In her literary career spanning three decades, Park Wan-seo produced more than twenty novels and about one hundred short stories, most of which showed her craftsmanship and vivid artistic imagination. Making her literary debut by The Naked Tree (1970) which deals with the female condition in postwar Korea, she often portrays how Korea has undergone profound or radical changes in social, cultural, and family patterns since the Korean War. This season, Park published The Complete Short Stories of Park Wan-seo, a five-volume edition composed of 75 chronologically-ordered short stories from 1971 to 1994, and received much attention from both the press and reading public.

Looking for the Cow, an anthology of modern and contemporary Korean poetry selected and translated into English by Professor Kevin O'Rourke at Kyunghee University, was published in Ireland. The anthology includes Han Yong-un's "The Silence of My Love," So Chong-ju's "Getting Pregnant and Having Babies," Kim Chi-ha's "Core." Po&sie, one of the major literary journals in France, focused exclusively on Korean poetry in the 1999 Summer edition and provided full coverage of modern and contemporary Korean poetry to French readers. Twelve Korean poets including Cho Chong-kwon, Nam Jin-woo, Ki Hyong-do, Song Chan-ho are featured in the edition. Translated into the Japanese language, the first two volume of Cho Chong-Rae's The Taebaek Mountains, the ten-volumes saga about the trials of the Korean people living in a small village in south Cholla Province during the 1940s and the 1950s, were published in Japan this season by Sueisa Sanha Homu publishing Company.

Each year, to promote the development of the domestic literary circle, the Daesan Cultural Foundation grants one of the biggest literary prizes in the nation for the best works in poetry, fiction, and literary criticism. The Seventh Daesan Literary Award was given to Whang Ji-wu in poetry, Seo Jong-in in fiction, and Kim Jong-cheol in literary criticism. Heo Man-ha was selected as the first recipient of the Pak Yong-rae Literary Award hosted by Taejon Ilbo. Novelist Yim Yu-mi won the Changbi New Novelist Award for her "Stairs of the Spring.""Women in Literature," a joint forum between Korean and British writers, was held in Seoul October 13 to 14, hosted by the British Council and the Daesan Foundation. The forum was structured to allow the literary representation of women to be examined from many angles like genre, gender, and region. O Jeong-hi, one of Korea's leading female writer, led off with a fine-tuned exploration into feminity, motherhood, and female desire of transcendence. Female British Novelist Michele Roberts spoke about the bonds of sisterhood that often transcend the barriers of social class and race. Kim Seong-hui, a professor of Korean Literature at Sogang University, in her paper "Living among Fathers: The Force of Wilderness," provided a reflective examination of feminine voices in contemporary Korean female poets. Other British participants were Louisa Young and Paul Bailey who discussed the issues of sensuality and eroticism as a means of breaking the patriarchal system of British society. Professor Choi Hye-shil and Professor Ryu Myung-sook and many other Korean scholars and writers participated in the discussion at the forum. The British writers also visited Taegu to join a seminar about women's writing in Britain held at Keimyung University on October 15.

Under the theme of "Creation and Recreation: Modern Korean Fiction and Its Translation," the 1999 Hahn Moo-sook Colloquium was held at George Washington University in Washington D.C. on October 30, co-sponsored by GWU Sigur Center for Asian Studies and the Korea Society. During the two-session seminar, in her paper titled "Literature and Experience," Pak Wan-seo spoke about how her literary works reflect her tragic experiences in Korean War. In her paper "Strategies of a Non-Native Translator," Dr. Yu Young-nan talked about the difficulties of translating Korean literary works into English. Bruce Fulton, a Ph.D. in Korean Literature, presented a reflective concept of translation as an act of bridging two cultures in the form of retelling, recreating and reenacting. The International Symposium on Korean Literature Abroad was held in Seoul October 15 to 17, 1999, organized by the Korean Literature Foundation. Four foreign writers including Jonathan Fryer, a British literary critic, Gennady Petrovich Trumov, a Russian literary critic, Ashraff Kahn, a Pakistan writer and Zeo Jenny, a young novelist from Switzerland, spoke on the globalization of literature in their respective countries. Translator Min Hee-sik and Kim Jai-hiun illustrated the problems facing the translation of Korean literature into the foreign language and suggested ways to promote overseas study of Korean literature by improving the quality of translation.

With the theme of "The Wisdom of the East Lighting the New Millenium," the Seventh Chang Mu International Festival, one of the largest dance festival in Korea, was held in Seoul and Sokcho October 19 to 26. The program featured three best-known dance troupes of Asia including the Guangdong Modern Dance Company of China and Sono Seni Dance Group from Indonesia and four local dance groups including Chang Mu Dance Company. Kim Mae-Ja, founder and chair person of Chang Mu Dance Company, performed a dance titled "The Eye of Heaven" at Towol Theater in Seoul December 9 to 10. Kim has contributed much to modernizing and internationalizing Korean Dance, and "The Eye of Heaven" celebrates the joy of life in the form of shamanistic ritual. The Fourth Busan International Film Festival was held in Busan October 14 to 23, and 210 movies from more than 40 countries were presented during the festival. This year, Piff highlighted the cinematic world of Film Director Yu Hyun-mok, a pioneer of realism in Korean cinema, in a retrospective session. His films featured at the session included An Aimless Bullet, a portrayal of a family destroyed by war and poverty. Among the seven sections of the festival, "A Window on Asian Cinema" received the most enthusiastic reaction from both the audience and film critics. In its fourth year since inception, the Pusan film festival has undoubtedly grown into the largest and best film festival in Asia. Screening 103 sci-fi films from 16 countries, the Seoul Cyber Film Festival opened on November 11 at the Chongdong A& C Theater. Divided into three sections of "The Cyber Odyssey," "The Cyber Classic," and "The Cyber Future," the festival offered the glimpses of apocalyptic futures run by cyberspace.

Gye JoengmeenKeimyung University, Daegu