Son Hong-kyu (born 1975) is a South Korean writer.
1. Life
Son Hong-kyu was born in 1975 in Jeongeup, Jeollabukdo. He graduated in Korean literature from Dongguk University. He began his literary career when he won the Writer’s World New Writer’s Award in 2001. He was awarded the Daesan Creative Fund in 2004, and the National Arts Fund in 2005. He has also won the 5th Violet People’s Fiction Award in 2008.
2. Writing
The special characteristic of Son Hong-kyu’s fiction is his serious exploration of the world, and people. It is easy to think strangely of saying that a certain writer’s characteristic is about the sincere examination of the world and people, because in fiction that is such an obvious thing to do. However, the reason why that is a characteristic of Son Hong-kyu’s writing is that it is so obvious. The fact that fiction’s sincerity is obvious means that the tradition of such sincerity is that much old, and that it is becoming considered as worn out or outdated. To the generation of Son Hong-kyu, who was born in 1975, what is important to fiction is not quite sincerity, but wit, experimentation, and uncommon sensations. Therefore, Son Hong-kyu’s sincerity can actually be his unique characteristic. Literary critic Shin Hyeong-cheol has said of Son Hong-kyu that, on the contrary to the current trend of postmodernist theme of death, whether of a person or a subject, “his works honestly show frustration and scars, and his lines are keen with the struggle for finding a reason for new hope”. He has added that his works “toss and turn with the anger against the inhuman world, and the affection for humanity”, that “he is a writer who is able to lean on the old hope that only people can shed tears.”
It is said that the characteristic of Son Hong-kyu’s fiction is serious study into the world and man, but it is not that his fiction only uses the old writing methods of realism. Son Hong-kyu’s fiction includes what almost every person would consider as ‘inhuman imagination’. In Saramui sinhwa (사람의 신화 The Legend of Humans), the protagonist ‘I’ does not think that he is a human, and thus can only talk with things that are not human, such as his dead grandfather, his nephew in his sister’s belly who isn’t actually human yet, and a snake that hides away in order to become a dragon. In “Geomi” (거미 The Spider), the ‘I’ is also not a person. Between an incompetent and violent father, a mother suffering from hardships of life, and a sister who is raped by her father’s creditor, ‘I’ begins to remember that she was actually a spider, and begins to break away. Though inhuman imagination, Son Hong-kyu depicts how the great violence of the world is defiling life of its decency, and that within that setting, people are reproducing the violence of the world, therefore asking the following. Is it really that valuable to be a human?
Reference
yes24 홈페이지, 2017.7.28.에 확인http://www.yes24.com/24/AuthorFile/Author/119343
신형철, ｢비인(非人)의 인간학, 신생(新生)의 윤리학｣, 『사람의 신화』 해설, 문학동네, 2005.
Shin, Hyeong-cheol, “The Anthropology of an Inhuman, and the Ethics of Rebirth”, Commentary on the Legend of Humans, Munhakdongne, 2005.
문학동네 홈페이지, 2017.7.28.에 확인.http://book.naver.com/bookdb/book_detail.nhn?bid=1601864
