[Feature] Between Fluttering Wings and Clanking Iron Chains: The Present and the Future of People's Poetry / Hwang Kyu-kwan
The Quarterly Changbi 171, Spring 2016
Abstract
Hwang Kyu-kwan, the poet, revisits the diverse facets of "Minjoong Poetry" (people's poetry) which appear to be declining these days compared with the flourishing 1980s. After reviewing some noticeable poems recently published by Im Sung-yong, Song Kyung-dong, Park So-ran, Kim Hae-ja, and Paik Moo-san, and furthering the argument on "the poetry and the politics", he comes to the conclusion that the essence of "Minjoong Poetry" hinges mainly upon how the poets find the way out of political propaganda and the stale description of traditional 'realism', and how freely they could express the potentiality of the common people with unfettered vigor of original language. The discussion of "Minjoong Poetry" today is an opportunity to consider, sense, and overcome our grave reality of a different nature.