Series introduces ‘all walks of life’ of Joseon period

When professor emeritus Kim Hung-gyu was asked to select and compile classic Korean stories for a book series, the first thing he wanted to do was introduce the kind of stories that are “page-turners.”

“Many say pre-modern Korea was a Confucian society,” Kim, a longtime researcher of traditional Korea literature, told The Korea Herald.

“And that is not incorrect. But the pre-modern Korea cannot be solely defined as ‘Confucian.’ It was very much a complex and diverse society and people felt all kinds of emotions (just like how we feel today). They missed others, felt betrayed, discouraged, sad and angry. I wanted to pick stories that are fun to read, and the kind of stories that really show what it was like to live in pre-modern Korea.”

And Kim succeeded in creating “page-turners.” The recently published series, titled “Korean Classic Stories,” offers some very unusual and unexpected stories, especially when considering that they were written during Korea’s strictly Confucian Joseon period. Readers will read about a gruesome murder, a wife who becomes a ghost after being killed during a war, and an aristocrat who chooses to starve himself to death so he can avoid losing his honor as a nobleman. They are, in Kim’s words, certainly not “fairy tales” with happy endings, nothing like the well-known “Chunhyangjeon” or “Simcheongjeon.”

“The well-known Korean classics tend to avoid the taboo topics,” said Kim. “But this series is not for children. I wanted to introduce the kind of stories that dealt with real people with real problems of the time period.”

One of the stories, titled “The Widow,” featured in the volume “Lives of Women,” tells of a high-ranking minister who makes an unusual and difficult decision for his young, widowed daughter, at a time when young widows of aristocratic households were expected not to marry again for the rest of their lives.

“When you think about it, so many people must have suffered because of that social expectation on young widowed women,” Kim told The Korea Herald.

“There must have been a lot of parents who were disheartened about their daughter’s situation. I’m sure many parents-in-law felt bad, too. What the father in ‘The Widow’ does is very unusual and it’s hard to think that something like that happened frequently in real life at the time. But this story tells us that the intellectuals at the time were at least very much aware of the flaws of such social expectations and codes of ethics, and that it conflicted with the innate desire of human beings.”

One of the most shocking stories featured in the series is Joseon scholar Yi Deok-mu’s (1741-1793) “The Tale of Eun-ae,” featured in volume 1. The story is based on the real-life case of a young wife stabbing to death an old woman for spreading false rumors about her chastity. What is surprising is that the young woman eventually was exempt from punishment.

“A woman’s chastity and fidelity were considered very important,” Kim said.

“If you were caught being unfaithful, you would be stigmatized for the rest of your life. It meant social death. So spreading false rumors about it is equivalent to today’s human trafficking. That is why this case was considered to be very complex and eventually was taken to the king. And he decided not to punish the young woman because of the troubles she must have faced because of the rumors.”

Among the stories featured in the series, the one Kim finds the most memorable is “Hunjomak,” included in volume 4. The short tale tells of a poor aristocrat named Hong Saengwon, who, in spite of his noble class, has to beg for food in order to survive.

The widowed man has two young daughters to support, so he would always visit the hunjomak ― a place where laborers produced a large number of blocks of fermented soybeans ― and ask for free food. One day, he is insulted by a drunk laborer for being a nobleman who begs to laborers for food, and eventually decides to starve himself and daughters to save his and their honor.

“It is a tragic story and throws a lot of questions,” Kim said.

“No one can really say what Hong does in the story is right ― not just to starve himself, but to take the lives of his daughters as well. He could’ve easily sold one of the daughters as a servant somewhere and made money that way. But he doesn’t. One’s class status and honor were considered very important in the time period. One of the questions this story asks is about human dignity.”

Kim said he hopes readers find the series to be both entertaining and informative. “Under the Confucian norms and system, there were a lot of diverse thoughts and experiences shared by people in pre-modern Korea,” he said. “And these experiences and problems are reflected in these stories. I don’t think works of literature must provide the right answers to ethical questions. They raise questions. I hope these stories can do the same for their readers.”

By Claire Lee (dyc@heraldcorp.com)