might be interesting not only for Lithuanian readers, but also for readers from all around the world who are not aware of the existence of the Republic of Užupis. In the case of Lithuania, The Užupis Republic might become a good opportunity to introduce Korean literature itself. It is worthy to mention that several collections of Korean short stories, including What Happened to the Guy Stuck in the Elevator by Kim Young-ha were previously published in Lithuanian. But The Užupis Republic is the first piece of Korean literature combining Korea, Lithuania, and universal values. I hope that Lithuanian readers who start to read The Užupis Republic from mere interest in how Koreans see their country, or how the Republic of Užupis is described by a Korean writer, will look for more works of Korean literature, and that The Užupis Republic will become an opportunity to introduce even more Korean literature to Lithuania.

by Martynas Šiaučiūnas-Kačinskas

*Martynas Šiaučiūnas-Kačinskas is the translator for the Lithuanian edition of The Užupis Republic. He graduated from the University of Vilnius and completed his PhD at Kyung Hee University in Seoul. He has written entries on Korean language and literature for a Lithuanian encyclopedia set, and has translated various works of Japanese literature.

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New Books

Fiction

Recommended

by Publishers Korean editors have handpicked their favorite titles among the collections from their own publishing houses. The following list contains hidden gems in Korea’s publishing industry. For further information, please contact the agents directly.

Copyright © Yoo Jun-jae, Into Mom's Dream, Munhakdongne Publishing Corp.

The Whale Rock

Eyebrows

Lee Soon-won, Bookgoodcome 2012, 176p, ISBN 9788997728039

Cheon Joo-ha, Prooni Books, Inc. 2013, 168p, ISBN 9788957983348

The whale rock, unable to move around on its own, comes to learn about a similar whale living in the ocean. Thanks to lightening the huge whale rock gets broken into smaller rocks, then into pebbles, and pebbles into earth where the rocks finally make it to the ocean. This fable offers a sense of healing for readers to connect with how dreams come true.

Eyebrows, a coming of age novel, is about a 17-year-old girl, Seohyeon, who has returned from her 16-month fight against cancer.

This story encourages young readers to rethink the meaning of life and death. The book also illustrates the importance of ordinary life.

Copyright Agent: Lee Soon-young bookgoodcome@gmail.com 82-2-359-5220 www.bookgoodcome.com

Salt Park Bumshin Hankyoreh Publishing Company 2013, 368p, ISBN 9788984316904

Salt asks poignant questions about fathers. What do they get in this overwhelming capitalist world? What do they lose? How do they live and float?

In the portrayal of the central character Seon Myeong-woo, aging fathers are depicted in a thought-provoking way that illustrates their life.

Copyright Agent: Lee Ji-eun editorlee@hanibook.co.kr 82-2-6373-6710 www.hanibook.co.kr

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Mimang: The Unforgettable (3 vols.)

Park Wansuh, Segyesa Publishing Co., Ltd. 2012, 354p, ISBN 9788933801888 (Vol.1)

Park Wansuh’s Mimang: The Unforgettable is a historical novel with a unique perspective. Set in the ancient city of Gaeseong, details including the lifestyle of Goryeo citizens, fashion, food, and other cultural aspects are fully reconstructed to the level of solid historical data. In 1996, a historical TV drama based on Park’s novel was aired on national television.

Copyright Agent: Heo Yun-jung 314yj@naver.com 82-2-6332-8082 www.segyesa.co.kr

Copyright Agent: Choi Jin-woo agency@prooni.com 82-2-581-0334 (Ext.117) www.prooni.com

Mother's Stake

Nutmeg Forest

Park Wansuh, Segyesa Publishing Co., Ltd. 2012, 596p, ISBN 9788933801840

Kwon Yeo-sun, Moonji Publishing Co., Ltd. 2013, 296p, ISBN 9788932023908

Mother’s Stake is Park Wansuh’s only serialized collection among her 80-odd short stories. In this collection, not only the title story, but also other insightful works including “Loss,” “Dreaming Incubator,” and “Three Days in the Autumn” showcase the author’s keen powers of observation and sophisticated writing style.

This story collection revolves around the theme of time and memories, asking readers to look back upon their life through their experiences, memories, and forgotten facts. The sheer force of forgetfulness is explored in this novel, highlighting forgotten people and forgotten times.

Copyright Agent: Heo Yun-jung 314yj@naver.com 82-2-6332-8082 www.segyesa.co.kr

Copyright Agent: Choi Ji-in jiin@moonji.com 82-2-338-7224 www.moonji.com

Poetry

Nonfiction

Unknown Night and Day

Like a Day of Feasting

Bae Suah, Jaeum & Moeum 2013, 216p, ISBN 9788957077214

Ko Un, Changbi Publishers, Inc. 2012, 516p, ISBN 9788936461195

Picturebook, Korean Illustrators

The story unfolds with 29-year-old Kim Ayami who works at an audio theater in Seoul faced with an imminent shutdown. Kim comes across a host of characters and events, but the repetitions and slightly nuanced changes in such meetings eventually lead to poetry.

A total of 240 poems have been selected from the vast pool of works by renowned poet Ko Un. This prolific poet has published about 160 books, showing no sign of fatigue in his creative energy. The collection offers a fascinating view of the poet’s literary landscape; even Ko Un publicly said he considers this collection to be truly representative.

Copyright Agent: Kim Young-lan jamoglobal@jamobook.com 82-70-8656-9583 www.jamo21.net

Scholar’s Class and Paintings Baik In-san, Daseossure Publishing Co. 2012, 120p, ISBN 9788974783594

Baik In-san, a researcher at the Gansong Art Museum in Seoul, has long studied Korean paintings. In this book, Baik has selected 22 paintings of flowers, birds, and animals as well as 30 traditional paintings of four gracious plants (plumblossoms, orchids, chrysanthemums, and bamboo), and explained their stories and meaning in a concise way for younger audiences.

Copyright Agent: Jun Eun-hee gosmgu@empal.com 82-2-3142-6611 (Ext.101) www.daseossure.co.kr

Copyright Agent: Sarah Lee copyright@changbi.com 82-31-955-3369 www.changbi.com

Kim Ji-eun, Lee Sang-hee Choi Hyun-mi, Han Mihwa Sigongsa Co., Ltd., 2013, 264p ISBN 9788952767479

Four professional writers share their ideas and views about the strengths of picture books and various illustrators. Major works by 29 Korean picture book writers and various images capturing their creative activities are featured in a way that brings readers closer to their works.

Copyright Agent: Amelie Choi amelie@sigongsa.com 82-2-2046-2855 www.sigongsa.com

Books, Humans, Time and Space: Reader’s Time and Space

Going Against Democracy

Cheong Soo-bok Munhakdongne Publishing Corp.

2013, 300p, ISBN 9788954620697

The author points to the dilemma of democracy in which violence is carried out in the name of the logic of the majority. The author claims that the monopolistic ownership of familyowned conglomerates should be replaced by sharing and creative labor through cooperatives.

In Books, Humans, Time and Space, people from different times and places are reading books. These seemingly disparate images, however, are brought together through the books. The book paints a gracefully balanced composition of everyday stories about readers enriching their inner world.

Copyright Agent: Kate Han rights@munhak.com 82-31-955-2635 www.munhak.com

Ha Seung-woo Little Mountain Publishing Co. 2012, 324p, ISBN 9788989646761

Copyright Agent: Yi Jin-gyu littlemt2001ch@gmail.com 82-2-335-7365 www.littlemt.com

Mom’s Smell 3 Hours a Day Lee Hyun-soo, Gimm-Young Publishers, Inc. 2013, 292p, ISBN 9788934961109

Babies learn their mother’s smell early in their life. This book attempts to identify the primitive yet underlying instinct to seek the stability and the origin of life hidden in a mother’s smell. The author’s consultations with tens of thousands of children in the past 20 years point to the importance of a mother’s smell, especially when children are on the verge of a crisis.

Copyright Agent: Cha Jin-hee jinhee@gimmyoung.com 82-2-3668-3203 www.gimmyoung.com

What Makes Me Different from Others Jung Chul-yoon, Eight Point 2012, 272p, ISBN 9788996947417

The book asks readers to think about what it means to be different. The author, who is often called a value innovator, has given more than 200 marketing lectures to college students and workers. As his advice and arguments are based on his own experiences, the author comes across as a colleague rather than a teacher.

Copyright Agent: Heo Yun-jung 314yj@naver.com 82-2-6332-8082 www.eightpoint.co.kr

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Graphic Novels

The Return of Hope

A Book on Playing with Books

Poetry of a Racing Youth

Hitler’s Golden Age

Norbert D.Y. Cha, Wis & Vis 2013, 316p, ISBN 9788992825726

Oh Seung-ju; Illustrator: Kim La-yeon Yiyaginamu, 2013, 248p ISBN 9788996752837

Youn Seung-chul, Yiyaginamu 2013, 560p, ISBN 9788996752844

Kim Tae-kwon Hankyoreh Publishing Company 2012, 308p, ISBN 9788984316362

This book celebrates the hope preached by healing expert Father Norbert D.Y. Cha. His core message of hope offers clues about what true healing is, especially for those who suffer from “fatigue syndrome” in this successobsessed society. Cha delivers a warm message of hope to readers who find themselves stuck in despair and disappointment.

Copyright Agent: Ha Seung-jin wisnvis@naver.com 82-2-324-5677

The book reflects the author’s years of hands-on experience as a reading specialist for children. Fable-like stories related to books are presented on the theme of conflicts between children and their parents, along with author commentary and reading tips. The book also comes with plenty of heart-warming illustrations.

Copyright Agent: Kim Jeong-ye puri@bombaram.net 82-2-3142-0388 www.yiyaginamu.net

There is a grueling race in the sizzling desert and the freezing Antarctic. For six days and seven nights, participants have to run a course of 250 km, carrying their food and equipment in their backpacks.

This book contains the poems and photographs of a five-time participant who was once deemed unable to walk due to his physical disadvantages.

Copyright Agent: Kim Jeong-ye puri@bombaram.net 82-2-3142-0388 www.yiyaginamu.net

This graphic novel starts from a question: Is it possible for Hitler to mysteriously show up in the modern era and take power again? The graphic novel compares some surprising similarities between Hitler’s society and South Korea of the 21st century.

Copyright Agent: Lee Ji-eun editorlee@hanibook.co.kr 82-2-6373-6710 www.hanibook.co.kr

Children’s Books

Into Mom's Dream

Raccoon in the Lab

Thief Turns into Helper

Rescue Mom!

Yoo Jun-jae, Munhakdongne 2013, 40p, ISBN 9788954620796

Kim Soe-min; Illustrator: Yoo Jun-jae Kyohaksa Publishing Co., Ltd., 2011, 152p ISBN 9788909170246

Park Hyang-hee; Illustrator: Kim Un-hee Kyohaksa Publishing Co., Ltd., 2013, 132p ISBN 9788909181938

Kim Young-Jin, Bear Books 2013, 48p, ISBN 9788993242775

An intelligent, human-like raccoon is used as a test subject in a lab. Trapped inside a small box, the raccoon goes through all sorts of experiments and painful procedures, which leads to an extreme fear of death. The author suggests that animal experiments are unethical and every life should be respected.

Cho-rok’s family members leave the house one day. A burglar breaks into the house, only to uncover secrets about Chorok’s family. This humorous story shows how the family reacts to the shocking truth that is exposed by the unexpected intruder.

Naro’s dog suddenly starts talking. “Hey, you’ve got to go somewhere with me,” the dog says. The dog named Peolleok is, in fact, a special agent from Iruria, a land of imagination which is now in serious trouble. It is only Naro who can save Iruria because he is the world’s most imaginative kid.

Copyright Agent: Kim In-ae inae16@hanmail.net 82-2-707-5325 www.kyohak.co.kr

Copyright Agent: Choi Hyun-kyoung kumahon@naver.com 82-2-332-2672 www.bearbooks.co.kr

Jisu stays awake at night and her mother urges her to get to sleep, so she sleeps.

But Jisu gets curious about her mother’s dreams. “What dream is my mother dreaming? Is she making a delicious sandwich for me? What am I doing in Mom’s dream? Where’s my Dad?” Before she knows it, she is already fast asleep in the hands of her mother and father.

Copyright Agent: Lee Bokee bokeelee@munhak.com 82-2-3144-3237 www.munhak.com

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Copyright Agent: Kim In-ae inae16@hanmail.net 82-2-707-5325 www.kyohak.co.kr

Hodgepodge Art Museum

Proposing a Lawsuit

Yoo Joo-yeon, Bear Books 2012, 48p, ISBN 9788993242751

Lee Myung-rang; Illustrator: Lee Kang-hoon Sigongsa Co., Ltd., 2013, 140p ISBN 9788952768308

A gust of wind hits an art museum and something strange starts to take place.

Mona Lisa gets back her eyelashes and Les Demoiselles d'Avignon jump into The Birth of Venus. A guard shows up and tries to track down the criminal. The book works like a ‘spot the difference puzzle,’ as readers discover unusual aspects in famous paintings and try to deduce the true identity of the criminal and the guard.

This thrilling story is a court drama customized for younger readers involving a child that ate too many meatballs at lunch and his trial. The legal verdict is based on the classroom rules, including a clause that allows anyone to file a lawsuit any time. Children come to realize the problems of court rules and try to set up better rules to establish a self-ruled court.

Copyright Agent: Choi Hyun-kyoung kumahon@naver.com 82-2-332-2672 www.bearbooks.co.kr

Copyright Agent: Amelie Choi amelie@sigongsa.com 82-2-2046-2855 www.sigongjunior.com

The Bizarre and Strange Circus

School Zoo

Eun Mi, Nurimbo Publishing Co. 2013, 36p, ISBN 9788958761549

This picture book details the central character’s journey to try to meet with the head of the Bizarre and Strange Circus troupe to become a member. The pictures are colorful and fantastic enough to fire up the imagination of younger readers.

Thrilling events we dreamed of in our childhood unfold in the picture book in an engaging way.

Copyright Agent: We Jung-eun nurimbo_pub@naver.com 82-31-955-7391 www.nurimbo.co.kr

Park Tae-hee, Nurimbo Publishing Co. 2013, 28p, ISBN 9788958761594

The book centers upon the perspective of an elementary school child whose imagination takes off while looking at a construction site. The book portrays the imaginative kid who plays with the images of cute and funny animals alongside an otherwise plain construction site.

Copyright Agent: We Jung-eun nurimbo_pub@naver.com 82-31-955-7391 www.nurimbo.co.kr

Far Countries, Neighboring Countries (updated edition): Espagna Rhie Won-bok, Gimm-Young Publishers, Inc. 2013, 262p, ISBN 9788934962432

Far Countries, Neighboring Countries has been the bestselling series for the past 33 years. This time, author Rhie invites readers to learn about Espagna. Spain’s golden period began to decline due to its reckless territorial expansion, and selfrighteous and closed cultural policies. In contrast to its glorious history, modern Spain suffered from a long period of dictatorship and ideological conflicts.

Copyright Agent: Cha Jin-hee jinhee@gimmyoung.com 82-2-3668-3203 www.gimmyoung.com

Earthworms: Mother Nature's Farmers Yi Sung-shil; Illustrator: Yi Tae-su Daseossure Publishing Co., 2009, 30p ISBN 9788974782573

In Earthworms, artist Yi Tae-su draws up a miniature picture of earthworms down to the tiniest details such as their mucous skin, and Yi Sung-shil weaves a rhythmic tale of earthworms. Any reader would be easily convinced that earthworms are both earth farmers and environmental guards who make tunnels and provide essential nutritional ingredients.

Copyright Agent: Jun Eun-hee gosmgu@empal.com 82-2-3142-6611 (Ext.101) www.daseossure.co.kr

12-Month Environment Calendar

That Is Why This Kind of Math Was Created

Im Jung-eun; Illustrator: Moon Jong-in Gilbutschool, 2011, 168p ISBN 9788962223972

Urinuri; Illustrator: Gang Gyeong-su Gilbutschool, 2013, 184p ISBN 9788962225266

The book reminds readers that at least once a month people should think about the Earth. Various environment-related anniversaries designated by the United Nations and environmental groups are explained in detail. The author shows that environmental protection can start from a simple act rather than a grand undertaking.

This book contains interesting stories about the history of mathematics involving both the East and the West. In the four-cut cartoon format, the human’s first number-crunching, the origin of numbers we use now, the first study of figures and the progress of mathematical calculations are presented together with engaging stories.

Copyright Agent: Kim Eon-su onssu@gilbut.co.kr 82-2-330-9864 school.gilbut.co.kr

Copyright Agent: Kim Eon-su onssu@gilbut.co.kr 82-2-330-9864 school.gilbut.co.kr

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Meet the Publishers

Little Mountain Publishing Co.

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1. Paper Meal Kim Jung-mi; Illustrator: Kim Hwan-young Little Mountain Publishing Co. 2002, 107p, ISBN 9788989646020 2. Baby Dog Park Ki-beom, Illustrator: Ru Dong-hun Little Mountain Publishing Co. 2003, 59p, ISBN 9788989646082 3. Ms. Mija from Our Neighborhood Yoo Eun-sil; Illustrator: Chang Kyeung-hwe Little Mountain Publishing Co. 2010, 104p, ISBN 9788989646600 4. We All Have the Right to Health Kim Sun; Illustrator: Kim So-hee Little Mountain Publishing Co., 2010, 124p ISBN 9788989646655 5. Dal from Binari Kwon Jeong-saeng; Illustrator: Kim Dong-sung Little Mountain Publishing Co. 2001, 59p ISBN 9788989646006

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We found Little Mountain Publishing Co. in the heart of a residential area tucked away from busy roads past several alley ways. As the company’s name suggests, Little Mountain was familiar and welcoming. We met editors who are passionate and full of ideas.

Little Mountain was founded in June 2001 with the hope of publishing books that are easy for everyone to read while being so interesting that readers would not want to put them down once they started reading. Their first book was Dal from Binari

by Kwon Jeong-saeng. The interesting fact about this book is that the main characters, the dog “Dal” and the priest, both exist in real life. The second book, Paper Meal by Kim Jung-mi, continues to attract attention and is loved by readers even today.

The main character Songi eats paper whenever she is bored or when she misses her grandmother. The author hopes that readers will feel love for those who are weak and vulnerable through the siblings Songi and Cheoli.

Baby Dog is another book worth reading, with a puppy as a central character. Children love the puppy.

Therefore, they hold him, fly him in the air, put him

in the tub, and teach him how to swim, but the puppy is just scared and tired.

Author Park Ki-beom shows how cruel a relationship can be when it is based on an absence of communication. He says that good intentions can actually be a source of fear for the receiver, so if you really care for the other person, you should put yourself in his or her shoes.

An adult is the main character in Ms. Mija from Our Neighborhood, which is quite rare in children’s literature. This is the story of Mija the loner and Seongji, a prickly child. Author Yoo Eun-sil’s unique, simple style leaves the reader feeling the deep joys and sorrows of life.

The picture book Gazing at Each O t h e r h a s t w o c ont r a s t i n g s c e ne s alternating throughout the book. On the one hand is the animals living peacefully in nature and on the other is how their lives are taken away from them. Humans love animals that are free in nature, considering the beaut y of how they enjoy their life as it is. At the same time, however, they are used to keeping them in cages and enjoy watching them live that way. Such ironies remind us how we as humans view and treat other living beings. This book asks us what kind of life makes us who we are.

Little Mountain is also strong in nonfiction for children and young adults.

We All Have the Right to Health written by a pharmacist Kim Sun argues that health is an issue that is related not just to

individuals but also to nature, that is, the health of all things which have life. This book offers us a chance to learn about facts surrounding illness and drugs. It also provides an opportunity to realize how an individual’s body, society, and nature are connected.

Find a Hidden Picture in Masterpieces helps children understand paintings from a children’s point of view. Unexpected and ingenious devices, which painters have hidden in masterpieces, are presented as riddles to be solved. Why Did History Walk into a Painting? enables readers to read and understand history by learning about masterpieces that depict historical changes.

Think Upside-down! The World Might Look Different (Vol. 1) suggests that we should think again about the “winnertakes-all” kind of society, science and technology, sharing, literature, poverty, and war. Think Upside-down! The World and I Can Change! ( Vol. 2) explores overcoming false delusions of modern capitalist civilization which would in turn change the world and our lives.

I n W h a t Li t t l e We K n o w A b o u t Hu m a n s a n d t h e Un i v e r s e , K or e a n scientists and scholars in the humanities answer “the most difficult questions in science that have yet to be answered” that have been selected by Science magazine in commemoration of its 125th anniversary.

This book also includes a discussion where humanists comment on the answers that natural scientists and engineers have given.

Coming down from Little Mountain, we felt that it is not a mountain that is too high and thus diff icult to climb, but a small one that anyone would be able to climb once they set their mind to it. We deeply agree with a fan of the publishing company’s books, who says Little Mountain often publishes the stories in our lives that are warm, touching, and forgotten.

by Kim Yeonzin

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2 1. What Little We Know About Humans

and the Universe Jeong Jaeseung et al.

Little Mountain Publishing Co. 2012, 286p, ISBN 9788989646822 2. Think Upside-down!

The World Might Look Different (Vol.1) Hong Se-hwa et al.

Little Mountain Publishing Co. 2008, 183p, ISBN 9788989646518

Think Upside-down!

The World and I Can Change! (Vol. 2) Kang Su-dol et al.

Little Mountain Publishing Co. 2010, 200p, ISBN 9788989646594 3. Find a Hidden Picture in Masterpieces Jang Se-hyun, Little Mountain Publishing Co. 2011, 88p, ISBN 9788989646815 4. Why Did History Walk into a Painting?

Jang Se-hyun; Illustrator: Oh Seung-min Little Mountain Publishing Co., 2012, 90p ISBN 9788989646846

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Afterword

Encountering Korean Literature: A Personal Journey My first encounter with Korean literature came through a roundabout process that started in 1992. I was sitting on a train in Germany discussing literature with a Korean woman whom I had just happened to meet, having by chance sat down beside her. Specifically, we were talking about The Man Without Qualities, a famous novel by the Austrian writer Robert Musil, and our discussion was so fascinating, we decided to get married and continue the conversation. Of course, I didn’t tell her about “our” decision for another year and a half.

She lived in Munich and I in Tübingen, but we took turns visiting each other nearly every weekend, and for three years in Germany, our conversation continued, as it had begun, in German, a second language for us both.

However, I was determined to become acquainted with Korean literature in English translation, so I asked her for a book to read. She managed to obtain a copy of Choi Inhoon’s early novel, A Grey Man, which I read slowly in an attempt to gain as much insight as possible into Korean culture. Ironically, the protagonist was a man “without qualities” wavering in the 1950s between Christianity and communism, which I took to mean the choice between right or left, South or North, and I suppose I was correct.

I attributed that political issue to the temporal setting of Korea in the 1950s. Little did I realize that South Koreans would still be stuck in this dilemma in 2013.

In 1995, we married and spent two semesters in Korea teaching before leaving again for nearly five years on postdoctoral grants, returning to Korea shortly before the millennial celebrations at the onset of 2000. Only slowly did I get back into Korean literature, and that was when I was solicited to serve as a referee, and later a judge, for the Daesan Foundation. As a referee, I evaluated sample English translations of Korean stories and plays, as well as poetry, and began developing a sense of what, in literary terms, Korea had to offer. I was especially taken with Park Wan-suh’s autobiographical novel, Who Ate Up All the Shinga?, translated by Yu Young-nan and Stephen Epstein, who appreciated my close proofreading of their manuscript and invited me to dinner with them and the author herself. Later, as a judge for the Daesan Foundation’s 2009 Translation Prize, I participated in choosing Bruce and JuChan Fulton’s translation of Ch'oe Yun’s story selection There a Petal Silently Falls: Three Stories no italics and I was privileged to meet the author and translators at the awards ceremony. As for the writings of Park Wan-suh and Ch'oe Yun, while these works were more complex than Choi Inhoon’s A Grey Man, I observed a similar concern with the right and the left in the struggle over the qualities of the

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Vol.20 Summer 2013

Korean soul.

Meanwhile, my wife and I had gotten into translation work ourselves, at times sponsored by grants from LTI Korea. For instance, we translated Jang Jung-il’s short story collection When Adam's Eyes Opened and Yi Gwang-su’s novel The Soil, both supported by LTI Korea and slated for publication this coming fall, if all goes according to schedule. These two works have been our greatest challenges thus far, but also thereby the most fulfilling, for we learned a great deal about translating literary texts through the endeavor itself, and the process has improved my own writing and conferred greater confidence upon me as a writer. In terms of themes, the two works are very different, of course. Jang Jung-il’s stories touch upon Korea’s political division, which was obviously not an issue for Yi Gwang-su, whose works were written under the Japanese occupation, but the latter was similarly obsessed with a search for authentic Korean qualities, and his literary legacy has been vigorously contested between right and left.

We can see this same search for genuine Korean qualities in the works of Hwang Sok-yong, particularly his novel The Guest, where he attempts an exorcism of the Christian right and communist left, in favor of traditional Korean shamanism as that which best informs the truest qualities of the Korean soul. Although my engagement with Korean literature continues in a roundabout fashion, I see that the first Korean literary work I read, about a grey man preoccupied with Korea’s division, offered paradoxical insight into Korean culture as a culture caught in a dilemma. That same divided Korea still remains.

Highlighting that division, Hwang Sok-yong attempts a third way. In contrast, much recent Korean literature by younger writers appears to ignore the division and its ripple effects in the Korean soul, but I can’t help wondering if this division is merely being studiously ignored in works such as Kim Young-ha’s I Have the Right to Destroy Myself, and is thus present in its absence.

by Horace J. Hodges

*Horace J. Hodges is a professor of the English Program Office and Division of International Studies at Ewha Womans University, where he teaches composition and research methods, and occasionally also history and theology.

He has a doctorate in history from UC Berkeley and has published articles on history, political science, religious studies, and literary criticism.

He is also a published writer and poet.

Contributors

Bae No-pil is a reporter with the JoongAng Ilbo.

Jung Yeo-ul is a literary critic. Jung

the author of Literature Speeding in a Maze.

lectures at Seoul National University and the Korean National University of Arts. She is the author of a collection of critical essays, A Small Antenna in My Study.

Bok Dohoon is a literary critic. His

Kang Yu-jung is a literary and film

Baik Jiyeon is a literary critic, and

collections of critical essays include A Portrait of a Blindman and The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. He is on the editorial board of list_Books from Korea.

Cha Won-hyun is a literary critic,

and a professor of Korean language and literature at Gyeongju University. He is also the author of The Ideology and Ethics of Modern Korean Novels.

Cho Kang-sok is a literary critic,

and a professor at Inha University Humanities Korea (HK). He has written such works as The Constellations of Aporia and The Empiricist’s Clock.

Cho Sung-myeon is a literary critic,

and a BK research professor at Inha University. His books include Cross the Border, Close That Gap: Genre Literature & Cultural Criticism and Korean Literature, Popular Fiction, Cultural Contents.

Cho Yeon-jung is a literary critic. She

made her debut in 2006 when she won the Seoul Shinmun New Critics Award.

Eom Hye-suk does research in

children’s literature and is an illustrated book critic who also works as a translator. Her most well-known work is Reading My Delightful Illustrated Books.

critic, and the author of the collection of critical essays Oedipus’ Forest. She is on the editorial board of list_Books from Korea.

Kim Beomsoo is a reporter with the Hankook Ilbo.

Kim Dongshik is a literary critic

and a professor of Korean language and literature at Inha University. His collections of critical essays include Cynicism and Fascination no italics Memory and Vestige.

Kim Hyoung-joong is a literary critic

and professor of Korean Literature at Chosun University. He is the author of the collection of critical essays One Book.

Kim Inae is a children’s story writer,

critic, and the president of the KBBY (Korean Board on Books for Young People). She is the author of the children’s stories Across the Duroke River, The Brave Little Mouse, and a collection of critical essays, Why Children’s Stories Are Fun to Read. She is also the recipient of Today’s Young Artist Award.

Kim Ji-eun is a children’s book

literary editor.

writer and children’s literature critic.

She currently lectures on theories of children's fiction writing in the Department of Creative Writing at Hanshin University. She is on the editorial board of list_Books from Korea.

Han Miwha is a book columnist. Her

Kim Min-ryoung is a children’s

Han Eun-hyeong is a writer and

works include Bestsellers of Our Time and This Is How Bestsellers Are Made. and critic in the publishing industry.

He is the author of The Living Library.

story writer who also studies children’s literature. She made her literary debut in 2006 when her children’s story won the Munwha Ilbo New Writer’s Contest. She is the author of My Cousin Sera.

Joseph Lee is a literary agent and

Kim Yeonzin is a children's book

Jang Dongseok is a book columnist

president of KL Management. His main interest lies in selling Korean literature to overseas markets. He is the author of A Man Selling Novels.

writer, and the author of the collection of short stories for children, What Movie Star Does Mom Love? and the long story for children Island Town Scandal.

Lee Kyung-ho is a literary critic, and the author of the collection of critical essays The Poet of the Trauma School.

Lee Taekyong is a TV producer and

team manager at the KBS Broadcasting Culture Research Center.

Pa r k Su k - k y o u n g w o r k s a s a

translator and children's literature critic. Park is an editorial board member for the Changbi Review of Children's Literature.

Pyo Jeonghun is a book reviewer,

columnist, translator, and freelance writer. He has translated 10 books into Korean and written Books Have Their Own Destiny, A Short Introduction to Chinese Philosophy, and An Interview with My Teacher: What Is Philosophy?

He is on the editorial board of list_ Books from Korea.

Richard Hong is a book columnist

and the head of BC Agency. He translated 13: The Story of the World’s Most Notorious Superstitions, has appeared on KBS 1 Radio’s “Global Today,” and writes columns for The Korea Economic Daily and Posco News.

Shim Jinkyung is a literary critic, and the author of Traversing Women’s Literature and Korean Literature and Sexuality.

Shin Soojin is a freelance children's book editor.

Uh Soo-woong is editor-in-chief of the Chosun Ilbo Weekly Magazine.

Yi Myung-suk is a columnist. He has published such books as Yi Myung-suk’s Japanese Comics, Manhwa, Finding the Critical Point, and A Cafe for Every Day.

Yi Soo-hyung is a literary critic. He

has written the collection of essays What Remains of Literature. He is currently a research professor at the Center for Teaching & Learning at Seoul National University.

Yu Youngjin is a children’s literature

critic and a teacher at an Elementary School. He is the author of The Body’s Imagination and Fairy Tale.

list_ Books from Korea

Vol.20 Summer 2013

87

Contributors

Featured Authors

Translators Ally Hwang received her PhD from

the Philosophy, Literature, and the Theory of Criticism program (PLC) in the Department of Comparative Literature at Binghamton University.

She was a fellow of the International Translation Foundation and LTI Korea. She has recently published a short story translation of Seo Hajin's, “At the Gunwale.”

Cho Yoonna is a freelance interpreter and translator.

Choi Inyoung is an artist and translator specializing in Korean literature and the arts. She has been translating for over 20 years.

E.K. DuBois is a freelance translator.

She currently resides in Seoul.

H. Jamie Chang is a Bostonian/ Busanian freelance translator.

Heidi Shon is a freelance translator.

She has also taught English as a fulltime lecturer at Hongik University.

Park Kyoung-lee is a graduate

student at Hankuk University of Foreign Studies. She won the 9th Korean Literature Translation Contest for New Translators in 2010.

Kari Schenk was the co-recipient of

the commendation award in the 2006 Korea Times Literature Translation Awards, and in 2010 she attended a special course in translation at LTI Korea. She teaches at Korea University.

intensive course at the LTI Korea Translation Academy and is now living and working in Seoul.

Sora Kim-Russell teaches fulltime at Ewha Womans University’s Graduate School of Translation and Interpretation and is currently translating a novel and a short story collection.

Yang Sung-jin is a staff reporter and

editor at The Korea Herald. Yang wrote a Korean history book in English, Click into the Hermit Kingdom, and a newsbased English vocabulary book, News English Power Dictionary.

Yi Jeong-hyeon is a freelance

translator. She has translated several books and papers, including Korean Traditional Landscape Architecture and Atlas of Korean History.

lecturer at Ewha Womans University's Graduate School of Translation and Interpretation.

K r y s L e e i s a b o o k r e v i e w e r,

translator, and fiction writer. Her short story collection Drifting House was published by Viking/Penguin in the U.S. and Faber and Faber in the U.K., in 2012.

Cover Art

Kim Uchang is a literary critic and

Lee Jin-joon was born in 1974 in

He has worked as a lecturer in English literature at Seoul National University and at Korea National Open University.

88 list_ Books from Korea

Vol.20 Summer 2013

in Jeongeub, North Jeolla Province in 1963. She made her literary debut in 1985 when her novella "A Winter Fable" won the Munye Joongang Literary Award for Best First Novel.

She is the author of seven short story collections, including The Blind Calf, The Sound of Bells, Unknown Women, and Moonlight Tales, and seven novels, including An Isolated Room, Lee Jin, Please Look After Mom, and I'll Be Right There. She has received a number of prestigious literary awards at home and abroad, including the Yi Sang Literary Award, the Dongin Prize, the Hyundae Munhak Award, Prix de l'Inapercu, and the Man Asian Literary Prize.

Kim Stoker is an editor and part-time

on translating fiction and nonfiction from Korean into English.

Kim Ungsan is a freelance translator.

Shin Kyung-sook is a writer. Born

Editors

Kim Soyoung is currently working

scholar of English literature. He has published a number of translations, including Mimesis, and many papers.

pp. 42-44, 57-58

Sophie Bowman completed the

Jung Yewon is a freelance interpreter

and translator. She received the Daesan Foundation Translation Grant in 2009, the LTI Translation Grant in 2010, and the Korea Times Translation Award in 2011. She is currently working on the translation of Vaseline Buddha, a novel

by Jung Young Moon.

Fiction

Masan, Korea. Since his first exhibition at the Koreana Art Museum in 2004, he has participated in over 40 major exhibitions around the world. His drawings, photographs, and media art are in permanent collections in Dubai and Seoul. He currently resides in Tokyo. www.leejinjoon.com

Jung Chan is a writer. Born in Busan

in 1953, he made his literary debut in 1983 when his novella "The Tower of Words" appeared in the bookazine World of Language. He is the author of several short story collections, including The River of Memor y, Complete Soul, The Road of Comfort, Die in Venice, and Pristine Home, and novels, including Evening of the World, Golden Ladder, Wilderness, and Jesus of Pontius Pilate. He is also the recipient of the Dongin Prize, among others.

written numerous books including: Memento Mori, Remember That You Will Die; A Collective Autobiography of Koreans; De Senectute; and Things That Disappear.

Ha Chang-soo is a writer. Born

An Boyun is a writer. Born in

Incheon in 1981, she began her literary career in 2005 when her novel Here Come the Crocodiles won the Munhakdongne Writer Award. Her other novels include The Doctor of Oz and Pretending Not to Know.

Copyright © Kim Hung-Ku

i n Po h a n g , No r t h G y e o n g s a n g Province in 1960, he made his literary debut in 1987 when his novella "Cheongsanyugam" won the Munye Joongang Literary Award for Best First Novel. He is the author of the short story collections Picking Daffodils and The Man Who Passed Through Thirty Gates, and the novels Trap, People Who Don’t Turn Around, and 1987. He is also the recipient of the Hankook Daily Literary Award.

Park Hee-byung is a scholar of

Korean literature. Born in 1956, he graduated from the Department and Graduate School of Korean Language and Literature at Seoul National University. He has written a number of books, including The Aesthetic of the Korean Stories of Extraordinary Events, The Ecological Thought of Korea, and Universal Love and Equality. Currently, he is a professor in the Department of Korean Language and Literature at Seoul National University.

Choi Ji-un is a writer. Born in Yeosu,

Jo Kyung-ran is a writer. Born in

Nonfiction pp. 60-66

Copyright © Kim Dong Wook

Seoul in 1969, she made her literary debut in 1996 when her short story "The French Optical" won the Dong-a Ilbo New Writer's Contest. She is the author of the short story collections Looking for an Elephant, Story of Gukja, I Bought a Balloon, Sunday Philosophy, and the novels Time for Baking Bread, Tongue, and Blowfish. She is also the recipient of the Hyundae Munhak Award and the Dongin Prize, among others.

South Jeolla Province in 1979, he made his literary debut in 2012 when his novel Oksu-dong Tigers won The Korea Economic Daily New Writer's Contest. Oksu-dong Tigers is his first novel.

Jeong Jia is a writer. Born in Gurye,

South Jeolla Province in 1965, she began her literary career in 1990 when she published her novel The Daughter of a North Korean Partisan (in three volumes) based on the life of her parents. Her short story “LotusPersimmon Tree” won the Chosun Ilbo New Writer’s Contest in 1996.

She is the author of the short story collections Happiness, Spring Scenery, and Dialogue of the Forest.

Department of Sociology at Seoul National University and received his PhD in sociology from the graduate school of the same university. Currently he is a professor at Seoul National University of Science and Technology.

He is the author of The Theory of Social Formation and Methodology of Social Science, Philosophy and a Chimney Sweeper, The Adventure of Philosophy, and The Hitchhiker’s Philosophical Journey.

Lee Man-keun is a university

professor. Born in 1959, he graduated from the Department and Graduate School of Mathematics Education at Seoul National University. He is the author of An Exciting Journey into Modern Mathematics, The Intriguing World of Mathematics, and Math Odyssey. Currently, he teaches at Dongyang University.

Lie Sang-bong is a fashion designer

who launched the Lie Sang-bong brand in 1985. Since 1994, he has participated in the SFW (Seoul Fashion Week) and the SFAA (Seoul Fashion Artist Association). Since 2002, he has presented his prêt-à-porter collections in Paris, France. Since 2011, he has presented and showcased his collections at Concept Korea in New York. He has participated in over 150 fashion shows at home and abroad, and his Hangeul calligraphy fashion design has received attention across the country and the world. He is the author of Fashion Is Passion.

Yi Jin-kyung graduated from the

Kim Yol-kyu was born in Goseong,

South Gyeongsang Province in 1932.

After graduating from the Department of Korean Language and Literature at Seoul National University, he majored in Korean literature and folk studies in the graduate school of the same university. He was a professor of Korean Language & Literature at Sogang University and a visiting professor at the Harvard-Yenching Institute. Currently, he is professor emeritus at Sogang University. He has

Dennis Hong is one of the young

scientists named in Popular Science’s "Annual Brilliant 10." He is a worldclass robotics engineer who is the first in the world to have developed a car for the blind, and is also an associate professor and the founding director of RoMeLa (Robotics and Mechanisms Laboratory) at Virginia Tech. In 2011, his TED talk "Making a Car for Blind Drivers" on technology for humans resonated with the world. He is the author of Robot da Vinci, Designing a Dream.

list_ Books from Korea

Vol.20 Summer 2013

89

Children's Books pp. 68-72

Goo Bon-joon is a reporter at the

Culture Desk of The Hankyoreh.

The only daily newspaper reporter in Korea to specialize in architecture, he has written articles to promote that architecture is not about real estate but about culture. He is the author of A House for Two and The House with a Heart.

S h i n h e e K i m & Hy u n o a r e

webtoonists. Their omnibus webtoon series On Death dealing with different cases of death in each episode was so educational and touching that it became an instant hit. In 2013, they published On Death into a two-volume comic book.

Jung Hasup is a children's book

writer. Born in Eumseong, North Chungcheong Province in 1966, he graduated from the Department of Korean Language and Literature at Sungkyunkwan University and worked at a publisher of children's books.

Currently, he divides his time between designing children’s books and writing.

His books include Haechi and the Four Monster Brothers, I Am 10 Years Old, and Bicycle: Laufmaschine or Velocipede.

Park Yeoncheol is a children's book

writer and illustrator. Born in 1970, he majored in dental technology in college. After graduation, he completed the API (Advanced Programme in Illustration) at Kingston University London, and attended the Children’s Book Writers Academy and the Children’s Story Academy. He is the author of The Story of the Uh-ChuhGoony, Here Comes the Bogeyman, Why Did Pinocchio Swallow the Trick? and Teru Teru. He won the Illustrator of the Year Award (Fiction) at the Bologna Children’s Book Fair in 2007 for his book.

90 list_ Books from Korea

Vol.20 Summer 2013

Born in Seoul in 1981, she studied Korean language and literature and creative writing in college, and also studied writing children’s books at the Children’s Book Writers Academy.

Her books include Griffin the Eternal Keeper of Gold, The Life of an Acrobat, and The Game King.

Kim Yu is a children's book writer.

Born in Seoul in 1979, she studied creative writing and Korean literature in college. She began her literary career in 2005 when her children’s story won the Kwangju Daily New Writer’s Contest. She worked as a children’s books editor at a publisher and also as a literature and art instructor at a child welfare institution. She is the author of the children's storybook My Name Is Gugu Sneakers.

Song Sok-ze was born in Sangju,

North Gyeongsang Province in 1960.

He published poetry in the monthly magazine Literature & Thought in 1986. He began a career as a writer in 1995 when his short story “The Last 4.5 Seconds of My Life” appeared in the quarterly Munhakdongne. He is the author of the short story collections The Last 4.5 Seconds of My Life, Thus Spoke Hwang Man-geun, the novels The Power of Man, Lee Chi-do the Fugitive, and the folktales Princess Pyeong-gang and On-dal the Fool. He is the recipient of a number of literary awards, including the Dongin Prize and the Hyundae Munhak Award.

Sun Ja-eun is a children's book writer.

Yoo Eunsil is a children's book writer.

Born in 1974, she studied literature in college, and debuted in 2004 when her children’s story appeared in the quarterly Changbi Children. She is the author of Dear Mrs. Astrid Lindgren; The Boy Who Knows the Names of Countries by Heart; Lee Yujeong, the Perfect (which made the IBBY Honor List); The Last Event; My Hair Smells Like Sunshine; and I’m Going To Be Sensitive, Too.

Oh Moonse is a writer who majored in Korean language and literature in college. He loves novels, music, movies, and games, as well as making and recording music. Since 2007, he has been writing about films on his blog "Overturning the Table and Kicking the Movies." Oh is the author of the novel Endless Rain.

INDEX Title Original Title Publishers/Agent Copyright Agent E-mail Phone Homepage

4p Encyclopedia of Pregnancy, Birth, and Parenting (Ttokttokhan Imsin Chulsan Yuga Daebaekgwa) Woongjin ThinkBig Co., Ltd. Kim Yun-kyung 82-2-3670-1016 ykkim0702@wjbooks.co.kr www.wjbooks.co.kr

My First Homemade Kimchi (Naega Damgeun Urijip Cheot Gimchi) Woongjin ThinkBig Co., Ltd. Kim Yun-kyung 82-2-3670-1016 ykkim0702@wjbooks.co.kr www.wjbooks.co.kr

Hongdae Style Woongjin ThinkBig Co., Ltd. Kim Yun-kyung 82-2-3670-1016 ykkim0702@wjbooks.co.kr www.wjbooks.co.kr

I’ll Be Right There (Eodiseonga Nareul Channeun Jeonhwaberi Ulligo) KL Management Joseph Lee 82-10-6239-9154 Josephlee705@gmail.com

If the Waves Belong to the Sea (Padoga Badaui Iriramyeon) KL Management Joseph Lee 82-10-6239-9154 Josephlee705@gmail.com

6p Hesperus (Gaebapbaragibyeol) LTI Korea Hwang Sok-yong info@klti.or.kr

Only Love (Dan Han Beonui Yeonae) Human & Books Ha Eung-baek hbooks@empal.com 82-2-6327-3535 www.humanb.co.kr

The Sound of the Shallow Water (Yeoulmul Sori) LTI Korea Hwang Sok-yong info@klti.or.kr

The Future of Silence (2013 Yi Sang Literary Award Anthology) (Chimmugui Mirae) Munhaksasang Co., Ltd. Jung Sara munsa@munsa.co.kr 82-2-3401-8543 www.munsa.co.kr

Toe Ma Rok: The Records of Exorcism Sidequel (Toemarok Oejeon) Elixir Lim Jee-ho hoyah@elixirbooks.com 82-31-955-8892 www.elixirbooks.com

Love No Matter What (Geuraedo Saranghara) Gong Gam Ki Baek-kim kunnabooks@naver.com 82-2-468-9661 www.kunna.co.kr

The Humanities, Starting Now (Jigeum Sijakhaneun Inmunhak) BetterBooks Jeong Ji-hyun bookstory@naver.com 82-32-325-5281 www.ebookstory.co.kr

You Are a Good Person (Dangsin Cham Gwaenchaneun Saramiya) CENTURYONE Shin Sung-sik imeditor@naver.com 82-2-318-1783 www.centuryone.co.kr

7p The Light Inside: An Odyssey of Art, Life, and Law (Naega Bogo Sipeotdeon Segye) Bookhouse Publishers Lee Eun-jung editor@bookhouse.co.kr 82-2-3144-3213 www.bookhouse.co.kr

Consumer Trends in Korea 2013 (Trend Korea 2013) Miraebook Publishing Co. Kim Sung-ok miraebookjoa@naver.com 82-2-325-7556 www.miraebook.co.kr

Special Delivery Service (Teukbyeolhan Baedal) Jaeum & Moeum Publishing Co. Kim Young-lan kylan@jamobook.com 82-70-8656-9583 www.jamo21.net

I Brush My Teeth (Chikachika I Dakgi) Blue Rabbit Publishing Co., Ltd. Kweon Hyeon-suk wise@brbooks.co.kr 82-2-581-8040 www.brbooks.co.kr

Candidate No.3 An Seok-bbong (Giho Sambeon An seok-bbong) Changbi Publishers, Inc. Choi Ko-eun copyright2@changbi.com 82-31-955-4359 www.changbi.com/english

Sherlock in the Attic (Darakbang Myeongtamjeong) BIR Publishing Co., Ltd. Sujin Lena Park 82-2-515-2000 (Ext.350) sujinpark@bir.co.kr www.bir.co.kr

Jiwon and Byeong-gwan Series (Jiwoniwa Byeong-gwani Series) Gilbut Children Publishing Co., Ltd. Yie Ho-gyun 82-31-955-3270 webmaster@gilbutkid.co.kr www.gilbutkid.co.kr

Dear Friend (Annyeong,Chinguya) Woongjin ThinkBig Co., Ltd. Min Ji-Hyoung penpen@wjbooks.co.kr 82-2-3670-1167 www.wjbooks.co.kr

8p 2013 Munhakdongne Young Writers’ Award Anthology (Munhakdongne Jeolmeunjakgasang Susangjip) Munhakdongne Publishing Corp.

Kate Han mshan@munhak.com 82-31-955-2635 www.munhak.com

Junk Minumsa Publishing Group Michelle Nam michellenam@minumsa.com 82-2-515-2000 (Ext.206) www.minumsa.com

9p Philosophy in Plain Language (Cheolhageul Dasi Sseunda)

Hello, The Artificial Being!

(Annyeong, Ingongjonjae!)

Bookhouse Publishers Lee Eun-jung editor@bookhouse.co.kr 82-2-3144-3123 www.bookhouse.co.kr

Korean Confucianism (Hangugyuhaksa)

19p

Jisik-sanup Publishing Co., Ltd. Kim Kyung-hee jsp@jisik.co.kr 82-31-955-4226~7 www.jisik.co.kr

Changbi Publishers, Inc. Choi Ko-eun copyright2@changbi.com 82-31-955-4359 www.changbi.com/english

Cat School (Goyangi Hakgyo)

Welcome to Our Ark (Bangjuro Oseyo)

Munhakdongne Publishing Corp.

Lee Bokee 82-2-3144-3237 bokeelee@munhak.com www.munhak.com

Moonji Publishing Co., Ltd. Choi Ji-in jiin@moonji.com 82-2-338-7224 (Ext.7111) www.moonji.com

Scary Mr. Cock-a-doodle-doo (Kkokkodaek Kkokkoneun Museowo)

Monster Virus City (Monster Virus Dosi)

15p In Search of an Epitaph (Bimyeongeul Chajaseo) Moonji Publishing Co., Ltd. Choi ji-in jiin@moonji.com 82-2-338-7224 (Ext.7111) www.moonji.com

The Pacific Continental Express (Taepyeongyang Hoengdan Teukgeup) Moonji Publishing Co., Ltd. Choi ji-in jiin@moonji.com 82-2-338-7224 (ext.7111) www.moonji.com

17p Seven Executors (Chilinui Jiphaenggwan) Polabooks Kim Hyun-jee laputa79@chol.com 82-2-2017-0295 www.hdmh.co.kr

An Evolutionary Myth (Jinhwasinhwa) Happy Reading Books Lim Hyung-uk happysf@naver.com 82-2-2277-9217 www.happysf.net

Distant Tales (Meolli Ganeun Iyagi) Happy Reading Books Lim Hyung-uk happysf@naver.com 82-2-2277-9217 www.happysf.net

Tower Bae Myung-hoon mh_bae@hotmail.com

Divine Orbit (Sinui Gwedo) Munhakdongne Publishing Corp.

Kate Han mshan@munhak.com 82-31-955-2635 www.munhak.com

Changbi Publishers, Inc. Sarah Lee copyright@changbi.com 82-31-955-3369 www.changbi.com/english

Sir Chancellor (Chongtonggakha)

Bori Publishing Company Jeon Beom-jun saltjbj@boribook.com 82-31-950-9511 www.boribook.com

Byulchunji Kang Moo-sung 82-31-955-4000 papafish@openbooks.co.kr www.openbooks.co.kr

The Loneliness of You (Neomudo Sseulsseulhan Dangsin)

Bookhouse Publishers Lee Eun-jung editor@bookhouse.co.kr 82-2-3144-3123 www.bookhouse.co.kr

An Illustration of a Dim Day (Jeomun Narui Saphwa) Moonji Publishing Co., Ltd. Choi Ji-in jiin@moonji.com 82-2-338-7224 (Ext.7111) www.moonji.com

Summer of Revenge (Baebanui Yeoreum)

Syncher

Munhakdongne Publishing Corp.

Kate Han 82-31-955-2635 mshan@munhak.com www.munhak.com

40p Memories of a Sad Time (Seulpeun Siganui Gieok) Moonji Publishing Co., Ltd. Choi Ji-in jiin@moonji.com 82-2-338-7224 (Ext.7111) www.moonji.com

Munhakdongne Publishing Corp.

Lee Bokee bokeelee@munhak.com 82-2-3144-3237 www.munhak.com

Planet of Robots (Robotui Byeol) Prunsoop Publishing Co., Ltd. Park Hyun-sook anne620@prunsoop.co.kr 82-31-955-1410 (Ext.306) www.prunsoop.co.kr

25p The Complete Works of Kim Uchang (Gimuchang Jeonjip) Minumsa Publishing Group Michelle Nam michellenam@minumsa.com 82-2-515-2000 (Ext.206) www.minumsa.com

27p Landscape and Mind (Punggyeonggwa Maeum) LTI Korea Kim Uchang info@klti.or.kr

31p Bed (Chimdae) Moonji Publishing Co., Ltd. Choi Ji-in jiin@moonji.com 82-2-338-7224 (Ext.7111) www.moonji.com

Pest Moonji Publishing Co., Ltd. Choi Ji-in jiin@moonji.com 82-2-338-7224 (Ext.7111) www.moonji.com

33p Bed (Chimdae) Moonji Publishing Co., Ltd. Choi Ji-in jiin@moonji.com 82-2-338-7224 (Ext.7111) www.moonji.com

39p Kindhearted Bokhee (Chinjeolhan Bokhuissi) Moonji Publishing Co., Ltd. Choi Ji-in jiin@moonji.com 82-2-338-7224 (Ext.7111) www.moonji.com

43p Moonlight Tales (Darege Deullyeojugo Sipeun Iyagi) KL Management Joseph Lee josephlee705@gmail.com 82-10-6239-9154

44p Pristine Home (Jeonggyeolhan Jip) Moonji Publishing Co., Ltd. Choi Ji-in jiin@moonji.com 82-2-338-7224 (Ext.7111) www.moonji.com

1987 Ries & Book (Homeros) Kim Je-gu ries0730@naver.com 82-2-332-4037

55p AOI Garden KL Management Joseph Lee josephlee705@gmail.com 82-10-6239-9154

57p Sunday Philosophy (Iryoirui Cheolhak) KL Management Joseph Lee josephlee705@gmail.com 82-10-6239-9154

Dialogue of the Forest (Supui Daehwa) EunHaeng NaMu Lee Jinny H ehbook@ehbook.co.kr 82-2-3143-0651 www.ehbook.co.kr

58p Pretending Not to Know (Moreuneun Cheok) Munyejoongang (Joongang Books) Rachel Ahn rachel_ahn@joongang.co.kr 82-2-2031-1322 jbooks.joins.com

Oksu-dong Tigers Minumsa Publishing Group Michelle Nam michellenam@minumsa.com 82-2-515-2000 (Ext.206) www.minumsa.com

list_ Books from Korea

Vol.20 Summer 2013

91

59p

66p

84p

A Stranger's Room (Tainui Bang)

Learning Man (Gongbuhaneun Ingan)

Paper Meal (Jongibap)

Minumsa Publishing Group Michelle Nam michellenam@minumsa.com 82-2-515-2000 (Ext.206) www.minumsa.com

Wisdomhouse Publishing Co., Ltd. Kwon Min-kyung ohappyday@wisdomhouse.co.kr 82-31-936-4199 www.wisdomhouse.co.kr

Little Mountain Publishing Co. Yi Jin-gyu littlemt2001hr@gmail.com 82-2-335-7365 www.littlemt.com

61p

On Death (2 vols.)

(Jugeume Gwanhayeo 1,2)

Baby Dog (Saekki Gae)

YOUNG COM Shin Seung-han sportszang@nate.com 82-2-2082-1746 www.dctoon.net

Little Mountain Publishing Co. Yi Jin-gyu littlemt2001hr@gmail.com 82-2-335-7365 www.littlemt.com

69p

Ms. Mija from Our Neighborhood (Uridongne Mijassi)

Fashion Is Passion (Lie Sang-bongui Fashion Is Passion) Minumsa Publishing Group Michelle Nam michellenam@minumsa.com 82-2-515-2000 (Ext.206) www.minumsa.com

Teru Teru

62p Eat! Seoul (Seoureul Meokda) Tabi Publishing Co. Park Sung-kyoung tabibooks@hotmail.com 82-2-326-3897

Korean Linguistic Culture (Malmaseuro Boneun Hanguginui Munhwa)

Sigongsa Co., Ltd. Amelie Choi amelie@sigongsa.com 82-2-2046-2855 www.sigongjunior.com

Little Mountain Publishing Co. Yi Jin-gyu littlemt2001hr@gmail.com 82-2-335-7365 www.littlemt.com

70p

We All Have the Right to Health (Urineun Modu Geonganghal Gwolliga Itda)

Princess Pyeong-gang and On-dal the Fool (Pyeong-gang gongjuwa Babo on-dal)

Samin Books Kim Jong-jin saminbooks@naver.com 82-2-322-1845 www.saminbooks.com

BIR Publishing Co., Ltd. Sujin Lena Park sujinpark@bir.co.kr 82-2-515-2000 (Ext.350) www.bir.co.kr

63p

Bicycle: Laufmaschine or Velocipede (Dallineun Gigye, Gaehwacha, Jajeongeo)

Universal Love and Equality: Hong Dae-yong’s Social Philosophy (Beomaewa Pyeongdeung: Hong Dae-yongui Sahoesasang) Dolbegae Publishers Lee Kyoung-a leeka@dolbegae.co.kr 82-31-955-5038 www.dolbegae.co.kr

71p My Name Is Gugu Sneakers (Nae Ireumeun Gugu Sneakers)

Math Odyssey (Lee Man-keun Gyosuui Suhak Odyssey)

Changbi Publishers, Inc. Choi Ko-eun copyright2@changbi.com 82-31-955-4359 www.changbi.com/english

Book21 Publishing Group Jung Young-joo jyjbest@book21.co.kr 82-31-955-2117 www.book21.com

I’m Going To Be Sensitive, Too (Nado Yeminhal Geoya)

64p

Sakyejul Publishing Ltd. Kang Hyun-joo kanghjoo@sakyejul.co.kr 82-31-955-8600 www.sakyejul.co.kr

Things That Disappear (Ijen Eomneun Geotdeul) Moonji Publishing Co., Ltd. Choi Ji-in jiin@moonji.com 82-2-338-7224 (Ext. 7111) www.moonji.com

72p

The Hitchhiker’s Philosophical Journey (Hitchhikerui Cheolhagyeohaeng) Humanist Publishing Group Park Sang-kyoung psk2001@humanistbooks.com 82-70-7842-9405 www.humanistbooks.com

65p Robot da Vinci, Designing a Dream (Robot Da Vinci, Kkumeul Seolgyehada) SAMTOH Claire Yang ysh@isamtoh.com 82-2-742-4929 www.isamtoh.com

The House with a Heart (Goo Bon-joonui Maeumeul Pumeun Jip) BookSea Publishing Co. Heo Seung shmj21@hanmail.net 82-31-955-7470 www.booksea.co.kr

92 list_ Books from Korea

Borim Press Jeong Kee-yun jebi@borimpress.com 82-31-955-3456 (Ext.153) www.borimpress.com

The Game King (Game Wang) Moonji Publishing Co., Ltd. Choi Ji-in jiin@moonji.com 82-2-338-7224 (Ext.7111) www.moonji.com

Endless Rain (Geuchiji Anneun Bi) Munhakdongne Publishing Corp.

Lee Bokee bokeelee@munhak.com 82-2-3144-3237 www.munhak.com

73p Children of Gwaengiburimal (Gwaengiburimal Aideul) Changbi Publishers, Inc. Choi Ko-eun copyright2@changbi.com 82-31-955-4359 www.changbi.com/english

78p The Užupis Republic (Uzupis Gonghwaguk) Minumsa Publishing Group Michelle Nam michellenam@minumsa.com 82-2-515-2000 (Ext.206) www.minumsa.com

Vol.20 Summer 2013

Little Mountain Publishing Co. Yi Jin-gyu littlemt2001hr@gmail.com 82-2-335-7365 www.littlemt.com

Dal from Binari (Binari Darine Jip) Little Mountain Publishing Co. Yi Jin-gyu littlemt2001hr@gmail.com 82-2-335-7365 www.littlemt.com

85p What Little We Know About Humans and the Universe (Ingangwa Ujue Daehae Aju Jogeumbakke Moreuneun Geotdeul) Little Mountain Publishing Co. Yi Jin-gyu littlemt2001hr@gmail.com 82-2-335-7365 www.littlemt.com

Think Upside-down! The World Might Look Different (Geokkuro Saenggakhaebwa!

Sesangi Mani Dalla Boil Geol) Little Mountain Publishing Co. Yi Jin-gyu littlemt2001hr@gmail.com 82-2-335-7365 www.littlemt.com

Think Upside-down! The World and I Can Change!

(Geokkuro Saenggakhaebwa!

Sesangdo Nado Bakkwil Su Iseo) Little Mountain Publishing Co. Yi Jin-gyu littlemt2001hr@gmail.com 82-2-335-7365 www.littlemt.com

Find a Hidden Picture in Masterpieces (Chajara! Myeonghwa Sok Sumeun Geurim) Little Mountain Publishing Co. Yi Jin-gyu littlemt2001hr@gmail.com 82-2-335-7365 www.littlemt.com

Why Did History Walk into a Painting?

(Yeoksaneun Wae Geurim Sogeuro Deureogaseulkka?)

Little Mountain Publishing Co. Yi Jin-gyu littlemt2001hr@gmail.com 82-2-335-7365 www.littlemt.com