Fracturing literary boundaries: Connecting with the Korean Peninsula in postwar Japan

Abstract

Koreans writers who remained in Japan after the end of World War II have largely been ignored by scholars of modern Korean literature. This chapter is an attempt to shed light on how Korean writers who remained in Japan actively engaged with the work of their counterparts on the Korean Peninsula and sought to contribute to the establishment of a “national” Korean literature. In so doing, the chapter argues that “August 15, 1945, " functions as a line of division that obscures ongoing intersections between Korea and Japan.