Jung Ihyun

Jung Ihyun (born 1972) is a South Korean novelist.

In this Korean name, the family name is Jung.
Jung Ihyun
Jung Ihyun at SIBF 2014
Born1972 (age 48–49)
OccupationNovelist
LanguageKorean
NationalitySouth Korean
CitizenshipSouth Korean
Alma materSungshin Women's University
Seoul Institute of the Arts
Jung Ihyun
Hangul
정이현
Revised RomanizationJeong Yi-hyeon
McCune–ReischauerChŏng Ihyŏn

Life

Jung was born in Seoul in 1972. She graduated from Sungshin Women's University Graduate School, and studied in the Department of Creative Writing at Seoul Institute of the Arts.

Career

She began her literary career in 2001. In 2002, she received the New Writer's Award by Moonji. After that her short story The Loneliness of Others (타인의 고독) received the Lee Hyo-seok Literary Award, and Sampoong Department Store (삼풍백화점) received the Modern Literary Award. Jung is an innovator in the field of Internet serialization in Korea, having written her second novel You Do Not Know, on the Kyobo Book Center blog. Initial posting of chapters resulted in 400,000 visitors to the serial.[1]

Works

In opposition to the Korean literary tradition of focusing on the marginalised and dispossessed, Jung depicts the dating, marriage, career lives, desires and conflicts of urban women. Her works are frequently set in the wealthy Seoul neighborhood of Gangnam[2] . She is known to describe those things in a sharp and cheerful way. My Sweet City (달콤한 나의도시) is considered to be the beginning of her fame. It is regarded as the origin of representative South Korean chick lit. After My Sweet City was published, it ignited a chick lit craze in Korea.[3] My Sweet City is considered to describe accurately women in their 30s. It was made into a Korean drama, and aroused sympathy from women in their 20s and 30s.

LIST Magazine summarizes her work:

Jung chooses to handle this reality through a “politics of masquerade” in the Baudrillardian sense. Jung’s characters happen to be young women with office jobs who are blatantly well-adjusted to the system. They are vicious and not ashamed of their desires to climb the socioeconomic ladder. In “Romantic Love and Society,” marriage is a means of moving up to higher social classes. In “Trunk,” fashion and cars are status symbols. The women are so conniving and sly that they are subject to ridicule in the end, which is Jung’s point. By portraying individuals who have become perfect embodiments of consumer capitalism, Jung reveals the phoniness of these individuals and the situation that surrounds them. Jung thus explores ways for literature to remain political in an age where politics to have lost its relevance.[4]

Awards[5]
  • Literature and Society New Author Award (2002)
  • Yi Hyo-seok Literary Award (2004)
  • Hyundae Literary Award (2006)

References
  1. Choi, Jae-bong (June 17, 2009), "Jung Yi-hyun, A Writer Known for Her Urban Style Representative of the 2000s", Korean Books Journal, 16
  2. Kim, Hyoung-joong (Summer 2011), "From Politics to Ethics: Jung Yi-hyun, Kim Ae-ran, Jeon Sung-tae, and Kim Yeon-su", LIST Magazine, 12: 14–16
  3. "소설가 정이현 씨 '꾸역꾸역 살아가는 것, 영원한 미스터리죠'". The Dong-a Ilbo. 2009-12-10. Retrieved 2013-10-26.
  4. Kim, Hyoung-joong (Summer 2011), "From Politics to Ethics: Jung Yi-hyun, Kim Ae-ran, Jeon Sung-tae, and Kim Yeon-su", LIST Magazine, 12: 14–16
  5. "Naver Search". naver.com. Naver. Retrieved 20 June 2014.
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