Korea in English-Language SF

This entry is part 60 of 72 in the series SF in South Korea

Over at Gusts of Popular Feeling, everyone’s favorite archives-trawler Matt has a post about about “the first SF story involving Korea” and a few other such tales from the Galaxy/Amazing Stories era.

I’ve left a comment clarifying that “the first SF story” should be qualified as “the first English-language SF story” and also noting that depending on how you define “SF,” one might consider Jack London’s Star Rover the first in the English language.

As for the first Korean-language SF story, I don’t know what it was, though I’d argue that the amount of remixing that seems to have gone on in the first Korean translation of Western SF (IIRC it was Jules Verne’s 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea) probably qualifies as a “new work”–at least as much as any Hollywood remake film, which would make it the first Korean-language SF story involving Korea. Not that I’ve actually had a chance to see it… maybe the translation sets the action in Japan. The interview I saw with Park Sang-Joon discussing it in some detail is in a box I left behind in Korea, so I can’t check.

In any case, a fascinating post over at Gusts, and I highly recommend it.

Series Navigation<< Seoul Comics World Convention #114 (December 2012)Articles on Korean SF in _list Magazine >>

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