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Red Sword
"Red Sword" by Bora Chung, book-launch, Seoul: May 3, 2025 -- UPDATE: Now with event-report
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It was far over-capacity. A great success, I think, for the author, translator, and publisher alike.
We had around 15 members of our Korean Literature Club in attendance, and I think several others invited by our members. It was really hard to see everyone. Total attendance was, by my attempt at a person-counting estimate, around 150 people.
I may post here on GoodReads, when I have time, my account of the Red Sword book-launch. A preliminary version of which I sent to our Kakao-chat group, but this is really a better venue for such writing.
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UPDATE, May 7: I've now posted the event-report. See: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
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"Red Sword" Bora Chung - Author's Note: historical background and motivation (my translation)
https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
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REPORT ON THE BOOK-LAUNCH WITH BORA CHUNG AND ANTON HUR
I made some notes about what was said at the Red Sword book-launch event (May 3, 2025) -- by Bora Chung (author), Anton Hur (translator), and Taylor Bradley (host; connected with the publisher, Honford Star).
I'll give highlights here based on my notes and what I remember.
I think 15 to 20 people associated with the RAS Korean Literature Club attended. Of around 140-150 total attendees (by my attempt at counting). Others' memories or impressions may differ from mine. But here's what I have:
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Bora Chung and Anton Hur are both authors and translators. Both do each thing.
These days Bora Chung seems to want to identify as primarily a translator of Russian and Polish literature into Korean. There are not many who do (can do) translation of literature from Russian and Polish into Korean. Not at her level of skill, ability, or qualification.
Bora Chung's reputation in this area even got someone recently (she said) to plead with her to do a Czech translation into Korean. "I don't speak Czech!" They didn't accept her explanation; Czech is close enough to Polish. They need her. She agreed.
Bora gives the impression of not being comfortable with her "star"-status and success since 《Cursed Bunny》a few years ago. In its way, this is a charming part of her character. Several people said things like that afterward. Some would call it authentic.
Bora revealed that she has also just finished (this week) translating into Korean Anton Hur's recent novel, 《Toward Eternity》 (or possibly a different one, I assume it is Toward Eternity). Anton Hur wrote that novel in English (published, July 2024).
Anton Hur is quite a personality. His personality or "stage persona" contrasts with Bora's, There is a "siblings teasing each other" nature to their interactions.
Bora and Anton are both cases of "international people." Or, maybe better stated, they are "transnational people." Both are Koreans by origin but have substantial ties to, and influences from, elsewhere. It is a perfect symbol of these influences that Bora signs her name in a style combining multiple alphabets (Cyrillic and Hanja-Chinese).
Bora is more Korean-language oriented, Anton is more English-language- and US-oriented. For Anton, I got the US-orientation impression from his way of speaking and "persona". He does have other major influences and flourishes, though. I noticed he signs the date in European style on the books he signed: "03 May 2025"; ordinary Americans would write "May 3, 2025."
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Naturally, a lot of talk during the event went towards the challenges of translation. A topic of fascination for many of those who have ever tried it or gotten near it. Everyone has their own opinions on different approaches.
Anton stressed that "translation" is much harder than "writing." In other words, producing good translations even into one's native language is much harder, and more time-consuming, than producing good writing in one's dominant or native language.
Anton made some interesting comments on how he prefers English as a language for literary production or consumption. He likes the relative liberty of English. He says English has less pressure to follow strict rules embedded in the language than Korean. Anton stressed, at one point, how "no one" writes (or speaks?) "perfect Korean." Really the only ones who use perfect Korean are highly trained, script-writing and script-reading people who appear on TV news.
Koreans, Anton said, tend to look on the Korean Language as an intimidating giant, with an Official Right Way To Do Things. Those writing or working in English simply don't have this idea. He said Korean is a "highly normative language."
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Anton Hur specified the year 2022 as the time things really exploded for Korean literature in translation. For him, but maybe in general.
Anton had been active in freelance translation work since the early 2000s (he is b.1981; he started with small projects in college). Finally, in 2022, he began getting big requests for translations from publishers, at a rate of requests that he could hardly keep up with. This continues in 2025 and 2026. He said his instinct was always been to accept every job offered. This has stretched him to the limit in the past few years.
The upward swing of interest in Korean literature in translation can be traced earlier than 2022, probably especially in the five or so years before 2022. That includes the great success of 《Cursed Bunny》by the same team here (stories by Bora Chung; translated by Anton Hur). 《Cursed Bunny》 was released in July 2021, also by Honford Star.
Event host Taylor Bradley, who is a co-founder of Honford Star, and the Korea agent for Honford Star, mentioned during the Q&A that 《Cursed Bunny》 really was the breakthrough for them. The book's success jumpstarted Honford Star into relatively big-player publishing status, in Korean-to-English translated literature. Success has continued since then.
Anton Hur spoke a little about the origin of the 《Cursed Bunny》 translation in English. (The Korean edition had been published back in March 2017 (?), by Arzak Publishing. Arzak (아작) was a then-small, obscure science-fiction "SF" press in Seoul.)
Around 2019, Anton Hur says he was hanging around a book fair in Korea, when he saw the Cursed Bunny book. He was impressed by it, and approached the publisher then and there to inquire about an English-translation possibility -- and suggested that he, Anton Hur, could be the one to do it. This, ca.2019, was before anyone quite had the idea of a coming sustained wave of interest in Korean literature-in-translation.
(The Korean publisher Arzak, before 2020, looks to have thought of itself mainly as a vehicle to translate foreign science-fiction into Korean. Before 2020 they had a small handful of original-Korean-language books. 《Cursed Bunny》(although it is not quite fully sci-fi in my opinion), is the second-ever original-Korean book Arzak published.)
The publisher, as Anton told the story, was highly skeptical. "This guy is asking about translating this into English? What the heck? Is he a scam-artist, or what?" That was the publisher's attitude towards Anton, as he remembered it. (I'm sure he dramatically embellished a little, for effect.)
The publisher readily gave the rights to publish; Anton Hur eventually found Honford Star; and the book came out--to unexpected success. That was 2021. 《Cursed Bunny》 got nominated for the International Booker Prize (May 2022; finalist but not winner).
In early 2022, the RAS Korean Literature Club, then co-led by Jenny Byun and Brother Anthony, read and discussed Cursed Bunny. Notably, that was BEFORE the Booker Prizefinalist announcement. (Jenny attended the May 3 book-launch event; many enjoyed talking with her after her long absence.)
Bora Chung characteristically, I think) said: Hey, there is always a dark side to success. As proof she wryly delivered the news of how she got "Covid" during her in-person attendance at the International Booker Prize gala in 2022.
Covid or not, Anton stressed again how big a deal the Booker Prize nomination was for him. Yes, he got more work, but there's more: This year, he was even recently asked to be a Booker Prize judge! The host asked him for insights. Anton said he'd love to, except that he's banned from talking about it until 2045.
As for 《Red Sword》, Anton said it was relatively easy to do a second book by the same author (and actually this is his third, counting "Your Utopia"). He's picked up a lot on Bora's style. Their collaboration will continue. They teased each other many times.
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Bora said she was a university lecturer for 12 years. It seems she is no longer actively teaching. She is a full-time translator and writer etc.
In the mid-2010s, she was teaching classes related to all aspects of Russia. She is a Russia specialist as well as a literature specialist.
In any case, one of her courses dealt with early contacts between Russia(ns) and Korea(ns). The period of regular contact dates to the 1860s, but for this course one of the centerpieces was these clashes of the 1650s. 《Red Sword》 is said to partially be an allegory, or "sci-fi retelling," of those China/Korea/Russia clashes.
Bora said she was delighted to find that there was a literary tradition connected with these 1650s clashes. Around fifty or sixty years after the battles, a Korean produced a novel based on the events. There is also a detailed diary of the campaign by a Korean. This was too compelling, to her, not to write about it. The idea was born, and she mixed it with her interest in science-fiction.
Other inspirations for 《Red Sword》 include Bora's interest in sword-fighting (Kendo) and her experience during the Sewol Ferry Disaster protests of 2014-15. She used those experiences to give a realism to the battle scenes in 《Red Sword》.
Bora mentioned one scene. April 2015: She, a hardcore protestor at the time, was among a group that got surrounded by police buses. The buses arrived deliberately surrounded a core-group to clear them away. The buses blocked-out the Sun, like walls closing in. It sounded ominous, even scifi-like to hear her relate the memory of that confrontation.
See also, my translation of her Author's Note:
https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
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Anton said he and/or others had been pushing for 《Red Sword》 soon after 《Cursed Bunny》 gained success in 2021-22.
In the meantime, since spring 2022, the world has been weighed down by the tragic drama of the Russia-Ukraine War. One attendee asked about this similarity, but especially the surprise development of North Korean military forces being sent to fight against the Ukrainians. There seemed to be a strong parallel, in this attendee's mind, between the 《Red Sword》 plot and these recent events.
Bora dismissed the idea: she wrote the book in 2017-18, and had in mind the 1650s, for story outline, and mid-2010s from her personal experience. Similarity with the Ukraine-Russia war of the mid-2020s is a coincidence. She said themes of "imperialism" are relevant to many eras. But the sci-fi outer-space "empire" in the novel is an allegory for Ch'ing-China.
Bora cultivates the persona of an activist. She didn't know if she could make the event, she explained once, because a few days earlier she had turned herself in to the police. What?! She went on: She'd joined an illegal protest staged, over something, by radical Buddhist monks in 2021 (?). Some were arrested; she was among those who escaped.
Bora said her conscience finally compelled her to turn herself in.
Host Taylor Bradley suggested that if Bora had to be arrested, could they request the police do it during the book-launch? Now that would be most-excellent publicity. (Lots of laughs at this.) --- Bora said she felt "almost disappointed": the police turned her away, declining to arrest her.
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On the topic of Korean science-fiction (SF): as a genre it only began emerging into its own in the 2020s. It had hardly existed even into the late 2010s. Bora said her students, in the 2010s, were usually unaware that sci-fi literature existed at all in Korean (not translations)! (Bora herself counts as one of the pioneers of its recent breakthrough.)
Anton recommended the magazine Korean Literature Now's Summer 2024 edition. That issue had several feature-articles on the rise of Korean science-fiction.
(I have seen that the Summer 2024 edition of the influential Munhak-Dongnae magazine also had feature-articles on the topic: "The Fictionalization of Science and the Scientification of Fiction" ["과학의 픽션화; 픽션의 과학화," 《문학동네》 No.119, 2024년여름].)
Red Sword is highly relevant on ongoing literary trends in Korea (and Korean literature-in-translation).
That takes me to the end of my notes. Thanks for reading 👍.
The RAS Korean Literature Club
Books mentioned in this topic
Toward Eternity (other topics)Your Utopia (other topics)
UPDATE, May 7: See my "event report": https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
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(The following info was posted to our Kakao-chat group. Those who are members of this GoodReads group and NOT of the Kakao group, and who WANT to be part of the Kakao chat-group: Feel free to contact me about it and I'll add you.)
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*** BOOK LAUNCH for RED SWORD novel ***
HOST: Honford Star (publisher), with Bora Chung and Anton Hur.
BOOK:《Red Sword》, by Bora Chung (translator: Anton Hur), May 2025. Published originally in Korean in 2019 as 《불은 칼》.
[Book Launch Event]
DATE: Saturday, May 3, 2025
TIME: 4pm -- 5:30pm
VENUE: "Platform P" 2F, Hongdae Station Exits 4 & 7 (near AK Plaza).
Address in Hangul:
- 마포구 신촌로2길19
- 마포출판문화진흥센터 2F
--- Note on addresses: These are the same addresses expressed differently. Korea is notorious for being loose with the concept of "street addresses" such that most people cannot name their own street address and so forth, and in many cases don't even know street names. Naver Maps works in both cases. Google Maps unfortunately gives the wrong "pin drop" for the first address, but the right "pin drop" for the second (the name of the building).
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※ ※ ※ Invitation ※ ※ ※
Honford Star invites RAS Korean Literature Club members to attend, free of charge. (Books will be for sale.)
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See also: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/red-sw...
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The RAS Korean Literature Club will read and discuss the Red Sword novel for our June 2025 session.
Red Sword is a science-fiction novel with a certain Korean historical twist, and the influence of its author, Bora Chung. (The club read Bora Chung's short-story collection "Cursed Bunny" in 2022.)
Before the 2020s, there was very little market for science-fiction by Korean audiences and very little was produced or found fertile fields of readerships.
Red Sword will be one of the few true "science fiction" books ever tackled by this group since its founding back in 2011-2012. (Back in the early 2010s, the launch of a Korean-to-English translation of a science-fiction book gaining thus much attention would have been hard to imagine, and really more like "impossible to imagine.")
In any case, for those who see this and are in Seoul on Saturday May 3, join if you can. If you can't join, you can still get on board to read the book and join the June 2025 session! It seems the Red Sword book will be in bookstores imminently.
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UPDATE, May 7: See my "event report": https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...