K-Book Trends -

Search word : "Tradition", Search result : 250

[TREND / KNOWLEDGE]

Knowledge Book Fairs, Another Type of Holiday 2024.07.01 When you work with books, you get to experience a yearly cycle of events. For small bookstores/publishers like Ghost Books, which is both a bookstore and a book maker, book releases are usually aligned with these events. This is because you can have quite good promotional effects by doing so, particularly if you publish fewer books and don’t have a great budget for marketing each book. As such, book fairs are very important for planning the year ahead. Aligning your publication schedule with these annual events gives you a clear guideline for managing the manuscript editing, designing interior layout and cover, and printing timelines.Over the past 8 years of running a small publishing house and bookstore, I have attended a number of book fairs. As I mentioned earlier, these events usually occur in a certain cycle. Meeting the authors that you have been seeing at a similar time and space every year is...

VOL.72 / 2024.07

[TREND / SPECIAL PROJECT]

Korea Today and the Charm of Korean Culture

Special Project [English Books in Korea ①] Korea Today and the Charm of Korean Culture 2024.06.03 I’m pleased to be able to introduce the English edition of my book about Korea through this interview. This is because such an opportunity does not come around often, and because through this, I can draw the attention of the industry and readers in this harsh climate where the number of English books about Korea is decreasing rather than increasing.One keyword that automatically comes to mind when you think of English books about Korea is “Kinokuniya” bookstores in Japan. I was literally overwhelmed by the number of English books about Japan that I saw at Kinokuniya Bookstore in Japantown, San Francisco, US. On the other hand, the number of English books published in Korea is far too little, and the fields are focused on culture and language, with very few on economics, society, practical skills, and people. What’s more, the number of titles is shrinking.M...

VOL.71 / 2024.06

[TREND / EXPORT CASE]

Publishing Kim Hyesoon and International Poetry

Export Case Publishing Kim Hyesoon and International Poetry 2024.06.03 New Directions was founded in 1936 by the pioneering publisher James Laughlin when he was a student at Harvard. Laughlin conceived of New Directions as a way to introduce some of the most groundbreaking and experimental poets of the time (Ezra Pound, William Carlos Williams, Marianne Moore, Hilda Doolittle, Louis Zukofsky), aiming to publish writing that “made it new” in English and other languages. He also traveled widely, introducing fiction writers and poets from abroad. Laughlin built one of the great literary lists in American publishing, and ND continues to publish international literature, following in his path.Poetry is a vital part of our publishing program. Currently, we offer the work not just of many interesting and important American poets, but poets from other countries as well? like Bei Dao and Xi Chuan from China, Tomas Transtr?mer from Sweden, Ana Lu?sa Amaral and Fern...

VOL.71 / 2024.06

[TREND / BOOK TRIP]

In Search of a Garden Where Our Beautiful Korean Language Breathes

Book Trip [A Trip to Literary Museums ②] In Search of a Garden Where Our BeautifulKorean Language Breathes Introducing Sonagi Village at Hwang Sun-won, Literary Housein Yangpyeong-gun, Gyeonggi-do, and Beyond 2024.06.03 The works of Hwang Sun-Won have a solid presence in Korean literature. The literary world he has built transcends time, genre, and ideology, naturally expressing the most Korean emotions. It was around 1952, when Korea was undergoing the Korean War, when his representative short story Rain Shower (read Sonagi in Korean) was released. However, it is difficult to recognize such a period from the portrayal of the two main characters in the novel. The only clue that connects the story to reality is the place name “Yangpyeong” that appears at the end. The thoughts that germinated in this place became the driving force for creating a literary space, and it led to new attempts to reinterpret the work in various ways.The Sonagi Village in the Hwa...

VOL.71 / 2024.06

[TREND / ONE-LINER QUOTES]

Understanding Today’s Korean Society

One-Liner Quotes Understanding Today’s Korean Society A Sociologist’s Pick 2024.06.03 Nho Myung-Woo is a sociologist teaching sociology at Ajou University and the owner of Nieun Bookstore, a bookstore specializing in humanities and social sciences books. Characters are one of the oldest forms of human media. The way we produce text with letters takes many forms, depending on each region’s historical traditions and culture. In alphabetic cultures that use a phonetic writing system, text is written horizontally from left to right. Alphabetic cultures write in syllables, rather than grouping syllables together and representing them in phonetic units. In contrast, East Asia’s Chinese character cultures adopted vertical writing, and it has been a long-standing cultural tradition.The vertical writing style branched out into many different forms in the 20th century, with different countries making ...

VOL.71 / 2024.06

[INFORMATION / K-BOOK MAP]

Where Literature Dwells - Bridging the Past and Present of Korean Literature through Its Museums -

K-Book Map Where Literature Dwells- Bridging the Past and Present of Korean Literature through Its Museums - 2026.04 Literary museums dedicated to specific writers hold profound significance. They serve as cultural archives that reveal the various elements behind the birth of a literary masterpiece. Numerous such museums operate across Korea today. Among them, we would like to introduce three locations selected for their historical and regional balance: the Yun Dong-ju Literature Museum in Seoul (Yun Dong-ju: 1917–1945), the Pak Kyongni Literature Park in Wonju, Gangwon-do (Pak Kyongni: 1926–2008), and the Na Tae-joo Pulkkot Literary House in Gongju, Chungnam (Na Tae-joo: 1945–). Yun Dong-ju was a poet who focused on self-reflection and maintaining a human conscience despite the oppression of the colonial era. Pak Kyongni was a novelist who gave form to the turbulence of modern Korean history thr...

VOL.93 / 2026.04

[INFORMATION / BEST SELLERS]

Which Foreign Books Did Korean Readers Choose in 2025?

Best Sellers Which Foreign Books Did Korean Readers Choose in 2025? 2026.02 "Interest in Korean fiction" is an indispensable phrase when explaining recent publishing trends in Korea. Thanks to the halo effect of Han Kang's Nobel Prize in Literature win in 2024, Korean novels swept the top spots on the comprehensive bestseller lists last year. The slump in non-fiction books, driven by the commercialization of generative artificial intelligence (AI), also played a significant role. The prevailing view in the industry is that the surge in Korean fiction—and Korean literature at large—is a "butterfly effect" resulting from the contraction of the local non-fiction market, a sector traditionally dominated by renowned foreign authors rather than domestic ones. However, this situation may present a unique opportuni...

VOL.91 / 2026.02

[TREND / TOPIC]

How Did the “Best Book Design From All Over the World” Begin?

Topic How Did the “Best Book Design From All Over the World” Begin? Books selected in Korea in 2024 2024.05.07 Launched in 1963 by the German Stiftung Buchkunst, the “Best Book Design From All Over the World” is a world-renowned competition that is now co-organized with the Leipziger Buchmesse. Leipziger Buchmesse is the earliest international book fair held every year. Leipzig, the background of Martin Luther’s debates on reformation, has been a center of book printing, publishing, and design since medieval times, as well as being home to numerous publishing houses. The competition is set in this historical context.In Korea, the Korean Publishers Association has been holding a contest for Korean books, and the selected books have been submitted to the contest in Germany. Consequently, Uhm Yoo-Jung’s collection, FEUILLES (Leaves), published by Media Bus in 2021, won the prize for the first time in Korea, followed by Workroom Press’s Samu...

VOL.70 / 2024.05

[TREND / BOOK TRIP]

The Footprints of Two Writers Who Sang of Hope in Times of Despair

Book Trip [A Trip to Literary Museums ①] The Footprints of Two WritersWho Sang of Hope in Times of Despair Andong-si, Gyeongsangbuk-do: Kwon Jeong-Saeng Fairy Tale Museumand Yi Yuk-Sa Literary Museum 2024.05.07 Literary museums are not just places to display writers’ books and materials, but also places that create new content based on those materials and spread writers’ spirits to future generations. As they preserve the past yet always have new stories to tell, it is always a thrill when going to a new literary museum, curious to see what stories they will tell. This is why many book lovers and even general travelers search for literary museums in their travels and take the time to visit them.Andong, Gyeongsangbuk-do, the destination of this month’s “Book Trip,” is a city of traditional Korean culture and is often referred to as the “spiritual capital of Korea.” Living up to its name, Andong is famous for being home to prominent schol...

VOL.70 / 2024.05

[TREND / KNOWLEDGE]

Today’s Local Bookstores Seen Through Data on Independent Bookstores in Korea

Knowledge Today’s Local Bookstores Seen Through Dataon Independent Bookstores in Korea A service for non-readers: a map of local bookstores 2024.05.07 Independent bookstores, each unique in its own way, are significant in that they create new cultures and book ecosystems. There is a platform that collects data on these independent bookstores and shares their locations, activities, and stories with readers online and offline ? it is “Bookshopmap,” a neighborhood bookstore map, which started in 2015. In this article, focusing on Bookshopmap, we will look at how the service started, how it works, and how it differs from traditional bookstores. We will also take a look at the changing trends of independent bookstores in Korea based on data statistics from the past 8 years, from 2015 to 2023. ...

VOL.70 / 2024.05

VOL.97/2026.08

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