Novel
혈의 누
Not translated into English
Yi In-jik · 1906
Synopsis
Pyongyang, 1894: during the fighting of the Sino-Japanese war, Choe Chun-ae loses, in the flight, her husband Kim Gwan-il and their seven-year-old daughter Ok-ryeon; she narrowly escapes an assault, saved by a Japanese patrol. Her husband, who believes his wife and daughter dead, leaves to study in America. Ok-ryeon, wounded, is cared for by Inoue, a surgeon in the Japanese army, who takes her to his home in Ōsaka and has her educated. There she meets a young Korean, Gu Wan-seo.
Context
The text appeared in fifty instalments in the daily Mansebo, from 22 July to 10 October 1906, then in book form in March 1907. Scholars generally see in it the first Korean “new novel”: it opens on the present situation before giving its causes, in a language close to speech. The encyclopedia of the Academy of Korean Studies also notes its clumsy structure and the absence of any criticism of Japanese imperialism. Banned by the police in 1911, it was reissued the following year under another title, expurgated; a sequel published in 1907 remained unfinished.
Who it is for
A novel first published as a serial, which combines war, exile and education received abroad.
Prizes and reception
Considered the founding work of the genre, it is often compared with the first poem in the new form, published two years later.
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