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Personal Secrets, Public History: Four Days by Lee HyunSu scrap

by Choi Jaebonggo link October 27, 2014

Author Bio 작가 소개

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Lee HyunSu

Lee HyunSu made her literary debut in 1991 as the winner of the Chungcheong Ilbo New Writer’s Award. She is the author of the short story collection The Rosewood China Cabinet and the novels New Tales of Gisaeng and Four Days.

Lee HyunSu’s Four Days is a novel inspired by the No Gun Ri Massacre that occurred during the Korean War in 1950 from July 26 to 29. A reported 135 Korean civilians were killed by U.S. army troops. The total number of dead and wounded is estimated to be around 400.

The author, who was born in No Gun Ri after the war, investigates the tragedy through the alter ego of documentary director Kim Jin-kyung. When Jin-kyung’s production company decides to do a documentary on the No Gun Ri Massacre, Jin-kyung visits her hometown for the first time in years. Jin-kyung and her family were ostracized in the village for being the descendants of an eunuch, and she has no positive memories of the place. When her boss finally bullies her into visiting the village, Jin-kyung discovers that her mother’s death was related to the massacre and not because of childbirth, as she had always been told.

The story is told from Jin-kyung’s and her grandfather Tae-hyuk’s point of view in alternating chapters, with a testimony by actual Korean War veteran Buddy Wenzel sandwiched in between. While Jin-kyung’s investigation into her mother’s death goes back in time from the present to the No Gun Ri Massacre, Tae-hyuk’s story is told chronologically from the Donghak Pheasant Revolution, through Japanese occupation, to the Korean War. The No Gun Ri Massacre is where these two narratives meet to reveal a tragic family secret, after which Jin-kyung moves on and completes the progress of filming what has turned out to be both a historical and personal project.

Writer 필자 소개

Choi Jaebong

Choi Jaebong

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