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This book is a cultural introduction to Korea, part memoir and part miscellany, which introduces traditional and contemporary culture through a series of essays, stories, anecdotes and poems. The book seeks to tell the reader all that he or she needs to know for a full and rewarding life in Korea or as a visitor passing through.
List of contents
Introduction 1 Korea in the 1960s 2 The Columbans 3 Learning the Ropes 4 Cultural Adaptation 5 In at the Deep End 6 The Cultural Experience: Where to Begin 7 The Confucian Monolith 8 The Choson Bureaucracy 9 The Buddhist Ingredient 10 Exclusivity Myths 11 Chilmajae Songs - So Chongju 12 Korea's Greatest Asset 13 Tales of the Immortals 14 At the Cultural Coalface: Immersion, Submersion? - Take Your Pick 15 Nine Priest Immortals 16 Seeking the Way 17 For Those of Us with Less than Immortal Status 18 Learning Korean Afterword Bibliography Index
About the author
Kevin O'Rourke, professor emeritus (Kyunghee University), is an Irish priest (Columban Fathers), who has lived in Korea since 1964. He has published many translations of classical and contemporary fiction and poetry including Tilting the Jar, Spilling the Moon (Dedalus 1993), Poems of a Wanderer: Selected Poems of So Chongju (Dedalus 1995), Looking for the Cow (Dedalus 1999), the Yi Munyol novella Our Twisted Hero (Hyperion 2001); The Book of Korean Shijo (Harvard 2002); A Hundred Love Poems form Old Korea (Global Oriental 2005), and The Book of Korean Poetry: Songs of Shilla and Koryo (Iowa University Press 2006).
Summary
This book is a cultural introduction to Korea, part memoir and part miscellany, which introduces traditional and contemporary culture through a series of essays, stories, anecdotes and poems. The book seeks to tell the reader all that he or she needs to know for a full and rewarding life in Korea or as a visitor passing through.
