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The Old Garden
Political prisoner Hyun Woo is freed after eighteen years to find no trace of the world he knew. The friends with whom he shared utopianist dreams are gone. His Seoul is unrecognizably transformed and aggressively modernized. Yoon Hee, the woman he loved, died three years ago. A broken man, he drifts toward a small house in Kalmoe, where he and Yoon Hee once stole a few fleeting months of happiness while fleeing the authorities. In the company of her diaries, he relives and reviews his life, trying to find meaning in the revolutionary struggle that consumed their youth-a youth of great energy and optimism, victim to implacable history. Hyun Woo weighs the worth of his own life, spent in prison, and that of the strong-willed artist Yoon Hee, whose involvement in rebel groups took her to Berlin and the fall of the wall. With great poignancy, Hwang Sok-yong grapples with the immortal questions-the endurance of love, the price of a commitment to causes-while depicting a generation that sacrifi ced youth, liberty, and often life, for the dream of a better tomorrow. Born in 1943, Hwang Sok-yong is a Korean writer of world renown and the recipient of numerous international awards and honors. His work, which grapples with the troubled recent history of his divided country, has been the cause of his imprisonment, his exile, and finally that rare achievement of a wide readership and appreciation in both North and South Korea. The Old Garden is, by the author's own admission, his most deeply auto biographical work.
480 pages, Hardcover
First published May 2, 2000
54 people are currently reading
1728 people want to read
About the author
Hwang Sok-yong
75 books336 followersHwang Sok-yong (황석영) was born in Hsinking (today Changchun), Manchukuo, during the period of Japanese rule. His family returned to Korea after liberation in 1945. He later obtained a bachelor's degree in philosophy from Dongguk University (동국대학교).
In 1964 he was jailed for political reasons and met labor activists. Upon his release he worked at a cigarette factory and at several construction sites around the country.
In 1966–1969 he was part of Korea's military corps during the Vietnam War, reluctantly fighting for the American cause that he saw as an attack on a liberation struggle.
In 1964 he was jailed for political reasons and met labor activists. Upon his release he worked at a cigarette factory and at several construction sites around the country.
In 1966–1969 he was part of Korea's military corps during the Vietnam War, reluctantly fighting for the American cause that he saw as an attack on a liberation struggle.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 40 reviews
March 19, 2023
خیلی وقت بود که به کتابی ۵ ستاره نداده بودم🥲
فکر میکنم به این دلیل ادبیات آسیا و خاورمیانه برام جذاب(تر؟!)ه که خیلی ملموستره. دنیاها و زندگیهای شبیه به هم
درد و سختیها و آرمان و آرزوهای نزدیک به هم
فکر میکنم به این دلیل ادبیات آسیا و خاورمیانه برام جذاب(تر؟!)ه که خیلی ملموستره. دنیاها و زندگیهای شبیه به هم
درد و سختیها و آرمان و آرزوهای نزدیک به هم
May 21, 2020
This book has taken me more than two months to read (I will forever remember it as my quarantine book) and before that it spent years on my shelf. Given this, you would think that I didn't enjoy it, but that isn't the case at all.
The novel follows two lovers, Yoon Hee and Hyun Woo, as they live through a period of change in Korea. At first, it takes a while to get used to the writing. I'm not sure if it's the translation or the fact that the nuance of Korean is different, but the language felt stilted and abrupt in the beginning. As I got used to it, I started to enjoy the straightforward writing that is at the same time lyrical and descriptive.
Part of why it took me so long to read this book is that it is so full of ideas. There are so many ideas crammed into this 500-page novel that it requires footnotes. I googled more than a couple of things to understand the events and theories depicted. Yoon Hee is an artist and reader, and in her notebooks she quotes many authors and ideologies. From thoughts on communism, socialism, capitalism.. there are so many sociopolitical comments that you really can't read it quickly.
Something that I found very interesting is the depiction of the United States. Growing up in America, I was taught to think of America as the great liberator and of capitalism and democracy as the only true ways of governing. However, through this book I saw America in a completely different light and got a little bit more insight into how the events of the twentieth century look from a different point of view.
Overall, a very insightful book that I'm glad I stuck with.
The novel follows two lovers, Yoon Hee and Hyun Woo, as they live through a period of change in Korea. At first, it takes a while to get used to the writing. I'm not sure if it's the translation or the fact that the nuance of Korean is different, but the language felt stilted and abrupt in the beginning. As I got used to it, I started to enjoy the straightforward writing that is at the same time lyrical and descriptive.
Part of why it took me so long to read this book is that it is so full of ideas. There are so many ideas crammed into this 500-page novel that it requires footnotes. I googled more than a couple of things to understand the events and theories depicted. Yoon Hee is an artist and reader, and in her notebooks she quotes many authors and ideologies. From thoughts on communism, socialism, capitalism.. there are so many sociopolitical comments that you really can't read it quickly.
Something that I found very interesting is the depiction of the United States. Growing up in America, I was taught to think of America as the great liberator and of capitalism and democracy as the only true ways of governing. However, through this book I saw America in a completely different light and got a little bit more insight into how the events of the twentieth century look from a different point of view.
Overall, a very insightful book that I'm glad I stuck with.
September 13, 2009
A garden is a metaphor for revolution. When painstakingly cared for, dry and barren ground can eventually yield the most beautiful of things. A garden can change an unruly landscape to an ordered plot, produce food and purpose, and forever capture the energy of a gardener with loyalty, conviction, and a love of what it could become. It can be simple in activity, process, and outcome, yet incredibly intricate and an entity all its own.
Many of us will never live this metaphor and will never have to face the difficulties the characters in The Old Garden must confront. After eighteen years of political imprisonment, South Korean Hyun Woo is freed only to find that the Seoul he once knew is gone and the woman he loves is dead. In this beautifully written book, the author uses her diaries and letters, woven with the Hyun Woo’s attempts to narrate his own past and present, to chronicle a man trying to find footing on the soil he fought to change, and face his choices and regret.
The novel’s world renowned and accomplished author, Hwang Sok-Yong has confronted these issues in his own life. Born in 1943, Sok-Yong has been imprisoned and exiled in the name of writing about his country, and his characters emanate a dedication and love of their home that is undoubtedly autobiographical. The author’s vivid imagery and veridical descriptions of the activists hiding “underground,” the aftermath of the Kwangju Massacre ,and torture at the hand of prison guards is affecting. Chills ran down my entire body when I read the main character Hyun Woo reflect, “Was it really possible for us—and there was not even a handful of us, and we were so young—to change the world with nothing but our noble intentions?” This was not just a story; this was something the author had truly lived.
But a garden can also be a symbol of more than revolution, and The Old Garden is first and foremost an incredible tale of a tragic love that grew despite all odds. While hiding in the town of Kalmae, Hyun Woo falls in love with a beautiful art teacher and ally of the movement. Beyond the already complex life of a political fugitive, he must now battle issues without a clear right or wrong, oppressed or oppressor, power or people. Must a revolutionary sacrifice their own bliss for the greater purpose? How can a revolutionary reconcile that he or she will most likely never experience what they fought to win? During one of the most poignant and meaningful moments in the story, he reads his lover’s diary entry about a day they washed laundry and fished in the sun. She writes, “What seems so insignificant, the everyday tasks of a simple life, is in fact the most important part, isn’t it?” The answer is yes, but for the revolutionary, it is anything but simple.
To survive the unfathomable emptiness in prison, Hyun Woo manages to grow a small garden beneath his crumbling cell wall with seeds gathered from rare trips outside of solitary confinement. Despite the lack of sun, of good water, and of real soil he is able to keep the small plants alive, relishing their growth and nurturing them constantly, until the winter comes and frost covers his walls. And while the conditions may have killed each flower and destroyed any lasting life, it was in the gardening itself that he found meaning.
Review by Melissa Ablett
Many of us will never live this metaphor and will never have to face the difficulties the characters in The Old Garden must confront. After eighteen years of political imprisonment, South Korean Hyun Woo is freed only to find that the Seoul he once knew is gone and the woman he loves is dead. In this beautifully written book, the author uses her diaries and letters, woven with the Hyun Woo’s attempts to narrate his own past and present, to chronicle a man trying to find footing on the soil he fought to change, and face his choices and regret.
The novel’s world renowned and accomplished author, Hwang Sok-Yong has confronted these issues in his own life. Born in 1943, Sok-Yong has been imprisoned and exiled in the name of writing about his country, and his characters emanate a dedication and love of their home that is undoubtedly autobiographical. The author’s vivid imagery and veridical descriptions of the activists hiding “underground,” the aftermath of the Kwangju Massacre ,and torture at the hand of prison guards is affecting. Chills ran down my entire body when I read the main character Hyun Woo reflect, “Was it really possible for us—and there was not even a handful of us, and we were so young—to change the world with nothing but our noble intentions?” This was not just a story; this was something the author had truly lived.
But a garden can also be a symbol of more than revolution, and The Old Garden is first and foremost an incredible tale of a tragic love that grew despite all odds. While hiding in the town of Kalmae, Hyun Woo falls in love with a beautiful art teacher and ally of the movement. Beyond the already complex life of a political fugitive, he must now battle issues without a clear right or wrong, oppressed or oppressor, power or people. Must a revolutionary sacrifice their own bliss for the greater purpose? How can a revolutionary reconcile that he or she will most likely never experience what they fought to win? During one of the most poignant and meaningful moments in the story, he reads his lover’s diary entry about a day they washed laundry and fished in the sun. She writes, “What seems so insignificant, the everyday tasks of a simple life, is in fact the most important part, isn’t it?” The answer is yes, but for the revolutionary, it is anything but simple.
To survive the unfathomable emptiness in prison, Hyun Woo manages to grow a small garden beneath his crumbling cell wall with seeds gathered from rare trips outside of solitary confinement. Despite the lack of sun, of good water, and of real soil he is able to keep the small plants alive, relishing their growth and nurturing them constantly, until the winter comes and frost covers his walls. And while the conditions may have killed each flower and destroyed any lasting life, it was in the gardening itself that he found meaning.
Review by Melissa Ablett
July 15, 2025
È stata una lettura impegnativa, ma ne è valsa decisamente la pena. Spero, un giorno, di poterlo rileggere in traduzione italiana🤞🏻
April 9, 2010
Here’s the story of The Old Garden: A South Korean political prisoner named Hyun Woo is released after 18 years in a cell. He has been almost entirely cut off from a society that moved from military dictatorship to a democratic state still marked by inequality. Upon stepping back into the world, he must re-orient himself to a modernized Korea, as well as to the people he left behind, and the legacy left by the love of his life. This love, Yoon Hee, was an artist who filled notebooks of journals and letters to him while he was in prison. She died of cancer before they could be reunited, three years before Hyun Woo’s release. After escaping the city of Seoul to the small town of Kalmae—where the couple once lived before the arrest—Hyun Woo examines the man he once was, the woman Yoon Hee was, and the consequences of all kinds of commitment in a nation changed.
It is especially notable that The Old Garden was the first work published by South Korea’s eminent author Hwang Sok-Yong after he himself was released as a political prisoner. A longtime activist, he was also a veteran of the Vietnam war, drafted into a corps responsible for clean-up for the American forces, or erasing evidence of civilian massacres. In 1993, he was sentenced in to seven years in prison after an unauthorized trip to North Korea. There, he conducted eighteen hunger strikes to protest the banishment of pens and inadequate nutrition. He was pardoned in 1998 by a new president in South Korea, an effort that was buoyed by an international outcry at his treatment through PEN America and Amnesty International, among others.
No wonder the world was eager to get their hands on The Old Garden when it was published a couple years later—though the English version only came to us last fall, thanks to Seven Stories Press. The book also spurred a Korean movie that brought it increased attention.
For me, the most moving scene in the novel comes early on. Hyun Woo is only days into his life as a free man. He is trying to navigate a busy and expansive public space in Seoul and is overcome by a physical nausea.
The book rests heavily in backstory, using not just flashbacks but also the device of Yoon Hee’s journals push us, and the narrator, into the past. Often this is very evocative and it makes sense for the narrator’s mind to brood so long in memory after spending 18 years outside of a world that progressed forward. But sustained over so long of a book—it clocks in at more than 500 pages—the backstory began to weigh on this reader. I got restless.
Another odd gap in the novel is that there’s not much space given to an articulation of the political beliefs that were, apparently, so passionately held that our characters would put their lives and freedom on the line for it. There are allusions to it—but no expansive vision. We know our hero participated in the Kwangju Uprising. We see interesting machinations of underground organizers who resisted the government. But this first-person narrative never got around to digging into what he believed and why. Besides being curious about it, so much rides on his activism. But, any political and social belief he has seems to be beside the point in this novel. And when we meet the narrator, 18 years after being incarcerated, perhaps they are. Nonetheless, wouldn’t he brood upon them—especially as he meets the society that emerged while he was cut off from it, comparing it to what he hoped for or feared? Wouldn’t he critique his own beliefs, as he comes to terms with what he lost on behalf of them? Especially for a novel set so decidedly in memory, wouldn’t these beliefs emerge, even if incidentally? I would think so. But in this novel, they don’t. For Hyun Woo, any beliefs he has are so ingrained as to never need articulation. His actions, then, in both the past and present, have an automatic quality to them that I found myself not quite buying.
On the other hand, I do appreciate the even-keel of the narrator. The pacing of the book has a patient quality to it that seems appropriate for a man tentatively re-engaging with life. Over the past few years, I found myself increasingly fond of quiet, low-key narrators—such as those in Per Petterson’s Out Stealing Horses, or Marilynne Robinson’s Home. I love being spun into the powerful inward energy of characters that are often un-remarked upon as they slip through the world. Hyun Woo, in his post-prison life, is native to this tribe of understated protagonists, and I love him for it. But I just struggled with comprehending the revolutionary roots with which he supposedly emerged—and given Hyun Woo’s focus on his past, it shouldn’t have been so hard.
It is especially notable that The Old Garden was the first work published by South Korea’s eminent author Hwang Sok-Yong after he himself was released as a political prisoner. A longtime activist, he was also a veteran of the Vietnam war, drafted into a corps responsible for clean-up for the American forces, or erasing evidence of civilian massacres. In 1993, he was sentenced in to seven years in prison after an unauthorized trip to North Korea. There, he conducted eighteen hunger strikes to protest the banishment of pens and inadequate nutrition. He was pardoned in 1998 by a new president in South Korea, an effort that was buoyed by an international outcry at his treatment through PEN America and Amnesty International, among others.
No wonder the world was eager to get their hands on The Old Garden when it was published a couple years later—though the English version only came to us last fall, thanks to Seven Stories Press. The book also spurred a Korean movie that brought it increased attention.
For me, the most moving scene in the novel comes early on. Hyun Woo is only days into his life as a free man. He is trying to navigate a busy and expansive public space in Seoul and is overcome by a physical nausea.
The book rests heavily in backstory, using not just flashbacks but also the device of Yoon Hee’s journals push us, and the narrator, into the past. Often this is very evocative and it makes sense for the narrator’s mind to brood so long in memory after spending 18 years outside of a world that progressed forward. But sustained over so long of a book—it clocks in at more than 500 pages—the backstory began to weigh on this reader. I got restless.
Another odd gap in the novel is that there’s not much space given to an articulation of the political beliefs that were, apparently, so passionately held that our characters would put their lives and freedom on the line for it. There are allusions to it—but no expansive vision. We know our hero participated in the Kwangju Uprising. We see interesting machinations of underground organizers who resisted the government. But this first-person narrative never got around to digging into what he believed and why. Besides being curious about it, so much rides on his activism. But, any political and social belief he has seems to be beside the point in this novel. And when we meet the narrator, 18 years after being incarcerated, perhaps they are. Nonetheless, wouldn’t he brood upon them—especially as he meets the society that emerged while he was cut off from it, comparing it to what he hoped for or feared? Wouldn’t he critique his own beliefs, as he comes to terms with what he lost on behalf of them? Especially for a novel set so decidedly in memory, wouldn’t these beliefs emerge, even if incidentally? I would think so. But in this novel, they don’t. For Hyun Woo, any beliefs he has are so ingrained as to never need articulation. His actions, then, in both the past and present, have an automatic quality to them that I found myself not quite buying.
On the other hand, I do appreciate the even-keel of the narrator. The pacing of the book has a patient quality to it that seems appropriate for a man tentatively re-engaging with life. Over the past few years, I found myself increasingly fond of quiet, low-key narrators—such as those in Per Petterson’s Out Stealing Horses, or Marilynne Robinson’s Home. I love being spun into the powerful inward energy of characters that are often un-remarked upon as they slip through the world. Hyun Woo, in his post-prison life, is native to this tribe of understated protagonists, and I love him for it. But I just struggled with comprehending the revolutionary roots with which he supposedly emerged—and given Hyun Woo’s focus on his past, it shouldn’t have been so hard.
February 7, 2016
A most evocative and a most memorable read...
August 29, 2024
This book is so beautiful, thoughtful and handles its characters with so much love. It moved me, and it offered me new perspectives and room to develop my own thoughts and feelings, I really enjoyed reading it from the beginning to the last page.
February 13, 2019
對於深沉的小說原作，電影非但沒有撕開流行文化的糖衣，反而淡化了近代史的省思，將主線導向愛情悲劇——允姬的柏林之行付之闕如，教人感受不到攝製的誠意。觀看黃晳暎筆下呈現的韓國，原應是比婁燁的《頤和園》更震撼的觀影經驗，但如今餘下的只有嘆息。（寫於2010年）
全文：https://hou26.org/zeta/huang.htm
全文：https://hou26.org/zeta/huang.htm
January 4, 2019
The Old Garden begins in the present (at the time the novel was written) with the release of the protagonist, Oh Hyun Woo, a political opponent of the South Korean dictatorship, after almost eighteen years of imprisonment. Near the beginning, he discovers that his lover, a teacher and artist, Han Yoon-hee, whom he has not seen since a few days before his arrest, has died of cancer a few years earlier. He returns to the house in the country where they lived together and finds her journals and unsent letters to him. The remainder of the novel is primarily flashbacks based on his memories and her writing, in a complex chronological structure reminiscent of the novels of Mario Vargas Llosa (especially La fiesta del chivo) but without the intentional disorientation of Vargas' writing. The way the novel is structured rules out any element of suspense as we know in advance that he will be captured and that she will die of natural causes without seeing him again; this focuses attention on the political ideas and the emotional reactions rather than on the plot.
The book initially concentrates on the events from 1981 on, starting with the aftermath of the Kwangju uprising, although for example through Han's memories of her father there is some context going back to the struggle against Japan. We see Oh as an underground activist for the next year, finally escaping to a refuge in the countryside and falling in love with Han, whom he lives with for a few months before "survivor's guilt" after his comrades are all captured or killed impels him to return to the now hopeless struggle in the capital. His experiences in prison are counterposed to her life on the outside, first waiting for him in the country, then returning to graduate school, and spending a few years in West Berlin as a student before returning home after the reunification of Berlin and the end of the Cold War. The tearing down of the Berlin Wall provides an emotional contrast to the still divided Korea.
This is a pessimistic book, as any realistic novel today must be; the capitalist liberalization of South Korea, which results in Oh's liberation as an old man, is shown as anything but what Oh and his friends had hoped for, and both the united Germany and the former Soviet Union are described as rather dystopian; and of course Korea was (and still is) divided between a poor and tightly controlled North and a corrupt and materialist if no longer dictatorial South. Nearly all the characters are tragic, dead or broken. It left me rather depressed. It's also a very powerful book, and I learned much that I did not know about the recent history of South Korea.
The book initially concentrates on the events from 1981 on, starting with the aftermath of the Kwangju uprising, although for example through Han's memories of her father there is some context going back to the struggle against Japan. We see Oh as an underground activist for the next year, finally escaping to a refuge in the countryside and falling in love with Han, whom he lives with for a few months before "survivor's guilt" after his comrades are all captured or killed impels him to return to the now hopeless struggle in the capital. His experiences in prison are counterposed to her life on the outside, first waiting for him in the country, then returning to graduate school, and spending a few years in West Berlin as a student before returning home after the reunification of Berlin and the end of the Cold War. The tearing down of the Berlin Wall provides an emotional contrast to the still divided Korea.
This is a pessimistic book, as any realistic novel today must be; the capitalist liberalization of South Korea, which results in Oh's liberation as an old man, is shown as anything but what Oh and his friends had hoped for, and both the united Germany and the former Soviet Union are described as rather dystopian; and of course Korea was (and still is) divided between a poor and tightly controlled North and a corrupt and materialist if no longer dictatorial South. Nearly all the characters are tragic, dead or broken. It left me rather depressed. It's also a very powerful book, and I learned much that I did not know about the recent history of South Korea.
March 28, 2021
Pour connaître mes impressions : https://madamelit.ca/2021/03/28/madam...
Au plaisir de les partager avec vous!
Au plaisir de les partager avec vous!
December 18, 2024
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February 7, 2025
텐매거진 북클럽의 9월 모임에 초대합니다. 날짜는 9월 27일 토요일입니다. 이번 모임은 '무기의 그늘', '오래된 정원', '손님', '삼포 가는 길' 등의 베스트셀러 작품들로 다양한 문학상을 수상하신 전설적인 소설가 황석영 작가님과 함께합니다. www.facebook.com/events/295035237335833/
Please join the 10 Magazine Book Club for our September meeting on Saturday 27th September. We will be joined by very special guest novelist Hwang Sok-yong, legendary author of several award winning & bestselling books including 'The Shadow of Arms', 'The Old Garden', 'The Guest' & 'The Road to Sampo.' www.facebook.com/events/295035237335833/
Date: Saturday 27th September.
날짜 : 09월 27일
Time: 4pm to 6pm.
시간: 오후 4시
Admission fee: 5,000won (Students 3,000won)
Place: Haechi Hall in Seoul Global Culture & Tourism Center
(5th Floor M Plaza in Myeong-dong) (https://www.facebook.com/SeoulGlobalC...)
Full directions are here http://www.seoultourism.kr/2013/eng/c...
Please join the 10 Magazine Book Club for our September meeting on Saturday 27th September. We will be joined by very special guest novelist Hwang Sok-yong, legendary author of several award winning & bestselling books including 'The Shadow of Arms', 'The Old Garden', 'The Guest' & 'The Road to Sampo.' www.facebook.com/events/295035237335833/
Date: Saturday 27th September.
날짜 : 09월 27일
Time: 4pm to 6pm.
시간: 오후 4시
Admission fee: 5,000won (Students 3,000won)
Place: Haechi Hall in Seoul Global Culture & Tourism Center
(5th Floor M Plaza in Myeong-dong) (https://www.facebook.com/SeoulGlobalC...)
Full directions are here http://www.seoultourism.kr/2013/eng/c...
April 21, 2014
A melancholy love story set against the backdrop of the political and emotional fallout of the Kwangju massacre. I'm impressed that the novel was translated into English, but don't understand why no translator is credited.
November 16, 2011
So hard to get through. Make sure you have knowledge of Korean history before you start this book or it will be very confusing.
February 21, 2022
Je pensais qu’il fallait vraiment connaître la vie de HWANG Sok Yong pour pouvoir apprécier son roman. Je n’avais pas vraiment idée de ce que ce serait, le titre n’évoquant pas du tout le côté politique du roman. En fait « le vieux jardin » est le pays, idéal, égalitaire et social rêvé par les activistes et manifestants qui n’on pas cessé de lutter contre la dictature para-militaire des années 80, depuis Gwangju jusqu’au premier président civil en 93. Ces évènements constituent essentiellement le climat du roman, racontés à deux voix par O Hyuno et Yuni. Le livre commence par la sortie de prison de O Hyuno qui vient d’être enfermé l’isoléent pendant 18 ans, ses premiers contacts avec le nouveau pays qu’il retrouve difficilement… La femme qu’il a aimée et qu’il espérait retrouver est morte quelques années auparavant et dans leur ancienne maison il retrouve tout ce qu’elle a écrit pour lui au long des années, car ils n’avaient pas le droit de correspondre. Vont s’entrecroiser à la fois les passages dans le présent, le récit de Hyuni et celui d O Hyuno racontant sa vie carcérale. Cette partie est tout à fait intéressante par la description que fait l’auteur de la façon dont Hyuno réussit à vaincre l’isolement, le froid, et continue à agir sur les conditions de vie par des grèves de la faim. Le récit de Yuni est situé dans la vie extérieure et se partage entre sa propre vie et l’atmosphère de revendications politiques dans laquelle elle se trouve entraînée sans trop le vouloir, mais faut-être parce que son amour en faisait partie. Comme elle s’expatrie en Allemagne, elle va assister à la chute du mur de Berlin moment saisissant d’une page de l’Histoire vue par le regard de quelques personnes dans le cadre de ce qu’il implique dans leurs vies.
Alors j’ai beaucoup aimé ce livre parce que je me passionne pour l’histoire de la Corée, particulièrement la période moderne depuis la partition. Mais je reconnais que ce n’est pas un roman au sens captivant du terme, il n’y a pas d’intrigue à proprement parler, et la grande part autobiographique, si elle lui donne un réel intérêt intellectuel et documentaire, n’en rend pas la lecture forcément rigolote ! Je ne veux pas du tout dire que c’est ennuyeux, je n’ai sauté aucune page, même pas une ligne, mais c’est une lecture constructive et « sérieuse » ! A vous de voir si vous sentez de découvrir un peu plus ce pays passionnant si vivant, si résistant, si vieux et pourtant si moderne !
Alors j’ai beaucoup aimé ce livre parce que je me passionne pour l’histoire de la Corée, particulièrement la période moderne depuis la partition. Mais je reconnais que ce n’est pas un roman au sens captivant du terme, il n’y a pas d’intrigue à proprement parler, et la grande part autobiographique, si elle lui donne un réel intérêt intellectuel et documentaire, n’en rend pas la lecture forcément rigolote ! Je ne veux pas du tout dire que c’est ennuyeux, je n’ai sauté aucune page, même pas une ligne, mais c’est une lecture constructive et « sérieuse » ! A vous de voir si vous sentez de découvrir un peu plus ce pays passionnant si vivant, si résistant, si vieux et pourtant si moderne !
August 19, 2020
3.5/5. Le Vieux Jardin est une lecture enrichissante, exigeante, parfois trop. Beaucoup de concepts évoqués sont étrangers à moi et j'ai parfois eu du mal à tout saisir. C'est une lecture que je referais sûrement plus tard, quand j'en saurais plus sur le socialisme, la guerre de Corée et la dictature mise en place.
Outre le contexte historique flou pour ma part, Le Vieux Jardin est un très beau livre qui met en œuvre principalement deux personnages diablement complexes, attachants par leurs qualités et par leurs défauts aussi. J'ai adoré la partie à Kalmoe, puis j'ai eu tendance à préférer suivre Yunhi (peut être parce que c'est une femme). La fin du livre m'a paru long néanmoins, peut être trop, et je n'avais malheureusement qu'une hâte, c'était d'en venir à bout.
J'ai beaucoup aimé découvrir un petit bout de la littérature coréenne que je ne connaissais pas du tout (j'aime en général les œuvres asiatiques) et il faut que j'y jette un coup d'œil pour les prochaines années. J'ai aimé découvrir l'écriture de Hwang Sok-Yong, pleine de poésie et pleine de blanc que le lecteur doit remplir lui-même. Écriture très pudique en accord avec les deux personnages qui sans aucun mot expriment beaucoup.
Outre le contexte historique flou pour ma part, Le Vieux Jardin est un très beau livre qui met en œuvre principalement deux personnages diablement complexes, attachants par leurs qualités et par leurs défauts aussi. J'ai adoré la partie à Kalmoe, puis j'ai eu tendance à préférer suivre Yunhi (peut être parce que c'est une femme). La fin du livre m'a paru long néanmoins, peut être trop, et je n'avais malheureusement qu'une hâte, c'était d'en venir à bout.
J'ai beaucoup aimé découvrir un petit bout de la littérature coréenne que je ne connaissais pas du tout (j'aime en général les œuvres asiatiques) et il faut que j'y jette un coup d'œil pour les prochaines années. J'ai aimé découvrir l'écriture de Hwang Sok-Yong, pleine de poésie et pleine de blanc que le lecteur doit remplir lui-même. Écriture très pudique en accord avec les deux personnages qui sans aucun mot expriment beaucoup.
August 23, 2024
This was a complex, beautiful story that I learned a lot from. I didn’t know a lot about the South Korean dictatorship going in, and this book provides such a powerful insight into the resistance against western and neoliberal forces in the 70s and 80s, and the activists who watched those forces win from behind bars, either literally or figuratively. It paints a heart wrenching picture of the impact of political violence not just on the prisoner, but on every participant in the life that he was wrenched from. It weaves the stories of Mr Oh and Miss Han beautifully, showing how they lived their lives apart during his imprisonment, with the heartbreaking conclusion that they never got to meet again. However, made better by the satisfying ending of him picking up the pieces she left through a relationship with their daughter.
Definitely not the lightest read, but I thought it was really beautiful and profound and stunningly and poetically told. I’m so grateful to have found this book!
Definitely not the lightest read, but I thought it was really beautiful and profound and stunningly and poetically told. I’m so grateful to have found this book!
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
February 7, 2018
Very interesting insights into how political prisoners saw the world and how they were treated in pre-democratic Korea. And maybe more interestingly, how their families dealt with life while they were in prison. The pro-democracy movement in Korea often gets confused with the Pro-NK movement and this was story was no exception. I didn't get the impression Mr. Oh was very pro-NK but he did make some confusing statements. I don't think this was an accident; I think the reader was supposed to be slightly confused by his pro-NK statements because I think Mr. Oh wanted a government that worked fairly for everyone and he hoped it would be in North Korea but knew he wouldn't be able to find it in any political system .
May 26, 2018
Lyrical, evocative, at times repetitive, a masterwork.
This work takes its time to build up steam. A long, leisurely read that is both artful and brutal.
The subject of the book is Korean dissident and political prisoner in 60s-90s South Korea. Part epistolary novel it alternates between the prisoner and letters written to him to be read posthumously authored by his wife. I learned so much about Korea (about which I was/am woefully ignorant). I have never read a work that I would call art literature that also was so disturbing at times.
I really enjoyed this book and am very glad I read it.
This work takes its time to build up steam. A long, leisurely read that is both artful and brutal.
The subject of the book is Korean dissident and political prisoner in 60s-90s South Korea. Part epistolary novel it alternates between the prisoner and letters written to him to be read posthumously authored by his wife. I learned so much about Korea (about which I was/am woefully ignorant). I have never read a work that I would call art literature that also was so disturbing at times.
I really enjoyed this book and am very glad I read it.
April 10, 2021
4.5 stars. This is a beautiful book. One that took me a long time to read because it is not plot driven. It is a reflection and I wanted to reflect as I read. The writing is simple but engaging. As much of the book is inner reflection and letters from the past between the protagonist and his lover, there's not much dialogue. But the Korea of his past and his present came alive for me. A depressing book in many ways but truthful and beautiful. Not for everyone as there is no satisfying conclusion per say. But that's not the point.
February 20, 2023
I couldn't complete this book. The writing was lacking soul. Perhaps the nuance and feeling got lost in translation somewhere. At the beginning, the story sounded interesting. I know a bit about Gwanju and Korean history. The problem is the characters. It's basically just this one guy and his love the whole story. Total lack of colour. I feel no attachment to any of the characters and their stories. I dunno what else to say but as I slowly made my way through half the book, I became more and more bored. Had to give it up.
October 21, 2025
It took me a while to finish, but it was a unique and marvelous journey that resides in the recesses of my mind for a long time.
As usual, Korean literature is charged with heavy emotions.
A novel that leaves a deep psychological and emotional impact. I love Korean literature because it is full of symbols and rhetorical images, and it always affects me profoundly.
I read it in the English version, which is not my first language, so I hope that one day I can read it again in the most beautiful language, Arabic.
As usual, Korean literature is charged with heavy emotions.
A novel that leaves a deep psychological and emotional impact. I love Korean literature because it is full of symbols and rhetorical images, and it always affects me profoundly.
I read it in the English version, which is not my first language, so I hope that one day I can read it again in the most beautiful language, Arabic.
October 12, 2022
Una historia densa, con una fuerte carga psicológica, política y emocional.
Este libro es un viaje. Un viaje a través del tiempo y el espacio, un viaje que te llevará a recorrer los senderos de la revolución, la vida, el amor y la desilusión. ¿Sacrificarte por la causa, sea cual sea, o vivir lo suficiente como para darte cuenta que el mundo es mucho más amplio?
Al final, todos tenemos un viejo jardín por encontrar o al que regresar.
Este libro es un viaje. Un viaje a través del tiempo y el espacio, un viaje que te llevará a recorrer los senderos de la revolución, la vida, el amor y la desilusión. ¿Sacrificarte por la causa, sea cual sea, o vivir lo suficiente como para darte cuenta que el mundo es mucho más amplio?
Al final, todos tenemos un viejo jardín por encontrar o al que regresar.
March 28, 2021
Une histoire d'amour magnifique entre un jeune étudiant se révoltant contre le régime dictatorial et une jeune prof d'art. Des étudiants qui ont cru en leur rêve jusqu'à se sacrifier. Le plus marquant dans ce livre est l'introspection de nombreuses années passes en prison par le personnage principal. Poignant.
April 22, 2025
屬於上個世代的韓國左翼社運人士的生命史詩，對於坐苦牢刻畫細節之深刻也許來自於作者本身的牢獄經驗，但除了「裡面」之外，「外面」一端則藉由政治犯的情人實際體驗了後來的局勢發展，1980年代南韓社運愈趨激烈，以及後來的柏林圍牆倒塌與蘇聯解體，這位情人走過了政治犯沒想到的路上。雖然整本書很厚，有詩意，卻也通俗好看；看介紹知道是在1998年開始在南韓報紙上連載的小說，2000年集結成冊出版，確實某種程度上做到了與大眾對話的企圖，實是做到了同樣也是有類似發展路徑的台灣作家做不到的事。
August 22, 2022
Powerful book. The story-via-notes approach has to be taken with some liberties, and I am not sure I enjoyed the "killed maternal instinct" aspect. Nonetheless, personal and beautifully written.
July 21, 2023
Lecture abandonnée à la page 214
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April 25, 2025chinese name 悠悠家园 or 故园
September 15, 2025
"Le portrait d'une génération qui a poursuivi le rêve d'une vie meilleure".
November 16, 2018
Thought-provoking, profoundly moving, and at times heartbreaking, the Old Garden is a masterful book set against the backdrop of the 70's/80's student movement in Korea. It is one of my favorite books.
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