Kang Unkyo (born 1945) is a South Korean poet and professor.
1. Life
Kang Unkyo was born on December 13, 1945 in Hongwon, South Hamgyeong Province. She was raised in Seoul, and graduated from Gyeonggi Girls’ Middle School and Gyeonggi Girls’ High School. She went on to earn her bachelor's degree in English Literature and Ph.D. in Korean Literature from Yonsei University.
Kang made her literary debut in 1968 with the publication of "Sullyejaui bam" (순례자의 밤 Night of the Pilgrims), winning the Sasanggye New Writer's Award. She was a member of the literary coterie that published Chilsimnyeondae along with Kim Hyeong-yeong, Yoon Sang-gyu, Lim Jeong-nam, and Jung Hui-seong.
She is currently professor emerita of Korean literature at Dong-a University.
Kang is noted for her poetry collections Heomujip (허무집 House of Nothingness), Binjailgi (빈자일기 Diary of a Pauper), Sorijip (소리집 House of Noises), Bulgeun gang (붉은강 Red River), Baram norae (바람노래 Song of the Wind), Seulpeun norae (슬픈노래 Song of Sadness), and Byeoksogui pyeonji (벽속의 편지 Letter in the Wall). She is the recipient of the Korean Writer’s Prize (1975) and the Hyundae Munhak Literature Award (1992), among others.
2. Writing
In her early career Kang Unkyo utilized nihilism as a point of departure from which to blueprint a future of free thought and equality between men. In response to the government’s violations of human rights and fundamental liberties during the late 1960s, the poet struggled to map a new path opposed to persecution and oppression; her works contained a measure of hope at the same time despairing at the then social and political situation. This focus resulted in Kang's name being associated with the "people's poetry" movement.
Kang's poem "Pullip" (풀잎 Blades of Grass) demonstrated her concern and affection for the powerful forces of life that shape communities and override any human machinations, including governments. Her later work, less dark and tragic than her previous poetry, contains optimism for the future while it still acknowledges the problems of the social conditions of the time. "Ireoseora pura" (일어서라 풀아 Blades of Grass, Arise), one of her most famous poems, uses the vitality and resiliency of grass as a metaphor for the powerful will of life that exists in all mankind. In "Oneuldo neoreul gidarinda" (오늘도 너를 기다린다 I Await You Again Today), the commonplace, ordinary “you” gains a new significance; “you” becomes an entity that has a brilliance in and of itself. Her later works, with their soulful attention to the glory of life and earnest quest for its meaning, place her in the school of poetry known as "people's poetry." Yet, as Kang's early poetry appropriated and altered the nihilistic school of thought, her later poetry also changed the standards of the "people's poetry" school. While much of the rest of "people’s poetry" has been criticized for only offering simplistic, normative perspectives of social reality, Kang’s poetry achieved a remarkable balance between the tangible and the abstract, the real and the ideal.
