London Korean Links

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Brother Anthony’s poetry talks in St Andrews and London

Brother Anthony of Taizé, the noted – and prolific – translator of Korean literature and poetry, is coming to the UK in March and will be appearing at the StAnza International Poetry Festival in St Andrews on 10 March and giving two talks in London on 13 and 15 March. Details below:

Past & Present

Saturday 10 March, 11:30 – 12:30
The Town Hall | Queens Gardens | St Andrews KY16 9TA
£4.50/£3.50 | Buy tickets
Brother Anthony on Korean poetry, Miriam Nash on Gwendolyn Brooks

StAnza International Poetry Festival logo

In our Past & Present sessions, contemporary speakers give a personal response to favourite past poets writing in English or other languages. Brother Anthony of the Taizé ecumenical order has lived in Korea since 1980, and is an acclaimed translator from Korean. For this Past & Present session, he will introduce some of the poets featured in a recent anthology of twentieth century Korean poetry, The Colors of Dawn, of which he is the editor. He’ll be speaking alongside poet Miriam Nash, who will be discussing Gwendolyn Brooks. The first black author to win the Pulitzer Prize, Gwendolyn Brooks garnered critical attention with her debut collection in 1945. Her work grew increasingly political over the course of the civil rights movement.

Translating Korean poet Kim Seung Hee with Brother Anthony

Tuesday 13 March, 6:30pm
The Poetry Translation Centre | 2 Wardrobe Place | London EC4V 5AH
£7.95 | Book tickets

Kim Seung-hee

We are excited to welcome Korean translator Brother Anthony to work with the Poetry Translation Centre for the first time. Brother Anthony is a respected translator who has lived in Korea since 1980. He is retuning to the UK to reading with the poet Ko Un at the StAnza Festival in St. Andrews. He will be introducing us to the work of Kim Seung Hee, a widely admired feminist surrealist poet.

There is no need to know the language being translated, just come along!

Poet

Kim Seung Hee (b. 1952) is a celebrated Korean poet. Her career began in 1973. In addition to ten volumes of poetry she has published two volumes of fiction. She is widely admired as a feminist surrealist and has received several major awards. Her volume Pots Bobbing was published in English as Walking on a Washing-Line (Cornell EAS).

Bridge Translator

Brother Anthony of Taizé was born in Cornwall in 1942, He studied European literature for 9 years at the University of Oxford. A member of the Community of Taizé since 1969, he has been living in Korea since 1980. He is now an Emeritus Professor of Sogang University (Seoul) and a Chair-Professor at Dankook University. A prolific translator, since 1990 he has published over 40 volumes of translations of Korean literature.

Workshop Facilitator

Clare Pollard is an award-winning poet and the editor of Modern Poetry In Translation. As a writer, Clare is very concerned with bearing witness to the times in which we live. Her work has frequently engaged with contemporary concerns. Her third collection Look, Clare! Look! (2005) was made a set text on the WJEC A-level syllabus. Her latest collection is Incarnation (Bloodaxe, 2017).

Translating Korean Poetry

Thursday 15 March, 6:00 – 8:00pm TBC
Korean Cultural Centre
Free | Registration details TBC
(Note change of date and venue. Originally scheduled for 16 March @ SOAS)

Abstract

Brother Anthony has published over 40 volumes of English translations of modern Korean poetry, by many major poets, and in this talk he will first of all give an account of the earlier history of the publication of translated Korean poetry from the 1930s, then relate his own career as a translator. He will reflect at some length on the theoretical issues facing the translator of Korean poetry into a language so unlike Korean as English is, before ending with the reading of a selection of poems by younger Korean poets.

Speaker Biography

Brother Anthony of Taizé was born in Cornwall in 1942. A member of the Community of Taizé since 1969, he has been living in Korea since 1980. A prolific translator, since 1990 he has published well over forty volumes of translations of Korean literature, mostly contemporary poetry, including work by Ko Un, Jeong Ho-Seung, Shim Bo-Seon, Do Jong-Hwan, Oh Sae-Young, Kim Seung-Hee, Cheon Sang-Byeong, etc. as well as fiction by Yi Mun-yol and many others.

(automatically generated) Read LKL’s review of this event here.

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