The Columbia Anthology of Traditional Korean Poetry

by Peter Lee

Overview

This groundbreaking anthology, edited by the veteran scholar who founded the field of Korean literature in the West, offers a representative selection from the four major genres of native Korean poetry: the Silla songs known as hyangga, Koryo songs, sijo, and kasa. The performance of oral songs was central to the religious life of ancient Koreans, and their passion for song and poetry is as evident in these texts today as it was to the earliest Chinese observers. Therefore, in addition to such classics as the Songs of Flying Dragons, the great eulogy-cycle compiled from 1445 to 1447, the volume also includes folk songs and shamanist narrative songs. Within each genre works are arranged chronologically so that the reader can trace artistic developments over time. The translations, many commissioned especially for this volume, have been prepared by distinguished scholars and literary translators and are fully annotated, making them ideal for use in the classroom.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780231111126
Publisher:	Columbia University Press
Publication date:	01/01/2003
Series:	Translations from the Asian Classics
Pages:	304
Product dimensions:	8.80(w) x 5.90(h) x (d)
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Peter H. Lee is professor of Korean and comparative literature in the department of East Asian languages and cultures at the University of California, Los Angeles. He is author or editor of numerous books about and translations of Korean literature and history, including Sourcebook of Korean Civilization (Columbia, 1997).

Table of Contents

Preface
Contributors
Part 1: Classical Poetry
Introduction
Hyangga
Koryo Songs
Songs of Flying Dragons
Sijo
Sasol Sijo
Kasa
Part 2: Poetry in Chinese
Part 3: Folk Songs
Part 4: Shamanist Narrative Songs
Index of Authors
Index of First Lines
Bibliography

What People are Saying About This

Earl Miner

This is a major cultural event, one owed above all to the unrivaled knowledge, devotion and good taste of Peter H. Lee. It is a full treasury of poems short and long, in Korean and Chinese, from the hut and from the palace, showing the Korean genius for adaptable originality amid intermittent Chinese hegemony and Japanese incursion. English readers have at last access to a full sample of a literature that now exists for them for the first time.

— Earl Miner, Princeton University

Jonathan Chaves

The Columbia Anthology of Traditional Korean Poetry is the best collection of classical Korean verse in translation we now possess. The selection is absolutely thorough, and a particular treat is the inclusion of some of the fine Chinese-language poetry by Korean writers. The list of contributors is a who's who of the best Korean poetry scholars and translators, including Peter H. Lee himself, Davis R. McCann, Richard Rutt, and others. The two long shamanist narrative poems are themselves worth the price of admission

— Jonathan Chaves, professor of Chinese, George Washington University

Editorial Reviews

The Columbia Anthology of Traditional Korean Poetry refreshingly builds in particular on oral lyrical tradition, customarily marginalized as peripheral in the canonical scheme of Korean literature... [It] is a valuable new resource for serious study in Korean poetic tradition.

Journal of Asian Studies - Chan E. Park

[A] Groundbreaking anthology.

The Washington Times - Dr. Yearn Hong Choi

[A] Groundbreaking anthology.

The Washington Times - Yearn Hong Choi

[A] Groundbreaking anthology.

— Dr. Yearn Hong Choi

The Washington Times

[A] ground breaking anthology.

— Choi Yearn-hong

Korea Times

The Columbia Anthology of Traditional Korean Poetry refreshingly builds in particular on oral lyrical tradition, customarily marginalized as peripheral in the canonical scheme of Korean literature... [It] is a valuable new resource for serious study in Korean poetic tradition.

— Chan E. Park

Journal of Asian Studies

[A] ground breaking anthology.

Korea Times - Choi Yearn-hong