Park Wansuh (1931-2011) was a South Korean writer.
1. Life
Park Wansuh was born in Gaepung-gun in what is now Hwanghaebuk-do in North Korea. Park entered Seoul National University to study Korean literature in 1950, but dropped out almost immediately due to the outbreak of the Korean War and the death of her brother. During the war, Park was separated from her mother and elder brother by the North Korea army, which moved them to North Korea. She lived in the village of Achiul, in Guri, outside Seoul until her death.
Park debuted in 1970 when her novel Namok (나목 The Naked Tree), won the Women's Dong-a Fiction Contest. At the time, she was a full-time housewife with five children. She went on to write fifteen novels and ten short story collections in a career that spanned almost forty years. She won all of Korea's major literary awards, and was posthumously awarded the Republic of Korea's Geumgwan Order of Cultural Merit. Her work has appeared in numerous anthologies in English, with recent standalone translations including Geu manteon singaneun nuga da meogeosseulkka (그 많던 싱아는 누가 다 먹었을까 Who Ate up All the Shinga?), Neomudo sseulsseulhan dangsin (너무도 쓸쓸한 당신 Lonesome You), and Geu sani jeongmal geogi isseosseulkka (그 산이 정말 거기 있었을까 Was that Mountain Really There?).
2. Writing
In terms of general thematic concern, Park's fiction can be divided into three groups. The first deals with the tragic events of the Korean War and its aftermath. Many of these stories reflect Park's own experiences. The Naked Tree, Geuhae gyeoureun ttatteuthaennae (그해 겨울은 따뜻했네 Warm Was the Winter That Year), and Eommaui malttuk 1 (엄마의 말뚝 1 Mother’s Stake 1) depict families torn apart by the war and the heavy price the war continues to exact from its survivors. The archetypal figure in these works is the suffering mother who must make her way through life after losing both her husband and her son during the war.
Park's works also target the hypocrisy and materialism of middle-class Koreans. The apartments of identical size, furnishings, and decorations that inscribe just as identical lives intent on gaining material gratification in "Dalmeun bangdeul" (닮은 방들 Identical Apartments), a marriage of convenience that brings about disastrous results in Hwicheonggeorineun ohu (휘청거리는 오후 A Reeling Afternoon), and schools where they prune, rather than educate, children in "Naktoui aideul" (낙토의 아이들Children of Paradise), all offer sharp denunciations of a bourgeois society. In these works, acts of individual avarice and snobbery are linked to larger social concerns such as the breakdown of age-old values and dissolution of the family. In turn, these phenomena are found to be symptomatic of the rapid industrialization of society in Korea after the 1960s.
From the 1980s onwards, Park turned increasingly toward problems afflicting women in a patriarchal society while continuing to engage with the lives of middle-class Koreans. Such works include Sarainneun nareui sijak (살아 있는 날의 시작 The Beginning of Days Lived) and Seo inneun yeoja (서 있는 여자 The Woman Standing), with perhaps the most vivid example being "Kkum kkuneun inkyubaeiteo" (꿈꾸는 인큐베이터 The Dreaming Incubator), in which a woman is forced to undergo a series of abortions until she can deliver a male child. Geudae ajikdo kkumkkugo inneunga (그대 아직도 꿈꾸고 있는가Are you Still Dreaming?) features a single mother who raises an unrecognized child, only to have the father try to take him away when he wants a male heir.
