A major, never before translated novel by the author of “Muj?ng / The Heartless”–often called the first modern Korean novel–“The Soil” tells the story of an idealist dedicating his life to helping the inhabitants of the rural community in which he was raised. Striving to influence the poor farmers of the time to improve their … [Read More]
Booklist: Korea through Literature (page 3)
Rat Fire: Korean Stories from the Japanese Empire
This volume brings together twelve short stories by colonial Korean proletarian writers, as well as two works written in 1946 under U.S. military occupation. The volume provides a diverse, ever-changing portrait of the complex movements of people and ideas that constituted both colonial Korea and the Japanese empire, adding the tumultuous experiences of those from … [Read More]
Straight Lines and Poison Gas – At the Hospital Wards (Bi-lingual, Vol 18 – Liberty)
I stood up with him. I reeled from the feeling of futility, with my legs shaky and my entire body sluggish. As I was walking out of that empty, white, square-shaped room, the man turned around, gave my shoulder a friendly grab, and looked straight into my eyes. “By the way, Sir, you might want … [Read More]
Black Flower
In 1904, as the Russo-Japanese War deepened, Asia was parceled out to rising powers and the Korean empire was annexed by Japan. Facing war and the loss of their nation, more than a thousand Koreans left their homes to seek possibility elsewhere—in unknown Mexico. After a long sea voyage, these emigrants—thieves and royals, priests and … [Read More]
Modern Korean Literature — An Anthology 1908-65
The sixth book in Kegan Paul International’s “Korean Culture Series”, this volume contains thirty stories that have been selected on the basis of historical interest and literary worth, each representing a monumental moment in the history of Korean Literature. The ten stories in the first part share the common theme of the Korean experience of … [Read More]
Seven Contemporary Plays from the Korean Diaspora in the Americas
From the publisher’s website: Showcasing the dynamism of contemporary Korean diasporic theater, this anthology features seven plays by second-generation Korean diasporic writers from the United States, Canada, and Chile. By bringing the plays together in this collection, Esther Kim Lee highlights the themes and styles that have enlivened Korean diasporic theater in the Americas since … [Read More]
The Land of the Banished (Bi-lingual, Vol 5 – Division)
The Land of the Banished is a heart-rending tale of a man torn and warped by the hardships of the Korean War period. Born into a landless peasant family, Mahn-seok becomes embroiled in the class struggle that descends upon his village with the onset of the war. From his rise through the ranks of the … [Read More]
Drifting House
A haunting and unforgettable debut spanning the last seventy years of Korean history, including the BBC Short Story Prize shortlisted story ‘The Goose Father’. Alternating between the lives of Koreans struggling through seventy years of turbulent, post-World War II history in their homeland and the communities of Korean immigrants grappling with assimilation in the United … [Read More]
The Surrendered
From the publisher’s website: Chang-rae Lee, the bestselling and award-winning author of Native Speaker, Aloft, and My Year Abroad returns with his most ambitious novel yet-a spellbinding story of how love and war echo through an entire lifetime. June Han was orphaned as a girl by the Korean War. Hector Brennan was a young GI … [Read More]
Lost Souls: Stories
Publisher description: These captivating short stories portray three major periods in modern Korean history: the forces of colonial modernity during the late 1930s; the postcolonial struggle to rebuild society after four decades of oppression, emasculation, and cultural exile (1945 to 1950); and the attempt to reconstruct a shattered land and a traumatized nation after the … [Read More]
From Wonso Pond
A classic revolutionary novel of the 1930s and the first complete work written by a woman before the Korean War to be published in English, From Wonso Pond transforms the love triangle between three protagonists into a revealing portrait of the living conditions that led to modern Korea, both North and South. In a plot … [Read More]
The Old Garden
Political prisoner Hyun Woo is freed after eighteen years to find no trace of the world he knew. The friends with whom he shared utopian dreams are gone. His Seoul is unrecognizably transformed and aggressively modernized. Yoon Hee, the woman he loved, died three years ago. A broken man, he drifts toward a small house … [Read More]
There a Petal Silently Falls: 3 stories
Ch’oe Yun is a Korean author known for her breathtaking versatility, subversion of authority, and bold exploration of the inner life. Readers celebrate her creative play with fantasy and admire her deep engagement with trauma, history, and the vagaries of remembrance. In this collection’s title work, There a Petal Silently Falls, Ch’oe explores both the … [Read More]
An Empty House: Korean-American Poetry
From the publisher’s website: A sequel to Fragrance of Poetry, a much acclaimed poetry collection, An Empty House contains ninety-four poems by twelve Korean-American poets. It is a work that represents significant thought, effort, and collaboration. Poems in this volume show the breadth and depth of Korean-American poets’ homesickness, grief, pain, and joy of life … [Read More]
Plays of Colonial Korea
From the publisher’s website: During the Japanese occupation of Korea, young intellectuals like Se-dŏk Ham, eager to transform the traditional Korean ways, introduced Western arts, philosophy, and technology and styled themselves as bringing enlightenment. It was in this edgy, tumultuous world that Ham’s plays were first performed. With the end of World War II and … [Read More]
Three Generations
Touted as one of Korea’s most important works of fiction, Three Generations (published in 1931 as a serial in Chosun Ilbo) charts the tensions in the Jo family in 1930s Japanese occupied Seoul. Yom’s keenly observant eye reveals family tensions withprofound insight. Delving deeply into each character’s history and beliefs, he illuminates the diverse pressures … [Read More]