The Literature Translation Institute of Korea (LTI Korea) is calling for submissions for this year’s Korean Diaspora Literature Essay Contest to expand the base of literary exchange through discovering and supporting writers of Korean diaspora literature. The writing contest will be based on 25 essays, novels, and poems written by people of Korean ancestry living in Central Asia, Europe, Japan, ...

The Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism Friday appointed poet Kwak Hyo-hwan as the new president of the Literature Translation Institute of Korea. His term will run through May 13, 2024. “With new president Kwak Hyo-hwan, we hope that LTI Korea expands its role as the key player in exporting Korean literature overseas,” a Culture Ministry official said. “The Ministry of Culture, Sports and ...

Lindsey Miller recounts the stress of constant questioning, her decision to believe in authenticity of relationships during her two years in Pyongyang

The Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism and the World Intellectual Property Organization on Monday announced the joint publication of webtoon “Let’s draw a dream” about the importance of copyrights, created by Korean lawyer Lee Young-wook. “We are glad that we could work with a professional from our country to create a webtoon that can increase the understanding of the importance of copyrigh...

The main theme repeated throughout the book is that the South Korea-US alliance should be a means to seek the national interest. In other words, the national interest needs to come first, before the South Korea-US alliance. He says South Koreans need to overcome their “addiction” to the alliance and need to focus on mutual interests for a healthier alliance. Accordingly, he writes, South Korea ne...

With Korea now better known around the world, there is less demand for introductory books on Korea and a higher interest for fictions by notable authors like Han Kang in English, compilations of Korean traditional stories and books about K-pop, among others. For those interested in finding and reading Korean literature in English, the best odds of finding them lies here. By Lim Jang-won ( ljw@...

Social media can be used to keep production costs manageable as well. The editors of the Seoul Review of Books, vegan magazine Moolgyul, feminist magazine RADish, independent magazine Quarterly Alone and film magazine FILO used Tumblebug to carry out crowdfunding campaigns. Smaller magazines can also opt to publish on an irregular basis and use social media to alert loyal readers to an upcoming ...

Jungwook Hong, a former National Assembly representative and former chairman of Herald Corp., has released a book of 50 essays about his journey to find his life’s purpose. Hong is a bestselling author whose 1993 autobiography, “Seven Acts, Seven Scenes,” sold over 1 million copies. That first book, which centered on his personal experience of studying in the US at Choate Rosemary Hall and Harva...

Democratic Party lawmaker Jeon Yong-gi, a member of the National Assembly‘s Culture, Sports and Tourism Committee announced Sunday that the Culture Ministry would conduct an investigation of all literary awards in Korea. The literary community was shocked earlier this month to find out Sohn Chang-hyun had won multiple literary awards with work that plagiarized author Kim Min-jung’s “Ppuri,” or r...

Books that have been shown on TV entertainment shows are sweeping bestselling charts, reaching bestsellers lists in travel, poetry and cooking categories in the second week of January, according to the country‘s largest bookstore chain Kyobo Book Center. “A Walk in the Woods” by Bill Bryson, for example, became the bestselling travel book after screenwriter Kim Eun-hee introduced the book on KBS...

Lee Seung-u’s “Heart’s Buoyancy” won the 44th Yi Sang Literary Award, one of the most prestigious literary awards in Korea given by publishing company Munhaksasang, on Monday. “A novelist getting a prize for his work is like unfamiliar guests suddenly coming into the clerk’s office full of rules and repetition,” said Lee in receiving the award. “Why did the guests come find me? Instead of asking...

The Literature Translation Institute of Korea announced the winners of the 2020 Korean Literature Translation Award, with Mariko Saito winning the grand prize. For this year’s prize, 115 translated works in 24 languages were considered. Mariko Saito, who translated the short story collection “To Hyun Nam Oppa” by Cho Nam-joo and six others into Japanese, won the top prize and 20 million won ($1...

“Lonesome Jar: Poetic Fables” takes the animals, plants and objects that we see every day and tells stories from their perspective, talking about human relationships and love. “While writing these tales, I was finally able to discover that in the midst of understanding and loving each other lay my own existential value and meaning,” writes Jeong in the preface to “Lonesome Jar: Poetic Fables.” ...

Former President Barack Obama’s "A Promised Land" sold more than 1.7 million copies in North America in its first week, roughly equal to the combined first week sales of memoirs by his two immediate predecessors and among the highest ever for a nonfiction book. Crown announced Tuesday that it had increased its initial print run from 3.4 million copies to 4.3 million. Sales also include audio and...

Picture book “The Paper Boat: A Refugee Story,” released in September, recounts the story of author Thao Lam, who escaped Vietnam after the Vietnam War in a small fishing boat with her parents, becoming a refugee at age 2. Known for previous works including “Skunk on a String” and “My Cat Looks Like My Dad,” Lam walks through the pain of her refugee experience as well as the help she received in...