Kim Chae-won (born 1946) is a South Korean writer.
1. Life
Kim Chae-won was born Kim Hang-ran in Gyeonggi Province. Chae-won is the pen name given to her by Kim Dong-ni when she made her literary debut. Kim studied painting at Ewha Womans University. Her father is the poet Kim Dong-hwan, one of Korea's foremost modernist poets, and her mother is the novelist Choe Chong-hui. Her older sister Kim Chi-won is also a novelist. They have collaborated on the short story collections Meon jip meon bada jip (먼 집, 먼 바다 집 Faraway House, Faraway Sea Home) and Geu yeojaneun geogieopda (그 여자는 거기없다 She Was Not There).
Kim made her literary debut in 1974, publishing the short story "Meon bada" (먼 바다 Faraway Sea) in Hyundae Munhak upon the recommendation of Hwang Sun-won. In 1975 she studied at the Art Students League of New York and published "Baminsa" (밤인사 Night Greeting) in Hyundae Munhak, completing her literary debut. She went to study art in Paris in 1976, returning to Korea in 1978. Kim has published seven short story collections, most recently Jjokbaeui norae (쪽배의 노래 Song of a Little Boat), two novels, a novella, and works of young adult fiction. She is the recipient of the 1989 Yi Sang Literary Award for Gyeourui hwan (겨울의 환 Winter Fantasy), and the 2016 Hyundae Munhak Literary Award for "Bereullin pil" (베를린 필 Berlin Phil).
2. Writing
Kim's writing is confessional and first-person, featuring a single subjective gaze. Her characters often feel helpless and lost, often juxtaposing present experiences with memories in an evocative rather than declarative way. Kim's childhood growing up without a father, who was kidnapped by the North Korean government during the political turmoil after the Korean War, has had a direct and indirect effect on her work. In Kim's novels her father is depicted as a victim of Korea's tragic history. The remaining family copes with his absence and decline, becoming tragic victims themselves. The pain and lack in the family that comes with the father's absence and decline becomes rooted as a trauma that controls their lives thereon.
The examination of how this trauma may be internalized and sublimated is the subject of Kim's most important literary achievement, her "Fantasy" series. Published over 14 years beginning with the 1989 novella Gyeourui hwan, followed by Bomui hwan (봄의 환 Spring Fantasy), Yeoreumui hwan (여름의 환 Summer Fantasy), and finally Gaeurui hwan (가을의 환 Autumn Fantasy) in 2003, it follows the relationship of middle-aged writer and younger man that is carried out over phone conversations, in a stream-of-consciousness study of the female psyche. The wounds of Korea's modern history are thus at the bottom of Kim's work characterized by its fantastical and dreamlike aesthetic.
