When first learning Korean in Los Angeles, I went to a Koreatown bookstore in search of simple reading material. There …
The Great Korean Plastic Surgery Novel: Frances Cha’s If I Had Your Face
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.
No Sex Please, This Is Korea: Jang Sun-woo’s The Road to the Race Track (1991)
Colin Marshall continues his dive into the Korean Film Archive’s YouTube channel with Jang Sun-woo's "The Road to the Race Track" (1991).
The First Comprehensive Introduction to “K-Lit” Past and Present: Youngmin Kwon and Bruce Fulton’s What Is Korean Literature?
Colin Marshall delves into the development of Korean literature as a genre, through Youngmin Kwon and Bruce Fulton's "What Is Korean Literature?"
The Korean Zombie Apocalypse: A Wave of Movies and TV Eerily Suited to the COVID Era
For this week's Korea Blog, Colin Marshall looks at recent(ish) films that presciently documented the same societal fears now exposed in the pandemic.
Six Expatriate Writers Give Six Views of Seoul in a New Short-Fiction Anthology, A City of Han
Colin Marshall explores a new expat story anthology, "A City of Han," collected by Sollee Bae, about living in Seoul.
The Book of Jiyoung: An Explosively Controversial Korean Feminist Novel Comes Out in English
Colin Marshall revisits "Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982," the debut novel by a former television writer named Cho Nam-joo.
In Praise of Pilsa, the Highly Uncreative Korean Method of Learning to Write
Colin Marshall discusses a maligned yet effective method of learning in Korea.
Rediscovering Korean Cinema: An Academic Look at the Zombies, Mutants, Criminals, and Prostitutes of South Korea’s Silver Screen
Colin Marshall looks at a new essay collection about the history and influence of Korean cinema.
The Coronavirus Breaks Out in Itaewon, the “Gays-and-Foreigners” Seoul Neighborhood Celebrated in a Hit Netflix Drama
Colin Marshall delves into culture of an Americanized neighborhood of Seoul and a popular K-drama set there: "Itaewon Class."
Selling Your Body to Seoul: Kim Ho-seon’s Yeong-ja’s Heydays (1975)
For the Korea Blog, Colin Marshall discusses the evolving portrayals of Korea's cinematic prostitutes.
