[KS] About Park Ryol
Frank Hoffmann
frank at koreaweb.ws
Tue Sep 12 19:28:39 EDT 2006
Park Rrrrryol, that doesn't exactly conform with
the Republican transcription system, does it? You
can take the term t'ujaeng quite literally,
meaning combat, fight -- used to refer to fights
with military means, or later, in mainland China,
also to ideological struggle (e.g. against
political enemies within). You will find many
Communist leaflets from the 1930s and 1940s with
"t'ujaeng" in the title, and there are even a
couple of "Bloody Struggle Histories of ..." the
anti-Japanese movement that were published in
South Korea between 1945 and 1949. After that the
term has rarely been used in the South, but
continued to be in high regard in the North and
in Mao's China. Although I would not associate
the term to Hitler's book. "Kampf" may well be
translated as "t'ujaeng," that seems a good
choice, in this case. Then again, "Kampf" is a
much more neutral word in German, not at all as
defined as "t'ujaeng," and by no means
necessarily referring to military or militant
means.
I doubt that Pak Yôl published a text with such
title, _Naûi t'ujaeng_, at least not in South
Korea or during the colonial period. The
anarchist journals and publications that the
circle around Prof. Ha Ki-rak (I think he passed
away) is publishing in T'aegu would sure have
reproduced such text, but I never even saw a
reference to it. The title would indicate that
the text, if it exists, was likely published in
North Korea. Am I wrong? Then again, I doubt it
is a book -- maybe just a short article. Pak was
not an intellectual, not a leader either, he
didn't write much. There are others who did, like
mentioned Ha Ki-rak or Chông Hwa-am, or Yu
Cha-myông from the Korean minority in China. Even
Yu Su-in who was once Ba Jin's Esperanto teacher
and who returned to North Korea (from China) in
the 1950s has left a long trace of publications
in both Chinese and Korean from the 1920s to his
death. (His grandson once showed me a 5000 pages
manuscript about the anarchist movement that he
had written.) Pak, on the other hand, had his day
of fame when he and his lover Kaneko were picked
by the Japanese authorities after the Kanto Earth
Quake to go on trial -- as a representative for
all Koreans in Japan, and as an indirect
justification of the massacres that had happened
in the aftermath of the earth quake.
All there seems to be by Pak Yôl himself are
poems he wrote in prison, published in the
popular left-wing magazine _Samchôlli_ (no. 14,
December 1949) [just saw the reference, haven't
seen them yet]: "Naûi okchung chap'yông"
(Miscellaneous poems from my time in jail). The
term "chap'yông," by the way, seems to be a
neo-Japonism. I could only find it in a Japanese
dictionary.
Since you mention Kaneko Fumiko (1903-1926) --
her autobiography, written in prison, for the
trial, as was usual in the Japanese legal system
at the time, is a full-fleged book (250 pp. in
English translation). It is an absolutely amazing
account! Very well written, extremely mature for
a twenty year old woman, a woman who grew up
under depressingly poor circumstances in Japan
and Korea, and as sensitive and politically
engaging as an autobiography can possibly be.
--> _The Prison Memoirs of a Japanese Woman_ (ISBN: 0873328027)
Best,
Frank
>I was interested to see that KBS recently
>prepared a documentary drama about Kaneko
>Fumiko, the 'lover' of the Korean anarchist Park
>Yol. I have heard that Park published an account
>of his activities (I assume after being freed
>from prison in 1945?) and some give the title as
>'na ui tujaeng' (the same Korean as Mein
>Kampf!!!) but I am unable (with my meagre
>patience) to track this work. Can I ask if
>anyone knows of it, and where it mmight be
>found? I would be most grateful.
>
>Brother Anthony
>Sogang University, Seoul
>http://hompi.sogang.ac.kr/anthony/
--
--------------------------------------
Frank Hoffmann
http://koreaweb.ws
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