24th ilb
5 – 14 Sep 2024 Program
9 – 18 Sep 2024 Young Program

Herkunft: South Korean

Bora Chung

Bora Chung was born in 1976 in Seoul, South Korea. She embarked on her academic journey at Yonsei University, Seoul, earning a B.A. in Russian Literature and English Literature in 2000. She further expanded her knowledge at Yale University, achieving a M.A. in Russian and East European Studies in 2002.

Kim Hye-jin

Kim Hye-jin was born in Daegu, South Korea, in 1983. She made her debut in 2014 with the novel »Jungangyeok« [tr: Central Station], which tells a love story between two people on the fringes of society. Three more novels have appeared since her first publication; »Ttare daehayeo« [2017; Eng. »Concerning

R.O. Kwon

R. O. Kwon was born in Seoul, South Korea, and moved to the USA with her family at the age of three. She grew up in Los Angeles in a Christian environment, but at the age of seventeen she experienced a crisis of faith and distanced herself from the devoutness

Moon Chung-hee

Moon Chung-hee was born in Posŏng in 1947 and grew up in Seoul. Even as a schoolgirl, she won several prizes for her poems, which she already began publishing as a child. She was the first woman in Korea to publish her poetry independently. In addition, she received lessons from

Lee Hochol

Lee Hochol was born in 1932 not far from the port city of Wonsan in what today is North Korea. Shortly after the civil war started in 1950, he was drafted into the People’s Army.  When he was a prisoner of war, he met the first Koreans who had Western

Kwang-Kyu Kim

Kwang-Kyu Kim was born in Seoul in 1941. During his childhood, he witnessed the re-establishment of Korean independence, the Korean War and the division of the country. In 1960 he began to study German and took part in the initially hopeful student protests against the Korean dictatorship.  After completing his

Kyung-sook Shin

Kyung-sook Shin was born in a village near Jeongeup in South Korea in 1963. Since her parents did not have the money to send her to high school, she moved to Seoul when she was 16, in order to attend school there. She studied Creative Writing at the Seoul Institute

Ko Un

Ko Un (real name Ko Un-t’ae) was born in Kunsan, in what is today South Korea, in 1933. His life has been characterised by extreme biographical breaks closely tied to the history of his native country and which also surface in his work.  During the Korean War he was forced

Kim Chi-ha

Kim Chi-ha (actually Kim Yong-il) was born in Mokpo in South Korea in 1941. He began to study aesthetics at the Seoul National University in 1959, and published his first poems in »Shi-in« (tr.: The Poet), a literary journal in Korea, in 1969. »The Five Bandits« (tr.) appeared in 1970.

Kim Dong-Seong

Kim Dong-sung was born in 1970 in Busan, South Korea, and studied Oriental painting at Hongik University. His debut as an illustrator came with »Samchongwa Hamkke Jajeongeo Yeohaeng« (1998; tr: Bicycle tours with my uncle). It tells the story of a girl and her uncle who witness the encroachment of

kate hers RHEE

born in Seoul, grew up in a racially segregated, working class suburb of Detroit, in the US. She is an interdisciplinary visual artist that uses language, food, and beauty practice in her practice to explore the construction of self from a transnational feminist perspective. Her works have shown at the

Jeong Yu-jeong

Jeong Yu-jeong, born in 1966 in Hampyeong, in the South Korean province of Jeollanam-do, first trained to be a nurse. She worked in a hospital for five years and then as an expert at the state health insurance agency for nine years before she began to write. After she spent