Novelist Lee Ki-ho has gained the fiction class on the thirty third Daesan Literary Awards for his novel “The Cheerful, Wrestle-Free Lifetime of Lee Sibong,” the Daesan Basis introduced Monday throughout a press convention at Kyobo Tower in Seoul.
The novel follows a younger man named Lee Si-seup and his grieving household, whose lives turn out to be intertwined with their pet, a Bichon Frise named Sibong. Collectively, they embark on an unlikely odyssey of loss, guilt and therapeutic.
Lee stated the story was impressed by his personal expertise dwelling with a canine named Sibong.
“About eight years in the past, I began dwelling with a canine for the primary time,” Lee stated on the press convention. “Being a canine proprietor is stuffed with pleasure, however there are additionally occasions when you need to do issues your pet doesn’t like. I attempted my greatest to look after him, however typically I felt he didn’t love me again as a lot. Out of that bittersweet feeling, I assumed, as a author, one of the simplest ways to indicate my honest love could be to jot down a e book about him. That’s how the novel started, half playfully.”
Lee obtained the Daesan Artistic Writing Funds in 2003, a type of early assist that he stated helped him by means of a tough interval when “no writer wished my manuscripts.”
“In my fourth yr after debut, I had no commissions and no writer interested by my work,” Lee recalled. “Successful that grant allowed me to pursue my literary profession and even to get married with that cash. To obtain the Daesan Literary Award now, for my longest and most private novel, seems like the best encouragement.”
The muse additionally honored poet Shin Hae-uk, playwright and director Joo Eun-gil and translator Chi-Younger Kim as this yr’s winners.
Shin obtained the poetry award for her assortment “The Fringe of Nature and Pure Historical past.”
“After I begin a poem, it usually begins with one thing deeply private — with pleasure, curiosity or obsession,” she stated. “However as I write, I’m reminded that I’m a part of a group, linked to the world. This award, I imagine, is a sign for me to remain extra deeply linked and accountable to that world.”
At 31, Joo grew to become the youngest-ever Daesan winner for “The Nice Battle on the Sheep Ranch.”
“After I staged the play in a 50-seat theater, it was exhausting even to attract an viewers. I usually puzzled if my effort meant something. Receiving this award makes me assume perhaps it did,” stated Joo.
Within the translation class, Kim was acknowledged for her English translation of Cheon Myeong-kwan’s “Whale,” which was shortlisted for the Worldwide Booker Prize in 2024.
“The information got here as a shock,” Kim, who couldn’t attend the convention, stated in a written acceptance assertion. “Nevertheless it’s no shock that the prize went to ‘Whale.’ Anybody who loves this novel is aware of how brilliantly it blends fable-like characters, vivid storytelling and social satire to disclose a brand new imaginative and prescient of Korean literature. My job was merely to re-pave the highway Cheon had already constructed.”
Kim additionally mirrored on her lengthy reference to the inspiration, recalling that she additionally started her profession with a Daesan grant almost twenty years in the past, when she translated Lee Dong-ha’s “Toy Metropolis” in 2005.
“That early grant made it attainable to publish Korean literature within the US, at a time when few American readers even knew it existed. It not solely helped form my profession but in addition laid a basis for the worldwide attain of Korean writing.”
Based in 1993, the Daesan Literary Awards honor excellent works in poetry, fiction and translation every, whereas the drama and literary criticism classes are awarded biennially.
The award ceremony will happen Dec. 5 on the President Lodge in central Seoul. Every winner will obtain 50 million gained in prize cash, and the three Korean-language winners’ works might be thought of for translation and abroad publication.
hwangdh@heraldcorp.com
