State-run institute also plans to translate Korean works of genre fiction


The Korea Literature Translate Institute announced on Tuesday they will select 15 local writers and support them with publishing their works overseas.

The 300 million-won ($257,000) project consists of translating excerpts from the selected writer’s works of fiction and sending them to literary agencies in foreign countries, especially the U.S. The institute is to announce the selected writers by the end of this year.

“There is no guarantee that local authors who are popular in Korea would be also successful overseas,” said Kim Seong-kon, who was appointed as the KLTI director in February.

“So even if your books haven’t been so popular here, there still is a chance that you may be selected if your works are considered to have market potential in foreign countries.”

The project comes after the English-translated edition of celebrated author Shin Kyung-sook’s novel “Please Look after Mom” became a best-seller in the U.S. following its release in April 2011. The book sold more than 100,000 copies in the U.S. within the first few days of its release there.

Shin won the Man Asian Literary Prize, one of the most prestigious literary prizes in Asia, for the novel in March. She received prize money of $30,000 while her English translator Kim Chi-young received $5,000.
Author Kim Young-ha’s English-translated novels, “I Have the Right to Destroy Myself” (2007) and “Your Republic is Calling You” (2010) also received positive reviews from U.S. readers and critics.

Kim of KLTI said the world’s young people today are not particularly interested in learning about Asian culture, but is interested in experiencing “hybrid culture” through literature.

“The reason why Kim Young-ha is getting attention in the U.S. is because his writing strays from things that are strictly Korean,” said Kim. “His literary themes are rather universal, which can be easily shared by the world’s young generation who are so used to the online culture.”

A special six-member committee, which consists of literary critics, scholars and publishers, will select 15 authors for the KLTI program. Once the authors publish their books overseas, the institute will also organize promotional book tours where they can meet and chat with their foreign readers.

The institute also announced that they’ll support translation of Korea’s genre function, including crime, SF and mystery. Kim said American publisher AmazonCrossing is particularly interested in Korea’s genre fiction.

“AmazonCrossing said the younger generation these days chooses e-books over paperbacks,” said Kim.

“And those e-book-users don’t read anything unless they are interesting. Even the works of ‘pure’ literature nowadays need the techniques of mystery and SF to get the attention of the readers. Even ‘Please Look after Mom’ had that technique of mystery fiction, with the mother is missing throughout the story.”

By Claire Lee (dyc@heraldcorp.com)