"For a book written in tribute to hangul and aimed at a non-Korean readership, it doesn't offer much of an opportunity to learn the alphabet."
King Sejong the Great: A Star Trek Writer Pays Novelistic Tribute to the Korean Alphabet’s Creator
The Korea Blog
Dispatches on the literature, cinema, current events, and daily life of Korea from the LARB’s man in Seoul Colin Marshall and others.
You can follow Colin Marshall at blog.colinmarshall.org, on Twitter @colinmarshall, or on Facebook @ColinMarshallEssayist.
The Agony and Ecstasy of Learning Korean, Expressed by Memes
Colin Marshall finds some levity among the Korean language-learning community.
Korean Provocateur: the Harrowing Films of Kim Ki-duk (1960-2020)
For this week's Korea Blog, Colin Marshall remembers director Kim Ki-duk.
Pansori at the Disco: Leenalchi, the New-Old Korean Musical Phenomenon of 2020, Gets Frustrated Tourists Dancing
For this week's Korea Blog, Colin Marshall dives into the 2020 music sensation Leenalchi.
Five Years a Seoulite: Looking Back at the Korea Blog’s First Half-Decade
Colin Marshall looks back on changes in Korea since he began writing about it for LARB.
Proper Travel: Island-Hopping Englishman Michael Gibb’s A Korean Odyssey
"Even when transplanted to the other side of the world, it seems, a man from an island not known for its pleasant weather will seek out more of the same."
Revisiting the Late Kevin O’Rourke’s My Korea, a Curious Memoir of a Land that Gets in the Blood
Colin Marshall remembers Kevin O'Rourke's long-haul observations of changes in Korean society.
Clarice Lispector Reborn in David Lynch’s Seoul: An Introduction to Outsider Novelist-Essayist Bae Suah
Colin Marshall discusses the enigmatic and subtle qualities of Bae Suah's fiction.
An American Aid Worker in Pyongyang: Andray Abrahamian’s Being in North Korea
For this week's Korea Blog, Andrei Rogatchevski takes a look at Andray Abrahamian’s "Being in North Korea."
The Woman Who Ran: The Cinematic-Romantic Collaboration of Hong Sangsoo and Kim Min-Hee Evolves
"The collision of the sexes in Hong's work has become more awkward and disembodied over time, and sex itself has dwindled to a conspicuous absence."
