Eun Heekyung (born 1959) is a South Korean novelist.
1. Life
Eun Heekyung was born in 1959 in Gochang, North Jeolla Province. She received her undergraduate and graduate degrees in Korean literature from Sookmyung Women’s University and Yonsei University. In 1995, she debuted as a writer when her novella “Ijungju” (이중주 Duet) won the Dong-a Ilbo New Writer's Contest. The same year, her first novel, Saeui seonmul (새의 선물 A Gift from a Bird), won the Munhakdongne Novel Award and recorded huge sales. Eun's works include the short story collections Tainege malgeolgi (타인에게 말걸기 Talking to Strangers), Areumdaumi nareul myeolsihanda (아름다움이 나를 멸시한다 Beauty Looks Down on Me), Jungguksik rullet (중국식 룰렛 Chinese Roulette), and the novels Maineo rigeu (마이너리그 Minor League), Bimilgwa geojinmal (비밀과 거짓말 Secrets and Lies), Taeyeonhan insaeng (태연한 인생 Nonchalant Life), and Bichui gwageo (빛의 과거 The Past of Light). She is the recipient of the Yi Sang Literary Award, the Dong-in Literary Award, and the Hwang Sun-won Literary Award, among others. Eun was a visiting scholar at the University of Washington from 2002 to 2004, and served on the Literature Committee of the Korean Culture and Arts Council (2005-2006) and as a non-executive director of the Literature Translation Institute of Korea (2018-2021). In 2014, she participated in the International Writing Program at the University of Iowa.
2. Writing
Eun Heekyung’s novels consistently deal with the problems of individuals who distance themselves from the existing traditions and systems of society. The cynical and antagonistic styles that appear in her early works were radical attitudes that came about through the process of mocking and rejecting the set social framework. In her later works, she has moved away from this style and instead begun to focus on portraying the journey of lonely individuals in search of their own way of life.
The work that brought Eun both critical acclaim and commercial success was Saeui seonmul. The narrator is a precocious girl named Jin-hee, who sees through the adults in the story and satirizes their pretense and contradictions. Tainege malgeolgi and Majimak chumeun nawahamgge (마지막 춤은 나와 함께 Save the Last Dance for Me) are other early example of Eun's work which both depict characters who protect themselves by avoiding human relationships, especially romantic ones.
The theme and style of Eun’s writing changed drastically after the death of her father, when she started to contemplate the roots of existence. If her works in the 90s mainly depicted independent characters who rejected existing customs and systematic oppression, then starting with Bimilgwa geojinmal, her novels turned their gaze toward the past to trace the roots of our existence through homes and family histories.
In Eun’s novels, growth is defined as “identifying the meager coordinates of one’s location.” In particular, Beauty Looks Down on Me implies that the lonely path of an individual looking for their coordinates and refusing to conform to society can be an acceptable way of life for modern people. Since the 2010s, her works have focused on such characters who quietly live outside the mainstream. Dareun modeun nunsongiwa aju biseutage saenggin dan hanaui nunsongi (다른 모든 눈송이와 아주 비슷하게 생긴 단 하나의 눈송이 A Snowflake that Looks Just Like All the Others) can be read as a single narrative because of the way each of the characters in the six stories are loosely connected via family histories. This structure shows the meeting, understanding, and solidarity of strangers who meet by chance.
