Kim Seong-Dong

Kim's later works dealing with the brutal legacy of the Korean War also rely on his personal experience. In the trilogy of My Mother and the Frog (Eomma wa gaeguri), The Star (Byeol), and The Waning Moon (Janwol), the recurrent motif of 'Mother's inexplicable stomach pains' is linked to the traumatic impact of the war and national division on ordinary individuals. The author's focus here is not on the war itself but on the survivors of its atrocities who must grapple not only with the material difficulties that continue to exert influence on their lives but with the responsibility of appeasing 'the lonely spirit of Father (read: the dead) still roaming the vast sky'. In One Lonely Hut (Omaksari jip hanchae, 1982), Kim Seong-dong continues his attempts to probe the origin of numerous problems that plague contemporary Korean society; he finds these problems continuous within the unresolved legacy of the Korean War. The House (Jip, 1989), A Glorious Outing (Hwaryeohan oechul, 1989), and Noodles (Guksu, 1995).

Korean director Im Kwon-taek made a successful movie of Mandala in 1981.

In 1978 Kim was honoured with Literature Prize for Novelists, an award he refused to accept.

Frustrated and confused, Kim finally turned to novel writing. These experiences left a deep impact on him. As a senior at Sorabol High School, he had also joined the Buddhist monastic order to become a disciple of the Zen master Jihyo. When his short story "Moktakjo" was published in Religion Weekly (Jugan jonggyo) in 1975, he was accused of defaming the order and duly excommunicated. Kim Seongdong then returned to the secular world and began working for several magazines and publishing houses. His writing career took off with the publication in 1978 of the novella "Mandala" in the magazine Korean Literature (Hanguk munhak).

Kim Seong-Dong (8 November 1947 – 25 September 2022) was a Korean author.

Kim Seong-Dong was born on 8 November 1947, in Boryeong, Chungcheongnam-do, a son of a communist organizer. In a violent bloodbath that resulted from ideological strife, he lost his father and members of both his paternal and maternal family and grew up stigmatized for his family's communist ties. Kim learned Chinese from his Confucian grandfather, and was able to continue his education in Seoul with the financial support of his relatives.