Book Reviews, Korea

Twisted Sister?

Not much is known about Kim Yo Jong, the younger sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un. She might have been born in 1987 or perhaps 1989. She studied in Switzerland as a child, along with her brother, but no one has reported on her studies there or whether she developed a love of… Continue reading Twisted Sister?

Book Reviews, Korea

Flower Swallows Sing (Review)

In the late 1950s, when he was in prison and expecting to be executed, the South Korean poet Ko Un vowed that if he lived, he would write a poem about every person that he’d ever met. This monumental project, Ten Thousand Lives, grew to 30 volumes. In memorializing people who might otherwise be forgotten… Continue reading Flower Swallows Sing (Review)

Book Reviews, Human Rights, Korea

Dying for Rights (Review)

In 2014, the UN produced a comprehensive report on the situation of human rights inside North Korea.  The result of a year-long investigation by a three-person Commission of Inquiry (COI), the report drew on 240 interviews and the public testimony of 80 people. It is a damning picture of human rights abuses inside a country… Continue reading Dying for Rights (Review)

Book Reviews, Korea

Environment, Politics, and Ideology in North Korea (Review)

Review of Robert Winstanley-Chesters, Environment, Politics, and Ideology in North Korea: Landscape as Political Project (Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 2015), 102 pages and Jae-Jung Suh, ed., Origins of North Korea’s Juche: Colonialism, War, and Development (Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 2013), 184 pages   Ideas have always played an important role in North Korean politics.  … Continue reading Environment, Politics, and Ideology in North Korea (Review)

Book Reviews, Korea

Being in North Korea (Review)

Review of Andray Abrahamian, Being in North Korea (Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center, Stanford University, 2020), 206 pages   North Korea, despite its reputation as the last communist holdout in the world, has no major problem with capitalism. It’s even willing to take lessons from the capitalist world on how to build a market… Continue reading Being in North Korea (Review)

Book Reviews, Korea

Rewriting Revolution

Immanuel Kim, Rewriting Revolution: Women, Sexuality, and Memory in North Korean Fiction (University of Hawai’i Press, 2018), 220 pages Immanuel Kim is determined to prove that “North Korean literature” is not a contradiction in terms. A professor of Asian and Asian American studies at SUNY Binghamton, Kim takes a close look at a number of… Continue reading Rewriting Revolution

Book Reviews, China

One in a Billion

The story of An Wei overlaps almost perfectly with the story of Communist China. Born in a small village some distance from the northwestern city of Xian, An Wei was seven years old when Mao took control of the country in 1949. As the son of peasants, he was part of the first generation of… Continue reading One in a Billion

Book Reviews, Korea

In North Korea (Review)

Review of In North Korea: A Trip to the Last Communist Dynasty (En Corea del Norte: Viaje a la Ultima Dinastia Comunista) by Florencia Grieco (Buenos Aires: Debate, 2018), 339 pages   The Argentine journalist Florencia Grieco took two trips to North Korea, in 2015 and 2017. Her account of those trips, along with some… Continue reading In North Korea (Review)

Book Reviews, Korea

The Plotters (Review)

Review of Un-Su Kim, The Plotters (Doubleday, 2019), translated by Sora Kim-Russell Assassination has been an integral part of Korean history. So many leading political figures have been felled by assassins – or, at the very least, threatened by them – that you might think that plotters are constantly at work behind the scenes of… Continue reading The Plotters (Review)

Art, Book Reviews, Korea, Uncategorized

North Korean Art (Review)

Review of BG Muhn, North Korean Art: Paradoxical Realism (Seoul Selection, 2018), 80 pages   Americans, if they have seen anything of North Korean art, have probably caught glimpses of the propaganda posters that occasionally appear in newspaper photographs of North Korean street scenes. The more knowledgeable North Korea watcher might be familiar with the… Continue reading North Korean Art (Review)

Book Reviews, Korea

Left Behind by Korea’s Success

In South Korea these days, a popular dish at trendy restaurants is budae jjigae—an everything-but-the-kitchen-sink stew full of noodles, red pepper paste, Spam, sausages, kimchi, American cheese, baked beans, tofu, and whatever else the chef might want to throw into the mix. Budae means “battalion” in Korean, which points to the stew’s origins in the Korean War.… Continue reading Left Behind by Korea’s Success

Book Reviews

House of Trump, House of Putin (Review)

President Donald Trump now finds himself, not even two years into his term, besieged by congressional opponents, a special investigator, numerous lawyers, the mainstream media, protesters in the street, and even anonymous critics within his own administration. Many of these opponents hope that the president will resign, be impeached, or be rendered politically impotent by… Continue reading House of Trump, House of Putin (Review)

Book Reviews, Korea

Nuclear Blues (Review)

Review of Nuclear Blues, Bradley Martin K. Martin (Great Leader Books, 2017, 321 pages)   It’s not easy to write about North Korea. It’s tough to get there, and it’s even tougher to talk to North Koreans freely if you do manage to visit. A good deal of material about the country is speculative, anecdotal,… Continue reading Nuclear Blues (Review)

Asia, Book Reviews

America’s Violent Century

John Dower is one the most preeminent historians of World War II’s Pacific theater and the aftermath of the conflict in Asia. His book War Without Mercy (1986) described the racial component of the U.S. campaign against Japan. In Embracing Defeat (1999), he examined the post-war U.S. occupation of Japan. He has long taken a critical look at U.S. foreign… Continue reading America’s Violent Century

Asia, Book Reviews, Korea

The Invitation-Only Zone (Review)

Review of Robert Boynton, The Invitation-Only Zone (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2016), 271 pages   The abduction of Japanese citizens by the North Korean government is so fantastical a story that it seems to be the stuff of magical realism. It’s not surprising that so many Japanese refused for so long to believe… Continue reading The Invitation-Only Zone (Review)

Book Reviews, Korea

Strange News from Another Star

NORTH KOREA IS NOT the information black hole it’s so often made out to be. It’s more like Alpha Centauri, a star several light years from Earth. We can remotely acquire a wealth of information about this distant location, even though there’s always a frustrating time lag. It’s not the speed of light, but the… Continue reading Strange News from Another Star

Book Reviews, Korea

The Other Vietnam Syndrome

THE VIETNAM WAR, for most Americans, has always been a tragedy with only two characters: the courageous but callow GI and the wily and ultimately victorious Vietnamese Communist. Everyone else, from the hapless South Vietnamese allies to the sinister Soviet and Chinese supporters of Ho Chi Minh, have been just bit players. This boiled-down confrontation… Continue reading The Other Vietnam Syndrome

Book Reviews, Korea

The Real North Korea

Any book that purports to tell the story of the “real North Korea” runs the risk of serious overhype. North Korea, after all, is perhaps the least understood, least accessible, and least research-friendly country in the world. It has been called an “intelligence black hole.” Journalists rarely visit, and when they do they can’t just… Continue reading The Real North Korea

Blog, Book Reviews, Eastern Europe, Europe, Russia and Eastern Europe

The Secret History of Yugoslavia

In the 6th century, in the Byzantine capital of Constantinople, the historian Procopius penned an account of the misdeeds of the emperor Justinian and his wife Theodora. The Secret History is a compelling account of the court intrigues of a treacherous emperor in a crumbling empire. That Justinian enjoyed a high reputation, the result of the military victories… Continue reading The Secret History of Yugoslavia

Book Reviews, Korea

The Real North Korea (Review)

Any book that purports to tell the story of the “real North Korea” runs the risk of serious overhype. North Korea, after all, is perhaps the least understood, least accessible, and least research-friendly country in the world. It has been called an “intelligence black hole.” Journalists rarely visit, and when they do they can’t just… Continue reading The Real North Korea (Review)

Book Reviews, Korea

Non-Traditional Security Issues in North Korea (Review)

Kyung-Ae Park, Non-Traditional Security Issues in North Korea (Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press, 2013), 265 pages   The U.S. government views North Korea largely through one optic: as a nuclear threat. Pyongyang claims membership in the nuclear club, has exported its nuclear expertise, and may or may not have the capability to attack another country… Continue reading Non-Traditional Security Issues in North Korea (Review)