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Best Korean Textbooks for Language Learning

Last modified: Jan 12, 2024 | 21 min read | By 90 Day Korean

Looking for the best books to learn Korean ? If your answer was a big “ YES !” then you’ve come to the right place.

But which one should you get? With many different ways of learning Korean , it can be challenging to pick the Korean textbook that matches your learning style best.

Not to worry, we’ve got a comprehensive list below to make sure you get the Korean book that is best for you .

With that in mind, we’ll introduce you to the best books to learn Korean  below!

Below is a free Korean PDF guide that you can download and review as many times as you want:

• 1.1 Active Korean
• 1.2 Korean Made Easy
• 1.3 Sogang Korean
• 1.4 Yonsei Korean 1 (English and Korean Edition)
• 1.5 2000 Essential Korean Words
• 1.6 Korean for Beginners: Mastering Conversational Korean
• 1.7 Learning Korean Through Traditional Fairy Tales
• 1.8 Korean Grammar for International Learners
• 1.9 Korean From Zero!
• 1.10 Korean Slang: As Much as a Rat’s Tail
• 2.1 List of Learn Korean ebooks
• 3.1 Identify Your Focus
• 3.2 Choosing A Korean Textbook
• 3.3 Stick to Your Choice
• 4 What About TOPIK?
• 5 Do I need a Korean Tutor?
• 6 Where to Buy Korean Books
• 7 A Goal Without a Plan is Just a Wish

List of Korean Textbooks for Self-study

Below are some of the best textbooks for learning Korean that are currently available. We’ve included an explanation of the type of student that they are likely to be best for. These Korean books are not ranked in any particular order.

Let’s get to it!

Active Korean

This series goes all the way up to the lower intermediate level , so it’s good for anybody studying Korean for the long haul. Although the lessons are very clear, it works best if you have a tutor to help you when using it.

It was started by the Seoul National University Language Institute, so you can be sure it’s one of the best Korean books out there.

All of the material inside the book has been thoroughly tested before publication, and the reading content has been well thought out.

If you are studying Korean on your own, then this book is easier to use than the Sogang series of books. You can be sure that you’re receiving a quality textbook education due to the extensive thought and planning that went into putting it together.

However, the later textbooks covered some difficult grammar concepts (such as reported speech) a bit too quickly. Therefore, you need to be careful to ensure that you fully understand the basic grammar fundamentals in Korean and have assimilated the content before moving on.

If you continue through the series and come across grammar content that you don’t fully understand with the textbook explanation alone, you should consider supplementing your studying with online and video resources that can help you understand higher-level grammar concepts better.

Korean Made Easy

Designed for self-study, this textbook has great reviews and is well thought out. The author taught at Sogang University and also started several of the Sogang textbooks.

This book is easy to use and is a good choice for beginners, especially if you prefer to work through a textbook without skipping around from section to section. It covers common Korean words and grammar for everyday conversation.

The listening and reading sections are based on the KLPT (Korean Language Proficiency Test), so this could be a great companion textbook for anyone preparing for the exam.

Sogang Korean

This series consists of some of the best books for learning Korean . These Korean textbooks are highly regarded and will take you from beginner to advanced. If you have a tutor and ample time on your hands, then these are the books for you! Many Korean students get started with this series.

There are twelve levels (1A up to 6B), each with a Korean language workbook. That means there are plenty of lessons and content to get you to an advanced level in Korean.

Sogang lessons focus on speaking, and these Korean textbooks are designed to be used with a tutor or in a small Korean class. As a result, they may not be the best choice if you’re planning on learning Korean by yourself. When learning words, it’s hard to nail correct grammar and pronunciation of Korean words if you don’t have a tutor to practice and speak Korean with.

It’s also best to listen to spoken Korean when you’re working with a tutor rather than watching video lessons and listening to dialogue that way. You just can’t break down the conversation you just heard in the same way if you’re watching a video compared to a teacher.

These Korean books don’t contain a writing section, as this was only added recently to the Sogang University course itself.

However, they’re still very extensive and a great series to commit to for serious Korean learners. Consider supplementing the textbooks with an additional Korean writing resource rather than passing them up altogether.

Yonsei Korean 1 (English and Korean Edition)

Also amongst the best textbook series for those learners who are getting started in Korean, Yonsei Korean is a series of textbooks developed and created by the Korean Language Institute at Yonsei University. Yonsei is one of the best and top universities in Korea.

The institute’s primary aim is the study and teaching of the Korean language. These books aim to help students develop well-rounded abilities in Korean communication.

They provide lessons and exercises that target listening, speaking, reading, sentence structure, and writing skills. Aside from the communicative skills that are targeted in these Korean books, the Yonsei series also incorporates lessons on learning about Korean culture. If you are interested in learning Korean culture alongside learning Korean, then this Yonsei book series will best suit you. 

Because of their academic nature, these Korean books are best used in a Korean classroom environment or with a tutor. Its lessons are packed chock full of vocabulary words and grammar concepts. 

The beauty of Yonsei Korean is the continuity of Korean learning that it provides to students. The Yonsei Korean textbooks are made up of 12 books divided into 3 language levels: beginner, intermediate, and advanced.

If you are learning Korean at a beginner level, the Yonsei Korean 1 and 2 textbooks are best for you. Each textbook is made up of 10 units with 5 lessons each. Lessons in these textbooks are highly focused on the essential Korean grammar and vocabulary that will help students to develop a basic understanding of the Korean language .

Once you complete the beginner levels, Yonsei Korean 3 and 4 are available for the intermediate level, and Yonsei Korean 5 and 6 for the advanced level after that. This Korean language series is a complete curriculum of lessons that are useful in helping students learn to communicate in Korean.

2000 Essential Korean Words

This is one of the best books for learning vocabulary words. It’s not specifically a Korean language textbook. This book is best for learning Korean in conjunction with a quality grammar-based textbook. You may also want to pair this book with the ‘2000 Essential Korean Words’ list on Memrise.com to boost your vocabulary.

It contains many vocabulary words that don’t translate easily into English, so it’s a useful tool for giving yourself a solid Korean vocabulary base .

If you’ve recently found yourself trying (and struggling) to translate a phrase or vocab word into Korean from English (or vice versa) , this may be one of the best books to have by your side.

Korean for Beginners: Mastering Conversational Korean

If you want to learn about spoken and conversational Korean, then this book is for you. While most textbooks start with “ My name is Steve, I’m a student, I’m from England ,” the actual first bit of language learning you are likely to need is going to revolve around ordering food or finding the bathroom.

The fact that this Korean language textbook starts by talking about food is a welcome relief. It also covers Korean emoticons rather early on (before teaching Hangul, the Korean alphabet) and is written with a sense of humor .

Not necessarily the best textbook for a structured approach to learning Korean; its lessons are designed more around getting you up and running in the Korean language quickly with sentences you’ll be using from day 1 in Korea.

Learning Korean Through Traditional Fairy Tales

If you’re not a fan of straightforward vocabulary lists and you want to experience a little bit of magic while you’re studying, this is the textbook for you!

It’s way easier to feel motivated to sit down and learn Korean when you’re following a story, so this textbook’s ability to weave traditional Korean fairy tales with concise and pointed language direction is a great introduction to learning Korean and keeping you motivated.

This textbook also has an interesting approach to introducing new vocabulary that helps ensure the learner will retain the information.

Rather than listing a Korean word and a definition side by side (which, face it, makes it easy to quickly forget a vocab word), this textbook introduces a new vocabulary word by providing context to help the reader guess the meaning of the Korean word.

Then, after providing the meaning of the vocab word, there is an exercise that asks the learner to practice the pronunciation of the vocab. It’ll definitely be hard to forget new vocabulary after that!

Korean Grammar for International Learners

A bit different from the other Korean learning textbooks on this list, the primary focus of this textbook series is a deeper understanding of how the language works.

This grammar book is definitely not for those who want to get up and running in Korean as quickly as possible, but it’s an invaluable reference for those who want a complete understanding of Korean sentences.

This also isn’t a beginner textbook, and you should only move on to this series after you know the basics of Korean or at least can read Hangul (there is no romanization ).

While the book is a bit short on explaining grammar points in detail, it makes up for that in an abundance of example sentences! This helps give a better sense of when and how, different Korean grammar would appear in use.

Although not the textbook to start with, as you progress in Korean learning and want to become more fluent in the Korean language you’ll need a good reference textbook. They don’t get much more comprehensive than this series.

Korean From Zero!

This series of Korean language books are available in both Kindle and paperback format. One of the best things about Kindle books is that you can first download a sample of the book and see if it’s a good match for you.

The Kindle version has pages, notes, and flashcards, which are nice features to personalize your study experience. The book could be good for you even if you know how to read Hangul already. The text guides you and suggests you skip pages if you already know the Korean alphabet.

Audio is included, making this an all-around good book to start out with and learn the foundations. There are volumes 2 and 3 as well if you want to continue studying using this series.

Korean Slang: As Much as a Rat’s Tail

This is one of the best books to learn Korean slang . It’s useful once you’re comfortable with basic Korean sentences and have a solid foundation of grammar . We recommend using this once you’re at least at a high beginner level. It’s a good supplement to a structured textbook or course to add some fun Korean slang to your vocabulary.

You can get this book in both Kindle and paperback format. The digital version is really nice if you want to live a minimalist life or take it with you as you travel. The paperback works well if you are the type of person who likes to take notes.

Learn Korean ebooks

Some people find it easier to learn digitally rather than in the traditional way. That’s when ebooks come in handy. Aside from traditional textbooks, you can also learn Korean through ebooks. Since ebooks can be accessed through your PC/laptop, phone, or tablet, it makes learning more accessible and can be done anytime.

List of Learn Korean ebooks

There are a good number of learn Korean ebooks nowadays, and we’ve listed some of them below. If you find it more effective to learn through ebooks, this list will be helpful to you!

Korean Made Simple

This textbook is best for beginners who have just started to learn Korean. It’s very easy to follow and has some basic grammar and reading sections. You will be able to learn quite a lot early on as the lessons focus on modal verbs and questions first.

Because of how the book is segmented, it works best for learners that need some assistance structuring their studying. You won’t have to bounce around sections or “go with the flow” if you commit to studying this book.

If you want to reach a decent level of Korean language ability quickly, such as grammar and vocabulary, then this book would be useful. Its grammar lessons are in-depth and easy to understand.

However, there may be a little bit too much in the way of explanation in some areas, particularly the section about learning basic Hangul (the Korean Alphabet).

Feel free to skim some of the more detailed lessons if you feel like you’re not getting anything out of them — they’re very interesting and can sometimes help you remember concepts by providing context that you’ll remember, but they’re not the best thing to focus on unless you want some additional knowledge.

Korean Honorifics aren’t tackled until the second textbook (Korean Made Simple 2), which helps prevent confusion early on. It was published in 2014, so it has up-to-date content and will provide you with relevant examples of conversation.

There is no audio with any of these textbooks, but you can download MP3 files for free on the author’s website. There are levels 2 and 3 for this series, as well as a workbook.

Integrated Korean

This foreign Korean textbook was written by the University of Hawaii and is used to teach Korean grammar lessons at SOAS (the leading U.K. school for Korean Studies).

Audio is not included, but you can download it for free from the author’s website.

It can be used on its own without a tutor since it explains everything in detail, but it may feel too stuffy and academic for some Korean learners.

Some of its content is also outdated, and some rarely-used Korean words, phrases, and expressions pop up more often than they should. If you’re interested in a textbook that focuses on more modern Korean conversation and current Korean cultural trends , consider a different textbook.

However, this Korean textbook is still a solid choice for any motivated self-learner.

Elementary Korean

Like “Integrated Korean,” this textbook has more of an academic feel to it, so it doesn’t score high on the fun meter. Although it was published quite recently, most of the book was actually written around two decades ago!

It still tops the “best Korean language textbook” lists because of how well-structured the lessons are and how thorough they can be without being too wordy.

It’s a great starter textbook for Korean learning and has a strong foundation in grammar.

Once Upon a Time in Korea

The Once Upon a Time in Korea textbook is one of the best textbooks for learners who are just beginning to venture into learning Korean. It could also be a great choice for learners who aren’t entirely committed to learning Korean.

The book is fun, colorful, and anything but boring, so it does a great job enticing readers who are true beginners or readers who are on the fence about committing to their Korean language learning journey. You just won’t want to put it down!

Rather than being structured around different aspects of the Korean language, this book uses the unique approach of centering each of its sections around a different story from Korean folklore.

Folklore is a great way to become familiar with a new culture because you’re not only exposed to the language that the story is written in but also the morals and values that are being passed on for generations through the story. This can reveal important aspects of Korean culture that will provide some interesting context for your studies.

Ewha Korean

This series of textbooks published by Ewha Women’s University in South Korea covers six levels of fluency, from those just getting started to the advanced. So, if you decide to invest your time studying Korean, you’ll have five subsequent books to take you step-by-step through your Korean language journey.

The Ewha textbooks are some of the best for self-study. Every aspect of the book is designed in a clever and well-thought-out way that can be enjoyed without a tutor.

From the table of contents to the illustrations and explanations used to introduce and explain concepts, these books were designed for a self-starter who wants to learn Korean fast but the right way .

One thing that sets this particular textbook apart from others is that rather than dividing up sections based on grammar, tenses, and other aspects of Korean language learning, the book is divided into real-world scenarios that you’ll encounter, like making a daily schedule and making meals.

Then, you learn different things about the Korean language through activities, exercises, and conversations centered around these various tasks. The flow of the book is very narrative, so it’s great for readers who get bored with Korean textbooks that are too dry.

Consider investing in this textbook if you want to practice speaking Korean, but don’t have a tutor — there are very brief “try what you learned” speech sections at the end of each chapter that give you an opportunity to try out the phrases and expressions you’ve been reading .

Korean Textbooks: So Many Choices!

Now that we’ve listed the best books to learn Korean, the next thing is to determine which one is best for you? With the explosion of popularity of all things Korean and interest in the country itself , there is a huge selection of new Korean textbooks written by some of the very best teachers out there.

However, many books are just reprints of older textbooks that let you learn very traditional Korean. That means they wouldn’t be the best choice because they may be out-of-date or overly formal. The Korean language is wrapped up in the culture, so the best Korean textbooks help you learn the cultural nuances of the language, along with the language itself.

For example, there are about half a dozen different ways to say “thank you” in Korean. It’s important to know which one is best to use so you sound polite and not offensive. The right book will help you with that.

Identify Your Focus

Another thing to think about is why you’re learning Korean . If you’ve decided that taking a course is best for you, then you can follow the structure laid out for you. However, if you’re starting out on your own, you’ll need to best understand how you learn to keep yourself motivated.

For example, if you want to be able to just talk in Korean , then grammar-focused books will not be the best choice. On the other hand, if you want to gain a more academic understanding of the Korean language, then a conversation book will probably leave out details you care about.

Studying what you will use helps maintain your motivation to learn Korean. Identifying your focus will help you determine what kind of resources best fit your language learning needs .

Choosing A Korean Textbook

It’s best if you can preview the contents of a textbook before buying it. You might also choose something recommended by someone you trust or who learns in a similar way to you. Choosing the wrong textbook will frustrate you or put you to sleep.

Also, consider how long you intend to learn Korean . Do you want to just spend a few months learning so you can get around on a short trip to Seoul , or want to become fluent enough to understand K-pop songs and K-dramas without translation?

While a longer series may divide concepts into several volumes spanning months or years of study, a standalone or beginner book may cover everything you’d want to know in a shorter period. Think about how long you want to learn and what level you want to get to at that time .

Stick to Your Choice

Once you choose a textbook series, it’s best to stick with that series in order to learn Korean effectively. Textbooks often have a planned out roadmap for what you’ll learn and when. Mixing different books can make you study topics you’ve already learned, or it may confuse you with the order of contents.

If you plan to study Korean for a while, then it’s best to choose a series of books that go up to the level you want to reach. You can always switch to another series later when you understand Korean (and your own study habits) better.

What About TOPIK?

You may have noticed that there are no textbooks mentioned that focus on the TOPIK Korean language test. The TOPIK is the Test of Proficiency in Korean . It’s the official test used for gauging a non-native’s level in Korean in business and academia.

If your goal is to score highly on the TOPIK, then you’ll be studying very differently than you would if studying for fluency. You would be best off studying for the test itself and the types of questions you’d encounter. An example of this would be to download the previous year’s tests and study those.

The TOPIK test, at high levels, will have questions on Korean vocabulary and grammar that you’d likely rarely (or never) encounter in daily life. The assumption is that if you know that level of Korean, you would already be familiar with the simpler aspects of the language. Even native Korean speakers can get a poor score on the TOPIK if they’re not prepared for it.

Also, the TOPIK test questions change every year, rendering most Korean books on the market out-of-date (you have been warned!).

Do I need a Korean Tutor?

Some of the textbooks work best if you have a Korean tutor to help you explain some of the concepts. That’s because some of them were written to be taught in a classroom setting.

If you don’t have a Korean tutor and want some help with learning the language, then check out the 90 Day Korean Inner Circle. It’s a structured online course that will teach you how to have a 3-minute conversation in the first 90 days. Membership includes personal coaching and speaking classes.

Where to Buy Korean Books

You can order them at Amazon or Kyobo Bookstore . We provide the Amazon link in the description above, where available. You can also go to Kyobo Bookstore and pick them up in person if they have the books in stock.

A Goal Without a Plan is Just a Wish

Remember, before choosing a textbook, it’s best to have a plan for how you’ll study. This makes learning Korean a lot easier than you think . The best textbook in the world won’t help you learn Korean if you don’t study it regularly.

Keep in mind that some textbooks are designed for self-study, while others are best used in Korean classes or with a tutor. Consider how comprehensive the textbook is and how much support you might need to answer questions about it before you decide to add it to your study plan.

Most importantly, choose a book with content that will keep you interested and engaged. You’ll be a lot more effective at learning Korean when you can enjoy the process. Eventually, you’ll find yourself able to read books on Korean history, Korean novels, historical fiction, or Korean literature too!

This list of the best Korean textbooks is by no means every textbook out there, and most language schools produce their own textbook. Of course, as well as using a textbook, you can study Korean in other ways, such as enrolling in a university course, joining a Korean learning program, or online course. Here is a fantastic way to get started .

Textbooks for learning Korean are also good gift ideas for oneself and for others who wish to learn Korean. You may also give yourself or other language learners you know a Korean gift card for an online course .

Do you have a favorite textbook that you use to learn Korean? What is your pick among the best books to learn Korean? Let us know in the comments below! And best of luck with your Korean language learning adventures!

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23 thoughts on “Best Korean Textbooks for Language Learning”

Hello! I need help and was wondering if you could help me.. I’ve just started learning Korean (like 2 weeks ago) and I want to buy a book. I’m between Elementary Korean and Korean from Zero. I am studying without a tutor. I love vocabulary and grammar. Your vocabulary has helped me a lot, thank you for that! Unfortunately I can’t find them (I want to flip through them) so I’ll have to order them online. Which one should I choose? Can you help me? Please?

Sure, happy to help. You can find our resources on Korean vocabulary and Korean grammar in the following links: https://www.90daykorean.com/korean-words/ https://www.90daykorean.com/korean-grammar/

I am more of a high beginner/intermediate level learner and i feel talk to me in koren doesnt give enough examples for each lesson. What do you suggest in terms of other textbooks in using?

Hi, Louise! The books listed above are for beginners. You can try that was published in Hollym. ^^

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25 Must-Read Korean Novels in English

By: Author Willow Heath

Posted on Last updated: 3rd April 2024

Ask anyone with at least one eye on world literature in translation which countries are putting out the most groundbreaking novels, and they will likely mention South Korea . Korean novels frequently bend and break genres, explore often untouched social and political themes, and speak to our very souls.

If you’re looking for the best Korean novels in English translation, this list of ten is the perfect place to start. Many of the Korean authors (and translators) mentioned here have entire libraries available for you to explore once you’ve exhausted this list.

You can also subscribe to the Korean Literature Now Magazine and browse their website to keep with the latest news, poetry, fiction, and articles.

A note on names: In Korea, family names come first, and publishers of Korean novels in translation seem to often disagree over whether or not to flip them for English language readers. Some do, some don’t. You get used to it.

Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982 by Cho Nam-joo

Translated by Jamie Chang

Approaching a book like Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982 is an enormous undertaking; something that should be done with real consideration. The novel has sold over a million copies in its native South Korea, has been adapted into a successful Korean film , and has been a huge spark for the fires of the #metoo movement in South Korea.

Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982 is a novel that has achieved so much, done so much good, and is now finally available to English-speaking readers. Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982 can be seen as the novelisation of the lived experiences of every ordinary Korean woman for the past forty years. It traces the life of a single woman from early childhood to marriage and motherhood .

The book begins with her being given an appointment with a psychiatrist in 2016 after she has developed a disturbing condition wherein she impersonates the voices of, and embodies the personalities of, the women in her life both alive and dead.

This condition is what initially introduces us to her character, and it is a very clear statement to the reader that Kim Jiyoung speaks for every ordinary woman of 20 th and 21 st Century South Korea. Everything you may have heard about Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982 being an impactful and important piece of feminist fiction is true.

It is a book that brings to light the everyday misogyny, sexism, ignorance, aggression, bias, and abuse (both active and passive) that women in South Korea (and, of course, the world over) suffer and do their best to survive in this modern world.

To really get the most out of Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982 , one of the most powerful Korean novels, it’s important to first understand the novel’s purpose.

It is not a story with a view to entertaining us. It is a book that enlightens, and encourages anger in, its readers. Kim Jiyoung is not an individual. She is not a character to form a bond with. She is every abuse victim. She is every woman who has encountered sexism at home, at school, in the workplace, and on the street, and who perhaps never even realised it.

Buy a copy here!

Love in the Big City by Sang Young Park

Translated by Anton Hur

Love in the Big City is a queer Korean love story. It is a tale of hedonism and friendship; a book about looking at life from all angles: with love and hate and anger and fear in our eyes.

Divided into four acts, Love in the Big City begins with Young at university, living his best life with close friend Jaehee. The two of them live together, party hard, sleep around, and look out for one another. But, eventually, Jaehee wants to get married and grow up.

This Korean novel’s second act explores Young’s relationship to his mother, now and in the past, and the third act sees him chasing love, finding it, being let down by it, and finding it again.

Translated elegantly and beautifully by Anton Hur, Love in the Big City considers how we live our lives when time is ticking, when there is fun to be had and things to be seen; when there are things to fear and people who want to hurt us.

This is also a novel full of charming details. Young and Jaehee, in their early days, look out for one another. He keeps her stocked with Marlboro cigarettes and she keeps the fridge full of fruits (blueberries are his favourites). Those details aren’t all positive — the novel doesn’t shy away from moments of pain and fear and difficulty. Young encounters homophobia and his relationship with his mother is strain in more ways than one.

Love in the Big City paints a raw and honest but ultimately kind picture of love and life in the modern day, and for that, it is one of the finest modern Korean novels.

Read More: 12 Best K-Pop Books (For Stans Everywhere)

Violets by Kyung-sook Shin

Kyung-sook Shin is one of South Korea’s most beloved and revered authors. One read of Violets and it’s easy to see why. This is a feminist tale about friendship in the modern world, and about the insidious, subtle ways in which men abuse women on a daily basis.

One of the most impactful and changing Korean novels of the past few years, Violets begins with its protagonist, San, as a young girl in 1970. She lives in a small village and is a lonely social outsider.

In the opening chapter, San shares a moment of tender intimacy with her best friend. For San, this is an awakening. For her friend, it is frightening and wrong. They don’t see each other again, and we spend the rest of the novel with San as a twenty-something living in Seoul.

When San takes a job as a florist, she develops a sweet friendship with her coworker, who soon moves in with her. But San is also at the whim of men. She learns how men violate the spaces and bodies of women on a daily basis, in a way that seems almost invisible. Violets has the power to reshape how we all see the social dynamics at play between men and women.

The physical and verbal weapons softly used by men to scare, suppress, and intimidate the women in their lives. It’s a novel that leaves a mark, but also a tender and beautiful narrative.

Watch our full video review of Violets

Buy a copy of Violets here!

Greek Lessons by Han Kang

Translated by Deborah Smith & Emily Yae Won

Han Kang is nothing short of a legend of Korean literature. Her novel The Vegetarian , also translated into English by Tilted Axis Press founder Deborah Smith, won the International Booker Prize in 2016 and the rest is history.

The Vegetarian was the first Korean novel that this writer ever read, and that is probably true for many readers. Han Kang and Deborah Smith opened the door for countless English-language readers to become intrigued by, and seek out more Korean literature.

With Greek Lessons , Han Kang is examining and testing the powers of language itself. This short novel follows two protagonists, one of whom is losing his sight and the other is struggling with mutism. Our mute character, an academic and successful writer, has suffered through the loss of her mother, the breakdown of her marriage, and has just lost custody of her child.

She has chosen to enrol in a class to study ancient Greek as a means of reconnecting with language, and by extension, with herself. Her teacher is our other protagonist, a man who spent his youth in Germany and who, therefore, has always felt a cultural disconnect.

His story plays out in the first person, and hers in the third. This is a striking distinction; wordlessly demonstrating how he is stuck in his mind, his memories, and his anxieties. Conversely, she feels a separation, a disconnect from herself, from her experiences — she is floating and alone, cold and confused.

Greek Lessons is a love letter to language as a means of connection, of understanding, of translating our experiences and our feelings in profound and satisfying ways. Han Kang continues to write some of the best Korean books of the modern day, and Greek Lessons is no exception.

Buy a copy of Greek Lessons here!

Walking Practice by Dolki Min

Translated by Victoria Caudle

Walking Practice is an ingenious piece of speculative Korean fiction that blends elements of horror, science fiction, and satire to create something thematically dense, sometimes funny, often shocking, and satisfyingly allegorical.

Across just 150 pages, this Korean novel tells the story of a nameless and genderless alien which crash-landed on Earth fifteen years ago, after fleeing a war that destroyed their homeworld. After surviving off anything they could get their tentacles on, they found that the most satisfying food available was, in, fact, human meat.

And so, for over a decade, they have been disguising themself as men and women, and using dating apps to seduce people, glean some sexual satisfaction (and occasional companionship), before devouring them in a gleefully gruesome manner.

For the novel’s first half, we follow this pattern a few times, and we see the differences in their behaviour when presenting as a man or a woman; how the unspoken rules of society encourage them to behave.

And also how others behave in response to them. This is an explicit examination of patriarchy and the restrictions of gender expression, as well as social relationships between genders. But it goes deeper than this, as our protagonist admits to their loneliness and seeks love, companionship, community, and a sense of belonging.

With smart and satisfying queer allegories aplenty and some truly astonishing and creative translation work from Victoria Caudle, this is one of the best Korean novels of recent years.

Buy a copy of Walking Practice here!

I Want to Die But I Want to Eat Tteokbokki by Baek Sehee

In her introduction to this incredible book, author Baek Sehee notes that her hope is for people to read this book and think, “ I wasn’t the only person who felt like this .” To that end, I Want to Die But I Want to Eat Tteokbokki is an exercise in empathy; in the author opening up her chest and letting her darkest feelings tumble out, in the hope that you will feel understood.

Depression is isolating, frightening, and draining. Knowing there’s someone else out there who has felt this way — who still feels this way — can be incredibly comforting.

I Want to Die But I Want to Eat Tteokbokki is unique amongst these other Korean novels in that it isn’t actually a novel, but rather a kind of epistolary narrative that tracks a woman’s life through therapy. Most chapters begin and/or end with a confession: a personal experience or a feeling related to the author’s depression and anxieties. The rest of the chapter is a transcript of a therapy session.

These sessions divulge personal experiences and opinions, and also provide us with advice and understanding from the therapist as they listen to the author’s experiences. It feels very voyeuristic, getting to know this author’s inner thoughts and feelings so intimately, but the sense of companionship that comes from it all is so appreciated.

Writing something so revealing and honest must have taken incredible courage, but Baek Sehee has done so with the selfless desire to help others feel less alone and unique in their pain. If you struggle with depression, or know someone who does, I Want to Die But I Want to Eat Tteokbokki is a lesson in empathy and a hug from a comrade-in-suffering.

The Plotters by Un-su Kim

Translated by Sora Kim-Russell

The most important thing to note about The Plotters is that it’s billed as a thriller, but it is actually far more than that. Rather than blending genres and emerging as a kind of Frankenstein’s Monster of different styles, The Plotters rather refuses to acknowledge genre.

The Plotters tells the story of Reseng, a successful assassin raised in The Doghouse Library – a library filled with books but empty of people, somewhere in Seoul – by an enigmatic old man known as Old Raccoon. Reseng has grown up knowing of nothing but the business of assassination, and curiously also knowing very little about that, either.

This is a piece of penetrating fiction driven by its eccentric but grounded characters, providing a unique and entertaining setting and circumstance, and telling a story subtly tied to the history and politics of modern day Korea. After the Korean War and the separation of the two Koreas along the thirty-eighth parallel, control of North Korea was seized by the Kim regime.

What is lesser-known, however, is that South Korea too did not have democratic freedom until the 1980s, suffering through martial law for some decades. This key aspect of Korean history plays into the story of The Plotters , as the democratisation creates a power struggle amongst assassins and leaves room for a different kind of man to take charge.

Blending this wild and wonderful story of assassins who work from an old library with real-world political events allows for some subtle commentary on the nature of fascism, martial law, democracy, and even capitalism, with regards to how these things affect the kinds of lives people can lead. Even assassins are not immune to political shifts.

The Plotters is one of the most ambitious Korean novels; something that has to be read to be believed. Its ability to defy genre, allow its plot to be carried along by comedy and eccentric characters, and keep a slow pace that takes time without losing momentum is truly staggering.

It takes influence from the tumultuous events of South Korea’s recent past without becoming dry and melancholy. Most importantly of all, it is fantastically fun.

Buy a copy of The Plotters here!

The Cabinet by Un-su Kim

Translated by Sean Lin Halbert

Un-su Kim’s The Cabinet is a fantastic and engaging blend of speculative short stories and a longer, underlying thread. Our protagonist, Mr. Kong, is a simple office worker who has wound up as the caretaker of a filing cabinet full of accounts of strange people known as “symptomers”: human beings with odd conditions and abilities.

The novel contains many stories dedicated to symptomers: a man with a gingko tree growing out of his finger; people who seem to jump forward in time at random; people who sustain themselves off glass, steel, or gasoline. These stories make up half the narrative, and paint a vivid picture of a world that is far stranger than what we see and believe in our day-to-day.

The broader narrative is about Kong himself. We gradually learn about his life, his boss, his childhood, how he ended up in this position. There is a mystery to uncover here, and as the novel progresses, that mystery gradually unfolds in an addictive, tantalising, and strange way.

The Cabinet is a work of boundless imagination, written by a beloved Korean author and translated brilliantly by Sean Lin Halbert.

Buy a copy of The Cabinet here!

Tower by Bae Myung-hoon

Translated by Sung Ryu

Tower is a truly unique and boundary-pushing piece of Korean science fiction. When we look at Korean novels in translation, too few of them are genre fiction. But that is slowly changing, and Tower is a Korean book you need to pick up and read.

As its name implies, this piece of Korean sci-fi is set entirely in an enormous tower. This titular tower is a nation unto itself, home to 500,000 people. Bae implies that it was built on Korean soil but this is never explicitly stated. The book is divided into a series of interconnected speculative tales, all set within this solitary tower nation known as Beanstalk.

The world-building is fantastic, as the tower needs to be a believable place in order for the author’s disparate tales to work. Infrastructure, economy, politics, and daily life all need to be accounted for and designed in a way that the reader can understand and appreciate.

The six stories in Tower are tied together by the place itself and by recurring characters and events. And each story serves to further build the world while also telling an entirely self-contained tale. In that sense, this is a unique piece of Korean fiction that blends the concepts of the novel and the short story collection.

And each tale also, as all good science fiction does, poses an ethical, political, or philosophical quandary for us to muse over.

Buy a copy of Tower here!

I’m Waiting for You by Kim Bo-young

Translated by Sung Ryu and Sophie Bowman

With the spread of Korean science fiction into the West, through the hard work of talented and dedicated translators like Ryu and Bowman, we get incredible gems like this one. I’m Waiting for You is one of the best Korean novels published in the past few years. Here’s why.

Kim Bo-Young is a legend of Korean literature, and even worked as a script editor on Oscar-winning director Bong Joon-Ho’s Snowpiercer . With I’m Waiting for You , readers can see first-hand why she’s such a special sci-fi author. This collection of four stories is essential reading amongst sci-fi books by women writers.

The four stories in this collection actually work as two pairs. The first and fourth stories — I’m Waiting For You and On My Way to You — are the same tale told from two perspectives: a bride and groom each making their way home to Earth for their wedding ceremony.

The second and third stories — The Prophet of Corruption and That One Life — also the longest and shortest tales respectively, blend religion, mysticism, and science fiction. In these two middle tales, the characters are a set of gods, and it is quickly revealed that they created Earth as a school in which they themselves can learn and grow.

The main protagonist of The Prophet of Corruption , Naban, is a single god whose prophets, disciples, and children all separated from them like cells. Individually, they spend entire lifetimes on Earth, learning and experiencing and dying.

Naban believes in asceticism as a school of learning; their children are reborn in low roles; they suffer and toil and eventually return home. But some are rebelling against this approach to living and learning. What makes these stories so tantalisingly addictive is Kim’s world-building and her attempt at writing gods as characters, with motivations and behaviours different from our own.

The stories that bookend this collection are each written in an epistolary fashion, as letters to the other. In I’m Waiting For You , our nameless groom is trying to make it to Earth, and is updating his bride each time something goes awry (and a lot goes awry).

The same is true in On My Way to You; the bride has her own hurdles to overcome . These two stories are heartbreaking. You’ll root for them, cry for them, hope against hope that things will work out for them.

Your Utopia by Bora Chung

From the author of the wonderfully strange, exciting, and diverse Cursed Bunny , Your Utopia is a science fiction short story collection. The protagonists of this collection vary from far-future space-faring humans to artificially intelligent cars and sentient elevators.

Though these stories are all within the realm of science fiction, they explore an enormous spectrum of style and tone. One story, Seed , is a bleakly funny satire that observes a conversation between a copse of trees and a handful of eugenics-made humans. Another, A Very Ordinary Marriage , follows a newly-married man who becomes paranoid when he catches his wife making secretive phone calls in a language he has never heard before.

The sheer amount of scope and variety in these stories wonderfully showcases the potential of science fiction to tell stories that make readers laugh, scream, and cry. Bora Chung is one of the most imaginative Korean authors, and this imagination is on full display in the stories of Your Utopia .

Buy a copy of Your Utopia here!

The Specters of Algeria by Hwang Yeo Jung

Translated by Yewon Jung

Separated into three acts and an epilogue, The Specters of Algeria begins with a girl named Yul, born during the military dictatorship of South Korea. Yul’s father is part of a theatre troupe, along with the father of her childhood friend Jing. We see the world through Yul’s eyes when the novel first begins.

Like with To Kill A Mockingbird , this naive perspective gives us a blinkered view of Yul’s world, but soon her friend Jing moves abroad and she grows up to own her own dress alteration business. Part two, set in the modern day, follows Cheolsu, a community theatre employee who tracks down Yul’s uncle Osu, a member of the theatre troupe who wrote and directed a play called The Specters of Algeria .

Or did he? As we soon learn, Osu claims that the play was originally written by Karl Marx and was lost to time, until he translated it, claimed it as his own, and directed it during the years of dictatorship as an act of subversion. The Specters of Algeria , like Timerlake Wertenbaker’s Our Country’s Good , is a story about the power of art, specifically theatre, as something that can transcend oppression, push back against it, and bring people together.

Buy a copy of The Specters of Algeria here!

The Age of Doubt by Pak Kyongni

Translated by some of the best Koean-to-English translators working in the industry, including Anton Hur, Sophie Bowman, and Mattho Mandersloot, this is a humbling short story collection. Pak Kyongni was one of Korea’s most celebrated and renowned authors, writing in the decades following the Korean War and through a South Korean dictatorship.

What we have here are six stories and a commentary, all written during the 1950s and 60s, which shed a light on the ordinary lives and tragedies of everyday people during that period. Many of these tales focus on women and their families, such as the titular The Age of Doubt , which follows a woman who lost her husband to the war and her young son to an accident shortly after.

Or the similarly titled The Age of Darkness , which details the intertwined lives of a family shaken by a shared tragedy. Few authors have ever shaken the Korean literary landscape like Pak Kyongni, and to have a selection of her early tales translated in this fashion, in a single collection, is a true gift!

Buy a copy of The Age of Doubt here!

My Brilliant Life by Ae-ran Kim

Translated by Chi-young Kim

Adapted into a Korean film, and now available in English translation by the translator of Kyung-sook Shin’s Please Look After Mother , My Brilliant Life is a gorgeous gut-punch of a literary novel by Korean author Ae-ran Kim.

My Brilliant Life tells the story of Areum, a sixteen-year-old boy with a degenerative disease. He is not likely to live much longer, given that he has the internal organs of a man in his eighties. Before he dies, however, Areum has a gift he wishes to give to his parents:

“My plan was this: write the story of my parents from the very beginning and give this to them on my seventeenth birthday. Instead of awards or a college diploma, I would gift them this story.”

Areum’s parents were childhood sweethearts; they had him when they themselves were only sixteen. Despite being careless, they made a beautiful family together and Areum became a gift. They formed a perfect, loving family together; something truly inspiring.

Thanks to his parents and their love, Areum has lived a wonderful life, despite its length. And he is grateful for this, so he wishes to give them one final present that highlights and celebrates the beauty of their love and their life together.

Throughout Areum’s youth, his parents have romanced him with stories of their own lives, their young years, and their relationship. He uses these stories to build his book. Meanwhile, as he compiles this final gift, he is in and out of hospital with health problems: blindness, heart failure, epilepsy, and more.

Despite how sad this story is, it remains uplifting. It’s a celebration of love and life and family. It teaches us to be grateful for those who show us love and kindness. It reminds us that life is something to cherish and admire and enjoy. For that reason, My Brilliant Life is one of the most poignant and powerful modern Korean novels.

Buy a copy of My Brilliant Life here!

The Court Dancer by Kyung-sook Shin

Kyung-Sook Shin has a gift for understanding her own people, her own society, with all of its beauty and its failings — this kind of gift is something that might be considered simple for anyone who is from anywhere at all, but that is arguably very far from the truth. With these skills, she has written some of the best Korean novels ever.

For Shin, each new novel demonstrates new strengths she had not previously revealed; new muscles she has not before flexed. This time she makes the telling of historical fiction seem as effortless as pouring crisp cold water into a glass.

Based on a true story — set in the final years of 19 th century Korea as China, Russia, and Japan are threatening the little nation trapped between them —  The Court Dancer is being described as a love story first and foremost: the romantic tale of a man and a woman from two different worlds, colliding in a moment of beauty.

And, sure, that’s fine, but really this is the tale of a woman born without a family, adopted into the courts of the Joseon Dynasty, romanced by a French diplomat, whisked away across the waves to foreign shores, and all the while trying to find the time to understand who she is, what she is, and what she wants out of a life that has never really been hers.

It is a tragic tale that transcends place and time to show people of all cultures that a woman’s life must be fought for. In translation, much of Shin’s earlier writing has allowed non-Koreans to experience and understand the mind and heart of the modern Korean.

With The Court Dancer , she has shown us the heart of pre-modern Korea with all the heart and mind she herself always lends to her writing.

Buy a copy of The Court Dancer here!

Untold Night and Day by Bae Suah

Translated by Deborah Smith

Bae Suah is one of the great contemporary authors of South Korea. Author of A Greater Music, Nowhere to Be Found, and North Station (some of the best Korean novels of all time), she has burst onto the stage that is 2020 with a topsy-turvy surrealist tale that feels uncomfortably in-line with the narrative of the 21 st Century.

Untold Night and Day is, to borrow author Sharlene Teo’s words, a fever dream of a novel; a book that is unknowably yet aggressively familiar to all of us. Ayami is a former actress who has worked for two years at a menial position in a tiny, almost entirely unknown, Seoul theatre which puts on auditory performances for blind audiences.

She’s approaching thirty, anxious, and unsure of herself in every way imaginable. She also soon discovers that she will soon be out of a job. What begins as a vivid setup — a drawing with thick black lines — gently begins to grow fuzzy. Ayami’s own colours start to blend, as do those of the story, and of time itself.

Reality, for us and for Ayami, slips away and loops in on itself. Surrealism, soon enough, has its nails in us and it won’t allow us to wake up. There perhaps isn’t a more apt description of Untold Night and Day than ‘fever dream’. This parallel runs deep.

At 150 pages, the novel is short – a quick read that, like a fever dream, manages to play deceptively with time and progress. You’ll wonder how long you’ve had your head in the book before a chapter break eventually allows you to take a breath. You might even emerge sweating and confused.

Untold Night and Day should be read with a clean and sober mind, then talked about after a few vodka shots. It’s a dirty and cracked narrative that encourages questions about our 21 st Century world and how we’re living in it. The novel is, indeed, a Lynchian fever dream, but it demands perseverance and complete absorption.

And, honestly, even if you were to try and quit it, the book likely wouldn’t let you. Open it up and let it sink into you as you sink into it.

Buy a copy of Untold Night and Day here!

b, Book, and Me by Kim Sagwa

Translated by Sunhee Jeong

Coming-of-age novels, and stories of self-discovery, can take a variety of forms across myriad genres of fiction, but most are typically grounded in realism, following the rules of their world.

b, Book, and Me is a story of a different sort, leaning on a fever dream surrealism that grows in intensity over time, and using ambiguity and a narrative fog to reinforce the strangeness and frustration felt and experienced by young people year after year. It’s a layered and anxious tale that captures the dangers and mysteries of youth better than most.

The titular b, Book, and Me are our three protagonists: b is a teenage girl from a poor family living in a nameless coastal town in Korea; Book is a friend met along the way who has an obsession with reading and collecting books; and the ‘me’ refers to Rang, our initial narrator and best friend of b.

The novel is split into three parts, with the first following a few clear and beautifully depicted days and memories in the life of Rang. The second follows b and begins to stretch itself into a feverish surrealism that mirrors her own unique fears, struggles, and stresses. The third teams the two up with Book as the walls of reality almost fall away entirely.

b, Book, and Me is one of the most creative Korean novels; it does an uncanny job of illustrating the often surreal and frightening life of a teenager growing up somewhere unknown, with vague ideas that there is more beyond their world.

The novel’s dreamlike nature is gently poured into the narrative as it moves forward and serves to reinforce the themes of the plot and the nature of its characters. Our protagonists are likeable, their motivations clear, and their world eerily understandable in spite of its impossible qualities.

Rarely does a novel manage to be so abstract and fluid and yet so clearly relatable. b, Book, and Me is a smart, beautifully written, masterfully translated work of Korean fiction that makes for a frightening yet true-to-life story of self-discovery and friendship.

The Hole by Hye-young Pyun

Here is, perhaps, an entirely new kind of frightening. We’re living in a new golden age of horror films right now, and, if Hye-young Pyun’s books are any indication, a parallel golden age of horror writing as well. The protagonist and narrator of The Hol e is the adorably-named Oghi, whom we learn about in two forms: In flashbacks where Oghi is presented as a successful professor and academic in a marriage falling apart.

This provides the disparity between Oghi’s successes and his wife’s failures which cause an uncomfortable rift between them. And in the present day. We find Oghi after a car crash leaves him unable to move or even speak, only communicating in blinks and the odd twitch of his left hand.

With these contrasting Oghis — the memories of him being confident, at times callous, versus the present day where he is mute and every voice has a patronising tone — create an immediately unsettling paradigm shift. The reader will find that, after each flashback ends, a kind of anti-catharsis sets in as we remember that, in the present day, Oghi is a prisoner in his own body; a narrator who cannot narrate. This is the first terror of the story.

The other terror comes in the form of Oghi’s mother-in-law, both his caretaker and sole remaining family member. After losing her daughter in the same crash that left Oghi paralysed, his mother-in-law is hardly an emotionally stable caretaker. To say more would be to risk spoiling things.

Where  The Hole shines, and wherein lies its true terror, is the state of Oghi’s body and his mind. So much horror and suspense writing relies on running, hiding, chasing, and being lost. But Oghi is not lost, and he cannot run. He is trapped from page one.

In choosing to ignore the tropes which make horror what it has become famous for, Pyun has crafted a very new kind of terror which builds on the writing of Franz Kafka, but with none of the black humour that results in staring into the void.

Instead, it replaces that with true, absolute dread which is maintained like a painfully drawn-out musical note for hours, page after page after page. The Hole is one of my favourite Korean novels, as well as one of my favourite horror novels ever.

Buy a copy of The Hole here!

The White Book by Han Kang

Calling it The White Book feels reductive, almost wrong on purpose. Because The White Book is less a book and more an embracing feeling of familiarity. This book — one of the best Korean novels of our time — is something you live and feel, and all of this is created by its use of empty space.

Han Kang has created a story unlike any you will have read, but beyond being a story it is very much an exploration of the familiar things in life. There are beautiful black and white photos throughout the book, taken by Han Kang, which only add to the experience as you try to grapple with the tone of each beautiful image.

The White Book has real depth and I can’t help but feel that every reader will have a different experience with it. Each tiny chapter of this story is titled with the name of a white thing, and the events and musings of the chapter circle its material theme.

It is this, coupled with the empty space, that so draws the reader into the very feeling of whiteness. A bleak kind of melancholy peacefulness that takes hold and gently squeezes. The narrative flits between first and third person, but always centres on the same lone character: a Korean woman, spending a little time living in an unspecified central European city.

It is here that our nameless narrator spends her time in introspection, though the exact subject of which I dare not say.

The story has nothing in the way of true dialogue, and its chapters are short with the time between them unclear, but what is clear is the way that the character lessens the weight she carries, eases her feelings, and helps the reader lose the tension they perhaps don’t know they are holding onto as they read.

T he White Book is an experience inasmuch as it is a novel. I’d urge all Han Kang fans to read it, but also anyone looking for a very different kind of art; art which is difficult to explain and more difficult to talk about afterwards.

Buy a copy of The White Book here!

At Dusk by Hwang Sok-yong

Hwang Sok-yong is arguably Korea’s most prestigious and well-respected living author. Following the success of his novels Princess Bari and Familiar Things , we arrive here, At Dusk .

The narrative here is split in two, with the books odd-numbered chapters recalling the life and memories of Park Minwoo, a rags-to-riches architect approaching old age, and the even chapters following the story of Jung Woohee, a twenty-eight-year-old woman who is barely making ends meet by working part-time to fund her passion for writing and directing theatre.

These two narratives have seemingly nothing in common. Until they do. Park Minwoo’s story is a familiar one: that of a man born into hardship and poverty, working his way through a series of fascinating and intense trials and labours to arrive at the success he always dreamed of.

The interesting twist in the formula here is that, for Park, the trials have always been passed, and now we are treated to a backwards view of his life from the viewpoint of an ageing man who has become disenchanted by his riches and his current social, political, and financial situation.

As for Jung, her tale takes on a very different narrative flavour. It is at once lighter in tone and heavier. Her struggles are in the present, and the immediacy of her pain and her fight for success is felt with real intensity. All the same, she has a lot of personality on show, and her dialogue and her exchanges are packed with vigour.

The theme of the day here is very much in the steadily increasing gravity of regret that weighs down on Park as he considers his role in the modernisation and transformation of modern day Korea. In his flashbacks he slowly begins to pine for the raw life that he had carved out and survived through in the slums of his childhood, a time when perhaps he felt more alive.

Buy a copy of At Dusk here!

To the Warm Horizon by Choi Jin-young

Translated by Soje

In this harrowing post-apocalyptic novel that brings to mind others of its kind — The Road, Oryx and Crake , I Am Legend — Korean author Choi Jin-young shows us how, against all odds, love can still win out in the end. After a disease has ravaged the entire planet, To The Warm Horizon presents us with two young Korean women who come across one another on the road in the cold wilds of Russia, in the most adverse of circumstances.

Dori lost her parents to the disease and is now in charge of her deaf and mute younger sister. Jina is travelling with her large extended family and childhood friend Gunji. Dori and Jina’s encounter leads to some raw and uncomfortable events, exactly the kind you’d expect to see in a disease-wrought, post-apocalyptic wasteland.

But against and despite all of this, and more,, the love and dedication that grows and is tended between these two women keeps the reader hopeful. This is a beautiful lesbian love story that uses this hook to set it apart from the less hopeful novels that populate the genre of post-apocalyptic fiction, making it an essential modern Korean novel.

Buy a copy of To the Warm Horizon here!

Welcome to the Hyunam-dong Bookshop by Hwang Bo-reum

Translated by Shanna Tan

A wonderfully cozy novel which, rather than being led ever onwards by its plot, instead reflects the ebb and flow of ordinary life with charming and astonishing accuracy. This is the story of a woman who, after realising that she is chasing happiness, leaves her job, divorces her husband, and fulfils her dream of opening an independent bookshop.

That woman is Lee Yeongju. Now in her late thirties, Yeongju is the proud owner of the Hyunam-dong Bookshop. And chapter by chapter, we feel as though we are sitting in the corner of her shop as things gently shift and change. She hires a barista, hosts bookclubs, interviews authors in front of a small audience, grows her shop’s social media profile, and builds a steady community of regulars to the shop.

As the cast of characters fills out, we get to know each of them more intimately, and many of them get their own chapters. We watch where they go, listen as they talk through their thoughts and troubles, and admire how they face the choices that appear before them.

Many of the book’s chapters are simple philosophical musings on business, literature, writing, and larger concepts like love and happiness. Our characters talk through their worries with each other and become closer as a result. It is wonderfully true-to-life and a very charming, intimate reading experience.

Endless Blue Sky by Lee Hyoseok

Translated by Steven D. Capener

Korea has seen a tumultuous hundred years, with the Japanese occupation, a civil war, and finally a divide carved across its belly, separating North and South. In the midst of such tumult, it is easy for information to be lost.

Fighting back against all of this information loss, and tearing down the barriers of language and time, is the publishing house Honford Star , who began by translating the short stories of many lost Korean writers into English. Endless Blue Sky is Honford Star’s first full-length Korean novel.

The story of  En d less Blue Sky begins with our protagonist, the writer Ilma, travelling up to Manchuria for the umpteenth time for business and, while he is there, engaging with a Russian dancer, Nadia, whom he is deeply enamoured with.

Conversing mostly in English, their relationship blossoms quickly; and Nadia, through Ilma, has fallen in love with the fascinating world of Joseon (Korea), demanding to be stolen into it so that she might discover its fashion, its theatre, and its art for herself.

Framing this blossoming romance is a colourful cast of characters, the most eccentric of which being the actress Danyeong, a woman obsessed with separating Ilma from his foreign lover and stealing him away.

Her behaviour is so obscenely cloak-and-dagger that the reader cannot help but picture her, finger to her lips, sneaking a few steps behind Ilma, muttering to herself about love and passion from behind a fake nose and moustache.

More than once, as I read, I considered with a smile that Lee seems to exist as a wonderful opposite to Japan’s Yukio Mishima, a man of far-right conservative values who chose to espouse his nationalistic beliefs through aggressive stories of blood and betrayal.

In much the same way, Lee’s politics are not hidden here, but rather exposed for all to see. The difference is in his opposing beliefs. While Mishima worshipped traditionalism and rejected change, Lee welcomed globalisation, socialism, and the eradication of borders.

While Mishima wrote with angst and rage, Lee wrote with love and celebration, though both wrote from the heart all the same. Lee Hyoseok was absolutely one of the more fascinating writers of early twentieth-century Korea; a man of thrilling political philosophies and a delightfully European approach to storytelling.

Endless Blue Sky is a joy to read, with eccentric characters and a love story that twists and turns with real human depth and agency as it moves on at a swift click. One of the best classic Korean novels and a true literary gem.

City of Ash and Red by Hye-young Pyun

From the writer of The Hole  (winner of the Shirley Jackson Award 2017), City of Ash and Red is a phenomenal celebration of all that is dark and wrong, and readers are in for a jolly good dystopian time with this one. This is just more proof of Pyun’s skill as author of the best Korean novels of this century.

Our nameless protagonist (nameless, perhaps, because his name doesn’t matter, or because it’s up for debate), divorced and working as a rat catcher, he is quickly and inexplicably transferred by his company to a country only referred to as C.

Upon arrival he finds the whole country drowning in disease and rubbish, with people being dragged into quarantine, and fear and distrust in the air. For the duration of his transfer, he has been in contact with someone named Mol, but he soon learns that Mol is not so easy to locate – the name is incredibly common in Country C.

This is the first of a hundred problems that our protagonist faces, as he is soon quarantined, released, has his luggage ‘misplaced’, is told not to come into work for ten days, and receives a call from an old friend who had married our protagonist’s ex-wife, only to be told by this friend that their ex-wife was found dead in our hero’s apartment, and he is a prime suspect.

Any fan of Kafka will recognise parallels between this tale and more than one of old Franz’s, with the key link being an overwhelming feeling of confusion, fear, and frustration. Our protagonist seeks answers, but none are to be found.

He wants to explain himself, but nobody will listen — nobody, in fact, cares. He wants to gain a firm grip on the facts, to stop his world from spinning and twisting, but the more desperate he becomes, the more life beats and berates him. You might see why, at this point, calling this book merely Kafkaesque is not enough. City of Ash and Red is something else entirely.

The Color of the Sky Is the Shape of the Heart by Chesil

Translated by Takami Nieda

Note: The Color of the Sky Is the Shape of the Heart was written in, and translated from Japanese so consider it a wild card, but it remains vital to the history and culture of modern Korea. Inspired by the author’s own experiences as a Zainichi Korean in Japan, The Color of the Sky Is the Shape of the Heart sheds a bright light on this subculture of Japanese people.

Zainichi Koreans are Japanese citizens of Korean heritage whose existence came around as a result of the Japanese empire’s occupation of the Korean peninsula. Our protagonist, Ginny/Jinhee Park, was born of Zainichi Korean parents and raised in Japan, speaking only Japanese.

At the beginning of the novel, Ginny lives in Oregon and recounts to us her childhood in Japan, going to both Japanese and Korean schools. From her earliest age, as a Zainichi Korean, Ginny (born Jinhee), faced discrimination and hardship. We see these hardships through visceral and painful vignettes.

We see the way that Japanese people view Jinhee and her people, and the way she was treated at Korean school as a girl who only speaks Japanese. Jinhee is a child of two cultures but feels like she belongs to neither; discriminated against whichever way she turns.

The Color of the Sky Is the Shape of the Heart is a difficult read but it couldn’t be anything else. It asks for sympathy and understanding, and has so much to teach us about Zainichi Korean culture.

19 Best Korean Authors: Must-Read K-Literature

Discover our guide with the best Korean authors you’ll want to add to your reading list. 

Western audiences have grown increasingly interested in Korean culture in recent years. From K-pop to K-food, K-beauty to K-drama, audiences have an insatiable appetite for everything Korean. To get a taste of South Korea’s culture, nothing compares to a page-turning novel.

Contemporary Korean fiction gives audiences an intimate, personal look at the modern-day struggles of a generation searching for identity, freedom, equality, and justice. Their stories remind us of commonalities. Discover the rich and storied culture of South Korea and its people with a book by one of the best Korean authors. If you’re interested in this topic, you might also enjoy the best Greek authors !

Here Are The Best Korean Authors

1. min jin lee, 1968 – , 2. cho nam joo, 1978- , 3. sohn won-pyung, 1979- , 4. shin kyung-sook, 1963, 5. frances cha, 6. han kang, 1970 –, 7. sang young park, 1988-, 8. hwang sok yong, 1943 –, 9. wan suh park, 1931 – 2011, 10. ha-joon chang, 1963 –, 11. krys lee, 1964 –, 12. yun choi, 1953 –, 13. kim young-ha, 1968 –, 14. kim un-su, 1972 –, 15. sora kim-russell, 1976 –, 16. yun ko eun, 1980 –, 17. ko un, 1933 –, 18. oh jung-hee, 1947 –, 19. kim in-suk, 1963 –.

As a child of immigrants, Min Jin Lee spent many enjoyable hours at the Queens Library, learning English book by the book. After earning her degree at Yale University, Lee practiced law in New York City for two years before quitting to focus on writing. Lee initially wrote short stories, some featured on NPR’s Selected Shorts. Then in 2007, she published her first novel, Free Food For Millionaires .

Though her debut novel was critically acclaimed, she is most well known for her book, Pachinko . 

Pachinko is a sweeping generational saga about a Korean family migrating to Japan. The story chronicles the family’s encounters with racism, stereotyping, and discrimination as they attempt to build a life while retaining their history and traditions. It was the first known book written in English about the intersection of Korean and Japanese culture. The novel was a finalist for the 2017 National Book Award and was released as an AppleTV series in 2022.

“You want to see a very bad man? Make an ordinary man successful beyond his imagination. Let’s see how good he is when he can do whatever he wants.” Min Jin Lee, Pachinko

• NATIONAL BOOK AWARD FINALIST * A NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW TOP TEN OF THE YEAR * NEW YORK TIMES NOTABLE BOOK OF 2017 *A USA TODAY TOP TEN OF 2017
• Roxane Gay's Favorite Book of 2017, Washington Post
• NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * #1 BOSTON GLOBE BESTSELLER * USA TODAY BESTSELLER
• In this gorgeous, page-turning saga, four generations of a poor Korean immigrant family fight to control their destiny in 20th-century Japan, exiled from a home they never knew.
• Lee, Min Jin (Author)

Cho Nam Joo attended all-girls schools throughout her education, eventually graduating with a degree in sociology from Ewha Women’s College. After graduation, Nam-Joo became a successful scriptwriter but could not reenter the workforce after taking time off for the birth of her first child. She began researching women’s issues in Korea as she searched for work. Her efforts eventually culminated in her most well-known novel Kim Ji-Young, Born 1982 , for which she earned international acclaim.

Kim Ji-Young, Born 1982 is often touted as launching a modern-day feminist movement in South Korea. It is the story of a 33-year-old stay-at-home mom who suffers a mental breakdown under the crushing misogyny and expectations of Korean women. The novel was translated into 18 languages and sold over a million copies. It was adapted into an award-winning Korean film in 2019.

If you enjoyed reading about the best Korean authors, you might also be interested in learning about the best Japanese authors .

“Jiyoung grew up being told to be cautious, to dress conservatively, to be “ladylike.” That it’s your job to avoid dangerous places, times of day, and people. It’s your fault for not noticing and not avoiding.” – Cho Nam-Joo, Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982

• Cho Nam-Joo (Author)
• English (Publication Language)
• 163 Pages - 01/09/2021 (Publication Date) - SIMON SCHUSTER (Publisher)

Sohn Won-pyong grew up in Seoul, South Korea, and is the daughter of a prominent Korean politician. She received degrees in sociology and philosophy at Sogang University, then pursued a degree in film directing from The Korean Academy of Film Arts. Won-pyung was a well-regarded film director until she turned to writing after the birth of her first child. Her debut novel for young adults, Almond , earned her international attention.

Almond’s protagonist, Yunjae, has a rare brain condition that makes it difficult to experience the emotions most of us take for granted, like fear or anger. His mother helps him navigate the world until a tragic accident changes everything and forces him to find courage. It is a powerful story about friendship and persistence. 

“Love is what makes a person human, as well as what makes a monster.” Sohn Won-Pyung, Almond

• Sohn, Won-pyung (Author)
• 272 Pages - 06/15/2021 (Publication Date) - HarperVia (Publisher)

At 16, Kyung-Sook Shin, the fourth of six children, left her parent’s home in a remote South Korean village to move in with her brother in Seoul. There she worked in an electronics factory by day and went to school at night until finally earning a degree in creative writing from the Seoul Institute of the Arts. Shin earned international acclaim with her 9th novel, Please Look After Mom , which has since been translated into 19 languages.

Please Look After Mom is a haunting story about a 69-year-old woman who becomes separated from her husband in a busy subway station in Seoul. The tale alternates between the perspectives of a husband, daughter, son, and mother as they desperately seek to be reunited. Long-buried secrets and struggles float to the surface, and the family members begin to wonder if they ever knew one another.

“Either a mother and daughter know each other very well or they are strangers.” Kyung-Sook Shin, Please Look After Mom

• Audible Audiobook
• Kyung-Sook Shin (Author) - Mark Bramhall, Samantha Quan, Janet Song (Narrators)
• 04/05/2011 (Publication Date) - Random House Audio (Publisher)

Frances Cha began writing stories at only eight years old. She recalls that her childhood stories had protagonists who were all white, blonde American girls. It took her decades to embrace her heritage and begin writing from a decidedly Korean perspective. After earning her MFA in creative writing from Columbia University, Cha was a travel and culture editor for CNN in Seoul.

Her debut novel, If I Had Your Face , has been translated into 11 languages and was named one of the year’s best books by several publications, including NPR, Time , and Esquire .

If I Had Your Face follows four young women living and working in Seoul. The hair stylist, the recent graduate, the new mother, and the hostess all attempt to carve out a life for themselves despite impossible social standards. They find that they are stronger together and that friendship might be the thing that saves them all.

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

• Cha, Frances (Author)
• 304 Pages - 04/13/2021 (Publication Date) - Ballantine Books (Publisher)

Han Kang and her family moved from Gwanju, where she was born, to Seoul when she was ten. After graduating high school, she studied Korean literature at Yonsei University and soon made her literary debut. Han’s first novel to be translated into English, The Vegetarian , earned her the Man Booker International Prize for Fiction in 2016. She was the first Korean in history to have done so.

Kang is also well known for her harrowing and controversial book, Human Acts, which was short-listed for the Dublin Literary Award.

Human Acts chronicles the aftermath of the tragic death of a young boy during a violent student uprising. The interconnected chapters are told from the perspective of the bereaved friends and family he left behind. The collective agony of these people as they encounter suppression and search for their voice is riveting and universally relevant.

“I’m fighting alone, every day. I fight with the hell that I survived. I fight with the fact of my own humanity. I fight with the idea that death is the only way of escaping this fact.” Han Kang, Human Acts

• Kang, Han (Author)
• 240 Pages - 10/17/2017 (Publication Date) - Hogarth (Publisher)

San Young Park was born in Daegu, one of the most conservative places in Seoul. He says that his life truly began when he moved to Seoul to attend university, where he gained a broader perspective. He studied French and journalism at Sungkyunkwan University, then worked for seven years as a copywriter and editor before making his literary debut as a novelist. His 2021 novel, Love In the Big City , made the top five list of all the major booksellers and went into 26 printings.

Love In the Big City is a series of four short stories that create a cohesive novel. It chronicles the life, love, and loneliness of a hard-drinking, fun-loving queer young man. From his nightlife exploits with his best friend and roommate, his struggles with an ailing and disapproving mother, and his latest Tinder matches, readers get an intimate, heartbreakingly hilarious look at twenty-first-century Korean life. Looking for more? Check out our round-up of the best South Korean authors !

“I was already thirty, a legal adult for ten years, and was old enough to know that my mother did not exist solely to hinder my existence but was a person in her own right who had fought hard making her way through life.” Sang Young Park, Love in the Big City

• Hardcover Book
• Park, Sang Young (Author)
• 240 Pages - 11/16/2021 (Publication Date) - Grove Press (Publisher)

Born in Japanese-occupied Northern China in 1943, Hwang Sok Yong ’s life story is as fascinating as his contributions to Korean literature.

After leaving China and settling in South Korea, he was drafted to fight in the Vietnam War on the American-supported Souther-side. Like many Korean writers , he has been deeply impacted by the brutality he witnessed in Vietnam, which is often seen in his work.

After the war, Yong returned to South Korea, where he actively participated in anti-government movements that eventually ended South Korea’s dictatorship in 1972.

Yong’s activism led to his imprisonment, which, combined with his war record, has given him first-hand experience of some of the world’s darkest human acts.

The Shadow of Arms tells the story of the black markets used by the northern Vietnamese to overcome the southern US-backed forces. The novel is based on Yong’s first-hand experience in the Vietnamese city of Da Nang, where he was tasked with rooting out the black market activity during the war. Hwang Sok Yong is a must-read if you want to learn more about the Vietnam War from a first-hand perspective.

“People hated and killed each other back then. Now even those who survived are dying, leaving this world one by one. Unless we find a way to forgive one another, none of us will ever be able to see each other again.” Hwang Sok Yong

Born in North Korea in 1931, the first half of Wan Suh Park ’s life was impacted directly by the Second World War, the Korean War, and the Vietnam War. As a child Park witnessed the Japanese invasion and occupation of what is now North Korea. During her early adult years, she watched her country ripped in half by the Korean War, during which she was forcibly taken from her mother at a young age by North Korean forces.

Her talents as a writer were repressed by war, and as a result, her literary career didn’t get started until the 1970s, just as the South Korean dictatorship was crumbling and the Vietnam War was ending. Through writing, Park could express the trauma that she and many others on both sides of Korea experienced during the war.

She collated several fascinating short stories in her book Year of Famine in the City , telling the reader of the harrowing poverty people faced in Seoul during the Korean War. Add it to your book list to learn about Korea’s 20th-century history. Park’s work reminds us that despite the prosperity enjoyed by South Korea in the 21st century, it was not so long ago a war-torn country where millions struggled to survive.

“What made his face burn was a sense of failure, the yearning for freedom that remained unfulfilled and the acute realisation that he didn’t know anything.” Wan Suh Park

Ha-Joon-Chang witnessed the so-called economic miracle that transformed South Korea from one of the poorest countries in the world to one of the richest. He embarked on an incredibly successful career in developmental economics as he tried to decipher why some countries grow while others stagnate in poverty.

His work is regarded as the most important in economics and development. If you’re looking for book recommendations to help you better understand poverty and growth, then Chang’s work should be on your reading list.

One of his best books is Bad Samaritans: The Myth of Free Trade and the Secret History of Capitalism , which uses examples from Chang’s childhood in South Korea to explain why the global economic system often hinders the development of poor countries.

“People who live in poor countries have to be entrepreneurial even just to survive.” Ha-Joon Chang

Krys Lee is a university creative writing professor, journalist, and author from South Korea. Her work has received several high-profile literary awards, including the Rome Prize and the Story Prize Spotlight Award. Currently, she works at the Underwood International College in Seoul.

How I Became A North Korean is arguably Krys Lee’s best book, especially for anyone looking to learn more about life in North Korea. The book follows the three main characters, Danny, Jangmi, and Yongju, who escape North Korea and flee to a small Chinese town across the border.

The three characters are plunged into a world of uncertainty, allowing Lee to explore themes of displacement, identity, and human rights abuse. If you like the sound of How I Became A North Korean , you should also consider reading Drifting House .

“ [I] often think about borders. It’s hard not to. There were the Guatemalans and Mexicans I read about in the paper who died of dehydration while trying to cross into America. Or later, the Syrians fleeing war and flooding into Turkey.” Krys Lee

Yun Choi , also known as Choe Yun, is a respected academic from Seoul, South Korea, who holds a Ph.D. from Sogang University. Although her work has some variety, she is primarily known for her politically themed books and papers. Her most notable work covers major political and historical events in South and North Korea and themes that touch on patriarchy.

There a Petal Silently Falls: Three Stories by Choe Yun is one of her most hard-hitting politically themed books. The three short stories explore the fallout from the Kwangju Massacre that saw an estimated 2,000 civilians killed by the forces of the South Korean dictatorship. 

The book’s first part tells the story of a young girl’s tragic attempt to survive in a hostile environment after her mother is killed due to state-sanctioned violence against women. The second part covers left-wing intellectuals’ brutal treatment during South Korea’s dictatorship until 1972. The third and final part is a critical commentary on consumerism and the world of academia.

“He felt intensely, sparingly violent whenever he saw her, and ultimately he lacked the superhuman effort necessary to control these impulses.” Yun Choi

Widely regarded as one of the most talented writers of a generation, Kim Young-ha’s historical fiction and crime thrillers are fantastic reads for anyone interested in these genres. Young-ha ’s work often focuses on the general absurdity of our everyday life and cleverly weaves what appear to be everyday scenarios into exciting crime thrillers .

Born into a military family, Young-ha spent much of his early life on the move. He spent his early adulthood at the University of Yonsei in Seoul, where he studied Business Administration.

Business never really interested Young-ha; despite his degree, he focused more on his writing.

His most notable book is Whatever Happened to the Guy Stuck in the Elevator?, which turns an apparently mundane incident into an exciting short story. The mundane setting snowballs into a dramatic tale that touches on all sorts of themes, such as narcissism, the tragedy of modern 9-5 life, and the basic principles of capitalist society.

“A revolution cannot progress without the fuel of terror. With time that relationship inverts: the revolution presses forward for the sake of terror.” KimYoung-ha

Born in the South Korean city of Busan, Kim Un-su , also written Un-su Kim, is an award-winning South Korean short story writer. In 2002 he published his first short story Easy Writing Lessons , which won a South Korean award. His success in the early 2000s pushed him to try and break onto the international scene.

In 2010 Kim made it onto the international stage when he published the crime thriller The Plotters . A French publishing house initially picked up the book, which was later translated into English.

The Plotters takes place in Seoul and tells the story of several assassins competing for dominance over the contract the city’s criminal gangs issued. If you’re looking for a Korean crime thriller, consider adding The Plotters to your reading list. If you enjoyed reading about the best Korean authors, you might enjoy our list of the best Vietnamese authors . You can also use the search bar at the top right of the page to search for authors in a country or region you are interested in.

“Black tea is steeped in imperialism. That’s what gives it its flavor. Anything this flavorful has to be hiding an incredible amount of carnage.” Kim Un-su

The California-based American-Korean author Sora Kim-Russell holds a master’s in East Asian studies from Stanford and has contributed to Korean literature through her impeccable translation work. Her translations have been featured in major outlets such as Harper’s Magazine and The New Yorker. In addition, she’s been entrusted with translating the work of some of the most respected Korean authors, including Pyun Hye-young and Hwang Sok-Yong.

One of her most successful translations was of At Dusk by Hwang Sok-Yong . The short novel combines elements of love and nostalgia as it follows a successful South Korean architect down memory lane as he returns to his childhood sweetheart. The translation by Kim-Russel received several awards.

“The future is not a thing we enter, but a thing we create.” Sora Kim-Russell

Representing a new generation of writers who never lived under the South Korean dictatorship, Yun Ko Eun is a radio host and author. As a result of her view of South Korea from a purely democratic and modern perspective, her work sheds light on modern life in the country and the concerns of the younger generation.

One of her most enthralling pieces of fiction is The Disaster Tourist , which was shortlisted for the Dublin Literary Award. Like many other Korean books with female authors, the story touches on the sexism women face in the workplace. The Disaster Tourist is more than a social commentary. It’s also a brilliant story about a woman forced to make a decision that leads to an absurd adventure.

“And if you, the reader, hadn’t picked this book, the narrative would be different still. When I think of the trajectory created by these converging choices, I hallucinate a constellation of coincidences floating in front of my eyes.” Yun Ko Eun

Born in Japanese-occupied Korea, Ko Un’ s globally recognized poetry and novels often vividly describe Korea during its most difficult historical period. Un grew up in a poor peasant family in what is now South Korea. The Korean War traumatized the young poet who became a Buddhist monk and actively participated in the anti-government movements in the 1960s and 70s.

As an activist, Un was repeatedly detained and tortured by the Park regime. Un’s personal struggle embodied Korea’s struggle in the 20th century. He has written over 80 books and countless poems. One of his most successful pieces, The Sound of My Waves: Selected Poems , has been translated into several languages and includes some of Un’s most moving passages.

“In the old days a poet once said our nation is destroyed yet the mountains and rivers survive Today’s poet says the mountains and rivers are destroyed yet our nation survives” Ko Un

O Chonhui, also known as Oh Jung-Hee , is a South Korean writer who has published short stories for nearly half a century. She grew up in the middle of the Korean War, and as with many Korean writers, the brutality of the events around her can be seen in her work.

Her work often depicts dark characters living in exceptionally dark circumstances where death is the only true relief. River of Fire is a collection of short stories that revolve around various female characters in different time periods and explore their struggles in an often hostile society.

“The sound of cannons that traveled from the other side of the mountain ridge would suddenly remind this quiet, sunken village of the war, and the refugees that arrived every now and then brought word that outside, there was still a war going on.” Oh Jung-Hee

Kim In Suk is a seminal figure among South Korean writers who grew up as democracy took root in the country. She experienced the transition from Park’s regime firsthand, so themes of democracy often play a part in her books.

Although not many of her books have been translated, The Long Road is available in English, and it’s highly recommended if you want to learn about the lives of Korean immigrants who moved to Australia. Some of her work has been used in K-dramas, such as Save Me and Chief Kim . Looking for more? Check out our round-up of the best Korean novels in English!

“You’re going far away, don’t say it’s lonely. You please don’t be scared You will have everything someday” Kim In-Suk

Peter is an experienced journalist and tech-lover who has spent years hunting for the best writing software. He firmly believes that we all need a helping hand crossing our Ts and dotting our Is and takes great pride in sharing his opinions on the best writing software out there.

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World » Asia » Korea

The best korean novels, recommended by bruce fulton.

The Penguin Book of Korean Short Stories ed. Bruce Fulton

Korean popular culture—television, film, and music—has been sweeping the globe. But Korean literature is darker and more serious than you might assume, given the fun and irreverent nature of 'K-pop.' Here, the respected translator and academic Bruce Fulton highlights five key Korean novels that offer insight into the culture and troubled history of the Korean peninsula.

Interview by Cal Flyn , Deputy Editor

Hwang Chini by Hong Sŏkchung, translation Bruce and Ju-Chan Fulton

The Guest: A Novel by Hwang Sok-yong, translated by Kyung-ja Chun and Maya West

The Dwarf by Cho Se-hǔi, translated by Bruce and Ju-Chan Fulton

One Left: A Novel by Kim Soom, translated by Bruce and Ju-Chan Fulton

Togani by Gong Ji-young, translated by Bruce and Ju-Chan Fulton

1 Hwang Chini by Hong Sŏkchung, translation Bruce and Ju-Chan Fulton

2 the guest: a novel by hwang sok-yong, translated by kyung-ja chun and maya west, 3 the dwarf by cho se-hǔi, translated by bruce and ju-chan fulton, 4 one left: a novel by kim soom, translated by bruce and ju-chan fulton, 5 togani by gong ji-young, translated by bruce and ju-chan fulton.

I want to begin by thanking you for selecting five of the best Korean novels. Could you tell us about the criteria you used to compile your reading list?

I guess, if you were to choose a single criterion, you might describe it as ‘translations that matter.’ We want our translations to make a difference. And at a time when Korean popular culture is arguably driving popular culture worldwide , we tend to forget that much of the oral and performative elements of Korean popular culture derive from the Korean oral tradition, reflected in Korean literature from its earliest days. So, yes, another criterion would be simply to maintain visibility for Korean literature in the greater fabric of Korean culture and tradition.

Yes, as you say, interest in Korean culture has blossomed in the West in recent years. That must be quite satisfying for someone like you, who has worked so hard for more than forty years to bring Korean literature to a wider audience.

We are ever hopeful. But we also have to remember that the tradition of Korean recorded literature—that is, apart from oral literature—continues to be an elite, conservative, and patriarchal tradition. The reason for this is that, until about 500 years ago, Korea did not have a script of its own. So for those who were literate on the Korean Peninsula, the literary language was classical Chinese.

How did Koreans go about learning the Chinese literary tradition? Well, first of all, you had to be male. The goal of becoming literate was to pass the government civil service examination in traditional Korea—an exam that was only open to men. So any self-respecting clan would sequester the oldest son, who would devote their childhood to mastering classical Chinese. If you think about the percentage of the population that could afford to do that in a traditional agrarian society, it’s infinitely small. Modern Korea, to a large extent, inherited this elevated status of recorded literature, whether prose or poetry, and this can prove intimidating to everyday readers. Only recently have women writers beaten down the doors.

“The tradition of Korean recorded literature continues to be an elite, conservative, and patriarchal tradition”

There’s a strictly defined entrance to writerhood in Korea. But in the last ten years or so, we’ve begun to see more diversity—what we might think of as ‘genre fiction.’ But very few Korean fiction writers have achieved financial success. The ones who have usually write multi-volume novels that are serialised in newspapers or literary journals. The author of one of the books I’ve selected recently confided that she’s happy if she sells more than 3000 copies of a story collection or novel in the Korean edition. And surveys suggest that Korean readers spend less than an hour a week on print materials. Just about everything is accessed on smartphones. So I don’t think it’s realistic to expect Korean literature, especially fiction, to find as much recognition as music and food. But that won’t stop us trying.

Yes, you recently released The Penguin Book of Korean Short Stories , the first work of Korean literature to be published by Penguin World Classics in the UK.

Yes, Penguin US has published a few Korean volumes in the last twenty years or so, but this is a first for Penguin UK. When people abroad think of Korean literature these days, they tend to think of books like The Vegetarian , an English version of a work by Han Kang—which, as a recipient of a major English literary prize, got everyone very, very excited. But what’s wonderful about the Penguin anthology is that finally we have a sampling of some of the stories that have brought modern Korean fiction to a very high point of development, the short story form.

This needs a little bit of context; back in the old days, fiction was not divided by genre or by length. It was simply fiction. The works that were recorded could be a few pages long, or they might be hundreds of volumes long—usually family histories, which were very popular among court women during Chosŏn, the most recent kingdom. But with the start of the modern period in Korea, which we usually date to the late 1800s and early 1900s, we see the western-style short story coming into Korea by way of Japan . Russian short fiction was very popular in Japanese translation in colonial Korea.

Another anomaly in world colonial history: Korea was the first sovereign nation to be colonised by a non-western power: Japan annexed Korea in 1910 and their occupation of the Korean Peninsula lasted until 1945. During those 35 years, young Koreans interested in literature were reading Western literature in Japanese translation, because Japanese was the language of instruction in the colonial Korean educational system. But it was the short story that proved especially engaging to the young Korean literati, and quite quickly Korea developed a very solid tradition of short fiction.

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The Penguin anthology contains 25 stories,  one or two of them verging on novella length, as well as an excerpt from a novel. What is historic about this excerpt is that this is not a South Korean novel, but a North Korean one.

This is one of the Korean novels you’ve chosen to recommend—also called Hwang Chini —by Hong Sŏkchung, which is in the process of being translated by yourself and Ju-Chan. An excerpt is available on the Asymptote Journal site. 

Hwang Chini is an iconic figure in Korean tradition, and it is notable that the author—instead of writing a novel of socialist realism about present-day life in Korea—chose to go back 500 years or so. I think this is what made it possible for this novel to be published in North Korea. The writing is superb. And we should remember that the author’s grandfather was Hong Myŏnghǔi, also a writer of note. The grandson has obviously inherited the grandfather’s gift for storytelling.

He was the first North Korean writer to win South Korea’s Manhae Literary Prize. Should we consider literature from North and South Korea as being one and the same?

The second Korean novel you wanted to recommend was Hwang Sok-Yong’s The Guest , translated by Kyung-Ja Chun and Maya West. Why have you selected it?

Earlier I mentioned that our number-one criterion for translating a novel was that it should somehow make a difference. But we couple that with what we believe to be an appropriate literary style for the subject matter. On the surface, this book would be about a disturbing aspect of civil war—a massacre, or what you might call an ideological cleansing. This novel is based on a historical incident that took place about two months after the June 1950 outbreak of the war.

This incident took place in a small city in present-day North Korea. North Korean historians blamed it on United Nations forces pushing north—those UN forces were primarily US military. But subsequent research revealed that the UN forces had nothing to do with those killings; their advance was used as pretext by hardline communists to purge those who were found to be lacking in commitment to the People’s Army and to the ‘Dear Leader.’ So, a disturbing but not uncommon historical incident.

So how does the author handle this material? Simple historical description is going to be of little use, because to anyone with any first-hand experience of the atrocities of the Korean War this will be nothing new. It will be a sad reminder of tragedy and possibly personal loss. So Hwang resorted to native Korean spirituality; this is significant for a number of reasons. Firstly, the practitioner of Korean spirituality, the mudang —often called a shaman in the west, although I don’t like that term— is by definition female. So, in a society with a traditional, patriarchal class system, it’s significant that practitioners of native spirituality are female.

“Until about 500 years ago, Korea did not have a script of its own. For those who were literate, the literary language was classical Chinese”

One of the most important functions of a mudang is to mediate between those of us still here on Earth and the souls of those who have died prematurely or unnaturally, who are thought to be floating up there somewhere, unable to journey to their final resting place. The practitioner will perform a ritual in which she tells a story, and part of that story involves the voices of the souls who are floating around there; the mudang will channel those voices as part of her performance. This has long been an aspect of Korean culture. But what Hwang Sok-Yong has done is to allow the protagonist, who was separated from his brother in North Korea, to find out exactly what happened in this small city, to effect reconciliation with his brother and with those whom he left behind.

The way this happens is that somehow he begins to hear these voices. There’s no mudang; instead the author is playing the role of mudang by allowing the protagonist—and us the readers—to hear the stories of the people who were massacred. The stories are not woeful, emotive, hysterical, they are told in a very calm, factual way. There was animosity, a misunderstanding. The UN soldiers were not involved. And once the various souls are satisfied their stories have been heard—they gather together and perform a kind of triumphant finale—they can journey to the afterlife.

That sounds like a very interesting text for our readers, a novel that offers a great deal of insight into both Korean culture and history. Shall we turn our attention to Cho Se-hǔi’s’s The Dwarf next? It was published in 1978 and was a bestseller in Korea. It functions as a series of linked short stories. Can you tell us more?

The early 1970s—more than halfway through the Park Chung Hee dictatorship —was a time when a writer could get in trouble for criticising the military dictatorship and restrictions on civil liberties. Several notable Korean poets and fiction writers served time in jail during the Park Chung Hee era in the 1960s and 1970s.

Cho Sehǔi had something very important that he wanted to talk about, the ‘little people’ who made possible Korea’s rapid journey from poverty. You have to remember that it wasn’t until the mid-1970s that South Korea’s economy caught up with the North Korean economy. He wanted to showcase the factory workers, male and female, who helped this monumental change in South Korea.

“It wasn’t until the mid-1970s that South Korea’s economy caught up with the North Korean economy”

He wanted these stories, which he gathered into a book, to be read by the widest possible readership. And to stay out of jail, he adopted a very terse, concise, syntactically simple writing style. Anyone with a middle school education could read this book. But as you might expect, it’s heavily overlaid with irony. The committed reader will find something of interest.

So it’s not just about the workers, those at the bottom of the socioeconomic ladder. It’s also about the people at the very top, the people who own these conglomerates in a variety of industries—tech, textiles, and so forth. Also playing a prominent role in these twelve or thirteen stories is the emerging middle class, which we see identified with some of the first generation of consumer goods.

When you say ‘little people,’ you are talking both literally and figuratively.

Like most writers, Cho Sehǔi is careful in the words he uses. Presumably his focus on the dwarf represents disproportionate development. If he’s talking about the Korean economy—and most of us agree that this was his goal— Cho Sehǔi is asking us to think about the course of its development, which was distorted during this time.

He first published these stories in literary journals, from 1976 to 1978. Then in 1978 he went to perhaps the most prestigious publisher of literary fiction in South Korea at the time, and the book went through more than a hundred printings. Practically everybody who went to school in South Korea has read this book, or at least knows of it.

He wanted readers to understand what made possible the South Korean ‘economic miracle,’ a phrase often heard when Seoul hosted the Summer Olympics in 1988. So we see some of the stories describing the working conditions of the factories in explicit detail. It reminds me of my mother—she grew up in the years leading up to World War Two and worked for the Boeing aeroplane manufacturing company during the war. In order to navigate the huge buildings in which these planes were built, she and the other women workers had to wear roller skates. Cho Sehǔi adds these sorts of telling details that give readers a sense of exactly the responsibilities that these factory workers had.

In a couple of the stories involving this emerging middle class, we see Shinae, a mother, protecting the dwarf as he’s being beaten by a man who owns a plumbing shop.  Shinae comes out with a kitchen knife and slashes the thug across the arm. These examples of cross-class solidarity occur so infrequently that I think this is one of the most triumphant moments in modern Korean fiction.

Thank you for putting it on our radar, I think a lot of our readers will be interested. But for now, let’s move onto the fourth Korean novel you’d like to recommend, Kim Soom’s One Left.

One of the reasons that some people find Korean fiction dark and depressing is that it covers some of the worst episodes of modern Korean history. Many people still have very negative feelings about the Japanese colonial period. Millions of family members remain divided by the Korean War. There were many who were incarcerated, and in some cases, tortured, during almost thirty years of military dictatorship.

What is significant about books like One Left is that the author is retrieving a significant population of Koreans from historical oblivion, and—once again—giving them voices, like Hwang Sok-Yong did in The Guest.

Believe it or not, it’s estimated that more than 200,000 Korean girls were taken from their ancestral villages after the outbreak of the Second Sino-Japanese War in 1937. They were physically taken, or manipulated by promises of a good job in a factory somewhere, where they could send money back to their families and their villages. Most of them ended up on trains that delivered them to so-called ‘comfort stations’ in Manchuria, where they were forced to sexually service as many as fifty Japanese soldiers a day. Not until 1991, 46 years after World War Two ended, did the first of the survivors go public. Only a small percentage ever made their way back to Korea.

For these girls inducted into sexual servitude, the euphemism ‘comfort women’ came into being; they’re more properly understood as sex slaves, women in indentured sexual servitude.

Not until five years ago was there a novel that focused exclusively on these women. Kim Soom researched all of the survivors’ commentaries, testimonies, newspaper articles, memoir-type essays. At least one of the women she cited gave testimony before the US Congress. And so all the detail in the book is based on historical evidence.

So, historically, the account is accurate, but Kim Soon has placed the story in the present, in a neighbourhood undergoing redevelopment. Most of the residents have moved out in advance of the demolition. The narrator is an unregistered former comfort woman, and most of the novel consists of flashbacks of the protagonist. In the present, she’s keeping count of the surviving women. As the novel begins,  there are more than 50, but by the end there is only ‘one left,’ the title of our translation. The Korean title is, literally, ‘One Person.’

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At the end of the novel the protagonist decides to go to the university hospital where the last woman lies close to death, to tell her that when she’s gone, there will still be one left: she herself.

On the way to the hospital, she remembers a time when she and some of the other girls from the Manchurian comfort station were on their way into a nearby town to serve the soldiers stationed there, and they had to cross a river in a boat. On their way back, the boat encountered rough water, and the protagonist was thrown overboard. She thought she was done for, but felt arms taking hold of her, and heard voices calling out her given name, a name she had not used or even thought of for seventy years. So in this way she is reclaiming her identity, the name she was given at birth, reclaiming those twelve or thirteen years spent in her childhood village. And by doing so she stands for each one of the 200,000-plus girls who were taken away. That’s the meaning of Kim Soom’s ‘One Person.’

I think that brings us, finally, to the final Korean novel we’re going to be discussing, Gong Ji-young’s   Togani. The title translates as ‘The Crucible’; it was first published in Korea in 2009 and your and Ju-Chan’s translation was released from the University of Hawai’i Press in spring 2023.

Once again we have a combination of compelling subject matter and an appropriate literary style for the subject matter. The novel is based on a real case of what you might call a sexual reign of terror at an institute for special needs children in South Korea. The victims were primarily hearing- and speech-impaired children, some of whom also had psychological disabilities. The perpetrators were twin brothers, sons of the Christian minister who founded the ironically named ‘Home of Benevolence.’

The protagonist of the novel ends up at this school as a kind of temporary teacher by happenstance. On his very first day at the school he hears a girl screaming from the women’s bathroom.

Gong Ji-young handles this potentially explosive subject matter by writing what you might call a novel of manners—a novel in which we see different elements of society interacting. Readers interested in how Korean society functions will find it interesting for that reason. We see, occasionally in the form of amusing anecdotes and dialogues, how the upper crust of this provincial city comes together to shield the twins when this pattern of sexual abuse becomes public.

But there are a couple of elements to the narrative that are rare in modern Korean fiction. There’s a prolonged courtroom scene… Now, I know that many readers in the UK are happy with police procedurals— The Inspector Lynley Mysteries , Vera … we’re big fans of the Midsomer Murders over here and have recently become addicted to the American Law and Order show.

In the climactic courtroom scene, one of the children is asked to identify which of the two identical twins assaulted her. In other words, the defense counsel is asking how she could know which of the identical twins was the perpetrator. The girl thinks about this, and signs a request to the judge: may she examine them closely? It’s granted. So she goes up to the two twins very closely and begins signing to them, and one of the men’s faces turns red. She points to him and says: he’s the one.

This is very unusual. It’s an example of how, little by little, we see what we might think of as genre elements coming into Korean literary fiction. There are also two long letters, which of course reminds us of the epistolary novel—novels that take place primarily through letters. I think that’s what makes this novel so significant as a work of literature. It was also made into a film which was a huge success and returned the novel to bestseller lists.

Many Korean citizens became outraged at the light sentences given to the two twins—six-month suspended sentences, with no jail time. So many Koreans demonstrated against this injustice that the Korean National Assembly passed a series of laws to strengthen the penalties. These laws did away with the statute of limitations on crimes involving the sexual abuse of minors, and relaxed the stringent requirements governing admissible evidence.

As a result, they came to be known as the Togani Laws , after the title of the novel. So here we see not only literary success but the power of literature to effect change in national law.

That’s a remarkable story. Thank you for sharing that. I think it brings us to the close of our discussion of these five Korean novels that everyone should read. But is there anything else you’d like to add, in terms of advice for those reading Korean fiction for the first time?

Yes. Some of what you will read may be disturbing. It’s dark. But if you are able to exercise empathy, to hear what’s being said, to feel what’s being felt, perhaps you will find some commonalities with your life.

What you read won’t necessarily be cheerful, but the way the authors treat the material leaves us with hope by shedding light on places that have gone dark to the detriment of an understanding of, and compassion for, what our fellow citizens have experienced.

July 7, 2023

Five Books aims to keep its book recommendations and interviews up to date. If you are the interviewee and would like to update your choice of books (or even just what you say about them) please email us at [email protected]

©Oliver Mann

Bruce Fulton

Bruce Fulton is the Young-Bin Min Chair in Korean Literature and Literary at the University of British Columbia. He is the co-translator, with Ju-Chan Fulton, of numerous works of modern Korean fiction, most recently Togani ; recipient of a Manhae Grand Prize in Literature; and editor of The Penguin Book of Korean Short Stories .

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How to Learn Korean with Easy Short Stories

Do you wish you could combine your passion for books with your Korean studies ?

Well, lucky you. You absolutely can! Not sure how to go about it or where to find them?

Then read on.

I’ve rounded up the eight best online resources to find and read Korean short stories. Plus, my best tips for learning Korean through reading.

1. 깨비키즈 (Kebikids)

2. 쥬니어 네이버 (junior naver), 3. 채널예스 (channel yes), 4. lonweb parallel texts, 5. beelinguapp, 6. naver’s bilingual 만화 (manhwa), 7. korean comics, 8. koreanclass101 youtube reading playlists for absolute beginners and beginners, why read easy korean short stories, and one more thing....

Download: This blog post is available as a convenient and portable PDF that you can take anywhere. Click here to get a copy. (Download)

This colorful site gathers many fascinating short stories that are incredibly easy to follow and understand, no matter how new or advanced your Korean studies are.

Finding fun, friendly animated characters, modern graphics and catchy songs, you’ll discover original stories about animals, life and the past.

The site offers free and premium stories. If you cannot use a Korean social security number and create a login, stick to the free materials. There are enough to keep you busy.

The site doesn’t allow me to embed links other than to the homepage, so to find easy short stories, click on the 동화 (children’s story) icon on the home page header.

This is the sixth icon from the left. Short stories are displayed as a gallery.

There are some great choices in there. Don’t miss out on “로미오와 줄리엣” ( Romeo and Juliet), Shakespeare’s most famous love story, and “엄지공주” (Thumbelina), that uplifting fairy tale by Hans Christian Andersen.

This fantastic library of accessible and diverse Korean short stories aggregates the best content from the Korean internet.

Highly visual, fun and easy to navigate, the free site lets you access hundreds of original and famous short video stories in Korean, perfect for improving your listening skills.

Their story categories include:

• Popular stories
• Modern life stories
• Classic stories
• Traditional Korean stories
• Aesop’s fables

Videos average five minutes per clip, making them easy to fit into even the busiest study schedule.

Extra Resources and Recommendations:

• “ 여우와 신포도 ” (The Fox and the Grapes)

This site is great for finding original, animated and easy Korean short stories.

Simply go to 한글 동화 (Korean children’s story)  to retrieve the selection and be prepared for some exciting content.

Like Naver, there are video short stories. But the best part about them is that each video is accompanied by a brief blurb describing the story.

This is a great help to identify key vocabulary and characters before you dive in.

Navigating the site from the above section is incredibly easy, as you have the option to browse stories by themes, such as 명작 (classic) and 생활 (life).

Simply click on the buttons from the section header to display a more refined selection.

• This comical animal story about a friendly bear with a pressing natural need

Lonweb has a few parallel texts in various languages. But you’re not going to find authentic Korean texts here.

Still, you can read about the adventures of Daisy Hamilton the detective, with parallel texts in English, Korean and Romanized Korean (as well as audio).

A note about Romanization: If you’re reading this post, you’ve probably already learned Hangul.

If you haven’t, I’m not sure that I would recommend picking it up alongside Daisy Hamilton or the texts in these other resources.

But I also don’t think it’s necessarily a disadvantage that Romanization is provided here.

The Romanization column in the middle separates the Hangul from the English, which pads you against getting distracted by the English translation while reading in Korean.

• “The Search for Lorna” Parallel Text
• Guide: Learn the Korean Alphabet Through Resources and History

Android App | iPhone App

This resource is useful for immediately accessing Korean-English bilingual texts on your phone.

Like Lonweb, you won’t necessarily find authentic reading here. But rather parallel texts that have been translated across various languages for various levels.

Texts come with “karaoke” reading —automatically self-highlighting as the audio plays—which is useful for staying focused on the Korean text and increasing your reading speed while learning new vocabulary in context.

You’ll find everything here, from simple lists of sentences to classic novels.

Webcomics come in bite-sized pieces, making each episode a perfect little mini-story.

Naver offers two online manhwa (comics) sites, one in English and one in Korean, with some webtoons available in both languages.

Manhwa is already great for learning through visual context clues, and the presence of English translations means you can check your understanding.

• “ 마음의 소리 ” (“ The Sound of Your Heart ”) — a popular South Korean webtoon by Jo Seok that has inspired two television series. Based on the author’s life, it applies a bizarre drawing style and an absurd sense of humor to everyday situations and has 526 pages to read through.
• Korean Wikipedia (to find more webcomics) — Find a webcomic that looks interesting and is somewhat well-known. You may be able to copy the title into Wikipedia and find the English title by switching the article language to English.
• Guide: How to Start Reading Korean Webtoons on Your Phone Right Now
• WEBTOON — site to find Korean webcomics in English

This neat little blog gives you short, entertaining comics to read with optional English translations beneath them.

Just hit the “English” option in the menu bar at the top of the page to hide the translations or make them visible.

The translations include cultural notes —from Korean brands of alcohol and hangover cures, to film, currency and street food.

Since the comics are isolated into small blocks, you can take your time with them and use the translations and cultural notes to make them into intensive mini-lessons.

Although they’re not strictly short stories, these animated videos test your understanding of written Korean through common scenarios like buying a train ticket.

You can logically deduce some word meanings from context, which helps you understand usage and aids memorization.

In the videos, you’ll look at Hangul and have a certain amount of time to interpret the text—such as the information on your train ticket.

While these playlists don’t provide extensive materials for practice, they help you get used to practical reading in time-sensitive situations.

Plus, they conveniently combine reading practice with listening practice, so you can work on your listening comprehension and your accent as you read.

The content available on the KoreanClass101 channel can vary for non-subscribers, but you can search within the channel to find reading resources for other levels, too.

• 8 Bright Resources for Korean Listening Practice
• KoreanClass101’s video for advanced reading comprehension
• They have simple plots and vocabulary. This makes it easy for you to focus on what matters most: the writing. The more you read, the better you’ll get at making quick progress in Korean and familiarizing yourself with various Korean words, idioms and structures.
• They stimulate your imagination. What makes easy Korean short stories special is that they take you to a fantasy world created just for you by their authors. They’ll also take your mind away from studying, enabling you to learn more naturally. This makes reading short stories a pleasant experience with positive, long-lasting outcomes for your Korean skills.
• They’re rooted in Korean culture . Storytelling, through the tradition of 판소리 (pansori) —musical storytelling—is part of Korean folklore. In pansori , the narrator usually blends singing with the narrative to give the story more emotional impact. The art of telling stories is intrinsic to the Korean lifestyle.

Opt for stories that you already know and read them in Korean.

This will make it easier for you to focus on grammar and learning new Korean vocabulary .

A great place to start looking is Korean sites or publishing houses focusing on children’s literature since they often translate iconic Western stories, myths and fables.

Write down new words and structures.

If you don’t want to break up your reading flow, use a pencil or highlighter to mark difficult vocabulary.

Then return to it when you read the story a second time.

Note the words in a notepad, search for them in your dictionary and try to memorize them before giving this story a third read. ( This article lists some great Korean dictionary apps to complement your studies.)

You’ll quickly find that this keeps the process engaging and productive!

Create a routine.

Make reading these stories a habit, and don’t be afraid to set a fixed daily time to read them.

If you have limited time, try to read at night when your work is completed and when you have plenty of time to relax.

Look at dead time in your schedule and turn it into productive time. Start reading while riding the subway, waiting at the dentist’s office or when stuck at home waiting for a delivery.

Read stories in chunks of two or three.

The best way to make reading in Korean more manageable is to split the stories into sections and read them over multiple sessions.

This makes them more digestible and will help you get excited about the stories you’re reading. And if you can’t wait for the next session to read the next chunk, by all means, don’t resist!

Combine reading with writing, listening and speaking exercises.

Every Korean short story you read should be accompanied by exercises that strengthen the other language skills.

And thanks to today’s technology, you can use an app or website to practice them while reading.

For example, if you watch a short story on FluentU , you can use the built-in tools.

FluentU takes authentic videos—like music videos, movie trailers, news and inspiring talks—and turns them into personalized language learning lessons.

You can try FluentU for free for 2 weeks. Check out the website or download the iOS app or Android app.

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These eight resources are treasure troves of memorable and inspiring Korean short stories.

If you enjoyed this post, you're already halfway to having the time of your life learning Korean with FluentU !

FluentU makes it possible to learn with K-pop videos, funny commercials, entertaining web series and more. Just a quick look will give you an idea of the variety of FluentU videos on offer :

FluentU really takes the grunt work out of learning languages, leaving you with nothing but engaging, effective and efficient learning. It's already hand-picked the best videos for you (which are organized by level and topic), so all you have to do is simply choose any video that strikes your fancy to get started.

Each word in the interactive captions comes with a definition, audio, image, example sentences and more.

Access a complete interactive transcript of every video under the Dialogue tab, and easily review words and phrases from the video under Vocab .

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TOPIK Writing Section Crash Course

Is the Writing Section your weakest point in the TOPIK Test?

Do TOPIK Essay Writing questions scare you?

Do you find it difficult to express your thoughts clearly in your Korean essay?

Are you not able to get a higher level of TOPIK just because of a low score in TOPIK Writing section?

You are not alone!

Actually most of the people score the lowest in the writing section of TOPIK II.

And because of that they are not able to get the desired TOPIK level.

When asked why they scored low in the TOPIK writing most of the people give one of the following reasons:

My Grammar is weak. I don’t know many advanced level grammar patterns or can’t use them correctly.

I don’t know many words. So, I can’t express myself well. Sometimes I can’t even understand the essay topic clearly because I don’t know some words.

I think my essay writing is not that bad but I don’t know why I get such a low score. May be my sentences are not ‘advanced enough’.

Actually, the real problem is none of the above.

• The real problem is that you don’t know what the examiners want to read in your essays.
• The real problem is that you don’t know how to write a great high scoring essay without learning new ‘advanced level’ grammar or vocabulary. Your existing knowledge of Korean grammar and vocabulary is good enough to write a well structured essay.
• The real problem is that you don’t know the secrets of comprehending and using the words that you don’t know. Yeah, you read it right. You can even write a complete TOPIK essay without knowing a single word given in the question. Not in every essay but definitely in some cases.
• The real problem is that you don’t know what is considered a ‘great’ essay in ‘Korean’. Structure, style and flow of a Korean Essay are different from an English Essay. May be you are just applying the wrong rules and techniques when writing your Korean essay.

In last 6 years, we have helped (through our One-on-One online classes ) hundreds of Korean language learners who were struggling with Korean writing because of the problems we mentioned above. Our methods literally shocked them. They couldn’t believe they could improve their Korean essay writing skills so quickly without memorizing new grammar and vocabulary for months and years. The methods developed by our experts not only helped them get the desired TOPIK level but also improved their Korean writing skills in general. Now, they were able to frame their sentences in a better way, organize and express their thoughts more clearly.

Problem was that only those of our readers who took online classes from us were able to benefit from those methods. So, we thought why not make a very specific and pointed course addressing the TOPIK Writing Section. and that’s how we came up with –

Who is this course for?

• This course is meant for those taking TOPIK test II (aiming for level 3, 4, 5 or 6) in 2017 and wanting to improve their score in the writing section.
• We  strongly think that the curse will also be useful to those Korean language learners as well who just want to improve their Korean writing skills in general, not for the TOPIK test.

What are the minimum requirements to take this course?

The course is in English so any Korean language learner can take it but we expect you to have at least beginner level Korean language proficiency.

How long will it take me to complete this course.

• This crash course will have 3 modules and 10 short and crisp video lessons with PDF worksheets.
• It should take you maximum 2-3 hours to complete the course.

After completing the course what will I be able to do?

By the end of this course:-

• You will understand what the TOPIK evaluators want to see in your Korean essays and how they mark them.
• You will be able to write well structured and high scoring Korean essays. Yup, without learning new grammar and vocabulary for weeks and months.
• You will be able to write better sentences and paragraphs in Korean, using your existing knowledge of Korean grammar and vocabulary.
• You will be able to boost your score in TOPIK Writing Section and get the desired level.

The course will be launched this December!

If you are planning to take TOPIK test in 2017 and are interested in the course, let us know your email ID and you will be the first to know when the course is launched.

• Themes in Korean Lit
• Overseas Angle
• Book for You

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[Essay] Magnolia Melancholia

Sometimes, rapturous futures are only reached after passing through the most terrible of nightmares. Having captured the attention of Korean readers with her creative story structure for many years, Choi Eunmi shows time and time again that dark things lurk beneath the beauty and happiness of everyday life. Simply put, beneath the many layers of life is a sea of terrifying and violent emotions. In Magnolia Sutra, for example, one of her most famous works, Choi depicts through fairy tale-like imagination the cycle connecting life and death, a deterministic world view, as well as the heredity of bad karma between a mother and daughter. Choi borrows the forms of fairy tales and fables in her story about a girl named Mulian who inherits the sins of her murderous mother. In this instance, Choi chooses the safest method for depicting violence of a most frightening world. Subverting traditional tropes used by fairy tales, like good triumphing over evil and justice prevailing, this story ends with a picture of a cold, emotionless world.    The magical world of fairy tales, which easily resolves conflicts and contradictions, is completely deconstructed by Choi’s icy gaze. Choi is perhaps more aware than anyone about how resentful violence and inescapable hatred are facts of life in a world where people must coexist. Heart-warming endings are not enough to solve the complexity of this world. Literary critic Kim Hyeong-jung’s reading of Choi’s somewhat pessimistic and masochistic gaze as an “allegory for hell” accurately presents the brutality delicately woven into her novels. Life-disrupting death and fiery, bone-engulfing hatred are the reality of our world.    The aesthetic of this novel is paradoxical because it paints Mulian’s melancholic life with the sweet fragrance of a magnolia tree. We cannot deny the pain and violence that Mulian faces, but there is immense beauty in how the novel depicts these realities with metaphors that conjure myth and fairy tales. She uses the most beautiful language to paint the most violent world.     In The Ninth Wave, her follow-up to Magnolia Sutra, Choi showed real-world, social concerns through a story about a proposed nuclear power plant and the regional social conflicts that surround it. By her second short story collection, A Person Made from Snow, Choi’s fiction began to address different problems from those of earlier works. In particular, she makes careful observations about the way in which the pandemic negatively affected daily life, pouring into her novel the various practical concerns that arose during that time. Choi’s gaze, which was already astutely aware of the violence of the world, shifted focus to confront the various catastrophic situations brought about by the pandemic. The deep valley of emotion that forms when social affects like isolation and transmission, fear and viruses, vaccines and social distancing, come into contact with personal conflicts is an important driving force in bringing out unexpected narratives.    Of the many such works, “Here We Are, Face to Face” tells the story of married women who during the COVID-19 pandemic, must cope with an increase in caretaker work. Constantly checking for fevers, proving their vaccination status, using debit cards from the government filled with emergency funds—the women in this novel, who are all in their forties, are denied a comfortable space to exist because of their unique status as mothers and workers in dual-income families. For these women, who work as workshop owners and public transportation assistants, the scope of their work doesn’t allow them to separate their private and public lives. For example, the soap making workshop that the main character owns begins from a “home workshop,” and Sumi, a female driver, has two things demanded of her at the same time: driving and assisting people onto the vehicle. Furthermore, the burden of housework invades their workspace and destroys their efficiency of labor. And even when they take just a short break from work, they cannot help but think about housework, like repairing the air purifier or restocking the refrigerator, and thus do not even know what it means to separate work and home.    The women in her novels cry out in frustration, complaining that no one has taught them how to raise children under such conditions; they urinate blood because they overwork themselves attempting to achieve perfection both at home and at work; and they specially prepare vegetable juice for their husbands, whose blood test results can either make or ruin their day. Not only do they have to endure intense labor that blurs the line between private and public, but they also must endure the intense emotional fatigue of being child caretakers. What can save these women who have died many deaths while fighting with their children, their husbands, and themselves?     Married women struggling for survival naturally lean on one another, but this relationship can never provide them with utopian solidarity because, as Choi’s stories show us, greed and envy will eventually re-isolate people. These women yearn for a safe place, but the pandemic has converted personal homes into virtual classrooms. Beyond the screen of a laptop, we witness the safest of places—a house—collapsing at the sound of a woman’s pain.     Precarious sounds, walls crackling and crumbling, fragile objects breaking—all of these reflect the reality of women who become isolated in the depths of pain they can never share with anyone. And yet, Choi goes one step beyond this terrifying awareness of reality. By simply staring into the face of other women who are in the same pain, women can overcome some of these feelings of isolation. Through a mirror that shows us that inherent in all of us is animosity and rage that threaten those closest to us, we see that Choi’s gaze has come to realize the violence of reality in a different light than before. Hers is not a world that ends with a cold-hearted message about violence, but a story about us as individuals who fully recognize the violence lurking in all subjects.     And going beyond making observations about the precarious reality of women, Choi also depicts in a new light the sex of women. In Yours Truly, female friends who raise their children together eventually hold each other back. For example, we have the following scene, in which Jin-ah takes out a pack of frozen breastmilk from the freezer, thus confessing to the first-person protagonist of the story that she is defined by her past and her sex as a mother:     “Jin-ah, if you leave it out like that, all of it will melt.”    Jin-ah doesn’t budge.    “I’m going to thaw all of it today. I’m going to thaw it all and pour it out. Just like you pour water into the kitchen sink.”    As Jin-ah says this, she picks up and hands me the stack of papers lying next to us on the chair, her face looking like a good student who used to get perfect marks. Day 9, Day 30, Day 56, Day 98. . . Lactation times for each breast, milk quotas to achieve weight goals, stool and urination counts for the baby. . . All of this diligently recorded over seven months, not a day missing.    “This is the milk that was inside my body back then,” Jin-ah says. “It’s the last bit of breastmilk I could have fed the baby. The milk I squeezed out of my body while crying all night watching my sleeping baby. Back then, every day was a roller coaster of emotion. These are six frozen lumps of me from back then, of Yoony from back then. And now I’m going to thaw them.”    Jin-ah’s hair is stuck to her cheeks with sweat.     “This is me. . . This is everything.”    Goodbye. I’m positive that’s what Jin-ah said. Goodbye, Yeong-ji.     Jin-ah has stored her breastmilk and all the history surrounding it, in a freezer for more than a decade. She puts this milk and history out on a table during a hot day to melt. Hidden in this scene, is a strange type of affect, furiously going back and forth between the maternity, childcare, friendship, and affection of women. Through this scene in which frozen lumps of breastmilk turn to sticky liquid, Choi makes the reader reimagine the relationship between Jin-ah and the protagonist of the story. In other words, this precarious relationship will disintegrate, collapse, or remain all right. Choi discovers a region that no one else who depicts female relationships has been able to discover. It is neither an amicable nor a hostile relationship, but a complex relationship between married women who are navigating maternity and their sexuality as women.    Thus in Person Made from Snow, violence and pain are no longer inherited, as they were in Magnolia Sutra; they melt smoothly. Now, as the critic Kang Ji-hui has noted, the violence in Choi’s novels has transformed into “something like liquid or gas, melting and evaporating with the flow of nature, as opposed to legends with rigid worldviews.” This transformation from a threat that stubbornly persists in the world into something that accumulates and then melts can be understood as a slight relaxation in Choi’s grim perception of reality.    Choi’s persistent gaze toward violence is not a cold-hearted resignation that leaves violence as violence, but a desperate struggle to find survival within violence. The novel Face to Face, Choi’s most recent work and a full-length novel that expands upon the aforementioned “Here We Are, Face to Face,” demonstrates a commitment into the future of her study of the sensations after violence. Just as Choi once wrote, we must view life from the bosom of deep time, as if those whom we sensed during the pandemic are both the same people who lived before it and the same people who will live after it. And I trust this commitment of Choi’s. Translated by Sean Lin Halbert  Korean Works Mentioned:•   Face to Face (Changbi, 2023)      『마주』 (창비, 2023)•   A Person Made from Snow (Munhakdongne, 2021)     『눈으로 만든 사람』 (문학동네, 2021)•   The Ninth Wave (Munhakdongne, 2017)     『아홉번째 파도』 (문학동네, 2017)•   Magnolia Sutra (Moonji, 2015)     『목련정전』 (문학과지성사, 2015)

by Chunglim Jun

[Cover Feature] Such Small Moments

“When will you rest?” I’m asked this quite often these days. Well, when will I rest? I’ve been teaching more college courses since last year, and on off-lecture days, I work at a bookshop. I spend three weekdays on campus, two at the shop. On weekends, I write and catch up on chores. The potted plant I’d recently received as a gift withered from neglect. It was a birthday gift . . . During busy spells, I don’t take a single day off. Sudden free time makes me anxious as I wonder if I’ve forgotten to do anything. I believe I’m in control of my time and tasks, but lately, they’ve been nipping at my heels.    I enjoy the reading and writing—even the other related tasks can’t be separated from the life I wish to live. But now I know. I’m beat. It took me long enough to see it. Reading is no longer a pastime but an extension of work. Sometimes, I suspect that I’m deceiving myself, conforming to assigned roles instead of working with self-agency.    After lecturing at the college located a four-hour round trip away, I muse on the subway ride home. I want to distance myself from this life. I want to go someplace far away. Maybe that’s why. Traveling is my only pause. The only bright spot in my busy routine comes with choosing a city and making plans to visit. Every day, I scour the internet for flights and accommodations. No matter if the trip falls through. Imagining is enough to pull me slightly beyond my quotidian force field.     I recently traveled to Tokyo. I looked forward to one thing—staying open to chance. To empty myself of thoughts triggered by controlled situations, embracing chance sensations instead. The beauty of travel lies in those moments that let you shed routine-hardened senses. But they now seem harder to cast off. For one, there’s my smartphone . . . It keeps information at my fingertips, but at times, I long to leave it in a drawer as I voyage away. Wanting to at least leave my laptop behind, I stayed up late working the night before the trip. I finalized my students’ grades and pre-ordered books for the bookshop. I double-checked everything to preempt work-related texts and calls. Later, I walked through customs, imagining the impossible: Could I have traveled without my phone?    Tokyo was the fifth Japanese city I visited. I had put it off, making the belated journey after seeing Fukuoka, Nagoya, Okinawa, and Kyoto. (I always used the Korean pronunciation “Donggyeong” for “Tōkyō,” getting teased for an old-fashioned habit supposedly betraying my gukmin-hakgyo-era upbringing.)[1] Outside the window the sun was setting as I took the Narita Express to Shinagawa Station. I overheard several non-Japanese languages—Chinese, English, and French. The eager voices chattered while I dozed off. The late-night work had taken its toll, it seemed. I arrived at my lodgings barely awake.     I was struck by the sheer number of people in Tokyo. The Shibuya Crossing and Akihabara Electric Town were inundated with pedestrians, and all the restaurants I stumbled on had long lines as if according to script. Like a scene from The Truman Show. Awed by the crowds, I stared and wondered where they came from. Instead of relaxing, I grew tenser than usual, even wishing to return straight home.    I mulled over my previous trips. Does the fleeting getaway from familiar routines and settings lead to any rest? Am I not being my own taskmaster, utterly exhausted as I trudge back to the hotel and collapse into sleep? Outside the window, the Tokyo Tower gleamed in the distance with several metro lines passing by in the background. Thoughts crossed my mind, one after another. Being too intent on rest, I was hardly enjoying my trip. Rest by compulsion. The pressure of time and tasks had been replaced by my coercive self pushing me across the sea.     Until age nineteen, I grew up in the countryside. The hillside village had only three buses a day going into town. Looking back, the place had enjoyed clear boundaries of rest. Seasons and weather separated work from repose—as an entirely “natural” consequence. For instance, farmers would leave the fields and head home at sunset, and once the cold winter set in, they would allow their bodies enough rest for the coming year. Nature affected the on-off switch of daily activities, and those rhythms set the pace for managing life.    On days without work, Father looked after plants and animals. His time was divided almost equally between work and care. Even on off days, he rose at dawn. He built a chicken coop in a corner of the warehouse, and when two farm dogs had puppies at the same time, he cared for nearly twenty pups. Father was delighted when I was given a jujube sapling for helping at a friend’s orchard. The friend’s father said it would take time for the sapling to bear fruit in our yard. Our family took turns looking after the sapling. Whoever had time watered it and kept the base free of weeds. As the seasons passed, we gathered around on holidays and spoke about the tree. Within three years, it bore fruit.    In the summer, villagers sat by the stream to escape the heat, and in winter, they swept the snow at dawn, exchanging greetings. Together, we worked and rested. The city, where I could work anytime, pressured me to work all the time. The sleepless, insomniac city disrupted my sleep.     Outside central Tokyo lies a neighborhood called Kichijoji. I chose that quieter place for the last day of my trip and woke up early to catch the train. I watched the tall buildings through the window gradually give way to single-story houses. Having boarded an express train bypassing Kichijoji, I got off at the next stop, Mitaka Station. I decided to walk the extra distance. The paths were quiet, and cyclists passed by now and then. I saw locals walking their dogs and reading newspapers in the park. Aside from my travel companion, no other tourists were in sight. My edginess eased. We spotted a used bookshop on the way and stepped inside. The front counter was empty, and even as we browsed, no one arrived. My friend chose several story books in the children’s section while I reached for pocket-sized paperbacks. We had made our selections by the time the apparent owner emerged, adjusting his glasses. He took his time tallying the prices on a calculator. Once the books were in our backpacks, we left the shop.    As we neared the small goods and vintage shops of Nakamichi Shopping Street, I saw several places leisurely opening for the day. No rush, no hurry. At a playground with a stately elm, a child squealed and skipped around. My friend and I bought donuts and ate them on a bench. The child left while we sat in the sunlight. A chilly breeze rustled the tree. Perhaps it was for these moments that I traveled. Small moments, an hour or even ten minutes at most. And for the places where those times gathered.    Tokyo had plenty of old cafés that seemed to stand still in time. I walked in the door, finding the streetside bustle fading like a distant memory. Shown to a table, I was served a hot towel and a glass of water. My eyes ran over the posters and faded patches of wallpaper as other customers came and went. Some of them were reading, some were waving at others and joining them, some gestured at each other mid-chatter, and some peered gravely at their phones. I ordered the “morning set,” a Japanese café staple, and sipped on a cup of their “blend coffee.” Ambient jazz melodies and hazy indoor air. Now that I’ve left Tokyo, I remember the place as a cozy nook overlaid with small scenes.     “Did you rest well?”     My travel companion and I asked each other on our return flight. In my daily life, I make different attempts to rest well or empty myself. At the end of those mostly failed attempts, I look to the next try with quasi-resigned hope. One does their best at work, but can they do their best to rest? In his book The End of Work, the American economist Jeremy Rifkin predicts that more free time and less working time will establish new lifestyle modes in the place of traditional culture.[2]  This points to the possibility of surplus time encompassing time for leisure or self-enrichment—in short, the possibility of rest.    When asked, “What do you do to rest?” most people say, “Nothing,” but that’s easier said than done. To do so, one must do nothing at all. I recall doing the following to rest:    1. Gaming. I once spent a fortnight shut in at home, gaming. I buried myself in the game without going out to see anyone or stopping to work. With my PlayStation plugged into the TV, I barely budged from the armchair. My daily routine went sideways, but my mind was somehow refreshed.    2. Watching TV dramas. When a minor surgery kept me homebound for a month, I binge-watched drama series. My friends had recommended several shows. I’ve been hooked ever since, and now I have several OTT subscriptions.    3. Sleeping. I used to get my sleep in one stretch. But with intervals of sleeping and eating, sleeping again and eating . . . the slight regret over time spent asleep is now compensated by the sense of being recharged.As one would expect, resting bears on the question of how to spend non-working time. Free time will only increase in the long run. Not working as much as others used to make me an anomaly, but now I seem to go against the norm by not taking proper rest.    I recently took up table tennis. In part for the exercise, but I also longed for physical learning. While writing my manuscript, I made a few resolutions. First, to separate work from rest. To work with greater focus and switch off to relax. Next, to ward off emptiness and ennui by seeking out new interests. To find occasions, not necessarily big or grand, that move my soul. Finally, to embrace the surplus nature of unproductive time. Doing nothing may be a challenge, but I can still free myself of guilt. These are my only wishes as I embark on 2024. Translated by Sunnie Chae  [1] Translator’s note: the term gukmin hakgyo [elementary school], a remnant of the colonial era, was changed to chodeung hakgyo by the Education Act Amendment Act No. 5069 in December 1995. [2] Jeremy Rifkin, The End of Work: The Decline of the Global Labor Force and the Dawn of the Post-Market Era (New York: A Jeremy P. Tarcher/Putnam Book, 1995), 221. 

by Min Byeonghun

[Cover Feature] Letting Go and Living with Mold

Living through COVID-19, a global pandemic, we all came to have a unique story of our own, one that could be shared with others. In 2020, the year marking the sweeping spread of the pandemic that upended the conventional human way of life, my own daily life didn’t change much. I read and write for a living, which I can do well enough without leaving the house or meeting people face to face. I continued to work from home as before, corresponding with my editors through email. The swimming pool I used to frequent daily closed down, though, so I spent more time walking instead, going out to the neighborhood park when it wasn’t crowded. The class I taught was switched to online at the start of the spring semester, but since the class was small, I invited the students to my place from time to time to have class and lunch together.    The most notable change in my life during that time was that I won access to a community garden patch overseen by the district office, and became a city farmer for the first time in my life. Around the end of March I plowed the soil; in April I planted seedlings of lettuce, tomato, eggplant, crown daisy, cilantro, and peppermint; I also sowed seeds of rucola, canola, carrot, dill, and radish, and waited for them to sprout. With the coming of May, the crops grew taller by the day, drinking in the sunlight and the warm air. In June, flowers blossomed, dazzling my eyes. I dug out the flowers by the roots and shared them with some fellow gardeners, then brought the rest home and put them in water. I placed a row of transparent bottles along the white wall and filled them with dill, tall with an abundance of yellow blossoms. I learned through the garden patch that flowers of edible plants are just as beautiful as decorative flowers. I had brought nature—the work of my own hands—not only into the kitchen but into the entire house as well, which quite pleased me.    So passed spring, and summer arrived. The rainy season that year was uncommonly long. In the central region of the Korean Peninsula, where Seoul is located, it lasted for fifty-four days, from 24 June to 16 August—the longest on record since 1973. Day after day, I would alternately close the windows when it rained, and open them when it cleared to let fresh air in.Mid-August, toward the end of the rainy season, I noticed a suspicious stain on the wall next to the study window. I went up for a closer look and saw three round spots of mold. Appalled, I immediately searched for how to remove mold, then wiped them away using a rag and diluted bleach solution. I was to leave on a three-day trip the next day, so it would be disastrous for the mold to spread with all the windows of the house closed and no one home.    When I came home I found that the spots of mold, to my horror, had returned in exactly the same color and size as before. I was utterly dismayed, but I mustered my strength and once again got rid of them. Then I went into the kitchen to cook and have my first meal back home. Feeling refreshed after getting rid of the mold, I wanted to set a nice table; I opened a cabinet drawer and took out a wooden spoon, which I don’t use very often. But something felt off; I took a good look at the spoon and found green mold along the edge of the oval head. A disheartening thought froze my mind: was it possible that everything in the house made of organic matter was covered in mold? I never used an electric fan or air conditioner, as the cold, artificial air didn’t agree with me; during the unprecedentedly long rainy season, the stagnant humidity in the house might have given rise to mold in unchecked corners.    I promptly threw open the kitchen cabinet doors and inspected the inside of each cabinet. My gut feeling had been right—a thin layer of mold had formed not only on the wooden spoons, but also in the grooves of all the wooden articles such as a bamboo wicker tray and a plate carved from a log. Even so, up to that point, I was ready to tackle the mold. At once, I pulled out all the household articles in the cabinets and sterilized the cabinets with alcohol. I washed the dishes, let them sit in diluted bleach solution for a time, then rinsed them again with water. Tiresome as it was, three days should be plenty to complete the task, I thought. I felt lucky that only the wooden items had been affected, and was relieved that the books remained untainted. Talking to a friend on the phone, I joked around and laughed, saying the books must be unscathed because I didn’t read much.    After cleaning the kitchen, I started on the study. As I dusted off the bookshelves, my eyes fell on the hardcover volumes in the original languages. To my astonishment, molds of different colors—white, green, yellow—lined the angular edges of the fabric covers. The molds were markedly different in color and shape from the ordinary kind that arise in the bathroom or kitchen when it’s not regularly cleaned, and the sight of them sickened me. I had never seen a life form of their kind before. Rubbing my arms to ease the goose bumps, I tried to cool my head, and making an effort not to shut my eyes, I went through each and every book on the shelves. Mold had taken over a good number of them, not only the fabric-covered ones but the paperbacks as well. A volume of Walter Benjamin’s work in English revealed, when I lifted its dust cover, white mold inside the hard covers and on the spine. Without hesitation, I shoved it into a paper bag. Avital Ronell’s Stupidity in its original English was ruined as well. Quarantining Benjamin and Ronell in the paper bag and throwing them out the door, I wept for the first time because of the mold. Not because the beautiful thoughts and words had been corroded by something so trivial as mold; my feelings of loss and grief were for the words underlined in inks of various colors and the notes in the margins. The traces of those days in which I had so struggled to make sense of the abstruse texts had been stolen by the mold. What had been taken from and become lost to me were not certain volumes by certain scholars, but those days of stupidity.    Calming myself, I walked past the shelves of books in English and looked through the books in German and French. My heart raced, as I didn’t know how badly the paperback books had been damaged; then I realized that funnily enough, the damage differed in degree depending on the publisher. The pages of the dark blue Suhrkamp editions of philosophical works being fungi-resistant, were clean though faded yellow. Thus the entire collection of Benjamin’s works in German, as well as Kant’s Critique of Judgment and Hegel’s Aesthetics, survived. So did the peach-colored Gallimard paperbacks and Folio editions. As for the French PUF editions, however, pretty green mold had developed along the spines; so the works by Foucault, Laplanche, and Kant were expelled. Scrutinizing the shelves, I grew increasingly cold and desensitized, feeling no regret at tying the books up in bundles and dumping them. Distancing myself from mold was the most critical issue at hand, and I no longer had any qualms about mechanically eliminating, expelling, and isolating what had been tainted with mold.     Now came the time to examine the shelf of Korean books. I noted that a shimmering green-gray mold had accumulated on all of the Workroom Press “Proposals” series. I’d never seen mold of such beautiful color before. It resembled rust on ancient bronze artifacts. In admiration, I yearned to contemplate it in silence. These books, I never wanted to dispose of. With each publication of the series, the editor had arranged a gathering with the translator, which I’d attended every time and took notes, in the book, of the translator’s words. Discarding the books was like discarding the vividness of those moments and the words, which I wouldn’t be able to hear anywhere ever again. I searched online to see how to restore books contaminated by mold and learned that librarians in Japan use gauze fabric dampened with 75 percent ethanol solution to wipe books with. I tried the same method to bring the “Proposals” series back to life. But the mold on the covers, made of imported paper, and on the inside of the spines was so persistent that I couldn’t let the books stay in the room with the other articles. In the end, I gave up on restoring them, and shed a flood of tears as I relinquished them. Hearing the news, the editor shared my pain. I sent her the dozens of peach-colored Gallimard editions of Maurice Blanchot as a sign of our days of friendship. So I sent away without hesitation even the ones that had survived—hoping that they’d live long in a safer environment.    In the end, though, I couldn’t be wholly indifferent or cold-hearted. As I tied up the severely damaged books, I felt as if my heart were slashed with a knife.It kept raining, even when the rainy season had supposedly ended. September came and the fall semester began, but I wasn’t done cleaning mold. Typhoons raged one after another. Rain fell without ceasing, and the disinfection took forever, with the mold ever multiplying. It was no longer a matter of picking out contaminated books to discard. I had to give the shelves some breathing space. I began to throw away unmarred books at random as well. Otherwise, the infested books would spread mold onto the books that were yet untainted. I scrapped all of Lacan’s Seminar series. A whole shelf was emptied, along with a period of my life. I got rid of all the German books on philosophy, too; I wouldn’t read them anyway. Hegel’s Aesthetics, I sent to an artist friend of mine. I asked my acquaintances if they wanted any of my Penguin paperbacks, and sent the books out in the mail. I threw out the signed copies of books that authors had sent me. I had no choice. The authors knew what I was going through and said they would give me another copy when things returned to normal.    I threw away so many things. I had to let them go, without condition. I had to create empty, quarantined space in order to salvage what still had life in them. I had to, to let myself live.Neighbors I hadn’t interacted with before learned about my situation, as I was constantly going in and out of the house to chuck loads of stuff, clutching an umbrella to protect myself from the typhoon. One of them, who lived a floor below, invited me over when I was all scruffy and offered me a meal. When I was absorbed in sterilizing the books, she would knock on my door and hand me something to eat. She sympathized with me, saying it must be heartbreaking for someone who studied books to have to throw them away.     Where had the mold come from? From the natural produce of the organic garden patch which I had so greedily brought home? Probably not; no trace of mold was detected at the front door, where I would leave the bag, straw hat, and rubber boots I used in gardening. On the other hand, the study, which had suffered the most serious damage, faced a mountain through the window. The mountain was thick with trees, but just outside the window there was no tree, only weeds in an empty lot. According to the neighbor who lived downstairs, there had been several acacia trees there up until a year ago, but the green space management at the district office had them felled. After the trees had been cut down, rainwater seeped through an embankment into her house during the rainy season one year. My guess is that with the trees gone from the forest, whose thriving trunks and weeds had made for a healthy, self-regulating ecosystem in which growth, development, and decomposition occurred in a cycle, the fungi in the humid air carried by the wind infiltrated my window; the mold spores that would have been kept at bay by the trees settled in my room and extended their power with the long rain.    Three years have passed since, but the mold hasn’t been completely eliminated. The mold has done no wrong. All it did was fly when the wind blew and grow when it was humid, according to the order of nature inherent in itself. No matter how much I wiped at it with ethanol, the spores, invisible to the naked eye, stayed hidden in unseen corners, ready to run rampant when the air began to stagnate and grow moist. When I spot such corners, I once again feel the need to empty my space and allow the air to flow. When the air begins to circulate again, of course, so do the spores.    In 2020, I experienced something irreversible that manifested itself in a powerful way through human factors—such as a climate catastrophe that included a long rainy season, frequent typhoons, and forest logging—that tangled with nature in the form of mold on the books in my room. Since that summer, as is the case with all inflection points in life, my idea and substance of life have never been the same.  Translated by Yewon Jung 

by Kyung Hee Youn

[Cover Feature] Breathe, Live, Rest

When I saw the painting Breathing Space, I remembered feeling like I was taking a deep breath. The piece was part of a solo exhibition, Wandering Mind. The painting depicted a person leaning against a small window of a large building, gazing at the sky—the artist’s way of saying that sometimes a small window can become an unexpectedly vast breathing space. The sky stretched beautifully above the building, its hue a poetic blue.      I, too, have moments where I do nothing but space out. On such days, I make a conscious effort not to plan anything or assign tasks to myself. I silence my alarms and sleep in; when I wake up, I give the house a thorough cleaning. I take in the tidy surroundings and gaze out the window—sometimes sunrays pour in, while at other times snow falls in large flakes. During those times, I don’t turn on the TV or play music. I savor the freedom to spend time in my own space. I observe the people passing beneath my window, simply letting myself  feel the quiet flow of time. The days I purposely spend in idleness fill my heart with a strength that eludes me on my most productive days.     Until a few years ago, I didn’t know how to properly rest. I constantly thought about what needed to be done the next day, or the manuscript I’d be working on at the time. One day, I woke up, and my neck felt stiff—I couldn’t turn to the side. At first, I brushed it off as a result of a bad sleeping position, but as days passed, the symptoms worsened. Stretching only seemed to amplify the pain, expanding from my neck down to my shoulders, and I couldn’t get a good night’s sleep. I went to see an oriental medicine doctor who pressed and prodded my neck, shoulders, and back. His diagnosis was as follows: “You frequently experience tension-related pain in your neck and shoulders, don’t you? It’s because when you do something, you pour yourself into it, which results in a tension build-up.” I almost fell to my knees at how accurate his observations were. It was like he had read my mind.     He emphasized the importance of concentrating during the day and fully relaxing at night. He told me that I unfortunately wasn’t able to unload the burden from my shoulders, which caused me pain. “It’ll get better over time. But you shouldn’t try too hard. When you’re resting, you need to let the burden go. Otherwise, your back will keep hurting.” I hadn’t even realized how hard I was pushing myself, and that my body was already overloaded. I was used to my frequent back and shoulder pain, and when I started hearing a popping sound in my jaw whenever I opened my mouth, I just thought it was a symptom commonly experienced by people in modern society and neglected it.     From then on, I began carving out dedicated time away from work and writing. For a while I threw myself into swimming; these days I opt for an occasional run. I head out at night and just run for about twenty minutes, without a set route. Running at night has its charm—you can hide your face in its shadows. What’s surprising is that I’m not the only one; many others walk or run in the darkness. Running is good for the heart, lungs, and legs, but it’s especially beneficial for your mental well-being. Focusing on each step gives me a temporary escape from my worries. Afterward, I feel light and refreshed in both body and mind.     I’ve also started learning the violin as a hobby, and I’m being consistent about it. I take lessons once a week and practice the pieces I’ve learned whenever I find the time. I don’t mind if I’m not good at it—it’s something I do for fun, and I enjoy it as such. When playing a piece, there are rests in the sheet music. These rests are periods of absolute silence, and when the next note comes along, it’s that much clearer. In the passages where the music needs to be delicate and soft, you have to play more quietly so that the emphasized notes stand out. Well-played music has good moments of rest.     Rather than trying to excel at everything, I’m practicing letting go of a few things. I was lying in bed, listening to a podcast, when one of the speaker said something I empathized with a lot: “In South Korea, from the moment you open your eyes until you close them, everything is all about competition: catching a bus, taking the subway, making a restaurant reservation.” Though this may not apply to all countries or cities, I believe it holds true for many places that have developed as fast as Seoul. Long commuting hours, repetitive labor, constant crowds wherever you go, a life of never-ending competition. Even when you’re resting, you crave more rest, and just taking a breath feels draining. At morning rush hour, the commuters’ faces on the subway carry a particular weariness. Sometimes they argue, hoping to get a seat. They’re all on edge due to how exhausted they are. I, too, have spent a few years among them.     I’ve worked as an editor for a decade now and made my debut as a poet seven years ago. Last year, I edited the highest number of books in my entire life. In the summer, I also published my second poetry collection. It wasn’t a new way of life for me—I was used to scrutinizing other people’s manuscripts and coming home to look at my own, but for the first time I was sick and tired of it. It became hard to make simple decisions; I didn’t have the will to do anything; I woke up in the morning crying for no reason. I wondered if that was what burnout felt like.     For a while, I did little else besides pour my heart into the violin. I hardly wrote or read, but I found myself drawn to reading several books related to music. Music revealed new territories for me. Reading Show Me Your Hands, I slowly delved into the inner world of a pianist, and with Lev’s Violin: An Italian Adventure, I envisioned countless violins, each made of different wood, each with their own unique timbre. Reading Schubert, I discovered all the failures the world-renowned composer had faced. Knowing that others have failed brings a smile to my face: it means that they were serious about their dreams and struggled to make them come true.     I feel that, rather than success, moments of failure are needed; instead of constantly pushing forward, we need periods of rest. For me, rest is a time to regain a pure perspective on the world. After a deep rest, I find that the words trapped in me start bubbling to the surface. I become eager to reveal what I’ve seen, what I’ve thought, and what I’ve experienced in my subconscious.     Through the COVID-19 pandemic, I came to realize the increased importance of a good rest. Koreans habitually go to work even during a typhoon or push through tasks when feeling unwell. But we are not machines—we’re humans, and as such, it is impossible to keep producing and creating without taking breaks. We know this, and yet we live as if it were possible. Rest is a fearful concept for me, even though ironically, I always long for it. I always think, “What if quitting my job and stopping to write means I won’t be able to start again?” I know that pausing doesn’t cause the world to collapse, but I’ve always had this irrational fear. Now my neck and shoulders hurt, my back is damaged, and on some days, my mind is so exhausted that I fall apart completely.     I have asked my poet friends what they do when they take a break. One of them mentioned isolating at home and immersing themselves in a movie or book they’ve been longing to watch or read. Another said they go camping or take a short trip somewhere. All their ideas were nice. How wonderful would it be to light a fire in the woods, grill and eat a delicious meal; or bury yourself in a beloved book—splendid! I, too, used to relax while doing the things I enjoyed. Do what I want, read what I like, eat something tasty, go to my favorite places. However, when true burnout hit, none of these activities seemed possible. I needed a time devoid of plans, a moment to pause everything and do nothing.      At the end of the year, I took my remaining vacation days and enjoyed an extended break until the new year rolled in. I stood in front of the window—as I stared at the large snowflakes, it almost seemed like they weren’t falling down, but instead, rising towards the sky. Like music played in reverse. I thought it resembled the rhythm of life. My puppy was asleep on my lap; gazing at that serene view brought peace to my heart. I’ve always enjoyed going to the library, the swimming pool, the museum, or just wandering around aimlessly, yet I liked this freedom of being alone, doing nothing, meeting no one, with no music or media.      Now, I’ve finally come to understand the beauty of this solitude, one that I do not need to rush to fill. I don’t need to go to cool places—a stroll around my neighborhood brings me a new joy. Instead of constantly reading books, I’m happy to take a break from all kinds of texts for a while. While being surrounded by friends is great, savoring the solitude of being alone is also perfectly fine. Once I embraced this mindset and spent my time resting at home, doing nothing, I began looking at my routine and the familiar places I frequented under a new light.     I’m not talking about resting in preparation to move forward, to take a leap; rather, it’s about indulging in unadulterated rest for the sake of resting itself, a complete acceptance of the nothingness that is the self. It is the freedom of existence, of reverting to an amoebic state, a form with boundless potential. This kind of rest brings me back to my innate self. Back to my childhood; to my early twenties when I was passionate about so many of the things in the world; to the days when love was the sole occupant of my heart; when I looked at the world with more simplicity; when writing brought me pure joy.     Writing is sometimes like a motionless swamp that offers no answer or reaction. Embrace that lack of an answer, let the emptiness sit there. Do not fear loneliness—step willingly into it and spend time with it. When I ceased fearing loneliness and heeded the doctor’s advice to lay down the burdens from my shoulders, I finally could slip into a deep, dreamless sleep.     Good rest isn’t merely a gesture in preparation for optimal movement, much like emptying your mind isn’t just a preparatory process for filling it up again. In Korean, 잘 쉰다 means both “to rest” and “to inhale and exhale.” So, 쉬다 (“to rest well”) means “to take deep breaths, exhale, and empty the body.” This implies that resting your body leads to resting your mind, which then leads back to resting your body in a seamless cycle. I wonder if leaving the empty spaces created by rest untouched isn’t just another way of saying “to be alive.” To rest essentially means to live—not to excel at something or to have a busy life, but rather to feel the happiness and fullness of simply being alive; to focus on the present state of both the body and mind.     In September, for my birthday, I went on a trip. I wrapped up all the work at the company, finished the manuscript that had held me captive until dawn every day, and escaped to Yeosu; the sea I saw there was the most wonderful I’d ever seen in my life. It took me four hours by train and then a little taxi ride to get to my accommodation, and once I got there and opened the curtains of my hotel room, the sea glittered beautifully in front of my eyes. I looked down to see the locals walking along the colorful street that followed the stone wall. At last, outside of Seoul, I could enjoy the different scenery and lifestyle of another city. It felt like a breath of fresh air after being stuck in the daily grind of commuting between home and work. With no particular plans, I strolled around with a little jump in my steps; I ate a patbingsu, looked at the cats, and relished the joy that complete relaxation brings.     During these empty times, I feel new stories and new desires emerging. The beauty of emptiness. Poetry knows this very well—its charm lies in the space between the lines, after all. Rather than the act of adding, I find the gaps left by subtraction more fascinating. Poetry is a game, a confession of your inner self, a reflection of all things of the world. It’s ironic, but after I spend periods without writing anything, my poetry becomes better, and I feel that the act of writing becomes more precious, and more fun.      During my experience with burnout, I learned that any weary heart finds restoration through proper rest. You don’t even have to work hard for it. Whether it is love for someone, an open heart towards the world, generosity towards others, a desire to write again, or a yearning to stand tall—all these feelings will eventually resurface. All you need to do to rekindle them is to bask in these moments of pure rest. I didn’t want to escape from work or writing; rather, I always wanted to break free from the monotonous landscape that was “me.” I didn’t realize that this person I knew as myself, who looked the same every day, was undergoing a constant process of internal change.     Someone once asked me, “Why do you write poetry? It seems lonely.” Back then, I couldn’t provide a proper answer, but now I think I can. Poetry allows one to peer into the solitude of one’s inner self, to appreciate life’s empty spaces. It’s the joy of filling the spaces between the lines by leaving some deliberately empty. Only after a good rest do you come to realize the multitude of answers that are out there. Translated by Giulia Macrì 

by Ju Minhyeon

[Cover Feature] The Bookstore as a Book

The topic of bookstores always brings me back to a personal story that begins the year before I was born. It was 1980, and my mother’s youngest brother, freshly discharged from military duty, decided to leave his boring old hometown and strike out for Seoul. He had no plans, only some money in his pockets to get him through the next few months. He scoured the big city for areas with cheap rent, and finally settled on a sleepy neighborhood in the Seodaemun District. His new home was a tiny shop with a floor space of about 10 pyeong, to which was attached a tinier room. The shop, he filled with books. The Munye Bookstore. That was the name of my other school—the place where my young self spent countless afternoons, and where—if I may be so bold—I learned even more than at my classroom desk.       The Munye Bookstore was a home where my young uncle ate and slept, where my young self would read until I nodded off into short naps. It was also a place of community, where young locals hung out in little groups and sang along to a strumming guitar, and a sort of pub where, late in the evening (a nationwide curfew was in place in South Korea until January of 1982), the bookstore doors would be shut and those young people would engage in debate and discussion over beer with peanuts and dried cuttlefish.         How did they end up gathering at Uncle’s bookstore? I’m afraid I don’t know. What I do know is that those young people were, to me, just as part of the bookstore as the volumes on the shelves. Not knowing what title to use for these friends? regulars? neighbors?—of my uncle’s, I would call them “uncles” as well (a few women were among these patrons, but I don’t recall calling them “aunties.” I wonder why?) and grow to recognize them. Employment, marriage, and other facts of life would call them away to other neighborhoods, but they were quickly replaced by new faces. The ones who left, too, would drop in when they were in the area, spot me reading on a stool in the corner, and exclaim, “Hey, it’s been a while! You’ve gotten taller, eh?” Some of those people still get together for meals—although they almost never drink—and to travel together. Even now, more than ten years since Uncle retired.         Uncle, why a bookstore, of all things?         The question came to my mind after I’d finished my own military service and prepared to return to school, wondering what I should do with my life. At the time I had vague dreams of authorhood, so perhaps part of me hoped to hear that he’d wanted to be an author too. But Uncle’s answer blew away my expectations.         Because I was broke. The thing about a bookstore, it doesn’t cost much money to start one. All you need are shelves, and the wholesalers were happy to supply you and get paid once the books sold. And if they didn’t sell, I’d just return them. It was the best kind of business for a poor kid like me.         It was coincidence borne of chance, then. But wasn’t that just another word for inevitability? Necessity had driven Uncle to that business, but in the blink of an eye, the bookstore ended up being a perfect fit for him. Uncle’s life revolved around reading books, selling books, and talking about books with patrons. So I can imagine the helplessness he must have felt in early 1998, when the landlord—who’d lost his job in the Asian Financial Crisis at the end of the previous year—decided to run the bookstore himself and refused to extend Uncle’s lease, kicking him out without even paying back the deposit. But I was only a high school student back then, too young and feisty to understand. I didn’t realize back then that Uncle’s youth, my adolescence, and maybe a period in Korean history, too, had ended forever.         Uncle opened up a new business near a local university. The new shop was packed with books on every wall save the door, but did not have a little side room where people discussed their books, or display shelves where interesting reads were proudly exhibited for all. Instead, the center of the floor was taken up by two rows of low shelves. Uncle’s new business was not a bookstore, but a chaekbang (book rental store) where patrons could rent comic books and novels. Unlike the ever-bright Munye Bookstore, the Kkaebi Bookshop (the most popular book rental franchise at the time) was dark, and the books stained by all the hands that had flipped through their pages. Uncle’s chaekbang started off on a downward spiral, which went on and on until the other franchise stores closed and the head office, too, finally closed the curtains in 2010. Munye Bookstore, stolen from Uncle by the landlord, had long since shuttered its doors by then.         If the financial crisis had been the death knell for Uncle’s bookstore, online bookstores would be the nail in the coffin for all the other physical bookstores, big and small. And I was there to see it all. While in the military, I became a Platinum-rank customer with an online bookstore, the credit card payments for which led me to take a logging job for an online store’s book database straight out of the army. In the summer of 2006, only one term away from my undergraduate degree, I became a full-time employee at an online bookstore. I was the merchandiser who oversaw books in the humanities, social sciences, sciences, and history sections.         Looking back, I must have learned everything I needed to know about books from Uncle’s shop. In On the Commerce of Thought by Jean-Luc Nancy, subtitled Of Books and Bookstores, Nancy explains, for the bookseller, the act of reading a book is both a lectio (reading) and an electio (choosing): “The bookseller. . . brings [books] and exposes them, giving them the vantage from which to play their role as subjects.”         Over the three years and six months I spent at that workplace, I tried to think of myself as a “book deliverer.” An individual who procures books, displays them, and creates the right environment for them to play leading roles of their own. But reality didn’t quite work that way. Unlike flesh-and-blood customers I could see at a physical bookstore, online readers were faceless statistics. And it was no easy task to deliver anything to faceless statistics. Worse, even the books were formless statistics! Although almost every book in existence was recorded in these online databases, they were utterly devoid of scent and difficult to estimate their thickness. They were completely flat. Although I could look up any book I could think of with the touch of a finger, I could neither turn them over in my hands nor look at the books around them, nor simply stroll through their presence. I was sick of work, I wanted to read only for the pleasure of it, I wanted to write for myself, I said, making up one excuse after another as I quit my job. But looking back, I think I know the real reason: the faceless readers and the formless books.         Long story short, after quitting my job, I became a writer—a book reviewer, to be precise—and continued to maintain my Platinum membership with all my book purchases. All the while, small bookstores around the country continued to shutter their doors. But I was so busy reading and writing that without any awareness of the issues at hand, I considered this phenomenon part of a natural progression, as unavoidable as the disappearance of record stores and video rental shops.         Then, in 2015, I saw the tides of change. I saw the rise of independent publications, and the continued growth of Unlimited Edition, a book fair specializing in independent books. So-called independent bookstores underwent a Renaissance (to exaggerate mildly), with more and more articles covering the “revival of neighborhood bookstores” and the “small bookstore boom.” But—strangely, thinking back—I wasn’t particularly interested. Not interested at all, in fact. Was I just that sick of bookstores? Was I just that steeped in the traditional publishing system? Or maybe I no longer felt the need to be a reader of the book deliverers. My shelves had long since been packed with more volumes than those that had filled the walls of the Munye Bookstore.         Then, in 2016, I received an email from Iro, the owner of first-generation independent bookstore Your Mind and organizer of Unlimited Edition. At the time, the rapid growth of local, or small, or independent bookstores had led to reader concerns that the quality of such establishments might decline. Iro’s proposal was that I join a bookstore exploration project that would examine the differences between these bookstores, learn about the bookstore owners’ outlooks, and the challenges they faced in their work. I accepted and spent one month with novelist Kim Junghyuk meeting the owners of eight wildly different independent bookstores for open interviews. (The transcripts have been published in a book titled Bookstore Exploration and include lectures from two Japanese bookstore owners as well as the transcript of a group conversation between four Korean bookstore owners.)         To confess, even as I started the first interview, I was skeptical. The napkin math just didn’t add up: these businesses didn’t look like they could afford the rent, let alone make a profit. I saw my uncle lose his bookstore. I saw the thieving landlord bungle the business in just a few years. I saw my uncle’s book rental store wither away with the times. To me, independent bookstore owners were naïve romantics, no different from Don Quixote.         Let me begin with the conclusion: I was being conceited and judgmental. These bookstore owners, naturally, were all aware of the potential problems. But they worked away at what they could, where they could. They led the charge of bookstores specializing in independently-published books, LGBT works, theme-rotating publications, artbooks, and travelogues, charging ahead alongside local bookstores big and small, and making all sorts of impacts on their communities. Just like Uncle’s Munye Bookstore all those years ago. Although the variety and quality of perspectives have since skyrocketed, the essence of these spaces remains unchanged: a sanctuary for people with non-mainstream interests.         As an author whose works appeal largely to people with non-mainstream interests—that is to say, as an author with a fandom of minuscule proportions—I empathize wholeheartedly. My bookstore events are attended by anywhere from four or five to no more than thirty to forty people, but those events are comforting. At those events, I see the faces of my readers, breathe the same air as my readers, and share certain emotions with my readers. But in a big meet-and-greet at a cinema, for example, I sometimes break into cold sweat, and not just because of the sheer number of people. And not just because of the small differences between book readers and movie audiences. I attribute it to the setting. A cinema is not a place for communication. When I’m at the front, I see the audiences watch me as though watching a film (one in which they recognize neither the actors nor the director), with arms crossed. A bookstore, on the other hand, is a place of exchange. In a bookstore, the readers and I—because I prefer discussions to lectures wherever possible—speak and respond as though having a conversation.         One experience that opened my eyes to the power of bookstores took place last spring at Goyo Bookshop, an independent establishment in Haebangchon specializing in literature. I led a seven-session workshop titled “A Writing Style Workshop for Those Lost Amidst Sentences.” A serial event like this was a first for the venue, which generally hosted one-off book discussions. Because space was limited, we capped the number of participants, which meant that registrations closed almost instantly.         To confess, I was once again skeptical. I’d only elected to lead a workshop rather than a lecture series because I thought it would be easier for me, but then I realized that lectures might have been easier after all: once I’d prepared a lecture, most of the sessions would have been under my full control. In a workshop, I would never know just how much to prepare or what direction the participants might decide to go. What if no one spoke up? Or what if we went off on tangents? For me, reading had always been a solitary activity, which was the very reason I loved it.         Once more, I was proven a fool. In a book talk, most participants are fans of the author. In this workshop, half the participants didn’t know me, and didn’t particularly care even after I introduced myself (they were diehard fans of Goyo Bookshop). In spite of that, reading and discussing the same book together was supremely fun, occasionally thrilling, and ultimately moving. I finally understood (and not just with my head) that books were not unchanging monoliths. Different readers, places, and contexts gave them entirely new meaning, and at times, different perspectives on the same book would entangle and generate a completely new chemical reaction. How should I put it? Jonas Mekas must have read my mind when he wrote Requiem for a Manual Typewriter, in which he said: “Ah, if you have never experienced it, been with it, no use telling it to you, you’ll never understand it.”    Translated by Slin Jung

by Keum Jungyun

[Cover Feature] Where Literary Experience Meets the Personal

"If books take us to new worlds such as we have never seen before, it is bookstores that provide the passage to those chance meetings,” wrote the author Kim Choyeop. Tucked away in the city’s alleys, small bookstores provide an intimate space for those wishing to embrace the literary experience of reading and writing. At small bookstores, we stumble upon new discoveries and the experiences that go with them. And when we pursue those chance meetings, intentionally or spontaneously, we find ourselves part of a community of readers sharing a range of interests.Why Small Bookstores Are on the Rise     Local bookstores, once a venerable neighborhood fixture, are steadily on the decline. This year alone saw the closure of Chuncheon’s Kwangjang Books, established in 1999, and Suwon’s Kyomoon Books, which opened its doors in 1986, while Daejeon’s best-known local bookstore, Gyeryong Books, founded in 1966, is struggling to pay the rent. On the other hand, oddly enough, new independent bookstores are popping up every week. The proliferation of independent bookstores, however, is unfortunately not due to an influx of readers discovering a newfound love for books and the joy of reading. In practice, the reasons are more varied than that.       The first is the popularization of social media. Independent bookstores are often located in areas with less foot traffic. You usually find independent bookstores in small, hidden alleys, at basement level or on higher floors, say, second or fifth, rather than on the ground floor. More often than not, these stores bear only the most discreet of signage and hardly advertise. How do readers find these out-of-the-way booksellers, then? The answer is social media. Connected by chance online, the reader seeks out the bookstore offline. Online encounters lead to physical meetings, sometimes developing into loyal followings.         The second reason can be found in changes in the publishing industry. The boundaries between independent and commercial publishing have been blurred as special editions and zines abound, with authors, illustrators, and content creators from various walks of life selling their own publications. Bypassing the traditional publishing system, they enjoy greater freedom selling their wares through independent bookstores. As independent publications and editions increase, so do independent bookstores, which in turn encourages and feeds this boom in diverse publications.         Third, running an independent bookstore can be combined with one’s primary job. Not only those who already work in the industry such as writers, publishers, editors, designers, or book bloggers, but pharmacists, lawyers, bartenders, IT developers, and videographers have been known to take up bookselling on the side. These bookstores operate at flexible hours. There are nocturnal bookstores, bookstores open only on the weekend, or bookstores that run as pop-ups. Not that running a bookstore in tandem with one’s day job is easy work, but it is true that, compared to other businesses, it doesn’t require much capital or highly technical expertise to start one.         Fourth, readers’ needs are expanding and changing. From a bookseller’s point of view, this is the most important reason. We live in an age that treats values as consumable goods. The independent bookseller must appeal to the customer’s heart. It’s the only way to compete with the discount pricing, loyalty points, and same-day delivery offered by chain bookstores, with their slick advertising videos. Which is why, at my bookstore, Yeonhui, the emphasis is on providing the reader with experiences. By this I mean not just the experience of buying books, but of reading, writing, and creating them.Reading Together In-Store    Finding time for oneself can be a challenge in today’s busy world. Going to a brick-and-mortar store in person takes time and effort in an age when, with a few clicks, it’s possible to have books chosen and delivered to one’s doorstep in the same afternoon.         With that in mind, imagine setting out to a small bookstore. The experience of buying books there starts with leaving the house. At the store, you browse on your own, without searching for adverts or reviews online. The lighting and temperature are just right for the books on display. Sometimes, seasonal music or scents complete the background. You discover a signed copy here, a favorite book there. Then there are the small pleasures of receiving a bookmark or postcard with your purchase, wrapped in that store’s distinctive paper. You might choose to read in-store, or take your books to a nearby park or café.         Outside of the business of buying and selling books, the most important function of a bookstore is to provide its customers with literary experiences. By literary, I am not referring to the mere act of reading novels, essays, or poetry, but learning how to explore thoughts and emotions, values and meaning, through artistic language or images.         Book clubs and author events are the most common type of event offering such experiences. Gone is the age of authors only speaking through their books. Authors are no longer mythical creatures, but ordinary people living lives much like those of their readers. This realization makes the reader feel closer to the writer than ever. In some cases, such small meetings have led to authors being discovered by readers or going on to achieve fandoms of their own. At Yeonhui, we host about two book talks a month for authors introducing their new works. We always take questions in advance and set aside a good portion for Q&A so it doesn’t become a one-sided event.          Yeonhui also hosts Wolgandokseo, a monthly online book club, sometimes with the editor of said book participating. We also offer workshops devoted to reading various titles in the humanities under a particular theme. Then there are reading challenges held randomly on group chats for readers who crave company but find it difficult to come in-store. One of our most popular events is the annual Year-End Book Adjustment, in which participants share their reading experiences of that year. People swap their reading lists with others and share the books they enjoyed or hated, the ones they recommend or intend to offer as gifts. The participants thoroughly enjoy talking about their reading habits and what they’ve learned through books that year. This is the one event I take part in as a reader and not a leader.  Writing, Recording, Creating    After reading, the next step is writing. There’s a saying that there are more writers than readers in Korea these days. Or, as some put it, those who read, write. Bypassing the traditional channels of new writers’ contests or similar competitions, today anyone can become a writer. Of course, as Tolstoy said, nothing can be gained in fits and starts, but one must start somewhere. There is a platform for every kind of keyword, from poetry and fiction to webtoons, web novels, essays, business, and self-improvement. Publishers and IT companies make it easy for anyone to publish their work and be discovered by developing writing platforms. Self-publishing physical books, too, is easier than ever. Which might explain why the majority of those frequenting small bookstores express an interest in writing. Not necessarily because they aspire to become a famous author or to write full time, but because they see writing as a means of self-reflection, a healing pastime.         Which brings me to Yeonhui’s writing workshop, a favorite with our customers. At the workshop, everyone becomes friends. Participants read their work out loud and listen to the works of others. Laughter and tears are shared. Through that person’s writing, it’s possible to catch a closer glimpse of who they are than even their family or friends have ever seen. And so the workshop writers are drawn more tightly together in shared intimacy.         Along with writing, the experience of recording is equally dear to me. Recording is different from writing. Text is only one way of recording; there is also photography, drawing, painting, and collecting things. For instance, writing a journal is one way of keeping a record, but so is taking a picture of the sky every day, collecting receipts, or recording conversations with one’s children. The records I love best are of neighborhoods and cities. As a reader, I particularly enjoy records of how personal histories tell the history of a city, of a certain page in socio-cultural history.         From writing and recording, the next logical step is creating one’s own book. More and more people write and draw these days with publication in mind. With side jobs becoming commonplace, books can serve as one’s calling card. Some decry the trend, saying it degrades publishing. However, I agree with Virginia Woolf who said, “Therefore I would ask you to write all kinds of books, hesitating at no subject however trivial or however vast.” Take traveling, for instance. One could write about the journey itself, or record one’s impressions of a new place, make a shopping list of the things one bought there, create a scrapbook of photos or postcards, or a map showing all the shops and stops one enjoyed. Rather than writing a thousand things in a secret journal that never sees the light of day, I believe that there is more to be gained by making ten pieces public if you have written fifty. With that in mind, Yeonhui offers workshops on self-publishing, storyboarding picture books, and creating your own postcard book.Literary Experiences in Practice    Yeonhui’s customers are a varied bunch. From teens to people over sixty, from locals who live minutes from the store to people who drive several hours to make the trip. There are nearly five hundred bookstores in Seoul, including chain bookstores, used bookstores, and independent bookstores, with around seventy in Mapo-gu alone. Out of all of those bookstores, why do people come to mine? Is it the Hongdae location? Is it because it’s run by a writer? The shop’s vibe? The books I stock?         L explains that coming into the shop and meeting other creators, writers, and readers keeps them on their toes. Making the long trip twice a month gives them the motivation to keep on learning, to keep on living. They particularly enjoy meeting people they might not come across normally, saying that it enriches their settled life.         P admits to liking the selection of books on offer enough that they wish they could take all of them home. They might not know me personally, but my taste in books is enough to endear me to them. In the end, a bookstore is all about the books. Pretty storefronts are all well and good, but as Arthur Danto says, real beauty comes from stimulating the mind.         J struggled at first with the idea of paying to attend a book club. They say, however, that the club introduced them to books they might never have read otherwise, inviting them to think about gender and environmental issues, and giving them a fresh perspective on how to deal with their family issues.         Back when the Gangnam Station femicide dragged feminism into the social discourse, countless bookstores around the country read about feminism together. A young man participating in one such event marveled at the questions brought up in the book we were reading, which had never occurred to him before. He went on to recommend the book to colleagues and friends, quizzing them about it over drinks. Their talks and debates were a direct result of his attending a book club.         Bookstores not only expand the scope of one’s literary experience, but can aid in self-discovery and personal growth. Which, in turn, leads to new opportunities. K, who participated in a bookmaking workshop at Yeonhui, now gives professional classes of their own on book design. H, who came to Yeonhui as a reader, is now an independent publisher and creator responsible for a host of events. G, a self-published writer, found a partner in illustrator Y, whom they met at the store. B, a frequent customer who amassed a pile of titles on bookstore ownership and completed Yeonhui’s workshop on opening one’s own bookstore, went into business opening a bookstore-cum-bindery in their neighborhood. As for myself, the shop is where I found my co-authors S, a longtime book club member; D, an author who was invited to give a book talk; and M, who came to interview for a job at Yeonhui, with whom I have a new book coming out soon.         So as you can see, I’m no different. I went to bookstores first as a reader, and through that experience, grew into a writer and then a bookstore owner. Books have turned me into an exceedingly active person. Reading, by definition, requires an actively participating reader. Video and audio clips play on whether I pay attention to them or not, but books remain forever still unless I turn the page, unless I follow each thought. Books have taught me that every step I make takes me that much further. And so when life gets me down, I read. With each line that I read, I prove that I exist.         As a bookstore owner, reader, and writer, this is my take: people who think books are boring just haven’t found the right book yet. If someone claims not to see the point of reading, it’s because they haven’t really had a proper reading experience. Once the mental switch is made that books are fun, or say, useful, one can begin to repeat and expand that experience. And that literary experience, in turn, lights up hidden pockets of happiness in one’s life. Through language, through images for which there are no words, through that which defies any sort of proof.         I guarantee that small bookstores will aid you at the beginning of this journey. I, and countless others, have gotten our start and continue to grow that way.    Translated by Yoonna Cho    Korean Works Mentioned:• Books and Coincidence (Yolimwon Publishing, 2022) 『책과 우연들』 (열림원, 2022)  

by Gu Sun-A

[Cover Feature] From Bookshop Enthusiast to Bookshop Owner

I want to start with a confession: I didn’t always like reading. Even into my twenties, I only ever read books for school. But in navigating life and society as an adult, I became overwhelmed with pointless doubt and anxiety—although, as a young adult, it didn’t seem so pointless. I developed insomnia. And then one day, I started going to bookstores to read books. I became a regular at my local bookshop. I even sought out bookstores to visit while on vacation. There was something therapeutic about opening a book and feeling the paper beneath my fingers. It brought me comfort. Sometimes I even imagined that books were letters sent to me from a faraway friend. Before I knew it, I had become a bookshop enthusiast.         It’s common for one hobby to lead to another. I attended every event held at my local bookstore, no matter what the occasion. I met authors and fellow bookworms. And through those experiences, I learned to read with greater depth and purpose. Then, a few years ago, I quit my job, escaped to Jeju Island, and started working at a bookshop in Hamdeok-ri. Through interacting every day with other people who loved books, the world of reading became even richer and more tangible. Just a few months back, I left my job and opened my own bookshop in a neighborhood filled with tangerine groves. I named the shop Goyo Letter. All this I did simply because I liked books, because I wanted to be closer to them.  Connecting Literature and Music    Some say that physically going to a bookstore to buy your books is inefficient, especially when nowadays you can buy anything with the click of a mouse. So why do some people still visit bookshops? As a store owner, it’s my job to attract customers. But I can’t do that by haphazardly displaying books on shelves. I eventually realized that people come to bookshops for a diversity of stories, and not just those you can find on a page.         These days, if someone wants to read a book of poetry, where do they go? I bet for many of us, the last poem we read was one assigned in our high school literature class. Many readers think that poems are too hard to understand. They try to read poems not to appreciate them, but to analyze them. Most people’s first contact with books happens through reading text on a page. But poetry originated from song and, for many centuries, was passed down orally. And yet, few people rack their brains trying to understand the hidden meaning of song lyrics. We just listen to the melody and enjoy ourselves. What if that was how we first came into contact with poetry? It is from this very question that Midsummer Night’s Poetry Reading and Music Concert, a program I started at Goyo Letter, was born.         Adults and the elderly far outnumber youth in the neighborhood of Hahyo-dong, Jeju Island, where Goyo Letter is located. Young people here hardly have the time to experience the arts, and even if they wanted to, this region doesn’t have the infrastructure to support it. Thus, Be Locally Lab, located just a stone’s throw from Hanhyo-dong in Harye-ri, was started with the goal to help young people in the countryside experience arts and literature. Last summer, Goyo Letter and Be Locally Lab teamed up to put on Midsummer Night’s Poetry Reading and Music Concert where poets and readers came together to read poetry. We organized the event with the goal of reading Hur Eunsil’s Stories of Recovery to participants, whom we presupposed are “youth living in a time when romance is disappearing.”         Stories of Recovery, as its name suggests, is a book of poetry that tells stories of recovery from various points of view. The poems in this collection contain messages of recovery about social and historical issues, including everything from deep personal and interpersonal wounds to major historical events like the Jeju April 3 Uprising to global problems such as the climate crisis. We also read and discussed Hur Eunsil’s other essays and poems on the topic of recovery.         It’s not uncommon for bookstores to host poetry reading events. But Midsummer Night’s Poetry Reading and Music Concert distinguishes itself with music. Inspired by the way people make streaming playlists, we made a playlist of music and poetry. Hur picked the music herself. Each song either inspired her to write one of the poems or was what she listened to while writing them. Participants listened to the poet read her poems out loud, after which they listened to its accompanying song. This allowed for the simultaneous creation of two types of experiences: poetic and musical. We also made a separate YouTube playlist under the title “Midsummer Night’s Poetry Reading and Music Concert.” This playlist was comprised of songs that the readers chose after reading Stories of Recovery. We made a QR code and distributed it to participants so they could experience it again on YouTube after the program ended. Singer and songwriter Yang Hyung-uk also performed a song he composed beforehand based on one of the poems read aloud by the author.  Scenes from Midsummer Night’s Poetry Reading and Music Concert         [. . .]          I think I can forgive you         I think I can almost write it         Why are these two feelings the same?          From where the flower has fallen         Medicine sprouts          At long last I think I can write         The name of tender things          —Hur Eun-sil, “Story of Recovery 1” Yang Hyung-uk performs at Midsummer Night’s Poetry Reading and Music Concert           At first, the listeners, who weren’t familiar with this collection of work, looked as though they had trouble understanding what the poems were about. But as the program went on, they volunteered to read poems out loud and eagerly shared their opinions. One participant, a writer, confessed that they were experiencing writer’s block because they couldn’t forgive someone. But as the program drew to an end, they had a transformative experience. They said, “I think I’m ready to forgive them. I think I’m ready to write again,” echoing one of the poems we had read together. Another participant even said they’d become a fan of Hur’s after the poetry reading.         I don’t want people who visit my bookshop just to read poems; I want them to experience poems in various ways, through poetry readings and music, for example. I think that such dynamic, artistic experiences can expand the scope of what it means to experience literature. When you go beyond merely reading a book, you become closer to that work and become interested in reading other works. I wanted to give readers a memory that would remain for a long time after the program. Would such a thing be possible had they read the book of poetry by themselves? Perhaps, but I think I’ve increased the probability of a lasting memory. That day, by gathering in one place to read poetry, listen to music, and share stories, we were able to connect on a deeper level, to each other and to the poetry.Connecting Literature with Photography    I want to introduce another program that provides different ways to experience literature. The program was created in collaboration with Still Negative Club. At Still Negative Club, people can buy film camera equipment, develop their own film, and share stories about photography. Our collaboration began with a simple question: What would it be like if people could experience literature and photography together? The goal of this program, which we named Reading Photos, was to allow people to transform the way they experienced their photography from “seeing” to “reading.” And then, if possible, we wanted to go one step further and transform that experience again, going from “reading” photography to “writing” photography from their own perspective. The experience of moving visual experiences to reading and writing takes a great deal of literary imagination. My hope was that through this program, readers would discover the points of overlap between photography and literature on their own. In photography, the same scene will look different when photographed from a different angle. Likewise, in literature, individuals living in the same world will express that world through their own unique perspective.         Participants were asked to bring a “scene from their life” in the form of a digital file. We developed and printed the photos on site, giving them a physical form, and then linked each photo to a scene from a book we had read. After going around and sharing our impressions, we wrote one sentence about our photo and read them out loud. In this way, a single photo gave birth to an entire story.   Scenes from Reading Photography  Expanding literary experiences and sharing warmth    Bookstores aren’t simply places to purchase books. We come to bookstores to enjoy and experience books in various ways. The traditional way to appreciate books has been to read them silently. This is still the preferred method for most people. But because of the spread of digital media, we have become used to watching videos and are unable to focus while reading text. Sometimes, books feel like a difficult homework assignment, a chore. And there are many people who feel pressured to read books, not because they want to enjoy experiencing literature, but because they think that’s the only way to become “cultured.”         For these people, bookstores can be a stepping stone that connects and brings them closer to literature. And we at Goyo Letter are helping them do that, one step at a time. I want to help people feel close to literature through programs that connect books with more familiar forms of art, like music and photography, and I want to let people know that reading texts isn’t the only way to experience literature.         In Jinwoo Hwon Lee’s Don’t Think Us So Desperate, which was introduced to participants at Reading Poetry, there is a picture of a large truck driving along a road at night. The title of the photograph is “The Sight of One Person’s Night Passing By.” By introducing this work, a poem comprised of only a title and a picture, I wanted to show participants that, just like how there is no rule that states a picture can’t become a poem, people have the freedom to express their thoughts in ways unique to them. We embodied the literary experience by connecting pictures with books and unraveling their stories. The experience of crossing genres shows that literary experiences are closer to everyday life than we think, allowing people to look at their daily lives through a literary perspective. In the end, expanding our literary experiences is the same as pushing the frontiers of our own world.         “Connecting people through books” and “Sharing each other’s tranquility”—these are Goyo Letter’s mottos. In an age where humans are being replaced and virtualized by AI, it’s possible that we might lose entirely the need to meet other people. But the further the world is digitalized, the greater the need for analogue forms of art and life, for standing across from real people, making eye contact, and exchanging warmth. When we read physical books, we experience sensations in our hands. I hope that readers who turn the pages of a real book will feel the need to come to Goyo Letter to meet the person behind the pages. At Goyo Letter, I call the books I’ve read companions. They are here to help. Every day, I come here to look after my companions, to take care of the bookstore, and to maintain the tranquility, the Goyo, that resides here. If you visit this place, I hope you discover your wholeness in this tranquility. I want you to feel your whole self, just as it is, without the need to prove yourself to anyone. And with that feeling of wholeness, I hope you find a book that will become a friend. I hope this book stays with you for a long time, that it lets you know you aren’t alone, that we’re always by your side.     Translated by Sean Lin Halbert            Korean Works Mentioned:• “The Sight of One Person’s Night Passing By,” Don’t Think Us So Desperate (Siindongne, 2018) 「한 사람의 밤이 지나가는 광경」, 『우리 너무 절박해지지 말아요』 (시인동네, 2018)• “Story of Recovery 1,” Stories of Recovery (Munhakdongne, 2022)「회복기 1」, 『회복기』 (문학동네, 2022)   

by Han Min-jeong

[Essay] Let the Face Be (Re)Born

Since Yi Won’s debut in 1992, an intense set of descriptors have clung to her poetry—terms like “cyborg sensibility,” “electronic desert,” “monitor kinder.” These descriptions were an attempt to explain the shock that her unfamiliar imagination sent through the Korean poetic establishment with the scenes in her first collection, When They Ruled the Earth, of people strolling down the street with wires and plugs hanging from their bodies like umbilical cords (“In the Street”). Yet even as they define her poetry in such terms, critics have also taken interest in those aspects of her poetry which break free of this definition. Such critics worry that this imaginative intensity obscures the fact that Yi’s poetry is “a kind of ontological question on a more fundamental level.”1)         These concerns ring true because Yi has always been immersed in the question of being human. As the electronic desert is no longer the central subject of her poetry, we can see that what interests her is not digital civilization, but ways of life in the here and now that we inhabit. The issue that has interested her for so long, it seems, is how people live in a changing world and how we as humans respond to these changes.         Here the motif that draws attention is the face. Perhaps because of the intensity of her other imagery, the face is rarely discussed by critics, but it appears prominently and consistently across her work. Notably, we often find faces in the process of disappearing or having already disappeared. Take, for example, the faces in “Self-Portrait” from her second collection, A Thousand Moons Rising Over the River of Yahoo! Even now, more than twenty years later, they form a remarkable and frequently discussed self-portrait.            As I took the mobile phone my face dropped and cracked I picked up a shard and slit my right wrist A twisted vein splits and the sun drops to the ground.            [. . .]            As soon as I turned on the computer the 17 inch monitor sucked up my face like a vacuum cleaner My eyes nose mouth all sucked in together and only the skin left sliding down over the edge of the desk I pick up my lukewarm skin and hang it next to the new calendar            These vivid descriptions—a cracked phone screen as a shattered face, a face sucked into a computer monitor—are the poet’s distinctive way of capturing human life under the domination of digital civilization as we become stuck to our phones like a single body, sharing nearly all our information with them, our senses lost entirely to digital devices. What’s interesting here is that the poet expresses this situation as the destruction and loss of the face. The broken shard of the human face ultimately attacks itself and brings about the end of the world as “the sun drops to the ground.” Why does Yi place the face at the center of this frightening imaginary? What does the poet mean to convey with this image of a faceless person with only skin left over?         The meaning of the lost face still eludes us. Scenes of lost and damaged faces appear in The World’s Lightest Motorcycle, where the face is torn to pieces and devoured by bread (“The Mirror Eats My Face”), and The History of an Impossible Page, where the face slips out of itself (“Face Escapes Face”) and faceless bodies walk (“Your Left Cheek”). In other words, each collection offers slight variations, but disappearing and destroyed faces are a persistent theme. Why does the poet explore the face in such depth?         To borrow the words of Giorgio Agamben, “only human beings have a face.”2) Agamben quotes Cicero’s observation that the face can exist in no animal other than humans to establish the face as a mark of human existence. From this, we gather that the loss of the face is not only the loss of that which is human but further, the loss of the human being itself, and a world in which the face is lost is a world in which humanity is lost. That is, Yi’s self-portrait as the faceless speaker of the poem points to a changing world which strips us of our humanity.3)         The faces depicted in the poet’s 2017 collection Let Love Be Born, however, reveal a somewhat different aspect. While the speaker of earlier poems typically perceives her own disappearing face, this collection finds her describing the ruined, erased faces of countless others. Here lies the Sewol ferry disaster. When the children return with faces crushed by the sea, when those faces must be covered in “a white sheet,” when we become numb or try to avoid the memory of the children—our minds “covered in darkness” (“Night and Day”)—Yi writes of their disappearing faces. To return to Agamben, the children’s faces have at some point become the ultimate site of politics.         The most affecting element here is that the face of the speaker writing about the lost children’s faces is also lost. In “Self-Portrait with Beak,” the speaker is “only beak / and neck / and below nothing but / vast horizon.” In other words, nothing is left of the speaker’s face but a beak.            write like slitting a pale throat            long beak, break through the flesh            let us walk again from the very end         (the place where words come out)         should we call it the railing            it is lucky we can still write         let us not lose writing                    cut across         smelling of burning meat            only beak         and neck            and below nothing but         vast horizon            The first thing we notice in this poem is the hopelessness of the speaker, who realizes she no longer leads a human life after experiencing the children’s deaths. But one of the poet’s essays, “Don’t Show the Bloodied Hand” from The Smallest Discovery, in which she describes the face of Francis Bacon, suggests there may be more than hopelessness here. She writes that the reason “[Bacon’s] face fills the air with the uncontrollable scent of existence” is that “his eyes, nose, and ears are unerasable,” and thus hold his face up “until the bitter end.”4) In the self-portrait above, is the speaker’s mouth the last thing barely holding up the rest of her face, and with it her humanity? Nothing of her face remains but the mouth, yet she writes and talks about the faces of the faceless, remembering and grieving them. In that sense, this act reads like a desperate struggle to lead a human life.         But why does the speaker grow this beak long enough to “break through the flesh”? Of course, this can be read pessimistically as the loss of the speaker’s humanity—the mouth is all that’s left of the face, and even the mouth is a bird’s beak. However, the poet has written elsewhere of how “the beak cracks the arc the lips can’t” as she chooses the “hard and sharp” bird’s beak in a mythic rebirth, hatching from an egg (“VirginEyes Birth”). Maybe if she uses this hard, sharp beak to write of those lost faces, the beak won’t slip from the children as it picks up their faces and writes about each of them one by one. This bird’s beak is like the “long tongue” that “breaks through the horizon,” the most useful tool to “pull [the children] from” the darkness (“Pocket Knife”) and to maintain, ironically, the speaker’s humanity.         In another poem, the speaker “Walked along the hills There were no hills but I walked the hills Who knows when a hill might emerge” (“This Is a Love Song”). Like this walk through the nonexistent hills expecting a hill to emerge, the speaker writes with her beak to find the children’s faces even though they are all gone. Starting again “from the very end [. . .] where words come out” and leaning on this beak as precarious as a “railing,” she risks her own face—no, her very humanness—to write about the lost faces and recover her humanity. Are these not the actions of someone who believes fully in the power of language? When she busies her beaks to bring back those vanished faces, we can no longer say that her face is lost. “In the vanishing, empty air called face” (“Red and Lips, Play if out of Step,” from I Am My Affectionate Zebra), this self-portrait with long beak is Yi’s new face. In her poems we come face to face with the most human of faces, although with the beak of a bird. And this face goes on asking us to lead a human life.      Translated by Seth Chandler        Korean Works Mentioned:    • When They Ruled the Earth (Moonji, 1996)『그들이 지구를 지배했을 때』 (문학과지성사, 1996)• A Thousand Moons Rising Over the River of Yahoo! (Moonji, 2001)『야후!의 강물에 천 개의 달이 뜬다』 (문학과지성사, 2001)• The World’s Lightest Motorcycle (tr. E. J. Koh, Marci Calabretta Cancio-Bello, Zephyr Press, 2021)『세상에서 가장 가벼운 오토바이』 (문학과지성사, 2007)• The History of an Impossible Page, (Moonji, 2012) 『불가능한 종이의 역사』 (문학과지성사, 2012)• Let Love Be Born, (Moonji, 2017)『사랑은 탄생하라』 (문학과지성사, 2017)• The Smallest Discovery, (Minumsa, 2017) 『최소의 발견』, (민음사, 2017)• I Am My Affectionate Zebra, (Hyundae Munhak, 2018)『나는 나의 다정한 얼룩말』 (현대문학, 2018)• “VirginEyes Birth,” Literature and Society vol.134 (Moonji, 2021 Summer)「난생처음 설화」, (문학과사회 2021년 여름호, 2012) 1) Ham Donkyun, “Impossible Elevation, Cliffside Flower Tree,” Afterword to The History of an Impossible Page, by Yi Won (Seoul: Moonji, 2012), 152.2) Giorgio Agamben, Where Are We Now: The Epidemic as Politics, trans. Valeria Dani (London: ERIS, 2021), 86.3) This point also helps us to understand the shadow and mirror that appear repeatedly, just like the face, in Yi’s poetry. While the shadow, which must clearly bear a distorted face, acts as a device to reveal those aspects of humanity which possess faint tinges of human being (“Shadows,” The History of an Impossible Page), the mirror is a means to look further into the face (“For the Mirror,” The World’s Lightest Motorcycle).4) Yi Won, “Don’t Show the Bloodied Hand,” The Smallest Discovery (Seoul: Minumsa, 2017), 153.  

by Song Hyun-ji

[Essay] The Possibility of Hypernarrative

The Well-Made Narrative and Beyond    Let’s take a look at the futuristic horizon of Ha Seong-nan’s novels. Ha’s work has been appraised as having “well-made” narratives which sufficiently embody the traditional structure of a novel. The characters in her stories embody the dispositions of the time period and their stories generate affective, fitting responses such as thinking things anew, reminiscence, foreshadowing, reiteration, climax, and lingering imagery. However, as with so much of aesthetic fate, a perfected form can also be its ruin. Stories with aesthetic potential—that is, newly emerging stories—transgress “well-made” forms and seek to create new forms which ultimately become predominant.    I would like to read this dialectic process of Ha Seong-nan’s work in a new way. The emotion that Ha’s works evoke in readers is “shock,” but this is an emotion that a well-made narrative cannot provide. Shock is close to the sublime and the sublime occurs beyond the limits of well-crafted aesthetic. In order to explain this emotion, one must go beyond conventional narratives to explore different possibilities.1 Let’s take the hypernarrative, which transcends narratology, and separates it into its various aspects—the object and space time. How do objects, time, and space operate within Ha Seong-nan’s heretofore unmentioned hypernarrative?     Hyperobject    In literature, the object usually refers to, first, the background upon which a character acts; second, the props (things) which suggest a character’s socioeconomic position; and, third, the things (symbols) which represent a character’s mental condition. An object is something that is subordinate and secondary to the character. Furthermore, it is something that can be replaced by another object. However, what if we included objects not as individualized matter, but as actors interacting with the characters? We live our lives creating countless strange connections with matter, environments, ecology, and objects. Timothy Morton has proposed the concept of the hyperobject, which includes the totality of all objects brought together in space and time.2    Matter is what connects the human to the inhuman, the animate to the inanimate, the subject to the object. A plastic bottle is not just a drink container, but a deadly weapon that can choke a sea turtle causing it to starve to death. Oil is not just an energy source that boosts the economy, but a hazardous material that rapidly raises the planet’s average temperature, threatening the ecosystem. Morton sees these objects not as a single plastic bottle or an oil drum, but as working together as part of a whole he calls the hyperobject. The hyperobject cannot be perceived by humans, yet it is highly influential in human life as an important actor in making connections.    There are many scenes in Ha Seong-nan’s work that show objects as more important actors than humans. Her short story, “The Wafer House,” elaborately describes a house becoming abandoned. According to traditional narratology, description is used to show the reader how the house appears. Old houses are signifiers of human fate. However, in this story, the descriptions are understated in comparison to the “family narrative.” Depictions of dust piling up, of slowly collapsing rooms, windows, window frames, walls, ceilings, etc., and of the characters’ faces and the dust falling from their bodies—all of these objects collectively create the present-day house. That is to say, it is the hyperobject as an actor interacting with the family and their neighbors’ lives.     “Flowers of Mold,” a short story appearing in the collection with the same title, tells the story of a man who spies on his neighbors by riffling through their trash bags. The story is filled with detailed, realistic scenes depicting the man digging through the dirty, disgusting garbage. The narrative is not aiming at describing the man’s inner motivations or desires. By going through the neighbor’s trash, the main character actually finds out more about what’s going on between the woman next door and her ex-boyfriend than the ex himself knows. This shows that the object of “trash” has more precise things to say than one person’s suppositions, words, and actions do. Furthermore, it means that the hyperobject of trash has more to say about humans than what people themselves convey with their words and actions. A lumpy, slimy pile of garbage covered in “flowers of mold.”    Hyperspace     In a typical narrative, space is laid out according to the movement of the characters. Because of this, space becomes a type of stage upon which the conditions of life are parsed and arranged. This space is analogous to the three-dimensional space that is usually perceived by humans. When three-dimensional space is combined with one-dimensional time (that is, time which is flowing in only one direction from the past to the future), it becomes four-dimensional space-time. This is how we usually perceive space-time in our everyday lives. People cannot be in two places at once and the Past-Me cannot exist in the same space as the Present-Me (or Future-Me). This is different, however, in hyperspace. Hyperspace exists beyond three-dimensional space, in fourth or higher spatial dimensions. In this space, characters can appear/disappear beyond the limits of three-dimensional space and they exist in different spaces at the same time. Let’s list some of the results of this. First of all, one object can exist while having a different relationship with humans at the same time. Second, objects (humans) from different times can exist in the same place. Third, objects (humans) from the same time can exist in different places. All three of these cases appear in Ha Seong-nan’s literary work.    First, “Bluebeard’s First Wife” starts with a scene of the paulownia tree wardrobe being brought into the house. The paulownia tree had been planted by a father for his newborn daughter in order to create a wardrobe to take with her when she gets married. “I” meets her husband James, gets married after three months, and emigrates to New Zealand for her husband’s study abroad program. She comes to find out that she has been tricked into a sham marriage used to cover up her husband’s homosexual relationship with an underclassman named “Chang.” As soon as she declares that she will return to Korea, her husband attacks her and locks her in the wardrobe. The place where she used to store her albums, diaries and memories is transformed into her coffin. She takes her husband’s straight razor (the object that made her husband appear to have a “blue beard”), slices his face, and barely manages to escape back to Korea. Objects in this story become different things in the same space. The paulownia wardrobe becomes a paulownia coffin and the razor that gives her husband a “blue beard” becomes a weapon that gives him a scraggly beard that he grows to hide the scar she’s left on his face. The objects that occupy one space become different objects at different times.    Second, “A Tale of Two Women” is a short story that uses “being in two places at once” as a motif. The main character “She” arrives in D city on a business trip and is mistaken for a woman named Oh Eun-yeong. Thirty years prior, “She” and her parents visited somewhere near D city where “She” got lost in the mountains. When the young “She” finally made it down the mountain after four days, she’d found herself in D city. “She” imagines that Oh Eun-yeong is the other half of herself that she left behind on the mountain. If “She” had never come down from the mountain, “She” would have become Oh Eun-yeong. A few days after she was rescued, a shocking incident takes place in D city (implied to be the Gwangju Massacre.) It is as if “She” and Oh Eun-yeong show the two possible lives of people who have come to different decisions about the historical wound that is Gwangju—two people who have lived different lives meeting in the same place.    Third, “Why Did She Go to Suncheon?” also uses the motif of “being in two places at once,” or doppelgängers, but in a slightly different way. One woman is a comedian who gets into a car accident on her way to an event at a university in the countryside and her doppelgänger is a woman who has her photo taken by a passerby while she is waiting at a traffic light. How did this woman become two separate people? It’s all because of a van they encountered on their way home back in high school. The van belonged to a gang of human traffickers who kidnapped women. The girl who didn’t enter the van became the comedian and the girl who was taken into the van experienced a different life altogether before ending up in Suncheon. This is how a woman from one time was split in two and could exist in two places at once.    Hypertime    Hyperspace has been theorized in many fields, from quantum mechanics to String theory. Since it is imperceptible to us humans, there are many theoretical ways in which hyperspace can exist. Hyperspace is predicted to exist in places such as infinite universes, parallel universes, extradimensional universes contained within infinitesimally small space, and more. But hypertime is not even predicted to exist in theory. This is due to the fact that all the matter in our universe is incapable of exceeding the speed of light. In order for time travel to the past to be possible, you would have to move faster than the speed of light, but this goes against the theory of relativity. Accordingly, in our universe, time moves only one-dimensionally, from the past to the future. This may be the case in the natural sciences, but time travel has long been a pillar of literary imagination. Time travel requires a different dimension of time in order to work, and that dimension is what we call hypertime.    Time flows differently for the characters that appear in “Alpha Time.” After suffering a fall, the mind of the character Mother is addled and she confuses her son for a customer calling out “stay and rest a while.” Mother had set up a stall in Sundae Street when the family was down on its luck. “Stay and rest a while” was what the women working on Sundae Street would call out to potential customers. It’s as if the mother is living out her younger days in the present. Among her children are a set of twins who live double or half-lives with even their immediate family unable to tell them apart. The Father had promised his daughter, “I,” that if he succeeded in business, he’d “put up billboards along all the major roadways with a sign that only you will understand,” but his business ultimately fails. Then one day, “I” discovers a billboard collapsing in the forest. The girl depicted on the advertisement wasn’t “I,” so it means nothing to her. She thinks, “I must have my own Alpha timeline which allowed me to see that sign.” This time is the time that exists after the family suffered hardship together. They all live their lives in hypertime: the happy memories where Mother stays; the timeline that is different from the time of the present where promises were not kept, that is, the Alpha timeline where by some strange means the father keeps his promises; and the time that the twins shared between them.Ha Seong-nan’s Novels and the Hypernarrative    Hypernarrative has been observed in the work of Ha Seong-nan through objects, space, and time. In Ha’s stories, hyperobjects are not the subject matter or part of the background, but an actor just like the other characters. Hyperspace allows for characters and objects to create different relationships through different spatial dimensions, or allows characters to live multiple lives, or allows them to be in multiple places at the same time. Hypertime goes beyond the flow of single dimensional time and appears in literary devices such as several independently flowing timestreams, going backward or forwards in time, and divergences in the timeline. All of this can be called hypernarrative. Hypernarrative is the narratological possibility for the limitations of traditional narrative to be broken and constructed anew.    Translated by Victoria Caudle      Korean Works Mentioned:• “The Wafer House,” Wafers (Munhakdongne, 2006)「웨하스로 만들어진 집」, 『웨하스』 (문학동네, 2006)• “Flowers of Mold,” Flowers of Mold (tr. Janet Hong, Open Letter Books, 2019)「곰팡이꽃」, 『옆집 여자』 (창비, 1999)• “Bluebeard’s First Wife,” Bluebeard’s First Wife (tr. Janet Hong, Open Letter Books, 2020)「푸른 수염의 첫 번째 아내」, 『푸른 수염의 첫 번째 아내』 (창비, 2002)• “A Tale of Two Women,” “Why Did She Go to Suncheon?,” “Alpha Time,” The Taste of Summer (Moonji, 2013) 「두 여자 이야기」, 「순천에 왜 간 걸까, 그녀는」 , 「알파의 시간」, 『여름의 맛』 (문학과지성사, 2013) [1] In my recent paper, “New Reproductions” (Sseum, Summer 2023), I examined ways in which recent works of literature move beyond the boundaries of traditional narratology. However, all work to “move beyond” (hyper-) is not wholly unrelated to basic narratology. Only works that contain formal narratology are able to move beyond it. This is because, according to dialectics, to “move beyond / hyper-” refers to inclusion and transcendence simultaneously. Ha Seong-nan’s texts show these aspects of “moving beyond.” [2] “Imagine all the plastic bags in existence at all: all of them, all that will ever exist, everywhere. This heap of plastic bags is a hyperobject: it’s an entity that is massively distributed in space and time in such a way that you obviously can only access small slices of it at a time, and in such a way that obviously transcends merely human access modes and scales.” Timothy Morton, Being Ecological, The MIT Press, 2019, p. 91.

by Yang Yun-eui

[Cover Feature] 212 Versions of the Same Story: Publishing Korean Literature in Japan

Japan is nothing short of a publishing powerhouse. In fact, the country churns out over 70,000 new titles every year. Among these thousands of books, translated works account for six to seven percent, 80 percent of which are translations of English books. The remaining 20 percent are works translated from Korean, Chinese, Italian, Spanish, Thai and other languages which together amount to fewer than 1,000 titles. However, a recent surge in books translated from Korean is drawing the envy of publishers from other language markets.    CUON, a Japanese publisher specializing in Korean literature, made its entry into Japan’s publishing market in 2011 with the release of Han Kang’s The Vegetarian, and has gone on to publish over a hundred titles since. The books are divided into the “New Korean Literature Series,” which focuses on contemporary works published in the 2000s, the “Classics Series,” which features some of Korea’s most renowned literary works of all time; the “Short Short Series,” which introduces readers to short stories in a bilingual format that includes both the original Korean text along with the Japanese translation; and the “Korean Poetry Selection Series,” which boasts a number of poetry collections. CUON also began publishing the Japanese translation of Pak Kyongni’s widely acclaimed epic novel Land in 2016, hoping to have all twenty volumes fully translated and published by next year.    The Launch of a New Translation Festival and Translation Contest    Although translated titles only make up a small proportion of all the books published in Japan, foreign literature enthusiasts have proven to be very dedicated readers. At the end of each year, foreign literature editors engage with their readers by holding events at major bookstores where they look back on the books published over the past year and reveal which titles are in the works for the following year. These events consistently draw in crowds of over 200 people. I have also participated a number of times over the years as a representative of CUON. After seeing just how eager readers were to learn about upcoming titles and how appreciative they were of all the work that went into making a book, I felt compelled to do something more for them. That’s when I came up with the idea of organizing a special event that would shed light on the various actors involved in the book-making process. Thanks to the help of LTI Korea and the Korean Cultural Center, I was able to host two translation festivals in 2018 and 2019. The events were called “Weaving the Languages of the World Together” and “A Window into Classics of World Literature,” and featured translators of Korean, English, Italian, Chinese, Czech, German, and other languages. Participants were given the chance to enjoy a wide selection of events, such as discussions between editors specializing in world literature. There were also talks between prominent translators, including a workshop led by three translatorswhosharedandcomparedtheiruniquestylesbyprojectingsentencesdirectlyontoascreen.    I remember the audience holding its breath as two translators began working together to improve the distinctly different translations on the screen. It was remarkable to see the sentences gradually come to life with greater clarity and depth of meaning. This workshop offered foreign literature enthusiasts a unique glimpse into the magic of translation. The event showcased the brilliance of translators, who, despite being such key actors in the publishing industry, often find themselves working in the shadows. Given the many industry professionals in attendance, I was extremely delighted that this workshop could draw attention to Korean literature while also serving as a platform for Korean translators to display their exceptional skills.    My team and I have also established an annual translation contest called “Koreans Books I Want to Read in Japanese.” Now in its seventh year, the contest requires participants to translate two designated short stories into Japanese within just six months. While undoubtedly challenging, it offers aspiring translators an opportunity to make a name for themselves given that CUON publishes the winning works. Past contest winners, such as Makino Mika who won the inaugural edition, have gone on to become full-fledged translators and have worked with various other publishers. Some have also broadened their expertise beyond fiction, translating works of nonfiction, picture books, movie subtitles, and even webtoons. The immense popularity of K-culture in Japan has cast the spotlight on Korean creative content, reaching far beyond the publishing industry to encompass movies, plays, and webtoons. It makes me very happy to see that the winners of the translation contest are able to take advantage of the rising demand for Korean translators in Japan.    The first year of the contest required participants to translate two short stories from Choi Eunyoung’s short story collection, Shoko’s Smile. Six months to translate two stories might seem daunting, but we set the bar high to ensure our contest only attracted individuals with a genuine desire to become translators. Organizing this kind of event necessitates setting up a judging committee, and to prevent delays and increased costs during the judging process, we tried to avoid receiving an excessive number of submissions. However, despite expecting around 50 submissions, we received 212. Although we were thrilled, this unexpected turn of events required us to find additional judges.    I still vividly remember the words of Choi Eunyoung during a book talk following the publication of the winning translations. “While there exists only one Korean version of Shoko’s Smile, it brings me immense joy to know that there are 212 versions of it in Japanese,” she said.    Translation and Publishing in the Age of AI    The translation contest’s judging criteria place the greatest importance on reading comprehension and Japanese fluency. The initial screening aims to filter out submissions by examining how participants translated a set of ten sentences deemed to be prone to mistranslation. Submissions that pass this stage proceed to the secondary screening, where they are handed to a panel of judges consisting of fiction authors and professional translators for further evaluation. Fiction authors usually favor translations that boast the most fluent-sounding Japanese, while professional translators tend to give the greatest credit to translations that they deem most faithful. While there may not be a single right way to translate, some translations are certainly better than others. What defines a good translation, then? Is it one which achieves fluency in the target language and provides a seamless reading experience?    To answer this question, I’ll give you an interesting anecdote from my time working on the publication of Ha Seong-nan’s short story, “That Summer’s Rhetoric.” Set in a time before telephones were widely available, the story features a scene which requires the characters to communicate with each other by telegram. In those days, a standard telegram message in Korean was limited to ten characters, with additional characters incurring extra fees. The protagonist therefore faces the challenge of conveying her messages within the ten-character limit. Translating this into Japanese proved to be quite tricky. Although telegrams were once commonplace in Japan, many people today wouldn’t be familiar with them, so we had to ensure the text was understandable to everyone. Additionally, although many Korean words and their Japanese equivalents are rooted in the same Chinese characters, making the number of characters match in the translation was no easy task. Nevertheless, the translator and the editor persisted, going to great lengths to refine and adjust each sentence until they could make it work. As showcased here, I believe the quality of a translation ultimately depends on how much time is invested into polishing the text. I like translations which read seamlessly in the target language while also reflecting the cultural peculiarities of the original.    During the initial screening of submissions for the translation contest, many participants were found to have made strikingly similar mistakes. In fact, some sentences were identical word for word, indicating that several participants had relied on AI to translate the text without bothering to revise it. It was truly a shame.    Back when I was a student in the early 1990s, translations were done by hand with a pencil and notebook, and the only tool at our disposal was a paper dictionary. Nowadays, it has become possible to translate an entire manuscript on the computer with the help of online dictionaries and AI translation programs such as Papago and DeepL. No human translator could possibly compete with AI in terms of speed—it’s a total mismatch. This has made it difficult to resist the temptation of seeking AI assistance for reading and translating purposes.    In fact, Japanese editors have already begun to embrace the use of AI to review Korean books. That’s because programs like DeepL allow them to translate 300-page manuscripts into Japanese in under a minute, and although the resulting translations are not perfect, they are good enough to allow editors to get a feel for a book’s content.    With that being said, while AI translations may allow us to grasp the gist of a text, they are still far from being able to produce a book that meets the standards required for publishing. It is also worth noting that Japanese editors interested in a Korean title will often ask a translator to provide them with a book proposal, which they will often use to decide whether or not to go forward with the translation. The proposal will usually include an author bio, a synopsis, research on similar books previously published in Japan, a list of selling points, and a sample translation of a certain length. Translators may choose to write a book proposal out of their sheer fondness for a work and try to pitch it themselves, or they may respond to a formal request from an editor who has expressed interest in a particular title. In any case, the book proposal is an essential component of the publication process, and I have yet to come across any editors who would be willing to entrust such an important task to AI.    All books go through this rigorous selection process before the green light is given to the translator, and carefully translated manuscripts also undergo thorough editing so that Japanese readers can enjoy a seamless reading experience.    Korean Literature Filling Japanese Bookstore Shelves    In 2015, CUON opened a bookstore specializing in Korean literature called Chekccori in the Tokyo district of Jimbocho, which is famous for its high concentration of bookstores. Chekccori boasts about 3,500 Korean books and 500 Japanese books related to Korea. Chekccori also hosts book talks featuring Korean authors as well as various other activities aimed at promoting Korean culture, which includes one-day Hangul lessons, bojagi cloth-making workshops, and traditional musical instrument performances. Chekccori is also a place for conducting business, where Japanese editors can come to look at Korean books and acquire their rights.    There has been a steady increase in the number of Korean books getting published since the bookstore’s early days, which has allowed us to expand the section where we showcase Japanese translations of Korean titles alongside the original work. I used to feel disappointed by the absence of Korean books in Japanese bookstores back in the 1990s, so I am filled with pride and gratitude when I see how much things have changed. Nowadays, large bookstores will usually have an entire section dedicated to Korean literature, and some even boast special displays for individual authors such as Han Kang, Park Min-gyu, Chung Serang, and Kim Yeonsu. These sorts of displays are becoming increasingly common as Korean authors gain more recognition in Japan.    But it doesn’t stop there—competition is growing among Japanese magazines to release exclusive content about Korea. In the past, articles used to focus mainly on topics such as Korean food, movies, K-pop, and actors, but an increasing number of them are now devoted to Korean literature and include author interviews and even full-length works. While magazines used to feature translations of original Korean works, they are now directly approaching Korean authors to request exclusive pieces on specific topics. This shift demonstrates how popular they have become in Japan. Moreover, there has been a growing interest among prominent Japanese figures to collaborate with Korean authors. Some have even asked them to conduct talks with them or to publish anthologies together.    The K-BOOK Festival in Tokyo    All the reasons stated above are what motivated me to organize the K-BOOK Festival in Tokyo, which has been taking place annually since 2019. The event serves both as a platform for new authors to meet directly with editors and readers as well as an opportunity for publishers to showcase the books they have recently released. Held in November, the festival has become a sort of celebration of the year’s literary harvest. Last year’s edition saw the participation of forty-six publishers along with prominent Korean authors Lee Kiho, Han Kang, Kim Yeonsu, Kim Ae-ran, and Chang Kang-myoung.    Held in bookstores across Japan, the Korean Literature Fair is an extension of this festival which serves to actively promote Korean books and help publishers fund more book projects. The event consists of creating special displays inside bookstores featuring titles by different Korean publishers. This year, we plan to invite thirty-five Japanese and five Korean publishers, as well as authors Kim Choyeop and Kim So Yeon, and poet Oh Eun. This “book feast” will serve as an opportunity for Korean and Japanese publishers, as well as authors, to gather and network with each other. Moreover, since Koreans have recently been traveling to Japan in high numbers due to the favorable currency exchange rate, the festival promises to attract many book lovers from both countries.    As mentioned earlier, there is high demand for Korean cultural content in Japan. However, Korean literature has taken relatively longer to reach popularity in comparison to other types of content. As such, sustained efforts will be needed to maintain this newfound love of Korean literature among Japanese readers. This involves introducing authors whose works reflect current trends, and finding ways to expedite the translation and publishing processes to ensure their books can swiftly reach the hands of Japanese readers. Never before has the need for skilled and experienced translators been greater.    Translated by Léo-Thomas Brylowski    Korean Works Mentioned:• The Vegetarian (tr. Deborah Smith, Portobello Books, 2015) 『채식주의자』 (창비, 2007)• Land (tr. Agnita Tennant, Global Oriental, 2011)『토지』 (나남출판, 2002)• Shoko’s Smile (tr. SungRyu, Penguin Publishing Group,2021)『쇼코의 미소』 (문학동네, 2016)• “That Summer’s Rhetoric,” The Taste of Summer (Moonji,2013)「그 여름의 수사」, 『여름의 맛』 (문학과지성사, 2013)  [1] Translators Kim Huna, Furukawa Ayako, and Yoshikawa Nagi participated in the event.

by Kim Seungbok

[Cover Feature] Let the Snake Wait Under His Weed: The (In)Decision of the Poetry Translator

Is This the End of Translation?    “We’d better pack our bags. Looks like all the good times are gone.” When a translator teaching at my university uttered this remark in early March over the advent of artificial intelligence, I thought to myself: “Were there ever good times for translation?” Last winter, as Open AI—the world’s largest AI research institution—was launching ChatGPT, the general belief was that it could completely replace writers and translators. Discourse on the translation apocalypse became mainstream. The translation tools that people had relied on were at most Papago and Google Translate, but now even tools like DeepL have entered the fray. In times like these, has human translation truly run its course? Are there no longer any prospects for professional translators? What should those of us in the realm of literary translation education be concerned about? It is no surprise that in the face of these questions, the number of people translating literature is dwindling.    Even though I am a bidirectional Korean-English translator of poetry, as well as a translation researcher and educator, I didn’t think much of these questions at first. But when I saw the faces of the students in my spring semester course, glowing half with interest and half with curiosity about what literary translation was, I was struck by this thought: ‘In a translation course, the assignments that students complete outside the classroom are important. How can I stop them from using ChatGPT to do them?’ So I made a decision. “All right, how about this? Let’s try it out with AI.” In that class, we began to learn more about the theory and practice of literary translation while working symbiotically with AI.    Over the course of the semester, we conducted various experiments. My students employed every means possible to translate their target texts. The only prerequisite was that they had to compare the AI translations with their own and write an essay about their observations in which they considered what aspects were important when it came to literary translation. Contrary to my expectations, I had students who were dissatisfied with the AI translation as well as students who were surprised at how quickly the AI translator was able to generate its output.     Here are the conclusions we drew after that semester. First of all, AI is great because it’s fast. But it makes frequent, glaring mistakes because it doesn’t understand context. Of all the many genres of literature, the one that remains a definite weakness for AI is poetry. In many cases, AI cannot discern the context or the particular characteristics of the form. That is not to say that human translations are perfect, either. The process evoked many laments such as “AI still has far to go!” and “Just as I thought—poetry is hard!” as well as sighs of relief with remarks such as “Ah, translation isn’t dead just yet! We need literary translators. Even more so for translating poetry!” This was how we ended the semester.    Can an AI Author an Afterword?    Once I shifted my concerns about plagiarism and other issues into an active use of ChatGPT in the classroom, the semester went by without incident, but I still had not managed to solve the issue of the diminishing place of translation in the face of AI. Yet as I was grading at the end of the term, a wave of dizziness struck me while looking over one student’s answer sheet. The student had responded to a question with more questions: “Why is everyone so intimidated by AI? Can an AI author an afterword?” To write an afterword for a translation, an AI would need to have a translation philosophy and a writing style of its own, but no AI translators meet these criteria. The student then asked about reading speed in literature. A self-described old-fashioned reader who preferred “slow reading,” the student said that because the process of literary translation was intertwined with the process of reading, to claim that human translators were useless against AI was to cede the importance of both literature and human beings.    This student’s bold questions and belief in slow reading touch on the issues addressed in this essay. As a translator of poetry, I often ask about the starting and end points of a translation. Why translate, and what for? Translations of Korean poetry into English or English poetry into Korean are not exactly welcomed in the commercial literary market. The readership for this work is almost nonexistent. There has never been a heyday for poetry in translation, nor will there be in the future. So why translate? As I confronted this student’s questions, I was able to question my own motives as a translator. I also realized that the nature of the anxiety we feel in the age of AI is a kind of contamination brought about by thinking too simplistically about translation’s starting and end points.    I translate poems because I love them and want to relay them to others. My reasoning may be simple, but my role as a messenger is a resolute higher calling. Poetry is a genre that even native speakers struggle to understand, so translators must have an eye to interpret the works in detail. If my starting point for reading and translating poetry is a love for the source texts, then the afterword I write at the final stop of translation is the mode, the ritual, that serves as the period officially marking the end of a translation project.In that regard, writing an afterword is both a joy and a right for the poetry translator. It is there that I reflect on how I encountered this collection of poems, what I enjoyed in the process of ferrying from one language to the other, what I found challenging, and how I found solutions for the uncertain bits. It is a lot like how we love. The kind of high-intensity love in which you adore something with a passion but must maintain a cool distance so as not to heedlessly fall into it. The afterword is my personal love letter to the poetry collection.    “Slow and Quick, Sharp”    Of course, not every literary translator encounters every work with this exceptional feeling of love. There are cases where translators are approached with requests from publishers. I translated my first poems from Korean to English in the early 2000s, when Korean poetry was virtually unknown in the world market. I also heard many slights about my research, asking why I was doing such untenable work. For the most part, all translations must endure delays. For example, it took twelve years from when I began translating Lee Seong-Bok’s Ah, Mouthless Things in 2005 until the collection was published in English. The poetry must first catch the translator’s eye, but it must also then stand out in the eyes of the target language editor. That kind of luck is not so easy to come by, which is why it takes such a long time for translations to be published.    However, “slowness” here does not refer only to the difficulty of publishing translations. More than that, when we accept translation as an act of reading, this slowness becomes a necessary exercise. Since speed alone does not tell us everything about human reading practices, the much-lauded speed of AI translation does not make our reading more efficient. Thus, even when we talk about translation speed, we need to look at slowness in a new light. When it comes to translating and reading, what are the benefits of high speed? Human translators cannot translate a text they do not properly understand. AI translation tools manage to regardless. Like a human brain, when a user inputs a sentence into AI, the AI then translates it by converting it into vectors (coordinates) that contain information such as vocabulary, sentence structure, word order, etc. Thus, the more data a language has amassed, the more accurate and detailed the translation will be. For languages that have not amassed much data, the AI will make egregious errors and feign ignorance. The strength of ChatGPT is its unabashed confidence even when it has made a mistake. The output, untouched by the translator’s anguish, is crude in so many ways.    What effect does speed have on us when we read works of literature, particularly poetry? Do we absorb what we read? In times like these, when speed and efficiency have become of the utmost importance, I think this slowness I describe can be applied as a new value to all reading and translation practices. Reading a poem is not encountering a single, unchanging interpretation. Likewise, translating a poem is not handing down a single, final verdict. Nonetheless, after all their agonizing, translators must make certain choices. Impossible choices. This process involves the dual rhythm of slowness and swiftness.    “Impossibility” is a concept that always comes up when we discuss translating poetry. Many doubt whether translating poetry is truly possible. Let’s look at a poem that is often mentioned in these discussions—Kim Sowol’s “Azaleas.” A set of lines reads: “가시는 걸음걸음 / 놓인 그 꽃을 / 사뿐히 즈려밟고 가시옵소서.” Some critics argue that the word “즈려밟고” here should be interpreted as “to trample or stomp on,” while other critics interpret the word as meaning “to take the first step or go ahead of someone.” Depending on which side the translators are on, their translations will differ. Each translator has to make a decision. It is a mysterious and often painful process. Until the last period is placed at the end of a translation, the translator is starting from a basic reading within their own experience and knowledge and spanning out to high-level criticism. This is why I often say, “A translator is a work’s first reader and its final critic.”    That is when creativity matters. Because a literary translation (which reveals the stance, personality, intelligence, empathy, reading ability, and language ability of the translator) involves all manner of reading and interpretation as well as criticism, it is impossible to carry out without creativity. One must read the semi-implicit meanings, omissions, and even spaces between the lines, then weigh the number of cases to make a final choice from among all the possible words with overlapping meanings. In his poem “A Sort of a Song,” the American poet William Carlos Williams advised writers to be “slow and quick, sharp” in choosing their words, likening poets to snakes waiting under the weeds. Translation, too, asks the same creative methodology of translators.    No AI technology can achieve this. ChatGPT has neither the patience nor the sharp resolve. The task of choosing one of the many possibilities contained in a single word, that creative intervention, distinguishes poetry translation from literal translation, which simply replicates and reproduces. That slow and quick, sharp judgment. Creativity in translation can be thought of in a new way along with certain rhythms, different speeds, that come up during the creative process.    In this way, the creativity of translation encompasses the creative reading of both translator and reader. Herein lies the greatest pleasure and comfort that translation can offer. Translators who fret over how to show a work of literature in the best light need the ability to regulate their own pace. To walk the taut line between two languages, staying focused while suppressing the desire to rush across. AI does not know this precarious, thrilling experience. AI does not know hesitation. It does not know the torment that persists until one solution is chosen out of all the different options, nor does it know the dual rhythm of slowness and swiftness involved in making that choice. The reason why AI cannot author an afterword is because it cannot recall any memories of that process.    When I am stuck on a translation, I go for a walk or else I cook. After fretting for a while over the inverted order of the words, I will think of an exquisite turn of phrase while driving and scribble it on the back of my hand. That slow and quick, sharp judgment—that long wait—is a blessing, not a weakness, as well as an essential virtue for the critical work that translation accomplishes. It is an effort to rely on my heart and my mind to leap over the gap between two languages while feeling around for the historical, cultural contexts contained in the poems. I am slower than AI, but after waiting like a snake under my weed, I aim to be a messenger snatching up a language all my own.    The Subject and Community of Translation    Let’s consider the translator’s style. Translators are the first and last readers of a target text, and translations are bound to turn out differently depending on the translator. I’ve experienced this countless times in the translation practicum I teach at LTI Korea’s Translation Academy. Four students translating a text will yield four different versions, and six students translating a text will yield six. No two translations are identical. The subject of a translation is simultaneously a matter of the translator and their interpretations. We read these differences not from the angle of right or wrong but as a kind of gradation. The work becomes richer and more profound. Translation cannot be reduced to merely humans versus AI. Translating poetry is not a game of baduk where the winner is determined by expanding the reach of one’s territory in either black or white.    Poetry creates newness. Poetry, which comes from the Greek word poiesis, meaning ‘to make,’ contains the most linguistic experimentation of all the many genres of literature. In making a familiar language appear unfamiliar, poetry is a genre that opens up new ways of seeing. Translation is relatively transparent about the production process of its subject. In that regard, translation is keener to consider the position of the subject. A closer look at the meanings of the word “subject” reveals several possible concepts, including the grammatical subject, the thematic subject, subjectivity, the self as subject, the citizen as subject, and so on. What I want to emphasize here is that, unlike AI technology, the subject of literary translation is a self-fashioning technology that can form different configurations according to its own interpretations. The interpretations that emerge via each of these different methods are a characteristic of literature that precedes other art forms. And poetry is there as well. By the power of its own subject-production, its making—poiesis itself.    Let’s look the poet Cheon Sang-byeong’s collection 귀천 as an example. Brother Anthony of Taizé, the translator, rendered the title of this work in English as Back to Heaven. Not sky or paradise, but heaven. Here, “heaven” merges the sites of birth and death into one. It suggests that, in death, we return to the place where we were born. The principle of life that ties life and death together remains alive in the translation. In interpreting this work, the translator depicts the world the poet imagined. He pulls the late poet into an embrace. It is a beautiful and warm reception.    In this way, translation enables new births that transcend different languages, time lags, life and death. The sympathetic community that shares translated poems creates a world that is different yet similar to, and similar yet different from, the world that has passed. A place of community and warmth created by translation. The creativity of translation is the seed that grows this community, these “commons.” And the subject of translation is the one who sows that seed. In that slow but sharp, fervent wait. In the era of AI, when I think again about the precarious place of the literary translator today, I think about “the one who sows the seed.” The sower does not linger only on fertile land. They may sow the seed even in barren soil. This seed sprouts with the help of all sorts of forces. No one knows exactly what kind of tree the seed will grow up to be. But what is certain is that it will become something. For me, as someone who reads and translates and teaches poetry, the joy and hope of translation resemble the higher calling of “the one who sows the seed.”    Translated by Paige Aniyah Morris        Korean Works Mentioned:• Ah, Mouthless Things (tr. Chung Eun-Gwi, Myung Mi Kim, Brother Anthony of Taizé, Green Integer, 2017)『아, 입이 없는 것들』 (문학과 지성사, 2003)• Back to Heaven (tr. Brother Anthony of Taizé, Young-Moo Kim, Cornell East Asia Series, 2010)『귀천』 (살림, 1989)• “Azaleas,” Azaleas: A Book of Poems (tr. David McCann, Columbia University Press, 2007)「진달래꽃」, 『진달래꽃』 (숭문사, 1951)

by Chung Eun-Gwi

[Cover Feature] Disintegration of Language: A Translator’s Self-defense in the Era of AI

The task of Hermes—that is what Olga Tokarczuk calls the work of a translator. Hermes is the Greek god who flies through the sky in winged sandals, wearing a winged helmet and carrying a staff entwined by two serpents. He is distinguished by his ability to cross over from heaven to the underworld, between the world of gods and the world of humans, delivering the gods’ will to men. He is one who crosses over, the one who delivers. A translator is like Hermes in that respect, save for the lack of winged sandals, helmet, and staff. What she has instead is a stooped back, stiff shoulders, and flattened buttocks. The body of a translator, who sits hunched in front of a manuscript for extended periods of time, is her tool. When I picture the translators I admire, the image that comes to my mind is people with long-enduring buttocks, not wings; people who carry words with caution, as though they were bricks, instead of moving them all at once. If asked the secret to their crossing over, these translators would doubtless say time. Time expended to translate a manuscript. Time expended—what an uncompetitive weapon in the era of AI.         They say that in the near future, translation will be the first profession to disappear. A translator’s time seems fragile in a world that demands maximum results with minimum cost and time. Many predict that translators working for subsistence will be replaced by AI, and that only a handful will participate as supervisors. The outlook need not be so gloomy, of course, but there will come a moment when translators must prove their competitiveness against AI.         When everyone was talking about ChatGPT, the first question that came to my mind was: why should humans translate books when AI is faster, cheaper, and more accurate? From time to time, I like to compare a sentence I translated with a Google translation. Google Translate is inadequate for translating long sentences and literary expressions, but on occasion, it generates surprisingly accurate results, filling me with an odd sense of shame as a professional translator. I am led to wonder if my translation isn’t swayed by my own personal interpretation, and if machine translation, which interprets a text in an objective, statistical manner, may not expand the possibility of literary translation.         I once imagined: I am at a publisher’s office, sitting side by side with an AI translator. We are translator candidates, competing for the same piece of work (in reality, of course, a translator is not selected in this way). To be chosen, I must make my case as to why I am better suited for the job than the AI translator. In what ways, as a human, am I more capable of successfully performing the task?         To answer the question, one must first study the principle of AI translation. Recent AI translation tools use Neural Machine Translation (NMT) technology to translate languages sentence by sentence. Neural network systems consist of an input layer and an output layer. When a sentence is input into the system, it outputs the coordinate values of words, syntax, word order, and so on by understanding the context through deep learning. The key is to acquire as much data as possible and input high-quality corpora.1 Simply put, AI translation involves statistics, probability, and calculation. The pros of AI translation include quick handling of large amounts of texts. This method involves a spontaneous and direct movement from one language to another, and is a way of expressing a one-to-one relationship that binds two languages into one. In other words, it is a return to simple language.        Is simple language, then, appropriate for literary translation? In this regard, a small seed of hope begins to grow in the mind of the human translator who feels small and insignificant in the face of efficiency. Literature is a fluid and complex system of words that commands specific, emotional, and connotative language, is open to various interpretations depending on the reader, and can change with the times. The first thing a human translator must do to translate intricate language is to read. Reading a work of literature is vastly more than obtaining information. The context must be identified, and further, reconstituted, during which process the reader’s imagination and subjective senses are mobilized. Thus, reading is not a passive act in which one accepts written language as it is, but an active response, a creative act, even. A translator—the first reader—seeks to translate in a creative manner through this process of reading. She ponders the meaning between the lines, and studies the context as much as she studies the text itself. This reading is a task in which translators invest as much time as they do in translating.     I studied drama in school, not literary translation. I began to translate because translating theatrical texts appealed to me. Before I start on a translation, I review all the TV shows, radio programs, and newspaper articles in which the author has appeared. I do this to find a voice: the author’s voice. I create a narrator necessary for the task of translation, constantly replaying in my mind the voice of the author, like that of an actor playing a certain role, and read the text in the way the author would breathe and see things. The narrator, of course, is not the author, having been created from my imagination and subjective senses. To be precise, the narrator is someone created within myself whose origin lies with the author.         Several years ago, I translated a couple of short texts by Marguerite Duras compiled in “Summer 80,” a collection of ten short pieces she had written for Libération between June and August of 1980. Working on the translation, I looked out every day at the Trouville Beach, where Duras had stayed while writing the book, and imagined her reading her own words to me. I was the stenographer setting down her words and breath on paper. There was a unique rhythm and intonation to her words, and I hoped that her voice had infused itself into the translated text, like a song from a foreign land unfamiliar to one’s ears. A certain hesitance around the border that keeps one from smoothly crossing over, a sense of displacement, suits the language of Duras, I thought. This, of course, is subjective interpretation and feeling—which is how I know what dangers lie in this method of interpretation. Creative translation entails the possibility of mistranslation. With each translated sentence comes continuing conflict. What seems a faithful translation to some could, to me, seem an awkward literal translation—a failure; to another, creativity could seem to be a betrayal of translation. Then there are limits imposed on my time, space, and experience. Translation is an attempt to simultaneously reach beyond a linguistic border and a translator’s limit, and something always goes missing or lost in the process. I once dreamed that the words and sentences I had missed transformed themselves into the author and tormented me. Each time I translate, I feel myself a failure and resolve to do better next time, but I’m flooded by feelings of stagnation—because I don’t know the right answer. What is a good translation? I have yet to find a sure answer to that question. I only know that the narrator I create should not be a reenactor for Duras, or an imitator of a certain language; and that the translation must be done in a language that is whole and intact. Will it be possible if I read and polish the manuscript again and again? As I lose myself in these thoughts, the clock ticks toward the deadline. I wonder if I have ever submitted a translation manuscript that is perfect. All of them are full of holes. Will the day ever come when I’ll be able to say, this time it’s perfect? What is a perfect translation, anyway?         Translator Jung Young-Mok said, “The task of the translator is not to achieve a perfect translation, but to perfect the language.”2 I think the statement is based on a beautiful and fascinating perspective that focuses not only on translation but also on the art of language as a whole. A language is not fixed to a certain text, so something entirely new can emerge as a text is translated from A language to B language; and a perspective that acknowledges this new creation, so that language may be perfected, sets the translator free. The holes and dents that occur as A and B come into conflict may become a sort of literary valley, which does not need to be laboriously filled. The valley itself can be magnificent. And if each translator creates a different valley—as each has her own language—how rich and colorful the view would be. If translation is a creative art, then its wholeness and beauty, I believe, have their source in this rich variety. Ten translators working on one text results in ten different texts, as the language we read is not simply source language, but a personal language with different histories and narratives. This language is handed down from parents to children and develops according to education, environment, encounters, circumstances, and personalities; then it undergoes progress, degeneration, and changes with time, becoming one’s unique trait. Thus, the coming together of an author’s language and a translator’s language is a conversation of sorts that can go in any number of unexpected directions, not one in which the answers can be predicted as in a conversation with AI. It is through this openness that we become aware that this world does not move in a single direction, nor is there only one aspect to it; there are so many different facets to this world, which can proceed in multiple directions.         Sometimes I try to think from an author’s stance instead of a translator’s. If my work is translated into another language, I would certainly welcome the possibility of varied interpretations. I would also be happy if the work transformed so much that it surprised me, as that would evidence the aliveness of my language. There is a life force that comes into existence only when a living entity changes and disintegrates. Yoko Tawada said, “Art must disintegrate in an artistic manner.”3 Translation, perhaps, is a process of disintegrating in an artistic way and gaining new vitality from the debris. If my words crumble away in a beautiful way, giving birth to something new, then that, too, would bring me joy.         Back in the shoes of a translator, I consider the act of crumbling in a beautiful way. If we believe that language affects thought, and that the words we write and translate ought to be imbued with the morals, ethics, and values of the day, the first thing that must be eliminated from the language of translation is discriminatory language, and particularly language that lacks gender awareness. The expression I’ve been wrestling with lately is “그녀,” the Korean word for “she.” In a Korean dictionary, “그녀” is a third-person pronoun referring to a woman previously talked about. The gender-equal dictionary compiled by the Seoul Foundation of Women & Family, however, points out that the word is used from the standpoint of a man to indicate a woman. Considering that a corresponding expression—“그남”—does not exist, we note that “그녀” does put an emphasis on a woman’s gender. Replacing every instance of “그녀” in a text with “±×,” however, may lead to confusion when a foreign language with separate male and female pronouns, such as “he/she” or “il/elle” are translated into Korean. Further, in translating sentences written by an author who lays emphasis on the narrator’s identity as a woman (for instance, in author Clarice Lispector’s works, it is important to reveal that the narrator is a woman), the term “그녀” cannot be excluded. And let’s say that there’s a story about someone whose gender is irrelevant, or someone with both masculine and feminine characteristics. In such a case, do we use “그” or “그녀”? Shouldn’t a fresh neuter pronoun be invented? None of these questions can arise in a simple language system in which two languages are placed in a one-to-one relationship. The questions become possible when language is not merely seen as a means of communication uttered through the vocal organs, but perceived as a complex and multilayered system fraught with social and cultural significance. Without such questions, the originality and creativity found in a translation language will seem nothing but mistranslation.         So, this is all there is to my self-defense as a human translator. The AI translator might already have finished and submitted the translation while I’ve been talking away about these hypotheses and theories. In the end, the winner of this competition will be determined by what the reader wants, which is the most reliable criterion. What does someone reading literature want? What does it mean to read literature?         Finally, I’ll borrow once again from Olga Tokarczuk in an effort to persuade readers of literature: “Literature is thus that particular moment when the most individual language meets the language of others.”4         With what kind of language do you want to greet this particular moment? My answer, as a reader, is clear: a language with a voice, a thinking language, a creative language, a contemplating language. And this answer is the hope, as well as the urging whip, that I hand myself—reader to translator.     Translated by Yewon Jung [1] Park Ocksue, “Error Analysis According to the Typological Characteristics of Source Text in Korean-English Machine Translation,” The Society For Humanities Studies In East Asia, no. 41, 2017.[2] Jung Young-Mok, From Perfect Translation to Perfect Language, Munhakdongne, 2018.[3] Tawada Yoko, Exophony: Traveling Outward from One’s Mother Tongue, Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 2003.[4] Olga Tokarczuk, “How Translators Are Saving the World,” tr.  Jennifer Croft, Korean Literature Now Vol. 44, 2019, p. 19. bit.ly/3slOIx3

by Shin Yoo Jin

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10 Contemporary Books by Korean American Writers

Reading Lists

Caroline kim recommends stories from a thriller about the l.a. riots to a magical realist novel about a doppelgänger.

In an interview in the NEA Arts Magazine, Toni Morrison revealed how she came to write The Bluest Eye :

“I wrote the first book because I wanted to read it. I thought that kind of book, with that subject—those most vulnerable, most undescribed, not taken seriously little black girls—had never existed seriously in literature.”

I felt similarly about middle-aged Korean immigrant men, men like my father who moved to America in their 30s and 40s, too old to ever be able to speak English fluently, too set in their ways to accept a culture where hierarchies are less rigid. Powerful at home, he was diminished in public, silent, unsmiling, removed, alone. I couldn’t help seeing him as strangers might. Who could guess at his inner life? Or even that he had an inner life? In my debut collection, The Prince of Mournful Thoughts , I tried to write the book I wanted to read: stories set during the Korean War, about important Korean historical figures, and the ordinary people I lived among but rarely saw reflected in the books I read.

I remember how excited I was when Chang-rae Lee’s Native Speaker came out. I felt a new consciousness, a distinctly Korean American consciousness, finally become a part of the literary imagination. I’ve cheered and been heartened by the popular success of Min Jin Lee’s Pachinko , a moving account about Korean lives in Japan during the colonial occupation, World War II, and its aftermath. Their successes make space for others to follow, and I’m happy to say that there are many more than 10 contemporary Korean American books out there, not that there couldn’t be more. But lately, it’s become hard to keep up (a problem I welcome) and like Viet Thanh Nguyen said in an interview with NBC News, the more Asian American writers there are, the less the burden of representation, allowing for “greater eccentricity and experimentation.” I can’t wait to see what comes next.

In the meantime, here are ten contemporary books that enlarge our understanding of Korean America and introduce characters who, until now, haven’t existed seriously in literature.

Your House Will Pay by Steph Cha

Early in the novel, Grace, a young Korean American woman, thinks about her parents in this way: “Day by day, dollar by dollar, they built new lives in this foreign place, all so she and Miriam could grow up free and clear, American.” What follows shows her that little is “free and clear” for immigrant families like hers. Or for others also struggling to realize their American Dream. Based on a real-life tragedy that helped incite the L.A. Riots, Cha writes with impressive nuance about survival in a complicated world where the distinctions between victims and perpetrators are blurred by racism and capitalism.

Edinburgh by Alexander Chee

I had never encountered a character like Aphias Zhe (“Fee”) before reading Chee’s novel. When asked if he’s Chinese, he answers Half : “Saying it always makes me feel split down the middle. Like a cow diagrammed for her sides of beef.” Twelve-year-old Fee’s life is further compartmentalized in the wake of the sexually predatory behavior of his choir master. In gorgeous prose that serves as a kind of grace, Chee shows us the fallout of this trauma and the ways in which Fee survives, the ways in which he’s changed.

Drifting House by Krys Lee

This is one of my favorite collections of short stories, and “The Salaryman” is my favorite in this collection. Clear-eyed and unsentimental, Krys Lee takes us into the life of one of the many faceless white-collar workers one sees packed into South Korea’s subway trains, one of many not thriving in Korea’s golden economic boom. After losing his job, Mr. Seo lives on the street with other jobless men like himself, so ashamed they can’t go home to their families. Instead they spend their time waiting in line for free food, dreaming of driving trucks or working as laborers in America, contemplating selling their kidneys for cash, and lying to their families. One such man “will call his parents and his wife, as he does every week, pretending to be in America. He will tell his parents that he, the oldest son, is their guarantee. He will promise to bring his wife over after he gets settled.”

The Kinship of Secrets by Eugenia Kim

I thought a lot about the pain of separation and Korea’s division at the 38th parallel as I was reading this novel of two sisters torn apart by the vagaries of Korean history. When the family in the novel immigrates to America, they leave one child behind, for pragmatic reasons (easier to support a smaller family) and also as a placeholder, a promise to the grandmother that the family will return. They have no idea that soon the Korean War will erupt and keep them apart much longer than they anticipated. I loved this book because it showed me what life was like in Korea during the war and in its immediate aftermath, how people survived and even thrived.

The Interpreter by Suki Kim

“Interpreting is almost a habit,” thinks Suzy Park, though for most of her life, it’s her older sister, Grace, who took on the bulk of the responsibility of translating for their immigrant parents. “Grace, since she was little, had to pore over a letter from the bank trying to make sense of words like “APR” or “Balance Transfers,” or call Con-Edison’s 800 number for payment extension.” Within this page-turning murder mystery, Suki Kim depicts the isolations that result from upended Korean parent/child relationships in a way that rings devastatingly true. 

Once the Shore by Paul Yoon

It’s impossible not to fall under the spell of Paul Yoon’s spare, elegant prose in this collection of short stories. Set on a fictional island off the mainland of South Korea, there is something haunting about these stories even if they are as realist as they come. From one of my favorites, “So That They Do Not Hear Us”:

“The following year he was conscripted by the Japanese military, though to this day it was, for her, an abduction. They came for him riding horses. She clawed at their boots and the horses’ flanks. They kicked her down and she hit her head against the base of a tree. Briefly she lost consciousness. When she woke, her eyes focused on the animals and their soft sighs, their white breaths. Hooves lifting, stamping the ground. Tremendous eyes. As if they had come from myth.”

Sorry to Disrupt the Peace by Patty Yumi Cottrell

At the beginning of this funny, bittersweet novel, the main character, Helen Moran gets a call that her adopted Korean American brother died by suicide. Also adopted, also from Korea but not blood related to her brother, she says, “I was the only one, perhaps, who knew and understood him.” Deciding to become a kind of detective in order to find out why he killed himself, she returns home to her estranged parents. What follows is a confrontation with her past that finally gives Helen Moran a kind of illumination.

Shelter by Jung Yun

Kyung Cho, the protagonist of Jung Yun’s novel, has always struggled to be the good Korean son. Though he chose not to go to college in California when he had the chance, instead remaining near his parents in Massachusetts, he tries to keep a great distance between them.

“Brick by brick, he’s built a wall around his life, trying to preserve his family and home as his alone. He helps out his parents when asked and visits when invited, but not too often, and never as much as he should. It’s the most he’s willing to do, the absolute minimum he can get away with and still be considered a son.”

Smartly paced, Yun unfolds the violence at the heart of this family made more heartbreaking by her spare, understated prose.

East Goes West by Younghill Kang

Published in 1937, Younghill Kang’s novel can in no way be called contemporary yet I’m including it because it still has an unmistakably modern sensibility. A romp of a novel, thanks to the ebullience of the main character, Chungpa Han, who travels across the U.S. and parts of Canada, meeting Americans of all kinds—African Americans in Harlem, a senator who picks him up hitchhiking, the wealthy men and women who hire him as houseboys and drivers. I’ll never forget the scene when he becomes a waiter at a Chinese restaurant and calculates that among the nine waiters, there “were three Ph.D.’s from Columbia, and two more to be next June; a B.A. and B.S. and one M.A.” Yet, the only work they can get is waiting tables.  It reminded me too painfully of my own parents, college graduates, working in assembly-line jobs or their good friend, a professor back in Korea, whom they never failed to address as Dr . Kim.

Disappear Doppelgänger Disappear by Matthew Salesses

Matthew Salesses begins his novel with “An Abbreviated List of Disappearances” which includes the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882, the Asiatic Barred Zone Act of 1917, and Executive Order 9066 in 1942 which effectively pushed Japanese Americans into internment camps. From there, he takes the idea of the “invisible Asian” to a whole new level. In interesting ways, Salesses plays with the ideas of identity and disappearance, beginning by giving his protagonist his own name, Matt. In fact, there are two Matts and two Yumi’s, his girlfriend, although one of them is named Sandra. Hyper-real, this novel made me laugh and think.

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In-Seok Kim - Colloquial Korean is easy to use and completely up-to-date! Specially written by an experience teacher for self-study or class use, the course offers (...)

2010 • 489 Pages • 25.73 MB • English • Submitted by kiehn.gail

Defense Language Institute - May 6, 2013 STUDENT GUIDE. TAPE INDEX. INTRODUCTION TO KOREAN GRAMMAR. INTRODUCTION TO KOREAN SOUNDS. UNIT 1 GREETINGS 

2001 • 271 Pages • 4.03 MB • English • Submitted by dickinson.raphael

Robert - Perhaps more than any other East Asian country, Korea adheres to the traditional collectivist and Confucian traits of harmony, hierarchy, status and p (...)

2007 • 558 Pages • 28.34 MB • English • Submitted by francisco86

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2000 • 140 Pages • 7.73 MB • English • Submitted by qkautzer

Young-A Cho - This book is intensive listening comprehension course for beginner to advanced beginner-level students. It makes learning Korean as well as listening (...)

2001 • 271 Pages • 722 KB • English • Submitted by bprice

2007 • 558 Pages • 28.34 MB • English • Submitted by tara.ruecker

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2010 • 126 Pages • 902 KB • English • Submitted by gbeatty

Gi In Lee - Without strong pastoral leadership in the local churches, the ministries and The Bible is not a manual for Biblical leadership, but it does provide.

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2016 • 0 Pages • 8.57 MB • English • Submitted by hilpert.glenna

Hollym International Corp., 1979. — 373 p.For the first time in English, a practical 367 page handbook with all you need to read and write the written (...)

2006 • 396 Pages • 1.72 MB • English • Submitted by webster61

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2010 • 126 Pages • 898 KB • English • Submitted by lgaylord

Gi In Lee - to my families including Jenny, and Isaac who have prayed, loved, and . 5Ernest E. Mosley, Called to Joy:Design for Pastoral Ministries (Nashville: . (...)

2006 • 225 Pages • 1.31 MB • English • Submitted by cremin.palma

Charles K. Armstrong - While most analyses of Korean politics have looked to elites to explain political change, this new and revised edition of Korean Society examines the (...)

2001 • 162 Pages • 137.34 MB • English • Submitted by hcartwright

Yefim Gordon - The Soviet Union's swept-wing fighter, controversially powered by a copied Rolls-Royce Nene jet engine, caused a sensation and more than a few problem (...)

We are a Korean American non-profit organization in the San Francisco Bay Area providing volunteer opportunities to middle and high school students who are interested in celebrating and learning about Korean culture while supporting diversity in the community.

Explore the diverse activities happening at Hansamo.

The 10th hansamo showcase & award night - april 20, 2024, saturday 4pm.

https://tickets.sanramon.ca.gov/orderticketsarea.asp?p=212&a=42&src=performancelisting&_ga=&_gl=

Our Programs

Hansamo consists of Performance Team (Pungmulnori, Dance, Nanta)

Performance Team:

Middle and high school students meet up every week on Saturdays and learn Korean traditional music and dance.

Pungmulnori - Korean traditional percussion musical instruments

Dance - korean traditional dance including samgomu and fan dance., nanta - korean drum play, korean class contest essays and digital books.

Support Hansamo today!

Thank you for supporting Hansamo, a purely civilian and nonprofit Korean student and parent association established to bring Korean classes to public schools in SF Bay Area and to promote Korean culture/arts and diversity in the community. If you wish to support or sponsor us, you can find the information on the Donation page . Thank you!

Awarding-winning Korean literary gems on show at COEX

A n array of award-winning Korean literary gems, from a novel recounting the horrors of Jeju Island’s 1948 massacres to a gripping dystopian feminist eco-thriller, have been curated for an exhibition at the Starfield Library in southern Seoul's COEX.

“Springing to Life,” co-organized by the library and the Literature Translation Institute of Korea, features 13 original Korean books alongside their 82 translated editions, all of which have garnered international recognition since 2019.

One of the highlights is the International Booker Prize-winning author Han Kang’s “I Do Not Bid Farewell,” which clinched the Prix Médicis for foreign literature last November, marking the first time a Korean work has been honored with the reputable French award.

The novel delves into the tragic events of the Jeju April 3 Uprising through the perspectives of three women. The incident saw approximately 30,000 civilians — nearly 10 percent of the island’s population at the time — purged in an anti-communist military campaign.

Also on view is “Phantom Pain Wings” by poetic heavyweight Kim Hye-soon. This poignant anthology of 72 poems nabbed the U.S. National Book Critics Circle Award in the poetry category in March.

To depict the haunting memory of war trauma and the endless struggles against injustice, Kim combines her signature experimental language with elements drawn from Korea’s folklore and legends, as well as cultural legacies plucked from different parts of the world.

Two graphic novels are included in the show: Keum Suk Gendry-Kim’s “Grass” and Ma Yeong-shin’s “Moms.” Both pieces received the Harvey Award for Best International Book in 2020 and 2021, respectively.

“Grass” offers an unflinching portrayal of the victims of Japan’s wartime sex slavery, while “Moms” presents a darkly humorous, unfiltered portrait of four women in their mid-50s in Korea as they navigate complicated love lives, sexual adventures and menial jobs.

On May 10, author Han will provide insight into the background and creative process behind “I Do Not Farewell” through a lecture and a reading.

“Springing to Life” runs through May 12.

The Most Popular Nonfiction Books of 2024 So Far, According to Goodreads

Always books. Never boring.

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Goodreads editors have crunched some more numbers to give us a list of 51 of the most popular nonfiction books of 2024 (so far). To do so, they looked at which titles their members had saved under the Read or Want to Read sections on the site, which boasts more than 150 million members.

They’ve organized the list into categories that may overlap a bit: Essays, History & Biography, Memoirs, Science, and General Nonfiction.

A sampling of Goodreads’ 51 most popular nonfiction books of 2024 is below:

There’s Always This Year: On Basketball and Ascension by Hanif Abdurraqib

Thunder Song: Essays by Sasha taqwšəblu LaPointe

My Side of the River by Elizabeth Camarillo Gutierrez

The House of Hidden Meanings by RuPaul

History & Biography

Madness: Race and Insanity in a Jim Crow Asylum by Antonia Hylton

Not Your China Doll: The Wild and Shimmering Life of Anna May Wong by Katie Gee Salisbury

Science, Technology & Health 

Blood: The Science, Medicine, and Mythology of Menstruation by Jen Gunter

Burn Book: A Tech Love Story by Kara Swisher

General Nonfiction

Why We Read: On Bookworms, Libraries, and Just One More Page Before Lights Out by Shannon Reed

Praisesong for the Kitchen Ghosts: Stories and Recipes from Five Generations of Black Country Cooks by Crystal Wilkinson

To see the complete list, visit Goodreads.com.

Find more news and stories of interest from the book world in  Breaking in Books .

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• PEN America Cancels Awards Following Writers’ Boycott Over Palestine
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NPR suspends senior editor Uri Berliner after essay accusing outlet of liberal bias

Npr suspended senior editor uri berliner a week after he authored an online essay accusing the outlet of allowing liberal bias in its coverage..

NPR has suspended a senior editor who authored an essay published last week on an online news site in which he argued that the network had "lost America's trust" because of a liberal bias in its coverage, the outlet reported.

Uri Berliner was suspended Friday for five days without pay, NPR reported Tuesday . The revelation came exactly a week after Berliner publicly claimed in an essay for The Free Press, an online news publication, that NPR had allowed a "liberal bent" to influence its coverage, causing the outlet to steadily lose credibility with audiences.

The essay reignited the criticism that many prominent conservatives have long leveled against NPR and prompted newsroom leadership to implement monthly internal reviews of the network's coverage, NPR reported. Berliner's essay also angered many of his colleagues and exposed NPR's new chief executive Katherine Maher to a string of attacks from conservatives over her past social media posts.

In a statement Monday to NPR, Maher refuted Berliner's claims by underscoring NPR's commitment to objective coverage of national issues.

"In America everyone is entitled to free speech as a private citizen," Maher said. "What matters is NPR's work and my commitment as its CEO: public service, editorial independence, and the mission to serve all of the American public. NPR is independent, beholden to no party, and without commercial interests."

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Berliner rails against NPR's coverage of COVID-19, diversity efforts

Berliner, a senior business editor who has worked at NPR for 25 years, argued in the Free Press essay that “people at every level of NPR have comfortably coalesced around the progressive worldview.”

While he claimed that NPR has always had a "liberal bent" ever since he was hired at the outlet, he wrote that it has since lost its "open-minded spirit," and, hence, "an audience that reflects America."

The Peabody Award-winning journalist highlighted what he viewed as examples of the network's partisan coverage of several major news events, including the origins of COVID-19 and the war in Gaza . Berliner also lambasted NPR's diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) policies – as reflected both within its newsroom and in its coverage – as making race and identity "paramount in nearly every aspect of the workplace.”

"All this reflected a broader movement in the culture of people clustering together based on ideology or a characteristic of birth," he wrote.

Uri Berliner's essay fuels conservative attacks on NPR

In response to the essay, many prominent conservatives and Republicans, including former President Donald Trump, launched renewed attacks at NPR for what they perceive as partisan coverage.

Conservative activist Christopher Rufo in particular targeted Maher for messages she posted to social media years before joining the network – her  first at a news organization . Among the posts singled out were  a 2020 tweet that called Trump racist .

Trump reiterated on his social media platform, Truth Social, his longstanding argument that NPR’s government funding should be rescinded.

NPR issues formal rebuke to Berliner

Berliner provided an NPR reporter with a copy of the formal rebuke for review in which the organization told the editor he had not been approved to write for other news outlets, as is required of NPR journalists.

NPR also said he publicly released confidential proprietary information about audience demographics, the outlet reported.

Leadership said the letter was a "final warning" for Berliner, who would be fired for future violations of NPR's policies, according to NPR's reporting. Berliner, who is a dues-paying member of NPR's newsroom union, told the NPR reporter that he is not appealing the punishment.

A spokeswoman for NPR said the outlet declined to comment on Berliner's essay or the news of his suspension when reached Tuesday by USA TODAY.

"NPR does not comment on individual personnel matters, including discipline," according to the statement. "We expect all of our employees to comply with NPR policies and procedures, which for our editorial staff includes the NPR Ethics Handbook ."

NPR staffer express dismay; leadership puts coverage reviews in place

According to the NPR article, Berliner's essay also invoked the ire of many of his colleagues and the reporters whose stories he would be responsible for editing.

"Newsrooms run on trust," NPR political correspondent Danielle Kurtzleben said in a post last week on social media site X, though he didn't mention Berliner by name. "If you violate everyone's trust by going to another outlet and [expletive] on your colleagues (while doing a bad job journalistically, for that matter), I don't know how you do your job now."

Amid the fallout, NPR reported that NPR's chief news executive Edith Chapin announced to the newsroom late Monday afternoon that Executive Editor Eva Rodriguez would lead monthly meetings to review coverage.

Berliner expressed no regrets about publishing the essay in an interview with NPR, adding that he tried repeatedly to make his concerns over NPR's coverage known to news leaders.

"I love NPR and feel it's a national trust," Berliner says. "We have great journalists here. If they shed their opinions and did the great journalism they're capable of, this would be a much more interesting and fulfilling organization for our listeners."

Eric Lagatta covers breaking and trending news for USA TODAY. Reach him at [email protected]

96-year-old Korean War veteran awarded with Purple Heart 73 years later

MANKATO, Minn. ( KEYC /Gray News) – A Korean War veteran from Minnesota who still has shrapnel in his leg from when he was wounded in combat will finally get his Purple Heart medal – 73 years later.

The U.S. Army notified 96-year-old Earl Meyer on Monday that he will receive a Purple Heart, which honors service members wounded or killed in combat.

The decision came after a campaign by his daughters, his attorney, and Sen. Amy Klobuchar.

Those efforts paid off once already as Meyer was awarded a Congressional Gold Medal just last year for his service.

The Army’s top noncommissioned officer, the sergeant major of the army, took an interest in Meyer receiving a Purple Heart medal after having been rejected for years due to a lack of paperwork.

U.S. District Judge John Tunheim this year ordered an Army review board to take another look.

The Army sent Meyer’s attorney a stack of documents Monday to notify them of the decision. That includes a certificate in color saying it was “for wounds received in action on June 1951 in Korea.”

Meyer said he’s glad he is finally being honored for his service.

“Anybody can make up a story. But when they hear people talking about it, they gotta realize this person knows what he’s talking about. I guess that’s the way they felt about my story,” Meyer said.

Copyright 2024 KEYC via Gray Media Group, Inc. All rights reserved.

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In 20 pictures: The Asia Pacific this week

And that's this week's photostory wrap from the Asia Pacific.

If you enjoyed that format or have any feedback, please let us know through the audience engagement form at this link .

We've also included some links below to ABC platforms and sites where you can read more stories from the region. 

And if you would like to see your own photos here, we've got an ongoing competition on to see your best shots from around the Pacific that you can take part in .

See you next week.

• X (formerly Twitter)

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