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FEATURE

Literature showcases a different side to the Korean Wave
RAIAN ABEDIN
Also known as Hallyu , the Korean Wave has been in full swing for years, spreading the culture and art of South Korea as an economy through all imaginable means of entertainment. Be it pop culture, music, or cinema, it’s clear that most consumers of any media are at the very least aware of Korean entertainment, if not actively participating in it.
While Hallyu has, in some shape, existed since 1999 (credited largely to the movie Swiri ), it has taken an enormous precedent in the eyes of the Korean government only in the last decade. In 2019 alone, all media attributed to the Hallyu movement added a net total of 12.3 billion US dollars, and this has rather obviously prompted the government to invest further into all media released from South Korea to capture audiences’ hearts. To the eyes of millions of fans worldwide, what really makes the K-wave so appealing is the many unique, and often uplifting, stories coming out of the country that challenge social conventions through their entertainment.
All of this brings us to one of the contributing factors of Hallyu that frequently gets swept under the rug in conversations: literature. With massive contributions from the government, as well as the establishment of the Literature Translation Institute (LTI) of Korea, this is a field that has seen exponential growth in popularity over the last decade. They have, however, attracted a different sort of crowd. Where so much of Korean entertainment (both in music and drama) focuses on uplifting or escapist entertainment, the books coming out of Korea are brutal in how they push the audience right back into the bleakness of reality. They are often laced with commentary on the politics and social structure of their country, provided through lenses that are sometimes bizarre yet always gripping.
In hindsight, The Vegetarian was the oddest of books for me to use as a gateway into Korean literature, a novel by Han Kang translated from the Korean by Deborah Smith which won the International Booker Prize in 2016. It was—and still is—the most widely celebrated book to come out of South Korea in recent times, but the content of the book is laced with an emotional weight so profound it serves as a whiplash when juxtaposed against the more uplifting counterparts of Hallyu . The story follows Yeong-hye after she makes the sudden decision to stop eating meat, something which drives her husband and the rest of her family into confusion and disarray. Abstract in presentation, the novel delves deep into the way people react when decisions are made that go against culture. This book, and by extension all of Han Kang’s work, strikes me less as a direct critique of the social structures we live under and more as an exploration of characters attempting to transcend these shackles.
Another notable work coming from South Korea is 2022’s Cursed Bunny written by Bora Chung. This collection of short stories made it to the shortlist for last year’s International Booker Prize and presents stories that are always dazzling and grotesque but rarely do they spell out the truth hidden underneath all the creepy tales. Then there’s Love In the Big City by Park Sang-Young, a queer coming-of-age story also published in 2022, which went on to be part of the International Booker Prize’s long list. All of these books, with their stylistic differences, offer an intimate look at life in Korea, and of the many ways characters struggle with their identity against patriarchy and abuse in a flashy world with an underbelly that’s often overlooked.
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Raian Abedin is taking book recommendations (in fact, he would love them) on IG: @raian_is_burning
Where so much of Korean entertainment (both in music and drama) focuses on uplifting or escapist entertainment, the books coming out of Korea are brutal in how they push the audience right back into the bleakness of reality.