32nd Daesan Literary Awards Winners Announced: ‘”I published a poetry collection last July and thought it was time to stop writing poetry; it might be my last collection, so I cried a lot…”‘
The poetry collection ‘Fantastic Store Next to Future Super’ by poet Kang Eun-kyu, who thought it might be her last, has won this year’s Daesan Literary Award. At the winners’ press conference held at the Kyobo Building in Seoul on the 5th, Kang said, “After publishing ‘Fantastic Store Next to Future Super,’ I fell into despair beyond powerlessness,” and added, “Being selected for the Daesan Literary Prize gave me immense literary energy.”
The poet, who has been writing for 56 years and is nearing the age of 80, expressed mixed feelings and a sense of apology for receiving the award when there are many younger poets around. Although she cried, she planned to write more poetry, thinking she would write just two more collections. “I’m thinking of writing poems that won’t contaminate the world, ones to stash away in my drawer.”
The Daesan Literary Awards are comprehensive literary awards that select works with significant value representing Korean literature in poetry, novels, theater, criticism, and translation. The theater and criticism categories are awarded every other year, and four categories are awarded each year. The translation category rotates among English, French, German, and Spanish. This year, works in the criticism and Spanish translation categories were judged.
This year’s winners include Prof. Kang Eun-kyu’s poetry collection ‘Fantastic Store Next to Future Super,’ Kim Hee-sun’s novel ‘All About 247’ in the novel category, Prof. Seo Young-chae’s ‘Garden of Friendship’ in the criticism category, and Álvaro Trigo Maldonado’s Spanish translation of Bora Chung’s ‘Cursed Bunny’ in the translation category.
Kim Hee-sun, selected in the novel category, studied pharmacology and works as a pharmacist while writing. She debuted by winning the New Writer’s Award from ‘Author’s World’ in 2011 and has also received the 16th Heo Gyun Literary Writer Award in 2024 and the 10th Young Writer’s Award in 2019.
Kim said, “I’ve been writing with the belief that a novelist’s duty is to listen to those without a voice,” and “The Daesan Cultural Award gave me great courage by confirming that the path I’m on is right. I am determined to continue listening to the voices of those without a voice as my path as a writer.”
Kim explained that the patients she saw while working as a pharmacist in a nursing hospital and those isolated during COVID-19 who were helplessly thrown before death are examples of people without voices. She also claimed that society’s perception of the elderly becoming burdensome as the aging society progresses is too superficial. “It’s surprising that our current society is so critical of the issue of elderly people driving. When viewed statistically, it’s not that the elderly can’t drive well, but they have no voice.”
Prof. Seo Young-chae of Seoul National University stated, “There are writings by authors themselves who don’t know what they’ve put down, and I always thought criticism is about talking about those very letters,” adding, “I will read more deeply, read more thoroughly, and read over again.”
Translation award winner Álvaro Trigo Maldonado, a professor at the University of Salamanca in Spain, was born in Spain in 1988. He became interested in translating Korean books through friendships with Korean students while studying in Germany in 2008. He has translated 12 Korean literary works so far, including Kim Ae-ran’s ‘The Outside is Summer’ and Kim Hoon’s ‘Namhansan Fortress’ and ‘Complete Works of Chae Man-sik.’ About ‘Cursed Bunny,’ he said, “It was such a shocking work that I fell in love with it from the beginning,” and “I was completely enchanted with the work as if cursed.”
The Daesan Literary Award winners receive a prize of 50 million won and a bronze pine tree sculpture by sculptor Yanghwa-seon as a trophy. The award ceremony will be held at 6:30 PM on the 28th at the President Hotel in Jung-gu, Seoul.