Kim Su-yeong

Kim Suyeong was a Korean poet.

Kim Soo-young (1921–1968) was a Korean poet and translator whose poetry explored love and freedom as poetic and political ideals.

Kim was born in Gwancheol-dong, Seoul on November 27, 1921.

After graduating from the Sunrin Commercial High School, Kim departed for Japan to study at the Tokyo University of Commerce.

He returned to Korea in 1943 to avoid the conscription of student soldiers in Japan.

A year later, he moved to Jilin, Manchuria with his family and taught at the Jilin High School.

At this time, Kim was also heavily involved in theatre work.

Upon Korea's Independence in 1945, Kim returned to Seoul to work as interpreter and eventually transferred to the Department of English at Yonhui University as a senior though he eventually turned down this position.

He was conscripted by the North Korean Army and became a prisoner of war.

Kim's literary orientation became clear when he led other young Korean poets in "The Second Half," a group dedicated to redirecting Korean poetry away from the traditionalism and lyricism of the early 1950s by confront social concerns by using language in a new way.

Among the innovations were the use of surrealism, abstraction, prose, slang and profanity in Kim's poems.

Kim's early poems were in a Modernist style, though later he changed directions, using everyday language in addressing social issues.

Many are political, either overtly or by hidden implication.

According to the scholar of Korean literature, Brother Anthony of Taizé, Kim's significance and impact only really took place after his death.

He was eventually released to the Geojedo Island Prisoner-of-War Camp in 1952, where he worked as an interpreter for the director of the hospital, and for the U.S 8th Army.

Kim, who taught English at Sunrin Commercial High School later in life, began working for Weekly Pacific (Jugan taepyeongyang) and Pyeonghwa Newspaper after returning to Seoul in 1954.

The following year, Kim retired from his work and began a poultry farming operation from his home, in order to devote himself to poetry, translation and literary criticism.

He published a poetry collection entitled Play of the Moon (Dallaraui Jangnan), for which he received the first Poet's Association Award.

He only published one volume of poetry (in 1959).

Shortly before his death, he wrote a theoretical article which sparked a lively debate.

Perhaps his best-known poem is "Grass".

The Kim Soo-young Contemporary Poetry Award is named in his honor.

(translated by Kang Yeo-Kyu and Uwe Kolbe) Edition Peperkorn: Thunum.

He died on June 16, 1968, after being struck by a bus while in Seoul.