The Life and Works of Korean Poet Kim Myng-sun

The Life and Works of Korean Poet Kim Myng-sun offers an introduction to Koreas first modern woman writer to publish a collection of creative works, Kim Myng-sun (1896ca. 1954). Despite attempts by male contemporaries to assassinate her character, Kim was an outspoken writer and an early feminist, confronting patriarchal Korean society in essays, plays, poems, and short stories. This volume is the first to offer a detailed analysis in English of Kims poetry. The poems examined in this volume can be considered early twentieth-century versions of #MeToo literature, mirroring the harrowing account of her sexual assault, and also subversive challenges to traditional institutions, dealing with themes such as romantic free love, same-sex love, single womanhood, and explicit female desire and passion. The Life and Works of Korean Poet Kim Myng-sun restores a long-neglected woman writer to her rightful place in the history of Korean literature, shedding light on the complexity of womens lives in Korea and contributing to the growing interest in modern Korean womens literature in the West.