Buckwheat Flowers Reminiscent of Lee Hyo-seok

There are countless beautiful words in the Korean lexicon, but the following passage is cited as one of the most wonderful writings in the history of Korean literature.

At the moment they are walking through a mountainside. You could almost hear and grasp the beastly breathing of the moon, and the leaves of beans and corns are drenched with the bluish hue of the moonlight. There are buckwheat fields all around the mountainside. The buckwheat flowers have just started to blossom. It looks like someone had sprinkled salt all over the fields and the view is breathtaking under the moonlight.

The poetic description of a 27-kilometer road from Bongpyeong(봉평) to Daehwa(대화) is found in the short story entitled , which is believed to have upgraded Korean literature to a higher level, winning the hearts of many Korean readers. In Bongpyeong, the main setting of the story, a buckwheat-themed festival takes place every year. The story was written by the gifted author Lee Hyo-seok.

Who is Lee Hyo-seok?

Born in Bongpyeong, Pyeongchang County in Gangwon Province on February 23rd, 1907, Lee Hyo-seok grew up in a noble family in the mountain village. In 1914, he entered Pyeongchang Public Elementary School, which was 40 kilometers away from his home. The young boy walked such a considerable distance every day as it was common to walk or use carts as transportation when traveling at the time. While walking between Bongpyeong and Pyeongchang, which later became the setting of his story , he was able to come in contact with nature.

Lee had a reputation as a brilliant student in school. He entered Gyeongseong Jeil(경성 제일) Academy in 1920. He was absorbed in reading Russian novels written by Tolstoy, Turgenev and Chekhov and began to show interest in writing while forming a friendship with Yu Jin-o(유진오), who was Lee’s senior by one year and later became a novelist and legal scholar.

Lee graduated with honors from the academy in 1925 and enrolled in Gyeongseong Imperial University. He published a story to begin to walk the path of a writer. While in university in 1928, he published his short story on the magazine『Light of Korea』to start his literary career.

He showed sympathy towards proletarian literature for some time and published works such as , . He got a job as an English teacher at Gyeongseong Agriculture School in 1932. In line with a change in his personal life, his works began to change as well. In 1933, Lee joined the Group of Nine or Guinhoe(구인회), which was a literary society advocating pure literature. From then on, Lee began to pursue aesthetics and pure literature, which eventually shaped Lee’s true character.

From Criticizing Reality to Exploring Nature and Indigenous Themes

Lee published about ten short stories and a number of prose works every year, including the 1933 story , which revolves around a poor young farmer who loves a girl named Buni(분이). He soon attained fame by expressing the indigenous Korean sentiment with lyrical beauty. In 1936, he assumed the post of professor at Soongsil(숭실) College and published , which is touted as one of the best Korean short stories. With this work, Lee was called a writer who inspires readers with the most aesthetic elements of pure literature. While reading his stories, many are often captivated by his poetic descriptions.

The bent mountain ridge is the back of a lying bull, and the leaves of white poplar trees, shivering constantly even without wind, are the breath of the mountain.

This phrase is part of Lee’s short story . He made his sentences beautiful with poetic expressions, and their unique emotional resonance lingers in the minds of readers for a long time. Lee was born in nature and grew up in nature. For him, seeking a lyrical, pure soul was as natural as breathing. It was also the reflection of a deep sense of loss for a spiritual homeland of the writer, who lived through the Japanese colonial period.

At 36, the Star of Literature Falls

Lee was prolific writer, publishing his works in newspapers, literary magazines and monthly journals. Unfortunately, he was stricken with a disease after he lost his wife and second son one after another in 1940. He struggled with illness and eventually died on May 25th, 1942. He was 36.

But Lee did leave his mark in the Korean literary community, as a complete collection of his works was published three times after his death. His short stories full of lyricism, such as and as well as his essays, including and have been included many times in Korean language textbooks for middle and high schools since 1948. No doubt, the name of Lee Hyo-seok pops to our mind first when thinking of great authors of modern Korean short stories.