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An illuminating afterword by Kim Yunsik of Seoul National University, a respected critic and scholar of modern Korean literature, emphasizes Kim Namjo as a "poet of the candle," exemplified by the poems of the "Candle Light" sequence as well as by a poem like "Late Snow," all of which are included here in Selected Poems.
One welcome feature of the volume is the inclusion of the breve over the vowel o for such words as choso (grass hand [cursive] writing) and Sorak (a mountain name), important for pronunciation and identification by readers with some interest in the Korean language. The translation "Love's Cursive" chosen for "Sarang choso" is startling to an English reader. "Grass-Hand Writings (Concerning) Love"...