Sok-Yong Hwang Knihy

The essential account of the South Korean 1980 pro-democracy rebellion.

Political prisoner Hyun Woo is freed after eighteen years to find no trace of the world he knew. The friends with whom he shared utopianist dreams are gone. His Seoul is unrecognizably transformed and aggressively modernized. Yoon Hee, the woman he loved, died three years ago. A broken man, he drifts toward a small house in Kalmoe, where he and Yoon Hee once stole a few fleeting months of happiness while fleeing the authorities. In the company of her diaries, he relives and reviews his life, trying to find meaning in the revolutionary struggle that consumed their youth—a youth of great energy and optimism, victim to implacable history. Hyun Woo weighs the worth of his own life, spent in prison, and that of the strong-willed artist Yoon Hee, whose involvement in rebel groups took her to Berlin and the fall of the wall. With great poignancy, Hwang Sok-yong grapples with the immortal questions—the endurance of love, the price of a commitment to causes—while depicting a generation that sacrificed youth, liberty, and often life, for the dream of a better tomorrow.

Based on actual events, The Guest is a profound portrait of a divided people haunted by a painful past, and a generation's search for reconciliation. During the Korean War, Hwanghae Province in North Korea was the setting of a gruesome fifty-two day massacre. In an act of collective amnesia the atrocities were attributed to American military, but in truth they resulted from malicious battling between Christian and Communist Koreans. Forty years later, Ryu Yosop, a minister living in America returns to his home village, where his older brother once played a notorious role in the bloodshed. Besieged by vivid memories and visited by the troubled spirits of the deceased, Yosop must face the survivors of the tragedy and lay his brother's soul to rest. Faulkner-like in its intense interweaving narratives, The Guest is a daring and ambitious novel from a major figure in world literature.

Seoul. On the outskirts of South Korea’s glittering metropolis is a place few people know about: a vast landfill site called Flower Island. Home to those driven from the city by poverty, is it here that 14-year-old Bugeye and his mother arrive, following his father’s internment in a government ‘re-education camp’. Living in a shack and supporting himself by weeding recyclables out of the refuse, at first Bugeye’s life on Flower Island is hard. But then one night he notices mysterious lights around the landfill. And when the ancient spirits that still inhabit the island’s landscape reveal themselves to him, Bugeye's luck begins to change – but can it last? Vibrant and enchanting, 'Familiar Things' depicts a society on the edge of dizzying economic and social change, and is a haunting reminder to us all to be careful of what we throw away.

In the evening of his life, a wealthy man begins to wonder if he might have missed the point.Park Minwoo is, by every measure, a success story. Born into poverty in a miserable neighbourhood of Seoul, he has ridden the wave of development in a rapidly modernising society. Now the director of a large architectural firm, his hard work and ambition have brought him triumph and satisfaction. But when his company is investigated for corruption, he’s forced to reconsider his role in the transformation of his country.At the same time, he receives an unexpected message from an old friend, Cha Soona, a woman that he had once loved, and then betrayed. As memories return unbidden, Minwoo recalls a world he thought had been left behind — a world he now understands that he has helped to destroy.In At Dusk, one of Korea's most renowned and respected authors continues his gentle yet urgent project of evaluating Korea’s past, and examining the things, and the people, that have been given up in a never-ending quest to move forward.

International Booker-nominated virtuoso Hwang Sok-yong is back with another powerful story -- an epic, multi-generational tale that threads together a century of Korean history. Centred on three generations of a family of rail workers and a laid-off factory worker staging a high-altitude sit-in, MATER 2-10vividly depicts the lives of ordinary working Koreans, starting from the Japanese colonial era, continuing through Liberation, and right up to the twenty-first century. It is at once a powerful account that captures a nation's longing for a rail line to reconnect North and South, a magical-realist novel that depicts reflect the lives of modern industrial workers, and a culmination of Hwang's career -- a masterpiece thirty years in the making. A true voice of a generation, Hwang shows again why he is unmatched when it comes to depicting the grief of a divided nation and bringing to life the cultural identity and trials and tribulations of the Korean people.

Am Rand der südkoreanischen Metropole Seoul liegt die „Blumeninsel“, eine gigantische Müllhalde, Lebensgrundlage und Wohnstätte einer Kolonie von Ausgestoßenen. Hier landet der Held des Romans, der 14-jährige „Glupschaug“, zusammen mit seiner Mutter, für die sich ein in der Hackordnung weit oben stehender Müllhaldenbewohner interessiert. Dieser „Baron“ ist für den Helden eine verhasste Stiefvaterfigur. Mit „Glatzfleck“, dem Sohn des Barons, freundet sich „Glupschaug“ jedoch an und lernt von ihm alles, was man zum Überleben wissen muss. "Vertraute Welt" ist eine Kritik an der modernen Wegwerfgesellschaft. Der Roman zeigt, was hinter dem raschen wirtschaftlichen Aufstieg eines Landes steckt, das Menschen ebenso aussondert wie Müll. Unverhofftes Opfer des zweifelhaften Fortschritts ist auch eine Bande altkoreanischer Kobolde, mit denen sich „Glupschaug“ und „Glatzfleck“ anfreunden. Für die beiden Jugendlichen wendet sich damit das Blatt, zumindest vorerst …

Hwang Sok-yong entraîne le lecteur dans l'Asie du 19e siècle, dans un monde de commerce d'opium et de prostitution. Vendue par sa belle-mère, Shim Chong est emmenée sur un navire marchand vers la Chine à seulement 15 ans. Elle se retrouve comme seconde épouse d'un vieil homme chinois sur le continent, où elle prend le nom de Lenhwa, Lotosblüte. Tout est terriblement différent de ce qu'elle connaissait. Cependant, un jour, elle découvre qu'elle peut aussi prendre sa vie en main. Ce récit explore les thèmes de la résilience, de l'identité et de la quête de liberté dans un contexte historique tumultueux.

Princesse Bari conte l'histoire d'une jeune fille, frêle et courageuse, qui fuit la Corée du Nord à la fin des années 1990, se réfugie un moment en Chine avant de traverser l'océan à fond de cale d'un cargo et de débarquer dans un Londres clandestin où se côtoient toutes les langues et religions. A Londres, Bari gagne sa vie comme masseuse, mais elle ne soigne pas seulement les corps, elle console aussi les âmes. Car Bari a hérité de sa grand-mère des dons de voyance qui lui permettent de voyager dans les rêves et de lire les cauchemars dont souffrent les autres. Ce roman habité par l'âme d'une jeune fille affrontant seule, avec confiance et obstination, de terribles épreuves, puise aux sources anciennes du chamanisme coréen : il transfigure une très ancienne légende où une princesse abandonnée va chercher à l'autre bout du Inonde l'eau de la vie qui permettra aux âmes des morts de connaître enfin l'apaisement.