(Granta, 2000) / (Granta, 1995) / A Gesture Life is a beautiful slow-burn novel which examines the relations between Koreans (both victim and collaborator) and Japanese in the wartime comfort stations. Native Speaker is a detective story which also explores the experiences of Korean immigrants in the US. Read A Gesture Life in preference to … [Read More]
Featured Posts - page 274
Richard Hooker: M*A*S*H
Fun, easy-to-read stories about the army surgical hospitals in the Korean War. Each of the chapters feels as if it’s tailor-made for an episode of a TV series (funny, that). As a Brit, I sometimes find I need a dictionary to translate some of the Americanisms (and I start skim-reading when they’re talking in any … [Read More]
Elizabeth Kim: Ten Thousand Sorrows
This one’s really depressing, and it’s amazing how the author (this is autobiographical) seems to have ended up reasonably unscathed — outwardly at least. If ever you think you’ve had a tough time, read this book and you’ll feel better: someone’s had it worse. This is the story of the mixed-race daughter of a GI … [Read More]
Mira Stout: One Thousand Chestnut Trees
(Flamingo, 1997) Absorbing and very moving book in which the narrator pursues her family history through turbulent twentieth-century Korea. Quite a good introduction to modern Korean history if you’ve never read a history book, but this novel’s much more than that. Links: Buy at Amazon.co.uk [Read More]
Brief book review: Suki Kim — The Interpreter
A detective story centring on a young Korean girl in New York who earns a living interpreting for the court system. By chance she comes across information which leads her to question the circumstances of her parents’ death. The novel is an interesting glimpse into the Korean underclass in New York. I was so taken … [Read More]
Margaret Drabble: The Red Queen
(Penguin, 2005) Inspired by the Memoirs of Lady Hyegyong. The first half is a re-telling of the original story with the benefit of an additional 200 years’ hindsight; the second half is set in modern times, in a story which echoes some of the themes of the original. The only part which stretches the credulity … [Read More]
DPRK embassy e-bulletin 7 April 2006: Dokdo
The text of a release circulated by the DPRK Embassy in London yesterday: DPRK Foreign Ministry’s Spokesman Slams Japan’s Claim to Tok Islet Pyongyang, April 6 (KCNA) — A spokesman for the DPRK Foreign Ministry in a statement issued on April 6 accused the Japanese authorities of recently allowing the description of Tok Islet as … [Read More]
Hwang Sok-yong: The Guest
(Seven Stories, 2005) Translated by Chun Kyung-ja and Maya West Originally published as 손님, Seoul 2001 The Guest of the title is an unwelcome foreigner: originally applied to smallpox, it is used by extension to cover the cultural imports of communism and Christianity. The theme of the book is that until the ghosts of the … [Read More]
Investing in Korea: Carrefour
We await a comprehensive analysis of why Carrefour failed to succeed in Korea. An article in yesterday’s JoongAng Ilbo suggests a failure adequately to “localise” — having French rather than local management; and despite having French management it is suggested that the need to refer decisions to head office (a familiar gripe) resulted in slow … [Read More]
How to boost your stock price
Get Yonsama to buy some shares. Though I guess this would only work with Korean small-cap media stocks: [Ottowintech]’s share price, which stood at W12,700 on March 27 right before resuming stock transactions, quadrupled in less than 10 days, netting Bae, who invested a total of W9 billion in the company, more than 10 times … [Read More]
Elevator music leads to defection
To many it’s the sort of music one would endure all sorts of hardship to get away from — but to a talented North Korean pianist it was a revelation which led him to defect to the South. Yes, it’s the easy-listening grooves of Richard Clayderman which inspired the conversion. It says something about the … [Read More]
Eric promotes Spam
Not the unsolicited email, but the processed pork luncheon meat so ridiculed in the Monty Python sketch. As Rowan Pease said in her recent talk on the hallyu in China, the only way for stars and studios to make money out of hallyu is via celebrity endorsements; but it’s certainly puzzling that such a (to … [Read More]
Korean art the latest hot investment
Elton John profits from his investment in the work of Korean photographer Bae Bien-u [Read More]
More on Lone Star / KEB and the US Kaesong visit
I’m guessing that Douglas Anderson from the US House of Representatives has now reported back to base following his visit to Kaesong. Jay Lefkowitz, the US envoy for NK human rights has condemned the low wages and poor conditions there, to the understandable irritation of the South. I’m also guessing that the messages taken back … [Read More]
Korea and foreign investment
Standard Chartered Bank chairman Brian Sanderson, in a recent meeting with Roh Moo-hyun, said SCB’s experience in Korea had been positive so far. It will be remembered that SCB bought Korea First Bank, South Korea’s eight-largest lender, from US private equity firm Newbridge Capital and the Korean government for around $3.2bn a year ago, sneaking … [Read More]
North-themed update
The Xinhua newsagency reports the cordial meeting between Kim Jong-Il’s brother-in-law Jang Song Taek and a member of the Chinese politbureau, as the DPRK’s tour of Chinese economic zones draws to a close. Meanwhile, Yoduk story, the musical based in a North Korean concentration camp, is a sell-out success. The BBC is now featuring the … [Read More]