Hwang Sun-won’s “Cranes,” which was published in 1963, beautifully captures the tragedy of a torn country divided by political ideologies and vividly renders the Korean people’s secret wish for reconciliation of the estranged two Koreas. The story is set in a small village near the 38th Parallel during the Korean War. As North Korean troops occupy the village, Songsam flees with other refugees, but his friend Tokchae decides to remain because he cannot abandon his old father and rice field. Simply because he is a farmer, Tokchae is appointed vice chairman of the Farmers’ Communist League. 

When the Communist troops have retreated to the North, Tokchae is arrested by the civilian right-wing security corps and is escorted to the police station in Chongdan to be executed. Songsam, who has returned as one of the security corps officers, volunteers to serve as an escort.

At first, Songsam harbors hostility towards Tokchae as he detests Communists. During their journey, however, Songsam gradually realizes that it is only ideological warfare that separates his bosom friend from him, and that Tokchae is in fact no Communist.

Childhood memories of setting a crane free evokes in Songsam a strong nostalgia for those innocent days when no ideological dispute existed between them. Songsam makes a friendly gesture by offering Tokjae a cigarette, and eventually their hostility and resentment dissipate.

At the end of the story, Songsam unties Tokchae and invites him to play the children’s game of freeing cranes once again. So they act out the “forbidden game,” which has no place in ideological warfare. Tokchae realizes the true intention of Songsam and runs for freedom.

Critics have criticized “Cranes” for its nave optimism for unification, arguing that unification is much more complex than such sentimentalism. It may be true that Hwang’s story harbors the plausibility and hope for reconciliation between North and South Korea.

Hwang indeed wrote the story in the early 1960s when Koreans were suffering under the anti-Communist, rightwing military dictatorship which oppressed the people under the name of guarding against North Korea. Perhaps the conscientious novelist secretly wished for reconciliation between the North and the South so that chronic ideological warfare and dictatorship could come to an end.

Nevertheless, a close reading of “Cranes” will reveal that it is not a story of nave optimism for unification. Rather, it is a story about the triumph of humanity over ideology. We often tend to be intoxicated with political ideologies and firmly believe we are absolutely right, while all others are wrong. If and when we become captive of some dogmatic ideology, however, we end up losing so many precious things in life: innocence, friendship, dignity, love and affection ― that is, all of the things we call humanity. Indeed, at the end of “Cranes,” humanity prevails over ideology.

It would be misleading, therefore, if we read “Cranes” as a unification fairytale. Hwang was a writer, not a politician, so he did not call for unification in his touching short story. Instead, he intricately exposed the relentless reality of pursuing ideology at the cost of humanity. He laments the situation in which human beings become slaves of political ideologies, helplessly chained to the stakes of dogmatism.

Perhaps Hwang was well aware of the fact that “unification” can be a political ideology as well. Indeed, nowadays even apolitical words such as “peace” and “environment” have become political ideologies, as leftists are using the issues to criticize U.S. interventions and capitalism. The term “socialist” is problematic as well; in “Separation of Power,” Vince Flynn points out that nowadays Communists disguise themselves as Socialists, as communism per se is on the verge of extinction.

Unlike the great writer Hwang Sun-won, our writers today are sharply divided into leftist and rightist camps, blindly defending certain ideologies. A writer’s imagination should be free as a bird, like the crane Hwang’s protagonists set free in the story. Cranes freely fly over the demarcation line between the North and the South, between Marxism and Capitalism.

Alas, some of our writers, unlike cranes, do not ascend into the sky to cross the border. Instead of flying over, they remain on the ground, promulgating enmity and skirmishing like roosters in a cockfight. And instead of crossing the border, they widen the gap between pure and engaged literature, between highbrow and middlebrow literature, and between elite and pop culture.

Traditionally in Korea, cranes, with their radiant white feathers and secluded habitats, symbolize independent, respected scholars. Unlike cranes, however, our writers often lose decency and are jealous of other writers, or flock together, excluding others.

Living in Korea today is like living in a war zone plagued by ideological clashes, with no Green Zone or safe haven. Like Hwang’s two protagonists in “Cranes,” our writers should also soften their attachments to political ideologies and let humanity prevail. For that purpose, we should play out “the forbidden game” once again, setting the cranes of our childhood memories free to soar into the sky, so that they can transcend the boundaries of the two ideologically different worlds.

By Kim Seong-kon

Kim Seong-kon is a professor of English at Seoul National University and president of the Literature Translation Institute of Korea. ― Ed.