Korea at FilBo 2022: five books of Korean literature available in Colombia

The 2022 edition of the Bogotá International Book Fair opened last night and for some time now several readers have been curious to know what is attractive in the literature of the guest country. Korea is the country of fashion in much of Latin America, not only because of its music, its films or its manga and anime, its gastronomy or its history, but also because of its writers and writers. All this is part of the so-called 'Korean wave' that has struck almost everyone with impressive force. In reality, it is their culture that spreads everywhere.

Publishers in the Hispanic world have not been alien to this reality and more and more are including books written by Korean authors, and authors, of course, in their catalogues. There is a long way to go before bookstores have a section with writers' books only in these latitudes so far away from the Asian continent, but what is certain is that their arrival has been intense. Although there are not a large number of titles in Colombia, there is one or the other good piece. From Infobae we leave you some recommendations that you can find in most bookstores in the country:

Human acts

Han Kang, is probably the best-known Korean author in the world, for the last few years. Her novel The Vegetarian, was a revolution in the literature of her country and at the time allowed the author to win the Man Booker Prize. In Colombia, the book caused a sensation as soon as it arrived, thanks to Plaza y Janés, which distributes in our country the label Rata Books, a Catalan publisher that has been responsible for translating some of Kang's works. One of them is Actos Humanos, a book with a peculiar narrative that focuses on what happened during the Kwangju massacre. A novel full of feeling, history and is one of those books that move while irritating.

Kim Ji-young, born 1982

Cho Nam-joo's novel, available in Colombia thanks to Penguin Random House, was a resounding success in South Korea at the time of its publication, especially among female audiences. The book presents us with a very simple story, the daily life of a character, the life of Kim Ji-young, a young woman who has not lived anything particularly striking. The story gains strength because it is a portrait of the life of women in this country, where they are born with fewer opportunities than men and have to spend their days at the mercy of the decisions of others, without being able to express their opinion most of the time, or decide for their own destiny. In some ways, the novel is a testimony of the author, although it is not entirely autobiographical.

The good son

A thriller of those in which the author You-Jeong Jeong tells the story of Yu Jin, a boy who has epilepsy seizures and describes his daily life, taking medication. His condition interrupted his career as an Olympic swimmer, as the medicine he takes causes pain in his body. The first encounters with the character place the reader at a time when he goes down the stairs of his house and finds his mother's corpse on the ground, with a cut from ear to ear and his clothes stained with blood. The boy doesn't remember anything, because he had collapsed hours before and his memory of what happened is not clear. He doesn't know who killed his mother, but he has the idea that he heard her scream her name.

almond

One of the pieces that has revolutionized the publishing market in Korea. This book Wong-pyung Sohn, available in Colombia thanks to the Oceano group, tells us the story of Yunjae, a 16-year-old boy who can't feel anything, has no emotions. His brain amygdala, which is responsible for feeding this capacity, is smaller than an almond and that's why it doesn't work well.

Raised by his grandmother and mother, he learns to hide his condition, pretending that he has emotions, and somehow everything is going well, as far as possible, until one day a psychopath murders his family. The boy is left alone and cannot react to what happened. It is a story that will move and impact more than one reader, because of the high level of emotion, ironically, it handles. This writer's pen is probably one of the most revealed of recent times on the Asian continent.

My painting workshop

Suzy Lee recently received the Hans Christian Andersen Award, which recognizes her as one of the most important authors of children's literature today. My painting workshop is the story of a girl who loves to draw. At the hand of a painter who takes her as a student in his workshop, the girl suddenly discovers that water is not just a colorless liquid impossible to paint, but a whole world that bustles around. With her own illustrations, the author tells us this story in which the first moments that every artist experiences with his art are very well portrayed. It is a tribute to the craft of the teacher who, with wisdom, little by little, reveals to the apprentice the keys to life.

There are many more books available in our country, and we haven't talked about the mangas, which, although they are not as recognized as the Japanese, have an interesting proposal. For now, this may be a small guide to getting into Korean literature that will give something to talk about in this edition of the FilBo.

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