Century of the Tiger: One Hundred Years of Korean Culture in America commemorates the hundredth anniversary of Korean immigration to the United States. Included are some of the best and most eloquent Korean poets and prose writers in Korea and America; together with visual artists, they bring to life the dramatic, complex, and largely untold story of the Korean American experience. Editors are Jenny Ryun Foster, Frank Stewart, and Heinz Insu Fenkl, and designers are Hawai‘i’s nationally renowned graphic artists Elsa Carl and Clarence Lee.

Century of the Tiger is printed in a large format and has full color throughout. The book’s 260 pages include reproductions of Korean art pieces, many from the collection of the Honolulu Academy of Arts; reproductions of pieces by contemporary Korean American artists Karen Hong, Ezekiel Chihye Hwang, Kloe Sookhee Kang, Diane Chongmin Kim, Grace Kim, Jinja Kim, Colleen Kimura, Chang-Jin Lee, Sandra Sunnyo Lee, Mary Long, Naomi Long, and Kwang Kyu Yi; and stunning color images of Korea by Hawai‘i photographer Tom Haar.

Century of the Tiger is a special publication of MANOA. Subscribers are receiving the volume as part of their subscription at no extra cost. Single copies may be purchased for $24.95 (soft cover) and $45 (hard cover).

Other web pages on this book are:

Chapter one, “Land of Morning Calm,” summarizes the cultural history of Korea, including the country’s many innovations in science and technology and its artistic achievements. It also provides readers with the context in which Koreans began to leave their country for America. The chapter features excerpts from the novels of Younghill Kang, the first Korean American writer. Having participated in the March first demonstration of 1919 and been pursued by Japanese police through China and Russia, Kang immigrated to North America at age twenty-one. Awarded a graduate degree by Harvard University in 1927, he was celebrated in the U.S. for his writing and his strong advocacy on behalf of Koreans and Korean nationalism.

Chapter two, “Sailing to the Garden of Mugunghwa,” tells the story of the first wave of Korean immigrant workers, most of whom settled in Hawai‘i. The remainder continued on to the West Coast. Writers in this chapter include Mary Paik Lee and Morris Pang.

Chapter three, “Manse!” recalls the nationalist movement, in which Koreans at home and abroad attempted to free their country from Japanese occupation. The movement not only created strong bonds among Korean immigrants, but also tragic splits as groups disagreed over the best strategies. Authors in this chapter include Margaret K. Pai and Richard Kim, as well as Korean poets Kim Sowol, Yi Sang-hwa, Sim Hun, and Yun Dongju.

Chapter four, “War and Liberation,” brings to life the turbulent years from 1941 to 1953. Many Koreans were hopeful that Japan’s defeat would lead to freedom for the homeland. In 1950, however, a bitter civil war erupted in Korea; after a three-year conflict, the country was devastated and thousands of families were divided. The writers in this chapter include novelist Kim Ronyoung, a daughter of the second generation who was born in Los Angeles. Like many of the parents of Kim’s generation, her mother was an activist in the Korean independence movement and devoted time and money to nationalist causes. Other writers in this chapter include Gary Pak, K. Connie Kang, Chris McKinney, Hwang Sun-won, Walter K. Lew, So Chongju, and Chon Sangpyong.

Chapter five, “New Arrivals in a Changed America,” brings readers to the present. In the second half of the twentieth century, Korean immigrants came to the U.S. in greater numbers and acquired new rights of U.S. citizenship, increasing the Korean American population to over one million. The chapter includes contemporary fiction writers Chang-Rae Lee, Caroline Jeong-Mee Kim, June Unjoo Yang, Ha-yun Jung, and Don Lee. Featured poets include Sue Kwock Kim, Ishle Yi Park, Naomi Long, Ok-Koo Kang Grosjean, and Kim Yangshik.

MANOA also featured writers from Korea in 1990, 1996, and 1999. The 1996 volume was supported by grants from the Samsung Foundation. See our backlist for information on these issues.

Century of the Tiger: One Hundred
Years of Korean Culture in America 1903–2003
Winter 2002 (vol. 14, no. 2)
cloth and paper, 256 pages

(Tiger image is from a painting
in the National Museum of Korea)

 

 

Detail of Exile
Photograph by Naomi Long

"Mahmi played solitaire with her small flower cards while I read a pulp novel I had shoplifted from the PX.

'What's that you're looking at?'

I showed her the cover of the latest installment in the Doc Savage series: the Man of Bronze in his tattered shirt and jodhpurs, his exposed torso gleaming with sweat and blood, his fists clenched, his face rugged like a slightly roughhewn Greek god.

Mahmi looked at the illustration and turned the book over to see the back cover, holding my place open with a finger. 'You're reading this because he looks like Daeri?'

'Ungh?' I said. I took the book back and examined it more carefully. On the color cover, Doc Savage's white-blond skullcap of hair and the creases on his face gave him a passing resemblance to my father, which I had never noticed; but the small portrait of him on the back was in black-and-white, and that older face, with its particular grimness, looked uncannily like my father when he was brooding.

'How could you not notice? It must be because you've ruined your eyes from all that reading. Let's get to sleep.'

'Can I read one more chapter?'

'Let's sleep when I've finished this round, ungh? You should start getting up earlier.' She slapped another card down on a column. It was the rain card: a man with an umbrella under black jags of what looked like seaweed, and a small toad-like thing running in the lower corner. 'That look on the man's face,' she said, 'it's like he could stab you with his eyes.'"

—from "One Big Word"
by Heinz Insu Fenkl

Details of Eloise and Maryand Papers I
Photographs by Naomi Long

About the guest editors: Jenny Ryun Foster was adopted from Korea in 1974. She has studied Korean literature, shamanism, and folklore in the United States and Korea. A fiction writer, she works as a librarian in Honolulu.

Heinz Insu Fenkl was born in Inch'on, Korea, in 1960 and came to America with his parents when he was twelve. A writer, translator, and former Fulbright scholar, he directs the creative writing program at the State University of New York in New Paltz. His autobiographical novel, Memories of My Ghost Brother, is about the coming-of-age of an Amerasian in Korea.