The Square

Description

Set just before the Korean War, this ground-breaking classic of Korean modernism tackles the shattering effect of Korea’s national division. Following its protagonist as he travels to the North, hoping to escape what he sees as the South’s repressive right-wing regime, it sees him dismayed by an equally destructive adherence to ideology in the so-called worker’s paradise.

A dark and complex story of the way ideology can destroy the individual, Choi In-hun’s investigation of his country’s partition into two diametrically opposed polities implies both communism and capitalism are pernicious and externally acquired infections.

“An exceptional work that offers a new perspective on the Korean War as well as a noteworthy starting point for the third generation of Korean War literature.” —Koreana