Most Popular
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[Exclusive] Korean military set to ban iPhones over 'security' concerns
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Korean, Romanian leaders discuss defense tech, nuclear energy
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S. Korea calls on Japan to confront history amid Yasukuni Shrine visit
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Yoon’s jailed mother-in-law excluded from latest parole list
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Hybe and Min Hee-jin, CEO of Hybe sublabel Ador, lock horns
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[Herald Interview] 'Amid aging population, Korea to invite more young professionals from overseas'
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Korea’s homegrown nanosatellite successfully launches into space
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[Pressure points] Leggings in public: Fashion statement or social faux pas?
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Nicaragua shuts down Seoul embassy
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Rocket engine expert, ex-NASA exec to lead Korea's new space agency
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Restless civilian-turned-dedicated killer
American Sniper: The Autobiography of the Most Lethal Sniper in U.S. Military HistoryBy Chris Kyle with Scott McEwen and Jim DeFelice(William Morrow)This is the season of celebrity for the Navy SEALs.The takedown of Osama bin Laden at his hideout in Pakistan thrust the institutionally secretive SEALs into the modern-media spotlight. Soon the SEALs seemed to become America’s favorite warriors: silent, deadly, mysterious.There have been innumerable news stories about SEAL Team Six, which killed bi
March 16, 2012
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Glimpse into natural materials of Korean architecture
Stone, Walls and PathsBy Yim Seock-jaeTranslated by Lee Jean-young(Ewha Womans University Press)Anyone who has been to a hanok, or traditional Korean house, will have noticed its exquisite use of stone and wood, and how it naturally blends into its surroundings. Wood and stone are the most representative natural materials used in Korea’s traditional architecture, serving both practical and aesthetic purposes.Scholar Yim Seock-jae’s English-translated book, “Stone, Walls and Paths,” is an insight
March 16, 2012
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Hollywood actors join audiobook projects
LOS ANGELES ― When it came to reading a book out loud, Dustin Hoffman was a bit rusty. The last time he had done something similar was in New York City in the late 1960s, right after filming “The Graduate.” A local radio station had recruited 30 or so people, including Hoffman, to read “War and Peace” on air, around the clock, until it was done.“That was the only other time I had done something like that, and it was wonderful,” recalls Hoffman, explaining why he recently agreed to perform the no
March 16, 2012
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Korea's Shin wins Asia's top literary award
South Korean author Kyung-sook Shin won Asia's most prestigious prize for literature on Thursday for her novel about a family's guilty soul-searching after the disappearance of their elderly mother.Judges of the 2011 Man Asian Literary Prize described Shin's novel "Please Look After Mom", which has
March 16, 2012
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South Korea to participate in Bologna children‘s book fair
South Korea will open the Korean Pavilion at the Bologna Children’s Book Fair to be held in Bologna, Italy from March 19-22, the Culture Ministry said Thursday.About 700 children‘s books submitted by 26 local publishing companies will be displayed at the Korean Pavilion, set to cover 301 square meters in the Bologna Fair Center.Among the books to be featured is “Grimmie’s White Canvas” by Sang Publishing in Seoul, which won the Opera Prima division of this year‘s BolognaRagazzi Award.The South K
March 15, 2012
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Saturday humanities classes offer insights on various subjects
Nine renowned university professors are holding Saturday lectures on various subjects in the hope of boosting public interest in the humanities, according to program organizers.The program, “Lectures by Eminent Scholars in the Humanities,” offers free Saturday lectures on a first-come, first-serve basis. It is organized by National Research Foundation of Korea, with the support of the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology.Hanyang University professor emeritus Choi Mun-hyeong kicked off t
March 14, 2012
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Encyclopaedia Britannica to end print editions
CHICAGO (AP) ― Encyclopaedia Britannica Inc. said Tuesday that it will stop publishing print editions of its flagship encyclopedia for the first time since the sets were originally published more than 200 years ago.The book-form of Encyclopaedia Britannica has been in print since it was first published in Edinburgh, Scotland, in 1768. It will stop being available when the current stock runs out, the company said. The Chicago-based company will continue to offer digital versions of the encycloped
March 14, 2012
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Scholar talks patriotism, democracy
Historian Jang publishes new memoir ‘To Live My Way’Scholar Jang Byung-hye, who is also the daughter of Korea’s third Prime Minister Jang Taek-sang, said public apathy toward politics endangered Korean democracy at an event to publish her memoir “To Live My Way.”The 81-year-old scholar’s book is a collection of Jang’s thoughts on various issues, including the life of her father, tips and advice for young people, and Korea’s modern history and democratic development. “I see a lot of people consid
March 13, 2012
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Saturday humanities classes offer insights on various subjects
Nine renowned university professors are holding Saturday lectures on various subjects in the hope of boosting public interest in the humanities, according to program organizers.The program, “Lectures by Eminent Scholars in the Humanities,” offers free Saturday lectures on a first-come, first-serve basis. It is organized by National Research Foundation of Korea, with the support of the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology.Hanyang University professor emeritus Choi Mun-hyeong kicked off t
March 13, 2012
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Couple haunted by mistakes of youth
The Lost DaughterBy Lucy Ferriss (Penguin)If all the bad choices people made as teenagers returned to haunt them as adults, the world would be filled with fearful and guilt-ridden people.Most people get away with those bad choices with few repercussions, but in Lucy Ferriss’ novel “The Lost Daughter,” they come back big for Brooke O’Connor.Brooke lives in Connecticut with her husband, Sean, who is from a big Irish-Catholic family. But Brooke and Sean have only one child, a daughter named Meghan,
March 9, 2012
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Mirage of American dream
Gods Without MenBy Hari Kunzru(Knopf)Early in “Gods Without Men,” Hari Kunzru’s ambitious and wonderful new novel, a strung-out British rock star stares into the big night sky hanging over the Mojave Desert.“The stars were like pinholes in a cloth,” he marvels. “You could believe you were seeing through to some incredibly bright world on the other side of the darkness.”It’s a great image, in a book filled with terrific writing.But it’s also a pithy description of the dangerous American dream tha
March 9, 2012
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Introduction to colorful Joseon women’s pendants
Norigae: Splendor of the Korean CostumeBy Lee Kyung-jaTranslated by Lee Jean-youngEwha Womans University PressFor anyone who is familiar with Korea’s traditional costume, hanbok, the term “norigae” will ring a bell. A decorative pendant hung from the inner or outer tie of jeogori, the upper piece of a hanbok, norigae carries both aesthetic and emotional traces of women from the Joseon era (1392-1897).Scholar Lee Kyung-ja’s English-translated book, “Norigae: Splendor of the Korean Costume” offers
March 9, 2012
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Questions for … author Ellen Ullman
Ellen Ullman is the author of “By Blood” (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, February 2012), a tale set in San Francisco in the ’70s, which involves an eavesdropper whose fascination leads to research into Heinrich Himmler’s Nazi Lebensborn program. Discoveries from her research for that book have touched her deeply.“The Bug,” recently reprinted by Picador, was a New York Times Notable Book and runner-up for the PEN/Hemingway Award, and the cult classic memoir, “Close to the Machine” (also reprinted by
March 9, 2012
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Children’s publisher developing app for e-reading
NEW YORK (AP) ― A leading publisher of children’s books is taking a big step into the electronic market.Scholastic Inc. is developing an app called Storia, which includes around 1,300 e-books and multimedia e-books that can be bought directly from the publisher or from retailers. Such favorite picture series as “Clifford the Big Red Dog’’ and “Ready, Freddy!’’ will be in digital format for the first time. The app also will feature games, quizzes, interactive stories, an e-dictionary and a virtua
March 6, 2012
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Garcia Marquez classic begins first e-sales
BOGOTA (AFP) ― Colombian writer Gabriel Garcia Marquez celebrates his 85th birthday Tuesday with a special gift: the start of sales of an electronic version of his masterpiece novel “One Hundred Years of Solitude.”“I do not know if it will be as successful as hoped but it is the goal,” Carmen Balcells, Garcia Marquez’s literary agent, said in an interview Monday with Colombian radio Caracol.This year also marks the 30th anniversary since Garcia Marquez received the Nobel Prize for Literature.“On
March 6, 2012
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‘Lost’ novel by dead Nobel laureate published
MADRID (AFP) ― A “lost” novel by Portuguese Nobel literature laureate Jose Saramago which he wrote in the 1950s before he achieved international acclaim has been published nearly two years after his death.Saramago sent the manuscript for “Claraboya,” which tells the tale of residents of a Lisbon apartment building, through a friend to a Portuguese publishing house in 1953 but never heard back from them.But in 1989, after the author had become one of Portugal’s best-selling contemporary writers,
March 4, 2012
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Battling for humanity and herself
PartialsBy Dan WellsBalzer & Bray Blame Suzanne Collins if you will. But the dystopian trend in young adult fiction isn’t going away. If anything, it’s growing even stronger in the run-up to the movie based on her book “The Hunger Games” as publishers rush in with their Next Big Things.Readers who enjoy headstrong feminist leads making their way through post-apocalyptic incarnations of major U.S. cities set in the not-too-distant future will find plenty to like in “Partials,” the kickoff to a ne
March 2, 2012
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[New Book] Crafty, fun spin on the werewolf genre
The Wolf GiftBy Anne Rice(Knopf)When Glen Duncan’s fabulously sinister and moving “The Last Werewolf” came out in July, it set an almost unreachably high bar for the lycanthrope subgenre, in much the same way Anne Rice’s 1976 classic “Interview With the Vampire” did for fang lit.Now here comes Rice with her own take on the wolf-man legend, “The Wolf Gift,” a fast-paced, heady romp that ranks with her best. I still give “The Last Werewolf” the edge, by the teensiest smidgen, because of its operat
March 2, 2012
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Introduction to Won Buddhism
The Moon of the Mind Rises in Empty SpaceBy Prime Dharma Master Kyongsan(Seoul Selection) Many foreigners will find Won Buddhism unfamiliar compared to other forms of Korean Buddhism. It was in fact founded in the 20th century, and is claimed to be a “reformed and modernized Buddhism” which combines Buddhism with Confucianism and Daoism.By picking up this English-language book written by the Ven. Kyongsan, who is the fifth Prime Darma Master of Won Buddhism, one can learn about the key ideas of
March 2, 2012
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Legacy for sale: Hemingway boyhood home on the block ― and under Wright’s shadow
In the world of legacies, Oak Park, Illinois, has a couple of biggies.The brilliant, scandalous architect Frank Lloyd Wright spent the first 20 years of his career there, leaving the western suburb with the world’s largest collection of buildings he designed.Then there’s the brilliant, scandalous writer Ernest Hemingway, who was born in Oak Park and spent nearly his first 20 years there, writing his earliest pieces, gaining an appreciation for nature and dreaming of worldly adventures.Frank Lloy
March 2, 2012