Yi Kwang-su / 이광수 / 2013 / KDC구분 > literature > Korean Literature > Korean Fiction > 20th century

A major, never before translated novel by the author of Mujông / 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 lots, become self-reliant, and thus indirectly change the reality of colonial life on the Korean peninsula, The Soil was vitally important to the social movements of the time, echoing the effects and reception of such English-language novels as Upton Sinclair's The Jungle. Source : https://lti.overdrive.com/media/A97983CE-F105-47A1-9717-0D6FE44F5D94

Yi Kwang-su / 이광수 / 2013 / -

Yi Kwang-su is regarded as a pioneer of modern fiction and a leading voice in modern Korean literature. His works criticized the irrationality of the old conventions shackled by Confucian traditions while advocating the enlightened views of his age. “Gasil” is a story based on the tale of “Seol’s Daughter and Gasil” appearing in The History of the Three Kingdoms, which deals with the moral and heroic acts of a young man. To keep his promise to Seol’s daughter, Gasil faces danger in ferocious battles and overcomes the temptation from his master’s daughter.

Kim Yujung et al / 김유정 et al / 2012 / KDC구분 > literature > Korean Literature > Complete Collection > Library > Complete Collection & Library (more than 2 writers)

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 the confrontation between man and woman; in some stories the relationship is portrayed as innocent and pure, in others the relationship becomes more sophisticated and complex. The ten stories in the second part all deal with old Korean or the old Korean way of life - the Korea of byegone days, which is gradually disappearing in the face of industrialization and internationalization. The third group of stories reveals modern Korea in the process of change during the period of the Japanese Occupation, the liberation from the Occupation, and the Korean War. All thirty stories may serve as social documents. From the time of ideological chaos following the independence of Korea in 1945 up to the fall of the USSR in the 1980s, modern Korean literature has been powerfully swayed by Marxist ideology one way or another. Literature has an important role to play in its portrayal of the relations between society and individual people, and it has a particularly vital social function in developing or undeveloped countries. However, the stories in this anthology are not just historical documents. They represent the peak of literary achievements by great and gifted writers in the first half of this century. It is remarkable to find so many talented writers producing so many powerful works of art in a short span of just over 50 years between 1908 and 1965. This anthology is an invitation to readers to grasp how much Korea has attained in the process of its modernization. The authors whose works appear in this volume are: Yi Kwang-su, Kim Dong-in, Hyun Chin-kon, Yi Hyo-suk, Kim Yu-jong, Yi Sang, Kim Dong-ni, O Yung-su, Hwang Sun-won, Sohn, So-hi, Hahn Mu-suk, Sunwu Hwi, Kang Shin-jae, Oh Sang-won, Suh Ki-won, Han Mal-suk, Choi In-hun, Kim sung-ok, Yi Mun-ku. Source : https://lti.overdrive.com/media/4114074?cid=37224

Yi Kwang-Su et al / 이광수 / 2010 / -

Yi Kwang-su (1892–1950) was one of the pioneers of modern Korean literature. When the serialization of Mujong (The Heartless) began in 1917, it was an immediate sensation, and it occupies a prominent place in the Korean literary canon. The Heartless is the story of a love triangle among three youths during the Japanese occupation. Yi Hyōng-sik is a young man in his mid-twenties who is teaching English at a middle school in Seoul. Brilliant but also shy and indecisive, he is torn between two women. Kim Sōn-hyōng is from a wealthy Christian family; she has just graduated from a modern, Western-style school and is planning on continuing her studies in the United States. Pak Yōng-ch'ae is a musically gifted young woman who was raised in a traditional Confucian manner; due to family misfortune, she has become a kisaeng but remains devoted to Hyōng-sik whom she knew as a child. The Heartless goes beyond the level of romantic melodrama and uses these characters to depict Korea's struggles with modern culture and national identity. A long critical introduction discusses Yi Kwang-su's life and work from his birth in 1892 to the publication of his first novel The Heartless in 1917. It contains in-depth analyses of the novel, Yi Kwang-su's literary theory, and early short stories. Source: https://lti.overdrive.com/media/9256500?cid=37224

Ch`ae Man-Sik et al / 채만식 et al / 1998 / -

A Ready Made Life is the first volume of early modern Korean fiction to appear in English in the U.S. Written between 1921 and 1943, the sixteen stories are an excellent introduction to the riches of modern Korean fiction. They reveal a variety of settings, voices, styles, and thematic concerns, and the best of them, masterpieces written mainly in the mid-1930s, display an impressive artistic maturity. Included among these authors are Hwang Sun-won, modern Korea's greatest short story writer; Kim Tong-in, regarded by many as the author who best captures the essence of the Korean identity; Ch'ae Man-shik, a master of irony; Yi Sang, a prominent modernist; Kim Yu-jong, whose stories are marked by a unique blend of earthy humor and compassion; Yi Kwang-su and Kim Tong-ni, modernizers of the language of twentieth-century Korean fiction; and Yi Ki-yúng, Yi T'ae-jun, and Pak T'ae-won, three writers who migrated to North Korea shortly after Liberation in 1945 and whose works were subsequently banned in South Korea until democratization in the late 1980s. One way of reading the stories, all of which were written during the Japanese occupation, is that beneath their often oppressive and gloomy surface lies an anticolonial subtext. They can also be read as a collective record of a people whose life choices were severely restricted, not just by colonization, but by education (either too little or too much, as the title story shows) and by a highly structured society that had little tolerance for those who overstepped its boundaries. Life was unremittingly onerous for many Koreans during this period, whatever their social background. In the stories, educated city folk fare little better than farmers and laborers. A Ready-Made Life will provide scholars and students with crucial access to the literature of Korea's colonial period. A generous opening essay discusses the collection in the context of modern Korean literary history, and short introductions precede each story. Here is a richly diverse testament to a modern literature that is poised to assume a long overdue place in world literature. Source: https://lti.overdrive.com/media/4004892?cid=37224

Yi Kwang-Su et al / 이광수 et al / 2015 / KDC구분 > literature > Korean Literature > Complete Collection > Library > Complete Collection & Library (more than 2 writers)

This anthology of short stories reflects the writers' shared core experience of Korea's trajectory from an inward-looking feudal state, through Japanese colony and battle-ground for the Korean War, to a modernizing society. Three stories have been added to the original edition. Source: https://lti.overdrive.com/media/4123934?cid=37224