Organizer & Chair: Bruce Fulton, University of British Columbia

To date, English-language comparative study of the two Koreas has tended to be situated at the institutional level and to focus on issues of geopolitics, regional security, and development. Comparative studies of the literatures of the two Koreas are virtually nonexistent, and indeed there is little scholarship in English on North Korean literature itself. The purpose of this panel is to demonstrate that ample resources are at hand—for example, classical fictional narratives, literary representations of canonical figures in Korean literary history, children’s literature, and even science fiction narratives—for such studies. The three papers to be presented in this panel, moreover, address topics that are of increasing interest to scholars in the Korean literature field: intertextuality, literary historiography, and non-mainstream literature, respectively. We hope through this panel to stimulate further comparative study of North Korean and South Korean literature and, within such study, further research on topics underrepresented in current scholarship on Korean literature.

Leif Peter Olsen, University of British Columbia

Recent publications in both North Korea and South Korea show ever-increasing interest in reading and rereading classical fictional narratives (kososol, kojon sosol) from Choson Korea (1392-1910). While both countries claim the same literary heritage, they interpret and adapt the texts in vastly different ways. In South Korea, for example, publications of kososol adaptations are targeted toward young adults, who are encouraged to understand their ancestors' stories and ways of thinking. Also, a number of South Korean writers of fiction have parodized kososol or used themes from them in their own writing. North Korean publications of kososol, on the other hand, encourage readers to gain an understanding of the plight of their ancestors in a feudal system and seek to find inner themes of struggle against unfair rule or socioeconomic disparity. At Kim Il Sung University, a translation research group has been publishing a large amount of classical literature, including kososol, translated into easy-to-understand modern Korean. This paper explores the differences between North and South Korean approaches to select kososol, as reflected in publications from the 1990s until now.

Dafna Zur, University of British Columbia

North Korean children’s literature remains unfamiliar and understudied. While early children’s books from the post-war period reveal a strong didactic anti-American narrative, children's literature ranging from the 60s to the present reveals a complex weave of literary styles and subjects. A close examination of the North Korean literary journal "Adong Munhak" from the 60s and the past five years reveals an abundance of stories titled "kwahak hyonsang sosol", or science fiction stories. My paper will look at the roots of North Korean science fiction and the influences of literature from the Soviet Union on this genre. I will then examine stories from the past decade, and discuss the possibilities and challenges this genre presents in the understanding of North Korean literature. Finally, I will discuss North and South Korean science fiction in a comparative perspective, noting the channels of expression that this particular genre has offered and the particular way it has been treated in North and South Korea.

Simon Suk Yeon Kim, Korea University

Hwang Chini, perhaps the most famous of Korean kisaeng from the Choson dynasty, left only several poems in the sijo and hansi style. Yet she was celebrated in later Choson by several yadam tales, and became a literary legend whose poetry was dedicated to freedom and love. Hwang’s legendary status has been championed by writers in the 20th century as well, and contemporary writers have taken Chini as a literary myth, a structural narrative pattern, a fixed structure inside which each writer adds his or her personal character. In this century, the myth of Hwang Chini has been retold by writers ranging from Yi T’aejun to Chon Kyongnin.

As many as four novels have been written about Hwang Chini, and each work presents new ways of interpreting her mythical personality and literary presence. Most interestingly, a novel about Hwang by North Korean writer Hong Sokjung is the very first North Korean novel to receive a literary prize in South Korea. My paper will focus on the different analyses of the variations and interpretations of the myth of Hwang Chini, and I thus intend to expose the originality and the relevance of its structure as a literary myth in contemporary Korean literature.