London Korean Links

Covering things Korean in London and beyond since 2006

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Selected publications

Fringe visit: The Song of Beast (after Hamlet)

Imagine Hamlet scripted / co-directed by Park Chan-Wook (Oldboy), Ryu Seung-wan (Veteran / Unjust) and Yoon Jong-bin (Nameless Gangster), with dialogue input from Yang Ik-joon (Breathless), and music by Cho Young-wook (Oldboy) and you’re starting to get close what this production is like. The setting is moved from Denmark to an abattoir which has a … [Read More]

Brief review: Taming of the Shrew, at the KCC

It was a great treat to see a shortened version of ‘Taming of The Shrew’ at the Korean Cultural Centre recently, performed in English by EDP, student drama club of Soon Chun Hyang University. Even if the academic talks that preceded it were not quite as lively, one valuable outcome of attending the seminar was … [Read More]

Report from the KCC Artist Talk: Shakespeare interpretations in East Asia

I hadn’t been to any of the events for Seoul in the City, part of this year’s City of London festival. The symposium at London’s Korean Cultural Centre for Shakespeare’s plays in contemporary East Asian languages seemed particularly interesting to me. My previous experience of Shakespeare in East Asia was confined to Ran, Akira Kurosawa’s … [Read More]

Artist Talk – Re-interpreting Shakespeare’s Hamlet

This is the third talk presented in connection with the Seoul in the City strand of this year’s City of London Festival. And check this link to find out about an offer of free tickets to Yohangza Theatre Company’s production of Hamlet this Saturday. Beyond Borders: Re-interpreting Shakespeare’s Hamlet Monday 14 July 2014, 19:00 to … [Read More]

Korean performances at the City of London Festival

This year’s City of London Festival has a Korean focus. And although most of the performances in the festival are of Western classical music, there is a Korean Hamlet from Yohangza Theatre Company (who do a wonderful Midsummer Night’s Dream), fusion music from Ensemble Sinawi and contemporary and street dance too. Sunwook Kim (piano) Wednesday … [Read More]

Here’s what Hamlet sounds like in Korean

In 2012, as part of their Globe to Globe festival, the Globe Theatre invited numerous theatre companies from around the world to perform their Shakespeare adaptations in London – and Yohangza Theatre Company from South Korea brought their Midsummer Night’s Dream [LKL review here]. For phase two of the project, the Globe Theatre is taking … [Read More]

A Korean Tempest: Sympathy from Mr Vengeance

Those who are familiar with Korean cinema will not need to be told that vengeance is a familiar topic, and indeed forms the theme for Park Chan-wook’s unplanned trilogy of films of which the best known is Oldboy. And probably many an essay has been written in Film Studies classes as to why Korean directors … [Read More]