With Gratitude to the LTI Korea

LTI Korea Banner Image
KLTI

My wife and I are still enjoying the after-effects of the good news, partly from receiving congratulatory messages such as this one from the Director of the Literature Translation Institute of Korea, Professor Seong-Kon Kim:

Dear Prof. Hodges,

I am sure you know already that your (and your wife's) translation of Yi Kwangsu's The Soil published by Dalkey Archive Press has been selected as one of "The WLT's 75 Notable Translations 2013." My heartfelt congratulations on the honor!

LTI Korea is excited to hear the news and greatly encouraged by it. Needless to say, we are very grateful to you.

Cheers,

Seong-Kon Kim

We were honored by the congratulations, but I felt that the gratitude should really be from us to the LTI Korea, so I replied as follows:

Dear Prof. Kim,

Thank you for the note of congratulations. We had indeed heard the news. My wife was alerted by someone at the LTI Korea early yesterday, but I was so busy that I didn't check my mail and only found out after 3 in the afternoon, when I arrived home and heard a brief report from my wife just before she left for a meeting.

I wasn't at first sure what to make of the news, for I was unfamiliar with the WLT. But I blogged on the honor (I'll blog on anything, you know) and linked to my blog entry where the scholars on the Milton List could access it. The Milton scholars' hearty congratulations made me realize that this must really be a big deal (to borrow an expression from your KH column this week).

I hope this recognition will be of some benefit to the LTI Korea, for without the translation grant, my wife and I would never have been able to undertake such a large-scale project. Please let us know if we can be of some assistance to the LTI Korea.

Best Regards,

Jeffery Hodges

Let me underline this point: Without LTI Korea's strong support through a sizable grant, our translation would never have even been undertaken, so much of the praise should go to this institute and to its Director, Professor Seong-Kon Kim, for their support.

World Literature Today Recognizes The Soil

Riffle Books

My wife and I received the good news yesterday that one of our translations has been recognized as numbering among the "WLT's 75 Notable Translations 2013," as the WLT noted that "working with the Literature Translation Institute of Korea, Dalkey Archive launched its Library of Korean Literature, bringing out several titles," including Yi Kwang-su's novel The Soil:

Yi Kwang-su, The Soil, Hwang Sun-Ae and Horace Jeffery Hodges, tr.

I was in seventh heaven, so to bring me back down to earth, my wife observed that our translation was undoubtedly selected more for Yi Kwang-su's stature than our work's quality. That's likely the case. (Dammit!) But we can pretend!

One thing is certain: Yi Kwang-su never imagined that an Arkansas boy from the Ozarks who can't even speak Korean would play a contributing role in rendering The Soil into English.

I can hardly believe it either -- though I quickly remind myself that without wonderful Sun-Ae, this wouldn't have been possible . . .

Lyin' Eyes

An Otherwise Pretty Dark Place

Kang Mi Jin, reporting for Daily NK, says that the "North Sees [a] Mixed Response to [the] Execution" of Jang Sung Taek (December 13, 2013):

News of Jang Sung Taek's execution has been met with mixed responses from ordinary North Koreans, one of Daily NK's sources has revealed.

The source, located in North Korea's Yangkang Province, told Daily NK on the 13th that, "Word of the execution is spreading rapidly throughout the country. Most people are openly critical of Jang, saying, 'He got the punishment he deserved,' and, 'How could he be so traitorous after receiving the love of the General (Kim Jong Il)?'"

However, she went on, "Their eyes and way of speaking seem to tell you that they don't really believe what they are saying."

They just can't hide their lying eyes, so these tricky circumstances call for some almost entirely inappropriate music!

Ozark Winter Weather: Uncle Cran and Cousin Bill

Uncle Cran in Ozark Snow

The Ozarks have been getting some snow recently, and as you see, Uncle Cran has sent the above photo. Here's another:

Cranless Snow

That extra blue tint makes the scene look even colder! Uncle Cran offered a few words along with these photos, beginning with a brief geography lesson:

This is not Alaska . . . . Just the frozen fields of Arkansas . . . . You have to bundle up, and even wear a ski type mask when you go out.

[These photos were] taken from the South side of the house . . . . You can see that I haven't been able to clear the snow with the tractor or snow shovel. It took a lot of shoveling to just get tracks cleared for the tractor to get to the barn and out to the field. Even then it took a lot of tries to finally get to get the hay bales in the barn area. The snow was so powdery, with ice underneath, that the tractor would just spin and not move anywhere, until I finally was able to get a path cleared.

You can't see my pet dog Buddy [in my arms in the first photo], just the tip of his tail, but every morning after breakfast I have to carry him to the tractor shed so he can unload his breakfast. The only way he can navigate is to follow the tractor tracks and where I shoveled a path. I carry him down, but make him follow me back.

That was Uncle Cran's report from North Central Arkansas -- though I'm still a bit unclear on how the tractor's spinning wheels are connected to the cleared path since Uncle Cran hadn't been able to clear the snow with tractor or shovel, but somehow shoveled a path for the tractor to move upon. Well, there's always a bit of ambiguity in a weather report. Anyway, more snow has fallen since Uncle Cran's email, and Cousin Bill now offers a somewhat ironic report on the weather situation in Northwestern Arkansas:

It's cold here, 29 [degrees fahrenheit] at typing time. We've had mostly lousy weather here all week. Sunshine and blue skies made an appearance twice, otherwise it's been gray and dreary.

Sunday past Scott and Morgan arrived at Buena Vista's Town Center intersection from Olathe[, Kansas] in less than three hours . . . from there to our house required only one hour and fifteen minutes . . . what? . . . yep the roads were so bad here they had a few necessary re-routes. We gave them just enough time to get over the shakes and the road horror stories before I announced "Well guys and gals, I've called Crystal Bridges [Museum,] and they're open, so let's get headed that way." I hadn't driven a half mile when I questioned my sanity (silently), all the while my optimistic mindset telling me the next curve of the road would offer a summer like Arkansas highway view . . . that didn't happen . . . the roads were snow packed and icy all the way to Bentonville's J St and Museum Way . . . the final quarter mile looking like the Arkansas summer highway I'd envisioned.

The best part of the Crystal Bridges visit was the staff's undivided attention . . . answering any questions we asked and offering answers to questions we didn't ask . . . "Did you know . . . the ceiling beams were cut from Arkansas pine?, the benches are made from trees cut right here on the grounds and Rosie the Riveter's pose is exactly as that of Michelangelo's painting of Isaiah". Our answers "Nope, nope and nope". We did observe (on our own) that Rockwell's included a halo above Rosie's head . . . I hadn't noticed that in previous viewings, perhaps the nearby nude bronze female figure got me distracted. I might add the personalized tour wasn't account my esteemed status in the Benton County community, but rather the fact that we were but four of maybe twenty people crazy enough to risk life or limb to visit in inclement weather.

Cousin Bill didn't supply any photos, though I'd like to see one of that Rockwell painting of Rosie the Riveter and compare it to Michelangelo's painting of Isaiah.

Fascinating . . . for me. Seeing the familiar winter snow but reading about an unfamiliar, important art museum in the Ozarks . . .

Dave Hickey on Art and Criticism

Dave Hickey
"Here's looking at you, kid."

Art Critic

I'm reading Dave Hickey's critique of the art world, namely, The Invisible Dragon: Four Essays on Beauty, which I love for its great prose, but to understand its critical stance with respect to the art world, I'll need to read a second or third time, for it seems to have made a strong impression there, as Hickey reports in the objective third-person:

In the Dragon's wake, he gave lectures in university auditoriums during which the faculty rose en masse from their seats in the back row and walked out. Honorariums were withheld. Dinners were canceled. Litigation was threatened. The endowed lecturer was deposited unceremoniously at a Ramada Inn beside an empty highway and left to dine out of the candy machine.

Why was he so despised? No, not for writing in the third person. Rather, because he said:

In images, beauty is the agency that causes visual pleasure in the beholder, and since pleasure is the true occasion for looking at anything, any theory of images that is not grounded in the pleasure of the beholder begs the question of art's efficacy and dooms itself to inconsequence!

In short, how art appears comes before what art means, an implication that the academic purveyors of art's meaning found threatening:

How was he to know that critiques of the sort he had been writing, however apt or inept, would threaten the livelihoods of well-scrubbed young Americans and scruffy, dolorous Brits. It never occurred to him that he was tilting at windmills upon whose continuing rotation jobs, promotions, raises, tenures, homes, pools, skis, bikes, spas, Audis, and academic reputations were absolutely dependent.

Therefore was he disliked. I'll report more if I find some pithy remark to record . . .

Christmas Comes Early For Uncle Jang . . .

Jang Song Thaek

"Jingle, jangle, jingle

I can hear those 'slay' bells ring"

Yonhap News

Kevin Kim calls attention to Joshua Stanton over at One Free Korea for his intriguing insight into the Child-King's possible faux pas in having his Uncle Jang so publicly executed for plotting a coup:

The very fact that North Korea concedes that a recently-esteemed and trusted leader secretly despised and plotted against Kim Jong Un is an acknowledgement of the unthinkable. It shatters one of the most sacred illusions of North Korean propaganda. Had someone tried to overthrow Kim Jong Il (and someone probably did) Kim Jong II would never have admitted it (and he didn't). Both Jang's execution and this announcement suggest that Kim Jong Un is a much more volatile man than his father, and much less schooled in the ideology that explains his father's longevity. For once, I'm astonished by North Korea's candor.

Joshua's point is that the Kim-family's spell has been broken. Every North Korean now knows that the man closest to Kim Jong Un hated him. There may now be a lot of desperate officials who were indebted to Jang and don't want to suffer his fate, and if the Man-Child Leader is perceived as volatile, unpredictable, and brutal, then he is making a problem for himself, as I noted about a week ago:

If he's executing people on a whim, then nobody in the high elite can trust him. An intelligent dictator can be harsh, but if the rules are clear and applied consistently, people will generally obey them and thus know that they are secure. But if there are no rules and punishment is arbitrary, conditions are ripe for revolt.

But we'll see. Meanwhile, let's appreciate the "Brilliant General" for this early Christmas present . . .

OIC Blames Extremist Free Speech for Islamophobia

Organization of Islamic Cooperation
"Engulf and Devour"
Wikipedia

Soeren Kern, in "OIC Blames Free Speech for 'Islamophobia' in West" (Gatestone Institute, December 11, 2013), informs us of the OIC's goal of limiting free speech about Islam, so I decided to look at the Sixth OIC Observatory Report on Islamophobia (October 2012 - September 2013) to see for myself what it says about free expression:

[T]he worldwide provocation caused by the publication of the nefarious caricatures of Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) by a Danish cartoonist in the Jyllands-Posten newspaper on September 30, 2005. This irresponsible act of abusing freedom of expression by a single individual that was among the first of many that were to follow in humiliating and negatively stereotyping Muslims, effectively contributed towards developing a culture of intolerance of Islam and Muslims in the West. (1)

I'm glad that's set straight. I had erroneously imagined that the worldwide rioting of Islamists over the Muhammad cartoons bore more responsibility for the negative image of Islam. Even worse:

[T]he perpetuation of Islamophobia, both in terms of the phenomenon's momentum and outreach, is disquieting. It is particularly alarming that what had initially started as mere exploitation and abuse of freedom of expression by some extremist elements, gradually found resonance in political spheres, ultimately leading to the institutionalization of Islamophobia. (1)

I had attributed the politicization of this issue to Islamist violence. How wrong I was!

[We OIC] Member States . . . strongly convey our grave concerns on growing Islamophobia to our western counterparts within the ambit of their bilateral consultations and to impress upon them that the sanctity of freedom of expression and freedom of religion cannot be allowed to be endangered by those few radical extremists who are determined to create unrest and divisions in our present day world of diversity by giving them a free hand in fomenting Islamophobia. (2)

The radical extremists are not the Islamists, but those who resort to freedom of expression! I didn't know that! Here's more about those extremists who so freely express their radical views on Islam:

The outcry against these extreme radicals may be universal but little could be done to contain them as they enjoy a free hand in inciting intolerance of Islam and Muslims under the pretext of freedom of expression. (7)

I hadn't realized that free expression was so dreadful -- not that the OIC or Muslims are actually against this dreadful practice in which people speak their minds:

Many distorted facts and ill conceived ideas about Islam continue to be accepted and justified despite the clear danger they represent in societies. These include the perception that Islam is linked to terror; that it is intolerant of other religious beliefs, that its values and practices are incompatible with modern democratic systems; that it favours repression of freedom of expression and undermining human rights and other misperceptions. (33)

The opinion that Islam favors repression of freedom of expression is wholly wrong! Freedom of expression is fine so long as it's not used to say anything negative about Islam. For instance, you wouldn't want to resort to free expression to link Islam to violence, though you might have been allowed to link Islamism to violence if the spelling weren't so close as to make people think of Islam, so just refer to those many violent misunderstanders of the Religion of Peace as "radical extremists," "insurgents," or even "youths," depending on the context.

You wouldn't want to lose your head over something as minor as the sanctity of free expression . . .

New Five-Star Amazon Review of The Bottomless Bottle of Beer

Amazon Books

A good two weeks have passed since my English Lounge reading from my novella, but the ripple effects perdure. A bit more notice. A few more sales. One online acquaintance was apparently thereby enticed to read it -- and reported back:

Kudos, Jeffery, on a very enjoyable and thought-provoking read.

Another acquaintance, my old Russian history professor Wallace L. Daniel, wrote me to say:

This is wonderful . . . . I have seen the illustrations, following them through the links . . . , and they certainly entice the reader. Also, I am glad you still find [the] Bulgakov [novel] appealing, especially since it is such a favorite of mine.

Moreover, another five-star customer review appeared on the Amazon site:

I read this book with much trepidation since I knew that the writer, a scholar of history and religion, would not/could not write a book without 'some meaning.' I was right! The novella contains many many allusions to Milton's Paradise Lost, biblical figures, historical facts and knowledge of good beer, the really good kind. Nonetheless, I enjoyed the novella because of the quirky characters and eloquent sentences that helped to mitigate my panic of being an ignoramus in biblical studies and Milton. By the end of the novella, I really wanted that bottomless bottle of beer, which I am certain, was not the author's intention. I think I would like to read it again upon more self study and perusals of some of the allusions Dr. Hodges used to get more out of this very meticulously written, but still good read of a book.

The reviewer writes as if an acquaintance of mine, but I can't quite place who this individual might be. I'll have to ask around.

Anyway, I've been hearing only positive remarks, though there will surely be readers who don't like my story . . .

Every Good Thing Must End . . .

Uncle Jang Song Thaek
Video at 8 minutes, 45 Seconds

Google Images

The current rumblings in North Korea over the party's purge of Jang Song Thaek, the uncle by marriage of the young North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un, are making even the North's ordinarily boring propaganda fascinating to read -- and even more fascinating to play around with, in the interest of truth, naturally, so let's keep in mind that we're reading about an uncle and his nephew:

"Report on Enlarged Meeting of Political Bureau of Central Committee of WPK (Workers Party of Korea)," Korea Central News Agency (KCNA), translated from Korean by Korea Open Source Project, Volume VI, Issue 238, December 10, 2013

In this historic period for carrying forward the revolutionary cause of Juche[,] the chance elements and alien elements who had made their ways into the party committed such anti-party, counter-revolutionary factional acts as expanding their forces through factional moves and daring [to] challenge the party, while attempting to undermine the unitary leadership of the party . . . . [T]he Political Bureau of the C.C. (Central Committee), the WPK, convened its enlarged meeting and discussed the issue related to the anti-party, counter-revolutionary factional acts committed by [Uncle] Jang Song Thaek . . . . [F]ully laid bare [were] the anti-party, counter-revolutionary factional acts of [Uncle] Jang Song Thaek and their harmfulness and reactionary nature . . . . The entire party, whole army and all people are dynamically advancing toward the final victory in the drive for the building of a thriving nation, meeting all challenges of history and resolutely foiling the desperate moves of the enemies of the revolution under the leadership of Kim Jong Un [nephew of Jang Song Thaek] . . . . The [Uncle] Jang Song Thaek group, however, committed such anti-party, counter-revolutionary factional acts as gnawing at the unity and cohesion of the party . . . . [Uncle] Jang pretended to uphold the party and leader but was engrossed in such factional acts as dreaming different dreams and . . . . behaving against the elementary sense of moral obligation and conscience as a human being . . . . [for Uncle] Jang desperately worked to form a faction within the party . . . . [and] tried to increase his force and build his base . . . . [Uncle] Jang and his followers did not sincerely accept the line and policies of the party . . . . The [Uncle] Jang group weakened the party's guidance . . . . Such acts are nothing but counter-revolutionary, unpopular criminal acts of giving up the class struggle and paralyzing the function of [the] popular democratic dictatorship [of Uncle Jang's nephew, Kim Jong Un], yielding to the offensive of the hostile forces to stifle the DPRK . . . . [Uncle] Jang seriously obstructed the nation's economic affairs and the improvement of the standard of people's living . . . . The [Uncle] Jang group put under its control the fields and units which play an important role in the nation's economic development and the improvement of people's living in a crafty manner, making . . . impossible for the economic guidance organs including the Cabinet to perform their roles[,] . . . . [thereby] throwing the state financial management system into confusion and committing such [an] act of treachery as selling off precious resources of the country at cheap prices, the [Uncle Jang] group made it impossible to carry out the behests of [his father-in-law] Kim Il Sung and [his brother-in-law] Kim Jong Il on developing the industries of Juche iron, Juche fertilizer and Juche vinalon . . . . [Uncle] Jang committed irregularities and corruption and led a dissolute and depraved life . . . . abusing his power, . . . [and having] improper relations with several women . . . . [Uncle] Jang and his followers committed criminal acts baffling imagination . . . [acts] perpetrated by the group of [Uncle] Jang Song Thaek . . . . Speakers bitterly criticized in unison the anti-party, counter-revolutionary factional acts committed by the [Uncle] Jang group and expressed their firm resolution to remain true to the idea and leadership of Kim Jong Un[, pure nephew of the corrupt Uncle Jang Song Thaek] . . . . The meeting adopted a decision of the Political Bureau of the Party Central Committee on relieving [Uncle] Jang of all posts, depriving him of all titles and expelling him and removing his name from the WPK [and his image from official photographs, of course] . . . . The party served warning[s] to [Uncle] Jang several times and dealt blows at him, watching his group's anti-party, counter-revolutionary factional acts[,] as it has been aware of them from long ago[, but try not to dwell on this point too much, as that might lead to groundless doubts about the party's superior wisdom]. But [anyway,] . . . [the Uncle Jang Song Thaek group] did not pay heed to [the party] . . . but went beyond [the] tolerance limit. That was why the party eliminated [Uncle] Jang and purged his group, unable to remain an onlooker to its acts any longer [-- but again, don't think about this point too deeply --] dealing telling blows at sectarian acts manifested within the party . . . . The discovery and purge of the [Uncle] Jang group, a modern day faction[,] . . . [has] made our party and revolutionary ranks purer . . . . No force on earth can deter our party, army[,] and people from dynamically advancing toward a final victory, single-mindedly united around [the pure] Kim Jong Un[, nephew of the corrupt Uncle Jang Song Thaek].

Family problems . . . (sigh) . . . every family has them. But there's a serious side to this, of course. The North might be growing unstable, motivating Kim Jong Un to distract everyone through serious provocations against South Korea.

Something to think about . . .

Jihadi Leader in Syria Prays for Peace

Sheik Saqr Al-Jihad
May Be Closer Than Appears
Memri

Short entry this morning on a prayer for peace in Syria by Sheik Saqr Al-Jihad:

Oh Lord blah blah blah make us victorious soon. blah blah blah Oh Lord blah blah blah Grant us victory. blah blah blah Oh Lord, we are not here because we love this world, but because we want to chop [the enemies'] heads off. blah blah blah

What? You see nothing peaceful in this prayer? Maybe you ought to have your own head examined? Get your brain washed? Have it infused with proper understanding of this sheik's spiritual position? Let me put it as succinctly as possible: If all enemies' heads get chopped off, there'll be perfect peace. You had better understand that. Or else you just might need to suffer an excess of peace yourself.

But you may have to be longsuffering in your wait for that perfect peace, for this prayer was raised to the heavens back in April, yet the good sheik still has enemies in Syria who have yet to lose their heads over his prayer and thus continue fighting him with heads attached firmly to necks.

I reckon they just don't believe in perfect peace.