Emanuel spoke about the function of literature in contemporary society, arguing that literature is the most effective means to address social issues because it is capable of moving people and changing their thinking patterns.

Emanuel talking at the seminar on literature.

Below is the paper that Emanuel delivered.

Emanuel Pastreich

Lee Byungju International Literature Festival

이병주국제문학제

September 29, 2011

“Literature and Humanism in the Current Age”

문학 과 후ㅠ머니즘

There has been a tremendous swing towards business and technology in our society today, both in East Asia and around the world. We see business schools and business majors emerging everywhere, even at institutions that seemed quite distant from business previously. Moreover, we also see that many jobs advertised take the MBA as a requirement. That shift in how we train our young people is born of a profound insecurity that many of us feel. There is a need to find employment rapidly that will pay us enough to survive in an age of such terrible and brutal competition. It seems as if it is only in business and in the apprehension of specialized skills in computer programming or nanotechnology can we hope to find security.

But we must remember that when Asia previously led the world in economic power and technological advancement, up until the 18^th century, it was literature (文) that was the dominant field of discourse and the source of strength. All those engaged in policy, in technology in all aspects of administration were expected to be grounded in the classics and to be prepared to write literary works, to make their correspondence literary. That is the great tradition and we can see that the tradition is awakening from its slumber today.

In the course of modernization, much negative was said about the great literary tradition of East Asia, but in most cases it was a serious misinterpretation of decadence in the late 19^th century as an indication of some fatal flaw in Asian culture. Today, at the start of the 21^st century, the strength of the Asian literary tradition is visible again.

The great Asian tradition of literature from the age of Confucius was an essential part of society because it made institutions and individuals more human. The great tradition of humanism in Asia that produced such figures as Wang Anshi and Sima Guang in China, Park Jiwon in Korea and Kaibara Ekken in Japan was the source of inspiration for generations and even non-Asians, like me, hold those figures up as heros.

Why is literature so important today? We live in an age in which many schools have cut back on programs in literature and young people see a degree in business as the best route to success. But I want to argue that in fact the future lies with literature and that our future leaders will be those who can express themselves effectively through literature. We can see just beyond the horizon a bright sun rising, a sun indicating an age when literature, the production of literature and the study of literature is again the central concern of intellectuals and the primary theme for Asians.

As literature emerges as the primary tool for creating a brighter and more human future, let us consider three primary problems in today’s society and discuss briefly the critical role of literature that literature will play in each case.

How can we change society?

All of us know that there are unhealthy trends in our society today that cry out to be addressed. We see increased cynicism, disregard for the public sphere, cults of materialism focused on the possession of luxury goods by a wealthy class that no longer feels any responsibility to the rest of society. I don’t think anyone disagrees about the existence of such problems, but we cannot agree on the solutions, and more importantly, we cannot address them through policy and law.

The problem is that we need to change the behavior of people and the values of people on a large scale. Laws, regulations, policies cannot change values and perceptions and we continue to be frustrated by the limited impact of our policies.

There is only one way of changing attitudes and behavior, and that is literature. Literature can change thinking because it does not draw attention to itself, but rather introduces ways of thinking. Let us go back to the late 19^th century when China, Korea and Japan suffered also from profound societal and cultural challenges as those nations faced terrible inequality and a resistance to modernization. At that time it was the “New Novel” (新小說) movement that swept Asia, transforming not laws or regulations, but rather the vary manner in which ordinary people saw the world. New concepts about the status of women, the importance of science, sanitation and internationalization were introduced with great impact through these carefully crafted novels. As Liang Qichao noted, there was no better way to change the cultural flow, and by implications, the direction of the nation.

That time has come again for us to embrace the transformative power of literature. Literature can serve to describe effectively the true challenges of our age, but it can also serve to transform the thinking of our citizens.

How do change how people think?

Literature, and by extension art and theatre, seems like a secondary field compared with technology and business for many, but in fact literature has the capacity to transform how the world is perceived—something that business and technology cannot do. Therefore, although we have misunderstood the role of literature, in fact literature is the strongest field of personal expression and the only hope we have for the future.

If we create compelling stories about individuals and the environment, we can change how citizens think about the environment and have the maximum impact on this serious problem. If novels make the environmental crisis visible to readers, they will comprehend it for the first time. If novels suggest a way forward for us, we will be able to find a road where previously there was nothing. So also social and economic inequality. If novels feature heroic figures who struggle to protect the environment and to create a more just society, readers will take those heros as models and alter their vision of themselves. Instead of following self-centered characters in search of material comfort, readers will find bravery and inspiration.

Now, part of this process requires bringing more seriousness to literature in general, and extending literature to include movies, television and games. We have in Asia a tremendous variety of performing arts, from television dramas to movies and on-line games and adventures. Unfortunately, these mediums are not taken up as a medium for serious literary and artistic expression. That should be our next step. Bring a high seriousness and purpose to the immense cultural production already taking place.

How can we make sense of change?

Our world is changing before our very eyes. We see an unprecedented rate of technological change that threatens to make all previous institutions irrelevant. Literature offers us an opportunity to make sense of those changes, to explore their full implications and propose tentative solutions. In a sense literature is the material out of which we can weave a new civilization and it is our most pressing duty to create a new world appropriate to the changes of today.

Without literature, and the power that it offers to transform not objects, but the significance of objects, there is little we can do to improve our situation. But with literature we can work a remarkable magic, changing both how the world is perceived and also what is valued. Literature, in all its forms, can make our society more human and assure that the new technologies, from robots and computers to nano and biotechnology are employed in a humanistic manner. That capacity of literature to set our direction is sorely needed today.

In the future we will need a broader approach to education that takes into account such critical fields as literature, art, philosophy and history. We need a society that values literature because of the deeper spiritual and personal satisfaction that such reading and thinking gives us. Only such a broad education can give us the self-confidence to respond effectively to the challenges of life. After all, if we spend our days trying to fill the emptiness in our lives through vacations, large televisions and expensive homes we will waste much more of our resources than if we learn to seek the depth of meaning to be found in a used book or just watching people pass by on the street, or observing blades of grass.

Literature allows the individual to see society and the world in its full complexity, to understand how value and authority are constructed out of the mixed strands of culture, ideology, economics and technology. Such a perspective allows the individual to formulate his or her specific strategy for survival and legitimacy within a constantly changing environment. It also gives the individual a historical perspective that gives him a better chance of anticipating the social implications of social and economic change. The technical expert may be able to tell us what the next generation of smart phone will look like, but the student with a firm grasp of history, sociology and anthropology will be able to anticipate its implications for how society functions. The business major may understand the importance of blogging, but only the literature major will be able to write blogs that are persuasive to a larger audience.

Let us remember the famous words of Max Weber:

“What is possible would never have been achieved if, in this world, people had not repeatedly reached for the impossible.”

Literature offers visions of the impossible and new interpretations of the possible. In our day and our age we need to put forth a dream for what might be and also to suggest new ways of understanding what is. Literature is our best hope.

“Awareness of a “Common Realm” among 18th and 19th Century Korean Intellectuals”

["18-19世紀 朝鮮 知識人의 幷世意識" (韓國文化 2011.06)]

In the journal Hanguk munhwa. Dr. Jung limns the process in Korea, and throughout China and Japan, by which  intellectuals from the late eighteenth century came to see themselves as inhabiting a “common realm,” a shared cultural space. Professor Jung describes anthologies of poetry and essays from Korea that include the writings of Koreans, Chinese and Japanese. He also gives examples of literary and other intellectual exchanges between writers in the three countries in that period.

What is so significant about this article is that it presents precedents for a common cultural sphere in East Asia from the 18th century. Such precedents are critical as we try to imagine a shared cultural and economic sphere in Northeast Asia today. If we can show that such a sphere existed previously, it will be far easier to obtain recognition and acceptance.

Emanuel delivered a lecture in Korean to the “Korea Society of East Asian Comparative Literature” (동방문학비교연구회) on the response of Japanese intellectuals to Chinese vernacular narrative in the 18th century. The talk placed stress on the important role that exposure to Chinese vernacular narrative played in stimulating an active debate on the significance of vernacular language in general in Japan.

There is a tendency to attribute a new significance to the novel and vernacular writing in the late nineteenth century in Japan to Western literature. Emanuel argued, however, that the real precedents lie in the engagement with Chinese vernacular narrative in the previous century.

See this link for the Powerpoint in Korean of the presentation

일본 소설 및 소설론

Members of the Group

Emanuel delivers talk.

His book on the reception of  the Chinese vernacular in Japan, The Observable Mundane: Vernacular Chinese and the Emergence of a Literary Discourse on Popular Narrative in Edo Japan, will be assigned in the East Asian Studies graduate program at Princeton

for  EAS 501 ”Proseminar in Chinese and Japanese Studies.” The course is taught by Professor Benjamin A. Elman, the department head.

The Novels of Park Jiwon, Translations of Overlooked Worlds, will be employed in a graduate course on Korean literature taught by Professsor David McCann in the Department of East Asian Languages and Civilizations at Harvard University.

This Advertisement introduces the immense project being undertaken at present by the Institute for the Translation of the Korean Classics (한국고전번역원) to render large sections of the Korean literary and intellectual canon into contemporary Korean language. Because literary Chinese was the intellectual language of Korea until the twentieth century, there is a vast amount of the Korean tradition that is simply not accessible to contemporary readers. Few Koreans today learn classical Chinese. That discontinuity in the Korean cultural tradition is critical to understand how Korean culture is different that of France or Italy, nations in which a remarkable cultural continuity over the last thousand years remains intact. If you ask an educated Korean about the writings of a 17^th century Korean philosopher, he or she would most likely stare at you blankly—with a few exceptions. But if you asked an educated Italian intellectual about a major Italian philosopher, he or she most likely has read some of the philosopher’s writings in the original.

The work of the Institute for the Translation of the Korean Classics is aimed at opening up the classical tradition to contemporary Koreans. The greater challenge will be making that tradition accessible to internationals. Although daunting, such an effort is absolutely essential if Korea is to get the recognition globally it deserves.

By the way, the situation is even more severe in Vietnam where also most of the writings until the 20th century are in literary Chinese but very little has been translated into contemporary Vietnamese.

After Kimchi and Winter Sonata: The Intellectual Korean Wave

August 16th, 2011

Emanuel Pastreich

The Korean Wave (hallyu) has swept the world. Korea’s romantic songs, thrilling movies and compelling television dramas have captured the imagination of a new generation-and quite a few from the previous generation. Although the mystique of Korean popular culture first took root in Japan and China, it has crept through Southeast and Central Asia and is now rolling into the Middle East and South America. Moreover, the Korean wave has extended to fashion and cosmetics, food and sports.

Nevertheless, although the Korean Wave has vastly enhanced Korea’s visibility, we find that further up in the food chain the Korean Wave has not started in earnest. The truth is that most intellectuals in the United States, Europe or even Japan cannot name any Korean writers, have not read the essays of Korea’s major intellectuals, and have little sense of the depth of Korea’s history. We do not see English translations of articles by major Korean journalists appearing in the New York Times, and although President Obama may praise Korean education, he does not cite Korean experts.

But as someone living in Korea, someone who reads Korean books and journals, visits Korean galleries and talks with Korean intellectuals, I can affirm that there is plenty over here that deserves to be introduced to the world in a big way.

The highest priority is for us to introduce Korea’s cultural past. There is an incredible wealth of writings by Koreans on Buddhism, Confucianism, self, and society produced over the last two millennia that has barely been touched. In most cases, those translations of the Korean classics that do exist were part of rushed projects to get out large amounts of text in short periods of time. We need scholars like Arthur Waley whose loving translation of Japan’s Tale of Genji made it an essential part of literature classes around the world, or David Hawkes whose remarkable translation of China’s Dream of the Red Chamber has made the novel a favorite. When the translations are of the highest caliber, international politicians and pundits will start to quote the great Koreans of the past. Only then will it no longer appear as if Korea suddenly stepped out onto the global stage in the 1980s.

Korean traditional medicine is a growth field. Korean scholarship on acupuncture and herbs is in many respects more comprehensive than what is available in China and Japan. And yet even as scholars at Harvard Medical School are taking a deeper interest in oriental medicine, little is available about Korea’s great medical tradition in English. Kyung Hee University’s Kim Nam-il’s translation of “Donguibogam” (Principles and Practice of Eastern Medicine) into English is a critical first step, but more steps are needed.

But the question is also one of the visibility of intellectuals. Let us take the case of Thomas Friedman. Friedman writes about dozens of countries in his best-seller The World is Flat. It is a sign of cultural success that American intellectuals are taken seriously not only for their opinions about the United States, but also for their writings about other countries. Koreans must do the same: get their perspectives out about all issues, not just Korea.

I recently read the fascinating book entitled Afghanistan: Lost Civilization: A Tribute the Vanished Buddhas of Bamiyan (아프가니스탄 잃어버린 문명: 진 바미얀 대불을 위 한  헌사) by Ju-hyeong Lee (이주형). In loving detail, Lee presents the tragedy of Afghanistan’s contested cultural traditions and the fatal decision of the Taliban to destroy the nation’s most sacred Buddhist statues. I found Lee’s writing to be exceptionally lucid and feel strongly that if the book were properly translated into English, it could be a global best seller.

When Korean writers start getting their articles published in world class intellectual journals like Daedalus and their books introduced in theNew York Times Book Review, the Korean wave will be complete. At this point Koreans don’t seem to think much further than Nature andCell Magazine. And, at the same time, we need to build Korean publishers like Seoul National University Press into global players.

Korea is producing some of the most creative and innovative artists in contemporary art. I find it hard to flip through a copy of Art In Americawithout seeing a work by a Korean. Yet those artists are just starting to get the attention that they deserve globally. What do we need to do? Well, we could form a “Seoul School” of painting with an original and significant vision, and get the word out about it globally. Or, we can just start integrating the avant-garde art of Seoul’s artists into Seoul’s architecture and public design. That alone would create a unique city environment. Seoul is already a thriving metropolis. It would just take a little nudge to take it to the level of Paris and Rome.

Finally, Korean language instruction needs to move up a notch as well. We need Korean textbooks that are imaginative and intriguing, with lively and humorous language taken from the best of Korean writing. We must leave behind those predictable dialogs between John the foreigner and Mr. Kim and create texts that focus on compelling scenes from Seoul’s cafes and offices. Such materials will compel international students to learn more. We also have to demand that international students read and write Korean at a high level. The Korean acceptance of the low level of foreigners in the Korean language has hampered the development of bilingual internationals.

Moreover, dictionaries of Korean language should be produced that are for international readers, not for Koreans. At present, a Korean-English dictionary presents the word “nolda” (놀다) followed by sentences illustrating the usage of different English equivalents. But there is no English language definition of “nolda” to be found anywhere. Why? Because the editors assume that the reader is a Korean and therefore already knows what “nolda” (to play) means.

As Korean culture becomes more central in the world, it will be essential to make sure the teaching of Korean is first class. Tragically, many courses in the Korean language taught in the United States are aimed at Korean Americans. Non-heritage students drop out after of Korean language courses after a few weeks because they simply cannot keep up with Korean Americans. But, ironically, those non-heritage students are the most likely to go on and become Korea experts.

Korea already has all it takes to be a cultural power like France, Germany or the United States at the highest intellectual level. All that is needed is the will and the vision.

On Murakami Haruki

The summer of 1993 followed the very intense period of study that made up my first year at Harvard-a period of readjusting to American society and also American academics. I was selected for a small research grant that allowed me to concentrate on reading in depth the Tale of Genji, the grade medieval Japanese novel, with my advisor for Japanese literature Edwin Cranston. Oki Yasushi, a professor of Chinese literature from University of Tokyo whose classes I had taken previously, was also visiting Harvard. It was a remarkable summer indeed as I remember an unending series of intense discussions about literature and history contemporary society and politics with fellow students and faculty. Harvard over the summer was different than during the year. Graduate ` major institutions around the world poured in.

It was during that summer that I heard about the visit of Murakami Haruki to Cambridge. One of the faculty at Harvard, Jay Rubin, had been long engaged in translating the novels of Murakami Haruki and invited him and his wife Yoko to stay for a year. As the iconic figure for post-modern literature, Murakami Haruki was somewhat far away from my field of classical literature. In fact I had to confess I had not read much of his writing and had only the vaguest idea at that time of exactly what sort of a writer he was. What I knew was that Murakami was best known for postmodern writings literary critics have remarked that his writings are almost without references to Japanese society.     For my part, I was reading the Tale of Genji and preparing to dive into classical writing of the 18^th century. I had actually drifted away from Japanese literature as it is practiced today and deep into the distant past. I was quite far away from the contemporary post-modern Japanese literary scene.

Suddenly one evening, I received a phone call from Professor Rubin. Murakami had rented an enormous off-road vehicle and the monster car would not fit into the underground parking lot beneath the apartment house where he had rented a small suite for the year in Cambridge. It was an emergency. Professor Rubin begged me to get out and help solve this crisis. I rode over to the apartment where Murakami was staying immediately on my bicycle and there on the street was a rather slim, smallish Japanese man in an enormous off-road vehicle.

Murakami struck me as a rather reserved and even shy person. As I would learn later, he was not at all shy once he started speaking in front of an audience. He was wearing a yellow lacrosse T-shirt and sun glasses.

It so turned out that Professor Oki Yasushi was staying in an apartment that I had found for him not far from campus that had a parking place in the basement. I called Oki up and we arranged to drive the monster over there immediately. We arrived at about 11 PM and managed to park the car successfully. We then sat down for an hour with Oki and Murakami on the floor of the unfurnished apartment of Professor Oki to just talk about this and that: living in Cambridge, the experience of Japanese overseas, recent events in the world. Murakami wanted to know how to hook up his new phone line and where to find Japanese food. Professor Oki and he hit it off and we were off for a beer at a local bar on Massachusetts Avenue. Murakami seemed most comfortable in these social engagements, speaking with candor about the state of the world over a glass of beer. He was less comfortable talking about his own personal experiences and often it was his wife Yoko who was the source for background on what Murakami was thinking and doing. Most of all, he did not enjoy discussing the significance of his works. He wanted them to stand on their own. Better to talk to him about microbreweries than the meaning of the novel.

In his behavior, Murakami was remarkably independent. Although he had asked me to try to find the parking place, in fact Murakami tried to take care of just about everything by himself. He was an excellent reader of English, but not always a confident speaker. He gave his talks and interviews in Japanese, although I think he could have given them in English. He had no desire to show off to anyone, I could tell, and he never tried to draw attention to himself.

I then walked back with Murakami to his apartment after going out for a drink. We should hands tentatively on the street and parted ways. He looked around the new neighborhood with fascination and I wondered whether he was already thinking of a new novel. Murakami’s writing is something he did: he would say, “I was working today.” But he did not ever specify what he was writing or what its significance was.

Professor Rubin invited me over to his house for a cup of coffee with Murakami and his wife Yoko then next day. They wanted to thank me, I was told, for helping to find a place to park their car. Murakami was quiet and his wife Yoko spoke far more than he did. But at the same time I could see that Murakami was not attracted to Harvard and its prestige. Professors were not important to him.  He would have been 44 years old that summer, but I would guess he spent almost all his time with people under 35. Of course he spent most of his time alone. But when he was out with Americans, he wanted the vitality of young people. He wanted very much to talk with graduate students and others in the more general community and get out of the university.

The conversation with Professor Rubin not particularly inspired, but Murakami indicated a desire to me to meet up again and gave me his phone number on a small scrap of neatly folded paper. I was quite busy with my own studies, and did not think too much when we would follow up with another meeting, but within a few days I received a call from Yoko asking for some practical advice about shopping in Cambridge.

In an odd way, the fact that I was interested in literature was not so familiar with his writings made our relationship less of a burden for him, and I think increased our intimacy. He did not have to worry about my asking him questions about his latest novel.

I have one photograph from that time of Murakami at my house. I had a small apartment on the first floor of an old house on Prentiss Street in Cambridge which I would invite friends to on occasion for small, intimate meetings every few months. My one room had an old Persian carpet on the floor and was full of old furniture I had collected from all over the city at used furniture stores. We would discuss Asian studies related matters, but more often than not, we would talk about contemporary society and even just our own personal experiences. For the most part it was just students, and Murakami joined us one Saturday afternoon. For the most part he was observing us, perhaps in some sense taking notes in his mind for a future novel about conversations and gestures, the interesting manner in which people interact with each other. I feel that part of his quietness is not so much that he is shy, as he is an anthropologist observing us extremely carefully. His novels are the results of those studies.

There was one moment at which he spoke in rather halting English. One of the students had just described the difficulties of finding an academic position in the United States. Murakami suddenly remarked, “Academics is a funny field. Whereas writers observe and then create their own parallel worlds in literature which are just as real, but with all the names changed, and the contexts hidden, in academics you are expected to document everything with footnotes—as if those little distractions made things more real. But when you start documenting everything with footnotes, you kill the cultural flow. Suddenly what was a constant flow of energy and words, culture and economic currents is reduced to a museum that never changes. A novel is like a zoo with the living specimens taken from daily life in it. An academic article is like a museum with stuffed dead animals.” We were a bit surprised that he spoke with such passion, but it was a compelling vision he put forth and we talked for another hour, although Murakami did not say another word.

Murakami hit it off best with best friend Eric Marler, the writer, performer and graduate student at Harvard’s department of English. Eric is one of those rare figures in graduate school who sees his study as a means to support his broader efforts and is not caught up in any concern with getting a job quickly. Eric and I spent several evenings talking with Murakami late at night about literature art and modernity. We would meet at the S&S Diner in Inman Square, Cambridge. The S&S Restaurant has been a Cambridge tradition since 1919 offering very representative New England meals. I remember one autumn evening the three of us talked until late at night at the S&S Diner about the role of the writer in a rapidly changing world. Eric spoke of the challenges faced in introducing Japanese literature in the United States.

Eric: “Let us take Harvard. Obviously there are professors who study Japanese literature, like your translator Jay Rubin. But at the Department of English, and in the larger community, there is a lot of resistance to taking Japanese literature seriously.”

Emanuel: “And yet we find that the families of those professors of English literature, maybe even those professors themselves, are reading your books. Perhaps they are attracted to the fact that is slightly different than the literature they are used to, but not too alien. But you are getting exposure”

Haruki:  “I suspect that it will take some time for writers like myself to go from what is read as popular literature on weekends to what is read as serious literature. But it will happen.”

Eric: “Well if we think about the world of art, Vincent Van Gogh was clearly popular art not worth discussing in the nineteenth century. But now he has found a place at the top of the pile. Perhaps we can expect a similar reordering. The question is, how long it will take?”

Emanuel: “Rethinking literature and the tradition will take years, but it is inseparable from a larger geopolitical shift. We are now seeing a shift to Asia in economics and in technology. That shift is combined with a new vitality in literature and art. At the same time, although I am aware of that shift, I do not know the names of any specific authors—except one!”

Murakami: “Except the one here drinking a beer with you! So the proximity is also a big part of the game. The writer as part of the larger community. One needs to actually sit down and have a beer with someone to enter the community.”

Emanuel: “Certainly we see that in the case of Nobel Prizes. In physics they go to the students of famous professors in the US who have won prizes already. The same is true in literature. It is hard to break in because unless you are part of the network, you are not considered a serious writer. This is one reason it has been so hard in literature for Asian’s to win Nobel Prizes. It is starting, but the progress in recent years is not because suddenly Asians are better writers.”

Haruki: “In some respects, the quality of the translator is critical. Jay Rubin has made all the difference for me. I have seen many great Japanese writers butchered by bad translators.”

Eric, “Performance is also a big part of literature. Although I write narratives, my monologues are a critical part of my literary career. I have a one-man show ‘Time Pieces’ that opens next week.”

Haruki:  “Really, tell me about it.”

Eric: “Well you have to come and find out, but basically I create a character then play him for a live audience. Very much part of the literary process for me. The monologue is called ‘Time Pieces.’”

Well, there Murakami Haruki was, sitting on a wooden chair with me in the basement of Leverett House at Harvard for the opening of Timepieces the following week. Murakami seemed visibly excited. Eric put on a masterly performance, including powerful readings from her own works.

Murakami was very much engaged and seemed to show real affection for Eric when the monologue was complete. We came up to him like his support team. Then we went out for a cup of coffee again afterwards, but oddly, Murakami did not want to discuss the monologue. He seemed to get more pleasure out of observing Eric and me talking.

We also took Murakami along to meet Spaulding Gray, one of America’s most important authors and performers when he performed his book “Gray’s Anatomy” at Hasty Pudding Theatre in Harvard Square. We stood talking with Spaulding Gray about his play, concerning his efforts to find alternative medical treatment for an eye ailment, for a good half hour. I felt from that moment that these social interactions are what is needed. American literary critics and writers have to meet and talk to Japanese and Korean writers.

When I arrived in Japan in 1999 for a semester of study at the University of Tokyo, Murakami called me up and arranged for us to meet at his office, a very attractive little apartment in the Aoyama district of Tokyo, for a cup of coffee. His assistant was a Korean woman, it so happens. My wife and I went to meet him and we talked for an hour of so about current trends in Japan, my teaching and research at the University of Illinois, and above all about my wife’s efforts to learn Japanese. Murakami made a special effort to speak with my wife at great length. He seemed to take greater interest in her progress in language than anything else. His wife Yoko was along as well and gave much valuable advice on methods for learning Japanese.

When my son Benjamin was born in Champaign, we sent a card to Murakami. He sent us a letter and a small gift almost immediately. The gift was a mobile with small animals dangling from it. We used that mobile for several years and it formed an essential part of our nursery.

Although we continue to correspond, meeting up recently has not been so easy. We continue to correspond however, and imagine some future date at which we may manage to get together again.

Mark recommended that I take the translation down from my website and prepare an authoritative version. I contacted Murakami Haruki’s office, through the introduction of Jay Rubin at Harvard—who is one of Murakami’s primary translators—and discussed the translations and Murakami’s publisher’s policy. This translation is by no means an “authorized edition” but in fact I talked with the office at length and sent the material by email to Murakami Haruki. There are several other versions out there, but I think this one is most accurate.

I spent quite a bit of time with Murakami Haruki back in the summer of 1994 when he was on sabbatical at Harvard for one year. We spent a bit of time together as I describe in my essay “On Murakami Haruki.”

http://japanfocus.org/-Murakami-Haruki/3571

]]> http://circlesandsquares.asia/2011/06/29/multilingual-seoul/ Wed, 29 Jun 2011 15:34:37 +0000 Emanuel Pastreich http://circlesandsquares.asia/2011/06/29/multilingual-seoul/ One sees a rapid increase in languages around Seoul other than Korean and English. Here are two notable bits of signage.

One is a mobile phone store with a sign in Chinese aimed at the increasing Chinese market in Korea. I am told that Chinese students have often more disposable income than Korean students at Korean universities. Have not conducted a study yet.

The other sign is for an Indian culture event. The poster does not assume a readership of Hindi, or maybe it does. In any case, Koreans previously had no tolerance for the Hindi language. That environment is changing quite rapidly.

U.S. scholar explores Asian literature

An American professor has brought the classical novels of the novelist Park Ji-won of the Joseon period onto the global stage by translating ten short stories into English.

Emanuel Pastreich, who goes by the Korean name Lee Man-yeol, recently published two books in English with Seoul National University Press: “The Novels of Park Jiwon” and “The Observable Mundane, a study of Japanese Chinese novels. He expanded parts of his dissertation on how Chinese vernacular literature impacted Korean and Japanese literature and expanded it into two separate books.

Professor Emanuel Pastreich, director of the Interdisciplinary Studies Program of the Kyung Hee University (Photo: Park Hyun-goo)

One side of his room is filled with Chinese and Japanese classic literature books, mostly from the 18th and 19th centuries. “I have put much work into researching literary relations between China, Japan and Korea and I think the topic is critical to our understanding of the region,” he explained of his work.

His devotion to East Asian culture and literature began when he chose Chinese literature and language as an undergraduate at Yale. “I was fascinated with Chinese characters. There’s something artistic about them,” he remarked.

Pastreich was motivated to study Chinese by “a combination of the fun of learning Chinese language, an interest in traditional Chinese culture and a feeling that China would become an important country in the future.”

That was in 1983, but back then East Asian language and literature was not a very popular major in the U.S.

“My major has only three students that year,” he said.

In his senior year, Pastreich was drawn to Japanese literature and later thought he should know Korea in order to understand the full history of literature in Asia. While writing his Ph.D. dissertation at Harvard University in 1994, he came to Seoul National University in 1995 for a year.

That’s when he discovered “great richness in the Korean tradition” and met his wife, who was a student of Korean music. Two years later they were married and his father-in-law gave him the Korean name “Lee Man-yeol,” similar in pronunciation to his name Emanuel., but featuring his wife’s surname “Lee.”

He speaks Korean fluently, although he remarks that he’s still more comfortable speaking Japanese. Nevertheless, Pastreich is fluent enough to carry on discussions with his students in Korean and often writes articles in Korean which he posts on his blog.

Pastreich became the director of the Interdisciplinary Studies Program at Kyung Hee University this semester. He is using the program as an opportunity to encourage cooperation between the humanities and the sciences. In his “Technology and Society Forum” class, he encourages students to discuss comprehensive issues such as how smart phones have affected our society. He carries on detailed discussions via his blog with the students.

His latest challenge is to go beyond the combination of different academic fields, experimenting with innovative new approaches to teaching. He is exploring different approaches to make students comfortable talking in class. “You cannot expect them to talk in class. You have to create an environment,” he explained. “Korean students have good basic knowledge of facts. However, in class, some of them are not focused and sometimes they are not serious. Once you get them involved, however, they have lots to say and are often thoughtful.”

With those challenges in mind, Pastreich plans to go back to his original major of literature and teach a comparative literature class and class on novelist Park Ji-won next semester.

His book launch will be held at the Paik Hae Young Gallery in Itaewon on June 30 at 5 PM. His books are also available at Kyobo bookstore and Amazon.com.

By Lee Woo-young (wylee@heraldm.com)

Reception commemorating the release of two books from

Seoul National University Press written by Emanuel Pastreich (이만열 교수님)

of  Kyung Hee University’s Humanitas College.

The Novels of Park Jiwon: Translations of Overlooked Worlds

&

The Observable Mundane: Vernacular Chinese and the Emergence of a Literary Discourse on Popular Narrative in Edo

Time:  June 30^th Thursday, 5pm–7pm

(초대일시: 6월 30일 목요일, 오후 5시-7시)

Place:  PAIK HAE YOUNG GALLERY

PAIK HAE YOUNG GALLERY

101-40 Itaewon, 1-Dong

Yongsan-Gu, Seoul 140-201

T. 82-2-796-9347  F. 82-2-796-9348

paikhy@paikhygallery.com

www.paikhygallery.com

Directions from Itaewon Subway Station(line 6) Exit #2
Walk toward till you see the Fire Station across and turn left at the Chosun Antique.

Walk up to the hill about 5 mins to the Grand Hyatt Hotel direction.

Follow the yellow line and you will see the white building of Paik Hae Young Gallery.

SEE ATTACHMENT for details and MAP 

SNU PRESS RECEPTION INVITATION

I corresponded with Noam Chomsky about five years ago frequently and started up the conversation again over the last few months. We had never had the occasion to meet in person, but on my recent visit to MIT as part of the larger effort to promote global collaboration in technology convergence I managed to meet him at his office. Here is a picture which includes also my close friend Eugene Pak of Seoul National University’s AICT (Advanced Institutes of Convergence Technology). A fourth member of the group is Bertrand Russell, logician,  political activist and author of “Has Man a Future.” I read that book as a child when I found it in the library of my aunt Jeanne in Luxembourg. Clearly Noam has him included in all portraits taken to indicate the spirit behind what he is doing today.

Interesting, the Wikipedia biography for Bertrand Russell has no mention of Noam Chomsky.

We talked primarily about my forthcoming book: “The Observable Mundane: The Reception of Chinese Vernacular Narrative in Edo Japan.” In this book I argue that there was no concept of a “vernacular” language that could be observed, analyzed and employed in literary production before the exposure of Japanese intellectuals to Chinese vernacular narratives and writings by Chinese intellectuals on vernacular narrative  in the 17th century. These Chinese vernacular texts  had the full authority of the great Chinese intellectual tradition for readers, but they included new linguistic registers and treated subjects that were beyond the previous range of literary discourse.

Noam stated that within the field of linguistics as practiced in the West even as recently as the 1970s there was much resistance to the serious consideration of linguistic phenomena in vernaculars. The complexity of all language has been obscured, he suggested, by the privileged status of certain forms of discourse.  I did not start out my research on the reception of vernacular Japanese narrative back in 1992 with any thought about Noam’s universal grammar.  But there is some affinity between the idea of “an innate set of linguistic principles shared by all humans” and a reconsideration of the value of the lower registers of linguistic discourse.

I think that because I received a C at Yale in a course in linguistics that was rather poorly taught, I had an allergy to linguistics as a field for the last twenty five years.  So I ended up a professor of literature interested in a linguistic phenomenon.

I tried to convince Noam to visit Korea, telling him how important a country it has become. But he was not convinced. He did note, however, that his grandchildren have a great interest in Korean popular culture, suggesting the Korean wave is sweeping even the United States.

It is clear that photography takes up most of its real estate, with haiku a close second, but at several stages in this blogs history, that is to say my history, there was a fair bit of prose as well. That has diminished, but when I do publish a piece elsewhere on the web, I do like to point it out.

That is what this is, a review of Thomas Chatterton Williams thought-provoking and excellently written memoir. Without further ado, I will let the review do the talking.

Oh, and for more blog brand dilution/confusion, stay tuned–a blog contest or two are in the wings waiting to make their appearance.

Thanks for reading/viewing.

“No dichotomy of flesh and spirit distressed or delighted him, nor did he know anything of the denial of that dichotomy by the creed of Christendom. The unity of that creed has proclaimed, against experience, against intelligence, that for the achievement of man’s unity the body of his knowledge is to be raised; no other fairer stuff, no alien matter, but this–to be impregnated with holiness and transmuted by lovely passion perhaps, but still this. Scars and prints may disseminate splendour, but the body is to be the same, the very body of the very soul that are both names of the single man.”

Wow.

Also, the annual Dassler Effect “Autumn, Then Winter” haiku contest is now officially receiving entries, on, this, the first day of Autumn. Please read the contest rules and enter. Deadline: October 23rd. Results: November 6th. $80 in prize money). So, start writing.

Well, this new version of The Dassler Effect has had a more promising start than I could have imagined. And yet its previous incarnation was no slouch either (it still shows up first on Google). Because it was around for longer, it has far more more photos on it than the current blog and there is a far sight more writing of various types on it as well. Here are links to its categores. A word of warning: the photo and art pages do take a rather long time to load:

• Ache for Eternity
• And Wears Man’s Smudge
• Blogness
• C. S. Lewis
• Catapult
• Church Life and Theology
• Essays
• Film, Music, Television, Books
• Flickr
• Food and Such
• J. R. R. Tolkien
• Lachrymose
• Lit and Library Stuff
• Personal Growth or Lack Thereof
• Photos and Art
• Photos and Art II
• Photos and Art III
• Politics and Culture Wrestling
• Pure Northerness
• Pure Silliness
• Random Poetry
• Science, Theology, and Ethics
• Snippet
• Storyville
• We Are Family
• Word Association
• World Affairs

Of course, taking care of a donkey and getting it to go, I am sure, is rather difficult work, even if I have always rather had a fondness for the beasts, especially Puzzle of Narnia. And baby donkeys? Well, I cannot begin to describe their cuteness.

However, I digress. This story is really quite cool, though, and more so for its non-donkey aspects. The eagerness with which children wait to read and then read the books made a particular impression upon me. In truth, it rather brings me up short as I sit typing this in my room, with books strewn on the floor near the head of my bed, books still in boxes from my recent move, books in thrift stores around the city which I can take hours to broswe and buy at a pittance, which itself is only a pittance because I make such a handsome wage, books at the library which pays my handsome wage on shelves and shelves and shelves, with numerous computers that can access the Internet and, yes, millions more books throughout the state of Missouri, and books, used and new, at Amazon which I can buy for rather more than a pittance, but still at amazing prices.

Now, I am not saying it is a bad thing to have access to so many books. It is wonderful, and this story highlights just how much of a privilege it, indeed, is, one that is not only good to reflect upon, but one that I, especially as a librarian, should be seeking to extend to others.

Another intersting aspect of the story was how the donkey library is also striving to have people treat donkeys with more care and respect, which is very cool. Don’t care for donkeys? Perhaps you might consider the Kenyan camel library.

“A cold coming we had of it,
Just the worst time of the year
For a journey, and such a long journey:
The was deep and the weather sharp,
The very dead of winter.”
And the camels galled, sore-footed, refractory,
Lying down in the melting snow.
There were times we regretted
The summer palaces on slopes, the terraces,
And the silken girls bringing sherbet.
Then the camel men cursing and grumbling
And running away, and wanting their liquor and women,
And the night-fires gong out, and the lack of shelters,
And the cities hostile and the towns unfriendly
And the villages dirty, and charging high prices.:
A hard time we had of it.
At the end we preferred to travel all night,
Sleeping in snatches,
With the voices singing in our ears, saying
That this was all folly.

Then at dawn we came down to a temperate valley,
Wet, below the snow line, smelling of vegetation;
With a running stream and a water-mill beating the darkness,
And three trees on the low sky,
And an old white horse galloped away in the meadow.
Then we came to a tavern with vine-leaves over the lintel,
Six hands at an open door dicing for pieces of silver,
And feet kicking the empty wine-skins.
But there was no information, and so we continued
And arrived at evening, not a moment too soon
Finding the place; it was (you may say) satisfactory.

All this was a long time ago, I remember,
And I would do it again, but set down
This set down
This: were we lead all that way for
Birth or Death? There was a Birth, certainly,
We had evidence and no doubt. I have seen birth and death,
But had thought they were different; this Birth was
Hard and bitter agony for us, like Death, our death.
We returned to our places, these Kingdoms,
But no longer at ease here, in the old dispensation,
With an alien people clutching their gods.
I should be glad of another death.

-”The Journey of the Magi” by T.S. Eliot

First is the story of a man who read the entire Oxford English Dictionary in a year. The reading of it did not make him a word snob, however. He says:

“Knowing what to call something makes me more aware of that thing. For instance, it’s not terribly useful for me to know that [the sound of] leaves rustled by the trees is a psithurism.

“I don’t want to walk down the street with my girlfriend saying: ‘Listen, there’s a psithurism.’ But knowing it means I pay more attention to it.”

Similarly, knowing that “undisonant” is the adjective to describe the sound of crashing waves and that “apricity” is the warmth of the winter sun brings these things more often to mind.

“It’s not easy to use them in conversation and so I enjoy them for their own sake. They are like one-word poems.”

Nice.

The second story, is really a photo essay of sorts and shows how movie poster makers employ fonts. Fascinating. As is this story a year or so ago about the creation of the font Helvetica.