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The Story of Hong Gildong

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The Story of Hong Gildong by
Paperback $16.00
Mar 15, 2016 | ISBN 9780143107699

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  • $16.00

    Mar 15, 2016 | ISBN 9780143107699

    Buy from Other Retailers:

  • Mar 15, 2016 | ISBN 9780698406612

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Product Details

Praise

“[A] marvel-filled swashbuckler…The Story of Hong Gildong begins to resemble a sword-and-sorcery fantasy in the mode of the film Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon…Besides being half fairy tale, half social protest novel, The Story of Hong Gildong possesses a profound resonance for modern Koreans.”
—Michael Dirda, The Washington Post

“Hong Gildong is an iconic figure in the Korean literary canon…He’s the mythic center of a sometimes-delightful, sometimes-unsettling tale, and it’s time the Western world gets to know him…The edition Kang has delivered is a chewy one, combining historical context and the archness of myth with wry personality.”
NPR

“Minsoo Kang’s long-anticipated and eminently readable translation of this Korean classic, with his incisive introduction, makes this edition of Hong Gildong indispensable for both casual readers and scholars of Korean literature.”
—Heinz Insu Fenkl

“[An] engaging, essential tale.”
-Publisher’s Weekly,”Pick of the Week”

“Wonderfully complex, rich with moral questions, and an easy read, like a fairy tale.”
Asymptote

“If you read only one book about Korean heroic outlaws this season, this should be the one.”
Kirkus

“For such a slim volume, The Story of Hong Gildong has an incredible array of implications for scholars of history, Korean literary history, and even contemporary political life…[Kang’s] engagement with the radical contours that would spread to East Asia in the late 19th and early 20th centuries brings a welcome critical eye to a story that deserves to be cherished as a massively influential piece of fiction, but maybe not as a blueprint for a new world.” 
-Asian Review 

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