Radica
NIKODINOVSKA
Ss
Cyril and Methodius University – Skopje,
Macedonia
The
Beginnings of Macedonian and Korean modern poetry :
Despite the huge distance between Macedonia and South
Korea and their different spiritual, historical, cultural, linguistic and other
traditions, still, in some spots of their historical passage these two
different people share a common destiny, being in different periods, part of a
great empires (the Ottoman, the Serbian, the Bulgarian, the Byzantine Empire
for the Macedonian people and the Empire of Japan for the Korean people).
The aim of this paper is
to give a brief comparison between the beginnings of Macedonian and Korean modern
poetry through the analysis of the work and personality of two poets, the
Macedonian poet Kočo Racin and the Korean poet Kim So-Wol. My choice of these poets is based on the period of time in which
they lived and wrote poetry, which is the beginning of the 20th
century, the period before the Second World War.
Before the analysis of the work and the contribution that the both aforementioned poets had given in
the affirmation of the modern poetry, we’ll make a brief review of the language
and literary circumstances in Macedonia and Korea in the mentioned period.
The Beginnings of Macedonian modern poetry
The question of a
literary standard of macedonian language was first considered in the 1850. The unfavorable
historical circumstances at the time did not provide opportunities for
accomplishing more in the building of a Macedonian literary standard. A
significant contribution to the analysis of this question was made by Krste P.
Misirkov's book "On Macedonian Matters" (1903), which was a kind of
synthesis of all previous attempts at establishing Macedonian literacy, and
pointed to the possible subsequent directions in the national and cultural
development of the Macedonian people, where Misirkov considers the
establishment of a Macedonian literary standard a task of prime importance. In
the 1930s, literary activity in Macedonian gained new strength.[2]
The process was hampered by the ban on the use of the Macedonian language in
public life. The Macedonian language was proclaimed the official language of
the Republic of Macedonia during the war, at the First Session of the
Antifascist Assembly of 'the National Liberation of Macedonia, held on August
2, 1944, in the Monastery of St. Prohor of Pčinja.
Its standardization was completed with the adoption of the alphabet (May 3,
1945) and the orthography (June 7, 1945) on the proposal of the Language and
Orthography Commission. In the years of its free life which followed it swiftly
grew into a fully-formed modern standard literary language.
Macedonian literature
The
earliest Macedonian literature, in the medieval period, was religious and
Orthodox Christian. After the decline of the Ottoman Empire (1913) came Serbian rule in 1913, the Serbs
officially denied Macedonian distinctiveness, considering the Macedonian
language merely a dialect of Serbo-Croatian. Despite these drawbacks, some
progress was made toward the foundation of a national language and literature,
in particular by Krste P. Misirkov in his Za Makedonskite raboti ( “On Macedonian Matters”, 1903) and in the literary periodical Vardar
(established 1905). These efforts were continued after I World War by Kočo
Racin, who wrote mainly poetry in Macedonian and propagated its use through the
literary journals of the 1930. Racin’s poems in Beli mugri (1939; White
Dawns), which include many elements of oral folk poetry, were prohibited by
the government of pre-World War II Yugoslavia because of their realistic and powerful
portrayal of the exploited and impoverished Macedonian people. Some writers worked
and published abroad because of political pressure. The Macedonian
language was not officially recognized until the establishment of Macedonia as
a constituent republic of Yugoslavia. With this new freedom to write and
publish in its own language, Macedonia produced many literary figures in the
postwar period.
The Macedonian Academy of Sciences and Arts divides
Macedonian literature into three large periods, which are subdivided into
additional ones. The periods of the Macedonian literature are:
- Old Macedonian
literature - 9 to 18 c.
-
From introduction of the Christianity till the Turkish
invasion - 9 to 14 c.
-
From Turkish invasion till the beginning of the 18 c.
- New Macedonian
literature - 1802 to 1944
-
period of national awakening
-
revolutionary period
-
inter-war literary period
- Modern
Macedonian literature - 1944 – today
Kočo Racin- the founder of the new
macedonian poetry
Kosta Apostolov
Solev (1908-1943), known in the
macedonian literature as Kočo Racin is considered the founder of the new
macedonian poetry. He was born in Veles, in the family
of poor potter who could not support Racin financially in his education. Racin
finished just one year in the local high school at the age of thirteen, and
then worked in his father's pottery workshop.
In 1924 he took part in the progressive communist movement. In November 1933 started to issue the monthly
newspaper "Iskra" (Spark), whose editor was Racin.
Racin was expelled from the party because of the critical speech
about the work of the Yugoslav communist party in Macedonia. In the spring
1943, he went to the Partisans. On the night of 13 June 1943, when he was going
back from the Partisan printing house on the mountain Lopušnik, he was mortally shot by the printing-house
entrance guard. There are two theories about his death. According to the first,
it was an accident: Racin was born with some hearing defect, so he may not have
heard the guard's call to stop and identify himself. According to the second
version, Racin was murdered.
His literary work is
of vital importance in a period so decisive for the history of the Macedonian
people, the period between the two world wars and revolution, during which he
were laid the foundations of the contemporary Macedonian history. Following the
only way historically correct, and always close to the current problems of his
time, Racin is one of those who first began to write new pages of macedonian
present. The poetry collection White
Dawns, published in 1939 (Zagreb), in macedonian,
is the most important Racin's work. The book, although forbidden, was secretly
spread among the people and had a big revolutionary impact. With this
collection and other works, the period from 1936 to 1940 is the most important
and most productive period in Racin's short life.
Particularly
important is the role of Racin in the formation of the contemporary Macedonian
literary language.
Racin's poetry
announces a whole new world of sensations and ideas, new conceptions of life
and, above all, a sensitivity qualitatively new, modern. This is the decisive
factor that differentiates the poetry of Racin from lyrical folk, from his
world of the past and also by its expression, a factor that puts Racin at the
head of a new literary period. Racin is the bard of his time and his people,
addressed to all the phenomens of his life, with a refined sensibility to
understand its most serious problems, the problems of a troubled social and
national existence. We can see in him a poet with distinctly combative,
revolutionary social vision in which opens the prospect of a human world of
universal humanity.
The focus of the poet whose exploitation is carried out with tobacco growers, workers in the tobacco
factories, the laborers, and even the phenomen of emigration, which forced
farmers to seek work and bread in distant lands.
The author of White Dawns (Beli Mugri) is the first Macedonian poet before
the war that went deep into the reality of his people. The problem of the
center of his poetry and his prose is the harsh social and national position of
the Macedonian people, the main character is the people of the "black
labor". The poet is full of indignation against the perpetrators of this
inhuman situation.
Despite all these social content strongly emphasized, Racin's poems
are characterized by a subtle and refined lyricism. The poem Lenka
from White Dawns even today is considered one
of the deepest and most sincere lyrical creations of the whole Macedonian
poetry.
The modern Korean poetry
Korea is a country with a
rich literary tradition and literature plays an important role in korean
society[3].
The history of modern korean literature has been influenced by the efforts and counter
efforts during the closing decades of the nineteenth century and first decade
of the twentieth to institute reforms in Korea that would enable it to survive
and prosper in the world (the Enlightenment Period), by the annexation of Korea
as a Japanese colony in 1910 and the installation of the colonial regime until
Korea’s liberation in 1945 and by the beginning of a state of division wich has
lasted until the present.
From
the annexation in 1910 until the japanese defeat at the end of World War II, korean
literature was produced under conflicted circumstances. While the colonial
government censored publications and imposed its policies on the education
system, many of Korea’s youth who had gone off the Japan to study encountered
new ideas and news of the world, read japanese translations of foreign literary
works, and even engaged in activities that led to the 1919 Declaration of
Korean Independence.
Modern Korean literature
gradually developed under the influence of Western cultural contacts based on
trade and economic development.
According Christine
Han[4] the
modern Korean poetry does not keep to one unique style and in fact has a wide
range in subject, tone, poetic shape, and perspective. The poets such as Kim
Sowǒl is also positioned in Korean literature with the national
history, as he is often understood through historical events or processes such
as colonialism.
Kim So-Wol
The
poet Kim So-Wol
(1902 – 1934)
was born in Kusong, North Pyongan Province and attended the progressive Osan
middle School, where he met the teacher and literary mentor Kim Ok. He went to
Paejae Academy in Seoul and then briefly to Tokio Commercial College before
returning to Seoul for a brief try at the literary life. After the publication of his book Azaleas, in 1925, he abandoned the
literary scene, returned to Namsi to run the branch office of the Tonga Daily
newspaper, fell into increasingly destructive drinking and died of an opium
overdose or possibly a suicide. Kim So-Wol's personal life also was not happy
because he was married to a girl selected by his family. The girl whom he loved
was also forcibly married and soon died. This sad story became the topic of one
of Kim's best poems.
Originally published
in 1925, Azaleas is the only collection produced by Kim So-Wol. The
verses he
wrote announce the birth of modern Korean poetry. So-Wol's poems are important for their
lyrical elegance, their folksong themes of loneliness and separation, and their
stunning command of the expressive possibilities of the Korean language.
Kim
So-Wol will be always remembered as Korea's first modern poet, the master of
subtle and delicate verses. His tragic life was typical for many of his peers,
the founders of modern Korean literature who lived in the 1920s and 1930s and write
great poems.[5]
In order to make closer to the Macedonian reader
the beautiful poem Azaleas written by Kim So-Wool
we’ve made a free translation from french into macedonian language with the hope that our University will create
in the near future translators for the korean language.
|
Kočo Racin
|
Kim So-Wol
|
|
Lenka
|
Azalei
|
|
Since Lenka left
a blouse of fine linen
unfinished on her loom
to go to her clogs to sort
tobacco in the factory,
her face has changed,
her eyebrows fallen,
her lips tight drawn.
Lenka was not born
for that accursed
tobacco!
Tobacco-gilded poison
for her breast-pink
garlands.
The first year passed
a load lay on her heart;
the second year went by
sickness tore her breast.
The third year the earth
covered Lenka's body.
At night when the moon
wraps her grave in silk,
the breeze above her
sadly warfs sorrow:
"Why was it left
unwoven that blouse?
The blouse was for your dowry
..."
|
Koga najposle, izmoren od mene,
ќe posakaš da si zamineš
znaj deka bez zbor
ќe te puštam da si odiš,
bez zbor i prezbor,
bez nikakva vreva.
Na ridot Jongpjon ќe se kačam,
cvetovi od azalea ќe naberam,
kitki alovi cveќinja,
patot po koj vrviš
so niv ќe go postelam.
Pa, togaš odi, so čekor baven
Gazejќi gi cveќinjata što pred tvoite noze
Ќe gi gledaš, dodeka me napuštaš.
I na kraj, koga ќe si zamineš
Zasiten od mene,
Znaj deka nitu edna solza
Za mojot život da proronam nema..
(Free translation
from french into macedonian by Radica Nikodinovska.)
|
From
the analysis given above it can be concluded that the macedonian
poet Kočo Racin and the korean poet Kim So-Wol have the following aspects in common:
- founders of the new modern poetry in Macedonia
and in Korea;
- short life and unresolved tragic
end;
- life
and suffering under foreign domination;
- continuation
of the folk poetical thread based on the tradition of the Macedonian and Korean
folk song;
- tragic and
patriotic motives (in Racin expressed in
an explicit way, in So-Wol implicitly);
- subtle and refined lyricism;
- command of the
expressive possibilities of respective languages;
- the most beloved and popular poets
(in Macedonia and in Korea).
As already mentioned in the introduction of this paper, despite the huge distance between Macedonia and
South Korea and their differences, these two different people share
certain periods of their existence, and a same destiny, that are reflected in
the poetic opus of Kočo Racin and Kim
So-Wol. We believe that there are many
more things that bond these two countries which are yet to be discovered.
2.
Han, Christine,
Translating modern korean poetry: Aesthetic nationalism and the history of
emotions, Columbia East Asia Review,
Columbia University, 2008.
3.
Hunggui, Kim, Understending koeran literature, East
Gate book, 1997.
4.
Lankov, A. The Dawn
of Modern Korea, EunHaeng NaMu publishing, 2008.
5. McCann, David R. (2001) "Korea the
Colony and the Poet Sowôl." In War, Occupation, and Creativity: Japan
and East Asia, 1920–1960, edited by Marlene J. Mayo and J. Thomas Rimer.
Honolulu, HI: University of Hawaii Press.
6.
Macedonian poetry in the world, Edicija
Relaciji, Dijalog, 2002, Skopje.
8.
The Macedonian poetry in the 19th and
20th century.
9.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kočo_Racin
11.
Hŭng-gyu Kim,Robert Fouser, Understanding
Korean literature, M.E. Sharpe, 1997
12.
Kichung Kim, An introduction
to classical Korean literature: from hyangga to pʻansori, M.E. Sharpe, 1996.
13. http://koreanpoetry.homestead.com/
14. http://hompi.sogang.ac.kr/anthony/2004Poetry.htm
15. http://www.asianinfo.org/asianinfo/korea/literature.htm
16. http://www.changbi.com/english/related/related3_1.asp
18. www.thefreelibrary.com
19. Конески, Б., Македонскиот 19. век, јазични и книжевно-историски
прилози,
Култура, 1986, Скопје.
20. Силјан, Р. Огледи за македонската поезија, Матица македонска,
2010 (Скопје : Графостил).
21. Рацин, Кочо, Бели мугри, Панили,
Скопје, 2006.
[1] This research is supported by the 2011 research grant from the
Academy of Korean Studies, Korea (Overseas
Korean Studies Incubation Program, AKS-2010-ANC-3102).
[2] www.gate.net/.../Macedonian_language_MANU
[3] Kim Hunggui, Understending
koeran literature, East Gate book, 1997.
[4] Translating modern korean poetry: Aesthetic
nationalism and the history of emotions, Columbia
East Asia Review, Columbia University, 2008.
[5] Lankov, A. The Dawn of Modern Korea, EunHaeng
NaMu publishing, 2008.
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