The culture and economy have become a new central axis in modern society which lost the antagonistic point, the ideology. Especaially, the present culture is very different from the past one. Developing countries sued to accept the advanced countries'...
The culture and economy have become a new central axis in modern society which lost the antagonistic point, the ideology. Especaially, the present culture is very different from the past one. Developing countries sued to accept the advanced countries' culture in many ways. However, that has been changing. Both "accepting" countries and "giving" countries are now able to develop their culture through exchange programmes.
Cultural exchange has been improved through various means, but the most effective and classic way to build cultural identification is through publication exchange. Literature among the publication exchange programme plays the main role of communication between cultures. Literature is not only the basis of culture by expressing life, ideology and history of a race but also the most effective intermedium between cultures. In any countries, we can find that the most active area in internatioal exchange in publication is literature.
So, I suggest we introduce and activate the introduction of Korean literature to other countries through finding out the characters, current and gistory of international introduction of Korean literature.
We have had exchanged programmes and accepted advanced cultures through publication, especially literature, in the modern times. We did not adopt dther countries' literature. We started to introduce our literature 100 years ago to other countries but accelerated the introduction, because of increased interest and want in literature, in 1980s. International introduction of Korean literature has been activated to be a known Korean culture over a short period.
Korean Tales was first published in America in 1889. Since then, there have been 497 publcations in 31 countries (in 19 languages). The Cloud Dream of Nine was published in the UK, traslated by James S. Gale. Among the modern literary works, Chosun's Representative Novels was first published in Japan in 1940 and Proud, the nobel written by Kim Nam-Chun, a member of KAPF, was published in Czech in 1947. Up until the 60s, Korean literary works published and translated were classic literary works, but the range was broadened to modern literary works in 1970s.
Since 1980s, international introduction of KOrean literary works was accelerated by increasing on interest in Korea through the 1988 Seoul Olympic games and support from The Korean Culture & Arts Foundation and UNESCO-Korea. Moreober, The Daesan Foundation, a provate foundation, took a part in supporting translation and publication under the motive of 'Globalization of Korean Literature' in 1990s. The current number of publications by countries are 107(USA), 80(France), 78(Japan), 51(Germany), 45(Russia), 24(UK), 24(China), 16(Czech) and 10(Poland), with other countries below 10 publication.
MOre modern literary works than classic ones, and core modern novel than poems have been translated and published. 8 works have been translated over 3 times- classic works(3) and modern works(5). The classic work Choonhyang was translated 5 times in 5 languages. The Silence of Lover, a modern poem, written by Han Yong-Un, was published 2 times in English, and 2 times in French and Czech. The modern novel. The Poet written by Yi Mun-Yol has been translated 5 times in 5 languages. So Chong-Ju(poet), Yi Mun-Yol(novelist)'s works are will known abroad. The present number of translations and publications shows works written by Korean modern writer will be translated and published more in the future.
147 Korean literary works have been published in Einglish, but it is very rare to be reprinted or published and sold by a famous publishing company. There are 83 Korean literary works translated in French, of which 54 works were published in 1990s which demonstrates a huge increase in popularity. In German, Korean classics were introduced gradually by 1970s, modern works were introduced in 1980s and have become more popular in 1990s. Compared with other languages, Korean literary works, modern poem, were only translated into Spanish from the 1980s and modern novel from 1990s. However, there are no publications of Korean classics in Spanish. 72 books have been traslated into East European languages such as Russian. Czech, etc. They have been translated without any special support gradually since 1950s. 49 classics were translated, besides 23 modern works were translated. Korean literary works in China were published based on the translator's interest and preference without any support from Korea. The works published in Peking and Shanghai translated by Chinese and whereas the works published around Yanbian, a parts of China, were translated by Chinese Korean. Korean literary works translated into Japanese after the diplomatic relationship between Korea and Japan were developed in early 1970s. Many works have been published since the 1980s. A large number of publications published before and after 1988 have shown a profit.
However, we did not consider copyrights issues as our main focus was on letting people know about Korean literary works. The importance of copyrights was first realised when 2 writers, Lee Chung-Joon and Yi Mun-Yol, made a contrant a contract with a French publication company, Actes sud in 1990s. This was shocking to Korean society where the concept of copyrights had not been addressed. After the contract we recognized the importance of copyright and tried to secure copyrights.
We have faced problems. The problems on translation and publication are:
1. which works should be translated
2. how to improve the quality of translation skills and train the translators
3. how to publieze and publish
In connection with supporting programme, there are several problems:
1. how to support the project systematcally
2. the shortage of specialist in this area
3. duplicated support from the different organizations
4. no education policy for new translators
The problems concerning translations are as follows:
1. how we spread our literature abroak
2. the shortage of professional translators
3. poor working environment for full-time translators
I suggest that how we can make Korean literature popular in the world is through analyzing the above problems and the current situation in Korea. My suggestions are as follows:
1. There should be a systematic policy for translation and publication of Korean literary works.
2. Support programmes to aid the above
3. There should be cooperation between supporting organizations.
4. It is very improtant to spread Korean literary works
5. Educate new translator.
6. We should try to keep the spirit of Korean literature alive.