"Eastern Sentiments" Translated by U of T Professor Janet Poole

Janet Poole teaches Korean literature in the Department of East Asian Studies at the University of Toronto. Her translation of Yi T'aejun's "Eastern Sentiments" was recently published by Columbia University Press. A brief description of the book from the publisher's website has been copied below. For further information please visit the source: http://cup.columbia.edu/book/978-0-231-14944-0/eastern-sentiments

The Confucian gentleman scholars of the Choson dynasty (1392-1910) often published short anecdotes exemplifying their values and aesthetic concerns. In modern Seoul one scholar in particular would excel at adapting this style to a contemporary readership: Yi T'aejun.

Yi T'aejun was a prolific and influential writer of colonial Korea and an acknowledged master of the short story and essay. He also wrote numerous novels and was an influential editor of cultural news. Born in northern Korea in 1904, Yi T'aejun settled in Seoul after a restless youth that included several years of study in Japan. In 1946, he moved to Soviet-occupied northern Korea, but by 1956, a purge of southern communists forced him into exile. His subsequent whereabouts cannot be confirmed, though rumors claim Yi returned to Pyongyang, only to be exiled once more. It is believed Yi T'aejun passed away between 1960 and 1980, but his works were not made available until 1988, when South Korean censorship laws concerning authors who had sided with the north were eased.