From the publisher’s website: Throughout the twentieth century, few countries in Asia suffered more from foreign occupation, civil war, and international military conflict than Korea. The Colors of Dawn brings together the moving and powerful voices of over forty Korean poets from these turbulent years. From 1903 to 1945, the Japanese Empire occupied the Korean … [Read More]
Archives: Books (page 113)
One Day, Then Another
From the publisher’s website: These poems give voice to the voiceless. His poetic task is to find a way to honor the weak and disenfranchised through small cautious steps into the cracks of this hidden world. Kim Kwang-Kyu’s most recent translation in English is The Depth of a Clam. He lives in Seoul, Korea. [Read More]
Shadows of the Void
From the publisher’s website: Ynhui Park’s poems are not difficult; they are usually simple and suggestive, inviting the reader to share an experience of some moment, some scene, in which the underlying void seems to have yielded to value and meaning…. His poems very often re-enact a search for consolation and peace, faced with the … [Read More]
Rain, Sky, Wind, Port
From the publisher’s website: Kim Namjo’s dynamic use of sensual language and vibrant imagery portrays the subtlety of humanity and passion for religious life. Her work has received numerous awards and she has served as chair of the Korean Poet’s Association [Read More]
I Must Be the Wind
From the publisher’s website: “‘Dazzling strokes of falling stars in falling water. I want to write poems like that,’ writes Moon Chung-hee. Thanks to Silberg and You, these poems dazzle bright in English. Here love is violent and ‘suffered, an encysted stone . . . wedged’ in the heart, and defiance trembles the soul: ‘Dress up for … [Read More]
Sorrowtoothpaste Mirrorcream
From the publisher’s website: “Her poems are not ironic. They are direct, deliberately grotesque, theatrical, unsettling, excessive, visceral and somatic. This is feminist surrealism loaded with shifting, playful linguistics that both defile and defy traditional roles for women” —Pam Brown About the author Kim Hyesoon is a prominent South Korean poet who has received numerous … [Read More]
I’m OK, I’m Pig!
From the publisher’s website: Kim Hyesoon is one of South Korea’s most important contemporary poets. She began publishing in 1979 and was one of the first few women in South Korea to be published in Munhak kwa jisong (Literature and Intellect), one of two key journals which championed the intellectual and literary movement against the US-backed military … [Read More]
The Book Of Korean Poetry: Choson Dynasty
The Korean Book of Poetry: Choson Dynasty is a comprehensive anthology of Choson Dynasty (13921910) poetry, with translations of 600 plus poems, an introduction to the dynasty, essays on the various genres, notes on poems and poets, guides to original texts, bibliography and so on. An ideal textbook for students of premodern Korean literature, it … [Read More]
The Crane in the Clouds: Shijo: Korean Classical Poems in the Vernacular
From the publisher’s website: This anthology presents well over a hundred Korean classical poems known as shijo, in English translation. Shijo, a form of poetic composition still very much alive, has a tradition spanning a thousand years. One of the first historical anthologies of shijo in English, this book offers an overview of that uniquely … [Read More]
Poems of Kim Yideum, Kim Haengsook + Kim Min Jeong
From the publisher’s website: This collection brings together three of the most exciting voices in contemporary Korean poetry to the English language in translation. These three women poets shock and delight, entertain and de-familiarize, corrupt and contaminate traditional readings and stereotypical definitions of Asian women, Asian poetry, Asian-ness. While K-pop girl groups sell cuteness, marketing … [Read More]
Ah, Mouthless Things
From the publisher’s website: Born in Sangju, Korea in 1952, Lee Seong-bok earned his Ph.D. in French Language and Literature at Seoul National University, then taught French Literature at Keimyung University in the city of Daegu. Since his first poem, “At a Familiar Brothel,” was published in 1977, he has impressed readers with his opulent … [Read More]
A Black Kite
From the publisher’s website: This selection from Kim Jong-Gil’s work contains just over 50 poems, written throughout his career and chosen by himself. The poems are those by which he wishes to be remembered. The topics are personal, often the result of a journey back to a place familiar in childhood, or of a moment … [Read More]
The Growth of a Shadow
From the publisher’s website: A selection of seventy-one poems by Korean author Taejoon Moon, these short, reflective poems shine a light on the ordinary aspects of everyday life through Moon’s keen observations of his surroundings combined with his use of rich detail. From a woman struggling with cancer to a flower dying in a pot, … [Read More]
We, Day by Day
From the publisher’s website: Whether suturing NoHae Park and Pablo Neruda together in a cinematic sweep or refusing the global economy’s demands to rush and sign over one’s literary life, Jin’s portraiture is time illuminated by an intelligence committed to “how strange questions, fountains of brilliant blood, gush unceasingly in the boundless desert of answers.” [Read More]
If my tongue refuses to remain in my mouth
From the publisher’s website: Sunwoo Kim’s debut collection of poems, If My Tongue Refuses to Remain in My Mouth, appeared in 2000, declaring in the boldest terms that at the outset of the new millennium she would bring to the page a radically different conception of poetry. Central to her work is the belief that … [Read More]
Whisper of Splendor
From the publisher’s website: Whisper of Splendor brings about 60 poems from the author to demonstrate his poetic ideals and art. In the book, the reader notes the persona’s propensity to take away the tangled web of meanings that packs his consciousness, so that he can take in things as they are, as they move. Declining … [Read More]