REWRITING REVOLUTION: WOMEN, SEXUALITY, AND MEMORY IN NORTH KOREAN FICTIONON SALE!
Immanuel Kim
Hardback: $68.00 $40.80
ISBN-13: 9780824872632
Published: April 2018ADD TO CART
ADDITIONAL INFORMATION
University of Hawaii Press
232 pages
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ABOUT THE BOOK
North Korea, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK), is firmly fixed in the Western imagination as a barbaric vestige of the Cold War, a “rogue” nation that refuses to abide by international norms. It is seen as belligerent and oppressive, a poor nation bent on depriving its citizens of their basic human rights and expanding its nuclear weapons program at the expense of a faltering economy. Even the North’s literary output is stigmatized and dismissed as mere propaganda literature praising the Great Leader.
Immanuel Kim’s book confronts these stereotypes, offering a more complex portrayal of literature in the North based on writings from the 1960s to the present. The state, seeking to “write revolution,” prescribes grand narratives populated with characters motivated by their political commitments to the leader, the Party, the nation, and the collective. While acknowledging these qualities, Kim argues for deeper readings. In some novels and stories, he finds, the path to becoming a revolutionary hero or heroine is no longer a simple matter of formulaic plot progression; instead it is challenged, disrupted, and questioned by individual desires, decisions, doubts, and imaginations. Fiction in the 1980s in particular exhibits refreshing story lines and deeper character development along with creative approaches to delineating women, sexuality, and the family. These changes are so striking that they have ushered in what Kim calls a Golden Age of North Korean fiction.
Rewriting Revolution charts the insightful literary frontiers that critically portray individuals negotiating their political and sexual identities in a revolutionary state. In this fresh and thought-provoking analysis of North Korean fiction, Kim looks past the ostensible state propaganda to explore the dynamic literary world where individuals with human emotions reside. His book fills a major lacuna and will be of interest to literary scholars and historians of East Asia, as well as to scholars of global and comparative studies in socialist countries.
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Review
By foregrounding love and sexuality, Immanuel Kim not only opens up our consideration of their importance in North Korean literary texts, but also highlights strategies for cultural resistance in the face of censorship and the complexity of the act of writing itself in North Korea. This is a major accomplishment and makes an important contribution not only to Korean studies but to Asian studies and global literary studies more broadly.--Theodore Hughes, Columbia University
Product Description
North Korea, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK), is firmly fixed in the Western imagination as a barbaric vestige of the Cold War, a “rogue” nation that refuses to abide by international norms. It is seen as belligerent and oppressive, a poor nation bent on depriving its citizens of their basic human rights and expanding its nuclear weapons program at the expense of a faltering economy. Even the North’s literary output is stigmatized and dismissed as mere propaganda literature praising the Great Leader.
Immanuel Kim’s book confronts these stereotypes, offering a more complex portrayal of literature in the North based on writings from the 1960s to the present. The state, seeking to “write revolution,” prescribes grand narratives populated with characters motivated by their political commitments to the leader, the Party, the nation, and the collective. While acknowledging these qualities, Kim argues for deeper readings. In some novels and stories, he finds, the path to becoming a revolutionary hero or heroine is no longer a simple matter of formulaic plot progression; instead it is challenged, disrupted, and questioned by individual desires, decisions, doubts, and imaginations. Fiction in the 1980s in particular exhibits refreshing story lines and deeper character development along with creative approaches to delineating women, sexuality, and the family. These changes are so striking that they have ushered in what Kim calls a Golden Age of North Korean fiction.
Rewriting Revolution charts the insightful literary frontiers that critically portray individuals negotiating their political and sexual identities in a revolutionary state. In this fresh and thought-provoking analysis of North Korean fiction, Kim looks past the ostensible state propaganda to explore the dynamic literary world where individuals with human emotions reside. His book fills a major lacuna and will be of interest to literary scholars and historians of East Asia, as well as to scholars of global and comparative studies in socialist countries.
Immanuel Kim’s book confronts these stereotypes, offering a more complex portrayal of literature in the North based on writings from the 1960s to the present. The state, seeking to “write revolution,” prescribes grand narratives populated with characters motivated by their political commitments to the leader, the Party, the nation, and the collective. While acknowledging these qualities, Kim argues for deeper readings. In some novels and stories, he finds, the path to becoming a revolutionary hero or heroine is no longer a simple matter of formulaic plot progression; instead it is challenged, disrupted, and questioned by individual desires, decisions, doubts, and imaginations. Fiction in the 1980s in particular exhibits refreshing story lines and deeper character development along with creative approaches to delineating women, sexuality, and the family. These changes are so striking that they have ushered in what Kim calls a Golden Age of North Korean fiction.
Rewriting Revolution charts the insightful literary frontiers that critically portray individuals negotiating their political and sexual identities in a revolutionary state. In this fresh and thought-provoking analysis of North Korean fiction, Kim looks past the ostensible state propaganda to explore the dynamic literary world where individuals with human emotions reside. His book fills a major lacuna and will be of interest to literary scholars and historians of East Asia, as well as to scholars of global and comparative studies in socialist countries.
Format: HardcoverVerified Purchase
Rewriting Revolution is one of the very few English language books that approaches the topic of North Korean culture with any nuance. It also offers a fascinating window into North Korean literature, which really is an underexplored area in English language writing on the country, but one that merits further examination.
The author Immanuel Kim effectively argues that despite strict confines, North Korean literary texts are open to a variety of meanings, some of which offer deep insight into the lives and thoughts of the country's people. I consider this to be one of the best books on North Korea out there and revolutionary (no pun intended) in its approach.
The author Immanuel Kim effectively argues that despite strict confines, North Korean literary texts are open to a variety of meanings, some of which offer deep insight into the lives and thoughts of the country's people. I consider this to be one of the best books on North Korea out there and revolutionary (no pun intended) in its approach.
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2020, English, Book edition:
Friend : a novel from North Korea / Nam-nyong Kim, translated by Immanuel Kim.Paek, Nam-nyong, (author.)
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Bookmark: https://trove.nla.gov.au/version/264090123
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Physical Description
pages cm.
1 online resource.Published
New York : Columbia University Press, [2020]Language
Check copyright status
Cite thisTitle
pages cm.
1 online resource.Published
New York : Columbia University Press, [2020]Language
Check copyright status
Cite thisTitle
Friend : a novel from North Korea / Nam-nyong Kim, translated by Immanuel Kim.Uniform Title
Pŏt. EnglishAuthor
Paek, Nam-nyong, (author.)Other Authors
Kim, Immanuel, (translator.)Published
New York : Columbia University Press, [2020]Content Types
textCarrier Types
volume
online resourcePhysical Description
pages cm.
1 online resource.Series
Weatherhead books on Asia
Summary
"A tale of marital intrigue, abuse, and divorce in North Korea. A woman in her thirties comes to a courthouse petitioning for a divorce. As the judge who hears her statement begins to investigate the case, the story unfolds into a broader consideration of love and marriage. The novel delves into its protagonists' past, describing how the couple first fell in love and then how their marriage deteriorated over the years. It chronicles the toll their acrimony takes on their son and their careers alongside the story of the judge's own marital troubles. A best-seller in North Korea, where Paek continues to live and write, Friend illuminates a side of life in the DPRK that Western readers have never before encountered. Far from being a propagandistic screed in praise of the Great Leader, Friend describes the lives of people who struggle with everyday problems such as marital woes and workplace conflicts. Instead of socialist-realist stock figures, Paek depicts complex characters who wrestle with universal questions of individual identity, the split between public and private selves, the unpredictability of existence, and the never-ending labor of maintaining a relationship. This groundbreaking translation of one of North Korea's most popular writers offers English-language readers a page-turner full of psychological tension as well as a revealing portrait of a society that is typically seen as closed to the outside world"--Other Form
"A tale of marital intrigue, abuse, and divorce in North Korea. A woman in her thirties comes to a courthouse petitioning for a divorce. As the judge who hears her statement begins to investigate the case, the story unfolds into a broader consideration of love and marriage. The novel delves into its protagonists' past, describing how the couple first fell in love and then how their marriage deteriorated over the years. It chronicles the toll their acrimony takes on their son and their careers alongside the story of the judge's own marital troubles. A best-seller in North Korea, where Paek continues to live and write, Friend illuminates a side of life in the DPRK that Western readers have never before encountered. Far from being a propagandistic screed in praise of the Great Leader, Friend describes the lives of people who struggle with everyday problems such as marital woes and workplace conflicts. Instead of socialist-realist stock figures, Paek depicts complex characters who wrestle with universal questions of individual identity, the split between public and private selves, the unpredictability of existence, and the never-ending labor of maintaining a relationship. This groundbreaking translation of one of North Korea's most popular writers offers English-language readers a page-turner full of psychological tension as well as a revealing portrait of a society that is typically seen as closed to the outside world"--Other Form
Online version Kim, Nam-nyong Friend New York : Columbia University Press, 2020. 9780231551403 (DLC) 2019037296
Print version Paek, Nam-nyong. Friend
New York : Columbia University Press, [2020] 9780231195607 (DLC) 2019037295Language
EnglishISBN
9780231195607
9780231195614
9780231551403Dewey Number
895.73/4Libraries Australia ID
66038849
66041149Contributed byLibraries Australia
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EnglishISBN
9780231195607
9780231195614
9780231551403Dewey Number
895.73/4Libraries Australia ID
66038849
66041149Contributed byLibraries Australia
Get this edition
View online
Borrow
Buy
Found at these bookshops
These online bookshops told us they have this item:
Boomerang Books(Australian)
Book specialist with a large number of titles available onlineBuy now
Book Depository(International)
UK's largest dedicated online bookseller. Free shipping worldwideBuy now
You also may like to try some of these bookshops, which may or may not sell this item.
User activity
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