Yang Seok-il: Blood and Bones 1 Korean Diaspora Literature

It is Osaka in the 1930s. Kim Shunpei, a migrant from Jeju Island, works at a fish cake factory and is widely feared for his physical strength and brutality. He moves through life in the only way he knows how: by terrorizing those around him.A bestseller in Japan, this harrowing, kaleidoscopic novel portrays the violent and eventful life of a flawed man modeled after the author's own father.Publisher’s ReviewBlood and Bones, originally published in Japanese in 1998, follows a half-century of the violent, eventful life of migrant worker Kim Shunpei in Osaka. Feared by coworkers, bosses, neighbors, family members, and gangs alike, he moves through life in the only way he knows how: by terrorizing those around him. Yang Seok-il's vivid portrait of Kim Shunpei is modeled after the life of his own father. Built from intimate memories of struggle in the gritty underbelly of Osaka, Yang's harrowing, kaleidoscopic novel depicts how patriarchal violence and restricted life chances can wrack a minority Korean community both during and after Japan's empire.About the AuthorYang Seok-il (b. 1936- )Born in Osaka, Japan, to a couple from Korea’s Jeju Island who settled in Japan during the Japanese occupation of the Korean Peninsula, Yang, whose Japanese name is Yan Sogiru, graduated from Osaka Prefectural Kozu High School and did odd jobs including driving a taxi after a business he pursued failed. His 1980s non-fiction work Takushi doraiba nisshi (Taxi Driver Diary), based on his experience as a cabbie, was made into the 1993 critically acclaimed film All under the Moon. He also won the 1998 Yamamoto Shugoro Prize of Japan for his semi-autobiographical novel Blood and Bones, which was also made into a film released in 2004.About the TranslatorAdhy Kim is a writer, scholar, and teacher of Asian and Asian American literature and culture.ContentsBlood and Bones 2Chapter 14Chapter 15Chapter 16Chapter 17Chapter 18Chapter 19Chapter 20Chapter 21Chapter 22Chapter 23Chapter 24Chapter 25Chapter 26

1st Collection of Short Stories on the Jeju April 3 Incident Published in 1957 as a Way of Informing the World Kim Sok-pom has devoted his writing career to raising awareness of the Jeju April 3 Incident through literature. Death of a Crow (1957) marked the beginning of his campaign; known as one of his major works, it is also the one that first earned him recognition. By writing about the uprising, he delved into history and the problems of humanity. Chronicling a variety of lives linked to the event was also his way of gaining understanding of this world.“Bak-seobang, Jailer,” “Death of a Crow,” and “Gwandeokjeong” are a series of closely intertwined works in this book that depict Jeju amid the massacre that lasted for about a year starting from summer 1948; “Death of a Crow” and “Gwandeokjeong” also feature the same person. Though “Feces and Freedom” and “A Tale of a False Dream” do not deal with the uprising directly, they help reveal the reasons why the author studied the massacre and his opinions of it.About the AuthorKim Sok-pomNovelist Kim Sok-pom, born in Osaka, Japan, in 1925, has extensively written novels related to the Jeju April 3 Incident on Jeju Island in 1948. He grew interested in the topic after hearing about the horrendous massacre from his relatives, who had stowed away to Japan. He devoted himself to raising awareness of such savagery through literature. Beginning with “Bak-seobang, Jailer” and “Death of a Crow” and later through The Curious Tale of Mandogi’s Ghost, “Gwandeokjeong,” and The Moon, he has kept producing works inspired by the event. In pursuit of freedom and liberation based on universality and in opposition to the absolutization of Japanese language, Kim has chosen to reclaim his identity as a Korean writer. For The Volcanic Island (Kazanto), he earned the Asahi Shimbun's Osaragi Jiro Award in 1983 and the Mainichi Arts Prize in 1984.About the TranslatorChristina Yi is an associate professor of modern Japanese literature at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, Canada. Receiving her Ph.D. from Columbia University, she had her first monograph, Colonizing Language: Cultural Production and Language Politics in Modern Japan and Korea, published by Columbia University Press in 2018. Yi was also the co-editor for both a special issue on zainichi (ethnic Korean residents of Japan) Korean literature and film for Azalea: Journal of Korean Literature and Culture 12 (2019) and the edited volume Passing, Posing, Persuasion: Cultural Production and Coloniality in Japan’s East Asian Empire (University of Hawaii Press).ContentsTranslator’s ForewordBak-seobang, JailerDeath of a CrowGwandeokjeongFeces and FreedomA Tale of a False Dream

의심 없이 편안하게 사랑하고 사랑받고 싶은 한 사람의 이야기 10년 넘게 기분부전장애(가벼운 우울 증상이 지속되는 상태)와 불안장애를 겪으며 정신과를 전전했던 저자와 정신과 전문의와의 12주간의 대화를 엮은 『죽고 싶지만 떡볶이는 먹고 싶어』. 지독히 우울하지도 행복하지도 않은 애매한 기분에 시달렸고, 이러한 감정들이 한 번에 일어날 수 있다는 사실을 알지 못해서 괴로웠던 저자는 2017년 잘 맞는 병원을 찾아 약물치료와 상담치료를 병행하고 있다. 이 책은 저자의 치료 기록을 담고 있다. 사적인 이야기가 가득하지만 어두운 감정만 풀어내기보다는 구체적인 상황을 통해 근본적인 원인을 찾고, 건강한 방향으로 나아가는 것에 중점을 두고 있다. 겉보기에는 멀쩡하지만 속은 곪아 있는 사람들, 불안 속에 하루하루를 버티고 있는 사람들에게 이제까지 간과하고 있었지만 본인으로부터 나오고 있을지 모를 또 다른 소리에 귀 기울여보게 한다.

Kim Tal-su (1920–1997) was one of the first and leading writers of the Korean Diaspora in 20th-century Japan. The stories in this collection include the critically acclaimed novella “The Trial of Pak Tal” and cover a range of periods and topics like the struggles of Koreans in wartime Japan, the Korean War and its aftermath, and the layers of Japanese and Korean history on the island of Tsushima. Full of the writer’s unique blend of humor and pathos, these stories offer a moving and multifaceted look at how Koreans fought to find their voice and identity in Japanese culture and society.Publisher’s ReviewThe so-called Zainichi Korean diaspora in Japan is a large and diverse community with a long and painful history that began with the Japanese colonization of Korea (1910-1945). One of the most prolific and influential Zainichi Korean writers in Japan, Kim Tal-su (1920-1997) left behind a wide body of work depicting the many social and psychological dilemmas that Zainichi Koreans face, such as passing and outing, racism and discrimination, and ethnic identity and political affiliation. This collection, which contains some of Kim’s most important shorter works, showcases his vitality and versatility as a writer. Together, these stories offer new perspectives on Zainichi Korean identity and agency and new horizons for rethinking Japanese and Korean history beyond the borders of the nation-state.Beginning with “Kindred Spirits,” a lively look at Koreans passing as Japanese and trespassing as bootleggers in wartime Japan, this collection includes the critically acclaimed novella “The Trial of Pak Tal,” a political satire about the Korean War (and the war within the Zainichi Korean self) through the eyes of a farmhand-turned-freedom fighter named Pak Tal and an equally sly and subversive narrator, and the historical travelogue “All the Way to Tsushima,” which follows Kim and his compatriots to the island of Tsushima, located between Japan and Korea, on a sentimental search for their lost homeland. The collection ends with two of Kim’s earliest works, “One’s Place” and “Memories of My Grandmother,” which explore the place of Zainichi Koreans in Japanese society and their lingering sense of loss and displacement.Sensitively and skillfully translated from the Japanese by Christopher D. Scott, with a detailed introduction to Kim’s life and literary career, “The Trial of Pak Tal and Other Stories” is a revolutionary work of Zainichi Korean literature and a landmark of Korean diasporic literature. Bridging the histories of Japan, the Korean Peninsula, and the United States—much like Min Jin Lee’s 2017 bestselling novel Pachinko—this collection brings long overdue recognition to a community that, as Lee writes at the opening of her novel, “history has failed.” As this translation shows, however, history has not failed Kim; it has redeemed him. Like Pak Tal in “The Trial of Pak Tal,” Kim has come back, albeit in English this time. And he has some unforgettable stories to tell.About the AuthorKim Tal-suA leading Zainichi (ethnic Korean residing in Japan) writer whose fiction charted the inner lives of Koreans during and after the Japanese occupation, Kim was born in Changwon, Gyeongsangnam-do, in 1920 and immigrated to Japan at age 10 along with family. He attended elementary school there but dropped out after being bullied by his Japanese classmates. Undaunted, he began learning Japanese and reading Japanese literature while performing menial jobs like factory worker, public bath attendant, and garbage collector. After graduating from Nihon University College of Art, he began working in 1943 as a reporter for the daily Gyeongseong Ilbo (Keijō Nippō) in Seoul.In 1947, Kim published his first novel Kōei no machi (City of Descendants). His works were hailed for eloquently and evocatively capturing the dilemmas faced by Koreans under Japanese colonial rule and the subsequent sorrow and resentment felt by his compatriots. His other major works include the novel Genkai nada (The Genkai Sea, 1953), the novella “The Trial of Pak Tal” (1958), and the 12-volume Nihon no naka no Chōsen bunka (Korean Culture in Japan, 1970–1991), which focuses on ancient relations between Korea and Japan.About the TranslatorChristopher D. Scott teaches Japanese and Japanese culture at The Nueva School in San Mateo, California. He received his bachelor’s degree from Princeton University and his master’s and PhD from Stanford University. His other published translations from Japanese to English include Kim Sa-ryang’s “Into the Light,” Levy Hideo’s A Room Where the Star-Spangled Banner Cannot Be Heard, and Shu Ejima’s Quick Draw.ContentsAcknowledgmentsA Note on Names and RomanizationTranslator’s IntroductionKindred SpiritsThe Trial of Pak TalAll the Way to TsushimaOne's PlacesMemories of My Grandmother