Manimbo by Ko Un and translated by Brother Anthony of Taize, Lee Sang-Wah

This is poetry from Korea, Republic of.

Manimbo by Ko Un translated by Brother Anthony of Taize, Lee Sang-Wah is published by Bloodaxe Books. This is a Book originally written in Korean. This was published in 2015.0 and has the ISBN of 9.781780372426E12.

Manimbo, by Ko Un and translated by Brother Anthony of Taize, Lee Sang-Wah from Korean, brings Korean-language poetry connected to Korea, Republic of into English through Ko Un’s Korean scope, motion, and the sense of a life-world crowded with figures, histories, and sudden song. The metadata gives the reader a doorway, but the real value is the pressure of a voice that has already changed the weather around it. I would read it for crowd, road, chant, and the large human texture that keeps entering the poem, not as a fixed lesson about Korea, Republic of. The best entry point is still the poem itself: the line that catches, the image that refuses to explain itself, the feeling that arrives before paraphrase. Manimbo belongs in the translated poetry library because it deepens the Korean shelf with a major voice of abundance, witness, and restless movement.

If you’d like to see international poetry continue and gain traction, consider requesting this work from your local library, or purchasing it from places like Open Books (a poetry only bookstore), Asterism Books (an independent press distributor), or bookshop.org to connect you with your local bookstores.

Check out more of the always in-progress translated poetry index here.