Engineers of the Human Soul: North Korean Literature Today

North Korean literature today is an extreme example of an inclina tion toward didacticism which has been expressed in differing forms under various social conditions throughout the history of Korean writing. In traditional Korea, writing was the unique function of an educated elite (who bore a responsibility for moral leadership of the society) and did not become the specialized vocation of a professional class until very recent years. But even then, works addressed to a popular audience beyond the writer's peers have tended to reflect a class attitude embodying many didactic elements. This tendency, adapted to the times, has continued into the modern era. There have been three major bursts of socially motivated, didactic writing during the twentieth century: turn-of-the-century works intended to introduce modern Western thought and thus enlighten the Korean people ; the nationalistic and socialistic literary responses to the 1910-1945 Japanese occupation; and the postliberation socialist realism of the communist north and, to some extent, the antigovernment writings of the intellectual opposition in the south. Since the north Korean didactic writing which this paper describes is a contemporary example of a tendency that has been clearly discernible throughout the growth of modern Korean literature, it is helpful to begin by considering the relevant historical background.