Kyung-ni Park

Kyung-ni Park
Hangeul	박경리
Hanja	朴景利
Revised Romanization	Bak Gyeong-ni
McCune- Reischauer	Pak Kyŏngni
See also : Korean name

Park Kyung-ni or Pak Kyong-ni (born October 28, 1926 in T'ongyŏng , Kyŏngsangnam-do , † May 5, 2008 in Seoul ) was a South Korean writer.

Life

Park Kyung-ni was (as Pak Kŭm-i 박금 이 , 今朴伊 ) on 28 October 1926 in T'ongyŏng in the province of South Kyŏngsang born when Korea a colony of Japan was.

Her career as a writer began in 1955 with the publication of the stories Calculation (Kyesan) and Black, Black, White, White (Hŭkhŭk paekpaek) in the magazine Moderne Literatur (Hyŏndae munhak) in 1956. In 1957 she received for the novel Zeit des Mistrust (Pulsin sidae), in which open war wounds of the human soul are depicted, the prize for contemporary literature (young authors) and thus drew the attention of literary circles. War widows appear as heroines in many of Park Kyung-ni's early works. As in “The Age of Mistrust”, the instinctive gaze of women exposes the reality saturated with deceit, hypocrisy and falsehood, and in an astute way captures the war, invisible from a male perspective, and its resulting drought of mental life.

In the novel The Daughters of the Pharmacist Kim (Kim yakkuk-ŭi ttal-dŭl) published in 1962, an important change in the author's literary world becomes apparent. In contrast to the previous works, which are based on personal experiences, Park Kyung-ni investigates the nonsense of war, the life of widows and the importance of the family from the most objective perspective possible.

This change is made in the novel Market and War (Sijang-kwa chŏnjang). In this novel, for which the author was awarded the Korean Women Author's Literature Prize, the war and everyday life portrayed from the perspective of women is presented in two locations, the market and the battlefield. The continuity of everyday life and the strangeness of the war are contrasted in a dramatic way through this mixture. This monumental epic space, opened by market and war, is later closed with the novel Land (T'oji), on which the author wrote for 26 years.

The 16-volume novel epic Land is a family saga that runs through the modern history of Korea from the end of the Chosŏn period to the occupation of Japan and independence . The disintegration of the feudal family structure and the reorganization of social classes, conflicts due to the adoption of Western values ​​and their historical connection with colonization, as well as the relocation to and subsequent return from Gando (today's Koreans Yanbian Autonomous District in Jilin , China ) rolled up from the individual perspectives of the innumerable main characters.

Park Kyung-ni's novel Land has been consistently well received by readers of all ages and has been filmed for television several times. In 1995, on the one year anniversary of the complete publication, Land was performed as an epic piece of music. The poet Yi Sŭng-ha edited the text and the well-known composer for traditional music Kim Yŏng-dong wrote the music. Park Kyung-ni used the proceeds to set up the "Toji Cultural Foundation" in 1996. Among other things, it serves as a venue for literary meetings, supports research projects and young authors, and is also active in other diverse areas. In this way, Pak Kyong-ni made her contribution to society.

On May 5, 2008, at the age of 82, she died of lung cancer in a Seoul hospital.

The Park Kyung ni Literature Prize was named after her.

Work

Volumes of stories

• 불신 시대 ( time of mistrust ) ( 동민 문화사 1963)
• 성녀 와 마녀 ( The Saint and the Witch ) ( 현암사 1966)
• 박경리 단편선 ( Tales by Pak Kyŏng-ni ) ( 서문 당 1976)
• 환상 의 시기 ( Time of Illusions ) ( 나남 1994)

Novels

• 표류 도 ( Driving Island ) Daehan Textbook Publishing, 1959
• 김약국 의 딸들 ( The daughters of the pharmacist Kim ) Ŭlyu munhwasa, 1962
• 가을 에 온 여인 ( The woman who came in autumn ) Sin t'aeyangsa, 1963
• 노을 진 들녘 ( field in the sunset ) Sin t'aeyangsa, 1963
• 내 마음 은 호수 ( My heart is a lake ) Sin t'aeyangsa, 1964
• 시장 과 전장 ( Market and War ) Hyonam, 1964
• 파시 ( Pashi ) (place where direct trade between returning fishermen and buyers takes place at the port during the rich catch season) Hyonam, 1965
• 토지 ( Land ) Munhak sasangsa, 1973
• 호수 ( sea locks) Sugwan, 1977
• 나비 와 엉겅퀴 ( butterfly and thistle ) Pŏmu, 1978
• 영원 의 반려 ( Companion for Eternity ) Myŏngsugak, 1979
• 단층 ( One Floor ) Chisik sanŏp, 1979
• 토지 ( Land ), complete edition in 16 volumes, Sol, 1994

Translations

German

• The daughters of the pharmacist Kim . Pendragon Verlag, Bielefeld 1999 ISBN 978-3-929096-71-2
• Market and War (translation by Helga Picht ). Secolo Verlag, Osnabrück 2002 ISBN 3-929979-65-9
• Land 1 (Toji. Volume 1. Translation by Helga Picht). Secolo Verlag, Osnabrück 2001 ISBN 978-3-929979-77-0
• Land 2 (Toji, Volume 2. Translation by Helga Picht). Secolo Verlag, Osnabrück 2002 ISBN 978-3-929979-64-0
• Land 3 (Toji, Volume 3. Translation by Helga Picht). Secolo Verlag, Osnabrück 2005 ISBN 978-3-929979-70-1
• Land 4 (Toji, Volume 4. Translation by Helga Picht and Han Jung-hwa). secolo Verlag, Osnabrück 2014 ISBN 978-3-929979-76-3
• One day in: Kuh, KS (ed.). Korean stories 3, Bouvier Verlag Herbert Grundmann, Bonn 1986 ISBN 3-416-01965-2

English

• Country . Kegan Paul International / UNESCO Publishing, London / New York 1996
• The Curse of Kim's Daughters . Homa & Sekey, New Jersey 2004

French

• La Terre . Belfond, Paris 1994
• Le marché et le champ de bataille . Ecriture, Paris 1997
• Les filles du Pharmacien Kim . L'Harmattan, Paris 1995

Awards

• 2008 - Gold Medal for Cultural Merit
• 1996 - The Chile Gabriela Mistral Medal
• 1996 - Hoam Prize
• 1994 - Unesco Seoul Association Personality of the Year
• 1994 - woman of the year
• 1992 - Order of Merit in the Preservation of Cultural Heritage
• 1990 - Inch'on Prize
• 1972 - Wŏlt'an Literature Prize
• 1965 - Korean Literature Prize for Women
• 1959 - Naesŏng Literature Prize
• 1957 - Prize for contemporary literature (young authors)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Korean Literature Translation Institute: 문인 DB: Park Kyung-ni ( Memento of the original from November 5, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , accessed July 5, 2013 (Korean). 
2. ↑ Chung Ah-young: Park Kyung-ni Dies at 82 . The Korea Times, May 5, 2008.
3. ↑ Korean Literature Translation Institute: Author Database: Park Kyung-ni ( Memento of the original from February 1, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , accessed on July 5, 2013. 

Note: This article places the family name before the person's first name. This is the usual order in Korean. Park is the family name here, Kyung-ni is the first name.