The designation and scope of the literature written by Zainichi Koreans, or ethnic Korean residents of Japan whose roots trace back to the forced occupation of Korea by Imperial Japan, defies categorization. It is sometimes referred to as “Zainichi Chōsenjin Bungaku,” “Zainichi Kankokujin Bungaku,” or “Zainichi Korean Bungaku,” but strangely the most common term in Japan is simply “Zainichi literature” (Zainichi bungaku). The title of an 18-volume collection of the literary works by Zainichi Koreans published in 2006 was An Anthology of Zainichi Literature (2006), and when Shakai bungaku (Social Literature) and Shin nihon bungaku (New Japanese Literature) published a special issue on the subject in 2007 and 2003, respectively, the term used was also “Zainichi literature.” The lack of either “Kankokujin” or “Chōsenjin” to explain their works is a result of the ideological conflict amongst Zainichi Koreans following the division of Korea into the South and the North. It is as if NHK, Japan’s national public broadcasting organization, were to air Korean language lessons under the program title “Hangeul Lessons,” which would only indicate a fraction of what was being taught.

As such, the literature of Zainichi Koreans shows the complex and various aspects of their lives by dealing with the themes of diaspora, identity, minorities, nationalism, the subaltern, racism, as well as of nationality, language, fatherland, ethnicity, ideology, and division.

The first generation of Zainichi Korean writers, including Kimu Saryan (Kim Sa-ryang), Kimu Tarusu (Kim Tal-su) and Chan Hyokuchu (Chang Hyok-chu), wrote in Korean, still their mother tongue, and were acutely aware that their motherland was Korea. The second generation, including Lee Kaisei, Kimu Hagyon (Kim Hak-yeong), and Kimu Sokubomu (Kim Seok-beom), found distance from the Korean people and language, and assimilated into Japanese society. While the first generation had to merely adapt to a new society, the second generation had been born into that society and was confused about whether they belonged to Korea or Japan, or North or South Korea.

By the third generation of writers, including I Yanji, Yu Miri, and Gen Getsu (Hyeon Wol), the questioning of ideology, nation or ethnicity, as well as any hint of nostalgia for their motherland, all but disappears from their work, focusing instead on depicting one’s torments as something universal. Four works by Zainichi Koreans have received the Akutagawa Prize, one of the most prestigious recognitions of literary acheivement in Japan presented by the publishing company Bungeishunjū: Lee Kaisei’s The Cloth Fuller in 1972, I Yanji’s Yuhi in 1988, Yu Miri’s Family Cinema in 1996, and most recently Gen Getsu’s Where the Shadows Reside in 1999.

The question of identity in Zainichi Korean literature is most often asked based on the typical themes of one’s nation, or people, and family. National or ethnic identity appears in the form of devotion to one’s nation and one’s people, sometimes demanding the sacrifice of an individual. For the Zainichi Koreans who wished to maintain their ethnic identity in a country that strived to establish a strong sense of national unity, the national assimilationist policies backfired, thus intensifying the sense of otherness and strengthening ties within the ethnic Korean community. Kimu Saryan’s Into the Light and Celestial Horse, as well as Kimu Tarusu’s Korea Strait and The Trial of Paku Tari, recreate the dismal lives of the Joseon people under colonial Japan, and criticize the intellectuals who betrayed their own people. Lee Kaisei focuses on the question of ethnic identity throughout The Cloth Fuller, while Kimu Hagyon captures what it means to be marginalized through the tormented soul of a frustrated individual whose existential status as a Zainichi equals the absence of national identity. With Volcanic Island, Kimu Sokubomu shed light on the April 3 Jeju Incident, a subject that had been avoided in the literary circles of South Korea. In Yuhi, the story about a young Zainichi Korean woman who goes to Seoul to study, I Yanji explores the inner world of being an alien in one’s homeland. In Yu Miri’s work, however, the homeland does not exist. The characters often seek a third way of life that entails neither returning to one’s homeland nor naturalization. On the whole, crisis, torment, and resistance regarding ethnic identity, i.e., aspects once considered unique to Zainichi Korean literature, have almost vanished, nullifying any reason for maintaining a separate category for works by Zainichi Koreans beyond the distinction between Korean and Japanese literature.

Zainichi Korean literature also explores what it means to be a family by examining the reasons families exist, family values based on Confucianism, and issues of domestic violence. The first generation of writers had a strong sense of heirarchy influenced by the Confucian traditions from Korea and the history of feudalism in Japan, which led them to think of family as the basic unit that makes up a people or a nation. Kimu Tarusu and Kimu Saryan depicted the family as something inseparable from one’s people and homeland, using the themes of ideological conflict, resistance against ethnic discrimination, and the Confucian ideal of family that was brought over from Korea. The second generation begins to question the traditional notions of the Korean family, rejecting the father’s sense of entitlement to near-absolute power based on the Confucian culture of patriarchy, even though the structure of the household is somewhat preserved through the continuation of customs such as gathering to perform ancestral rites.

By Lee Kaisei’s The Cloth Fuller, the question of ethnicity had already faded away, the emphasis now being a criticism on the tyrannical father, while the mother appears as a symbol of the fervor to educate one’s offspring. Kimu Hagyon’s Alcohol Lamp is a tale of the torments of a young mind caused by a family history of conflict and violence. For third generation writers, the family is no longer in mere conflict or discord, but rather utterly destroyed with no signs of recovery. The father is depicted as an oppressive figure who intensifies the conflict about nationality within a family caused by marriage. The families in Yu Miri’s Full House and Family Cinema have been broken to the point where it is difficult to say the characters constitute a family. The main character of Gen Getsu’s Where the Shadows Reside eventually cuts all ties with his family. In Blood and Bones, Yan Sogiru offers a glimpse into the life of a man driven by primitive impulses and greed that results in the self-destruction of his family, each member thinking of the others as an enemy to be defeated. In this sense, each work contains a personal trauma of the author from growing up, including the psychological and physical abuse by one’s parents, bullying at school, loss of speech, attempts at suicide, and dropping out of school.

The fact that many of the writers direct their Japanese readers to look down on Zainichi Koreans by employing as a main subject the painful history of their families, as well as the overall autobiographical nature of their stories, remain as problems to be solved. An image of brutal conflict between father and son does not represent the average family of ethnic Koreans. While the first generation was problematic in their xenophobic stance based on too firm an identity, it is also cause for concern if like the third generation all identity is lost and the void is filled with pure egotism. 

by Chang Sasun
Professor of Korean literature
Hongik University