2009년 3월 25일 수요일

JL's source for his novel 'Star Rover' Jack London

At Star Rover, JL at first tried to use Chong Mong-ju as main character instead of using the name of Yi Yong-ik.

"But I must baseten, for my narrative is not of Adam Strang the shipwreccked sea-cuny on a coral isle, but of Adam Strang, later named Chong Mong-ju (lined) Yi Yong-ik, the Mightty one, who was, one time favorite of the powerful Yunsan, who was lover and husband of the Lady Om of the princely house Min, and ... "

See his JL1194, chapter 15, p. 524.

JL's source for his novel 'Star Rover'

4. Angus Hamilton
Korea. New York: C. Scribner's Sons, 1904.
mentioned Lady Om, Opert, Yi Yong-ik

5. The Korean Review
Sept 1902, p. 385: The Treasure of Kyong-ju
"From the archaeological standpoint, the city of Kyong-ju in southern Korea is probably the most interesting point in Korea. It is not so old as Pyang-yang but the .... The southern city and its environs are rich in historical remains but it is our purpose to speak here only of ..."

Sept 1902, pp. 384-385
There is a picture of the torture of a prisoner, titled "Torturing a wwitness". 다리 사이에 나무를 집어 넣고 주리를 트는 모습이다.

2009년 3월 19일 목요일

Jack London Report

Most of JL's newspaper articles, personal letter, and diary on Korea were published in Jack Lodon Report.



Also see following articles;

JL 605. Dr. Moffett, March 13, 1904, 31pp. 4to, Sunan, Korea; see JLR p. 82

JL 606: typewritten, same contents.

JL 1020: March 5, 1904. Ping-Yang, autograph. On the Peking Road; see JLR p. 42

JL 819: The Japanese: [Russo-Japanese War Sketch], MS 2pp. 4to, typewritten; see JLR 122.

Jack Lodnon's Cherry

"Cherry" is an unpublished manuscript by JL.
This book is the sequel of "Jack London and Hawaii," published in 1917.
"Cherry felt enigma of oriental mind....in herself. and also in other Japanese> her peculliar beauty...walk, straight gaze; her carriage superior to white girls about her; modulated voice, inflection, etc."

1. London, Jack. Cherry: [misc, pages from novel]. Carbon copy (MS) 24pp. 4to (typewritten), (JL557)
2. London, Jack. Cherry: [novel]. A.Ms. 269pp. 4to. unfinished. Author's autograph corrections. Nov. 21, 1916. Also: by Charmian London. (JL558)
3. London, Jack. Cherry: [novel]. MS. 78pp. 4to. (typewritten). Incomplete Corrections by Charmian London Nov. 21, 1916. (JL559)
4. London, Jack. Cherry: [novel]. MS. 78pp. (typewritten). Unfinished. Author's autograph corrections. Nov. 21, 1916. Also : Note by Charmian London (JL560)
5. London, Jack. Cherry: [novel]. MS. 78pp. (typewritten). Unfinished. Author's autograph corrections. Nov. 21, 1916. Also : Note by Charmian London (JL562)
6. London, Jack. Cherry: [novel]. MS. 331pp. 4to. (typewritten). Autograph corrections in pensil by Charmian London. Nov. 21, 1916 (JL564)

JL's source for his novel 'Star Rover'

3. Isabella Bird Bishop's Korea (1898 edition)
JL carried Bishop's book in his travel to Korea in 1904. He chose Bbishop's travel route.
Compare JL map book and Bishop's map in her book.

pp.10-11: "General Map of Korea and neighboring countries" Indicated in this map Bishop's travel routes in Korea
pp. 66-67: "Sketch map of central Korea" Indicated in this map Bishop's 1st and 2nd journey in Korean peninsula. "Road to China"
pp. 292-293: travel in Songdo
p. 357: Itinerary

JL's source for his novel 'Star Rover'

2. William Elliot Griffis' Corea

XXXI: (marked) A body-Snaching Expedition
p. 458: Tai-wen-kun
p. 396: A body-Snaching Expedition

JL's source for his novel 'Star Rover'

1. Passing of Korea
There were plenty of side marks in "passing of Korea" stocked in JL library.
These marks are indicated mainly before p. 150.

p. 17: "As rice is the national dish,... Kimchi... minari.... part among the side dishes."
p. 18: (marked) "Korea is celebrated... ginseng, of course takes the leading place."
p. 21: (marked) "tiger"
p. 24: "the wicked ruler prince Yunsan(1495-1506)"
p. 41: "kisang(dancing-girl)"
p. 42: (marked) "after the vocabulary of abuse has been exhausted the two constestants clinch with with each other, each attempting to grasp the other by the top-knot, which forms a most convenient handle."
pp.62-3: included a photo of prinsoners with kals
p. 63: (marked) "The commonest method of purnishing officials has always been banishment."
p. 65: (marked) "Beating seems to be an essential feature in almost all punishment."
p. 66: (marked) description of torture. "He was bound about the ankles and the knees, and then two sticks were crowded down between his two calves and pried apart like levers so that the bones of the lower leg were slowly bent without breaking."
p. 86 (marked) "In 1361 occurred another of those periodical invasions to the Hong-du, or "Red heads," - a wild robber tribe."
p. 87: (marked) "One was a monk named Sindon"
p. 106: (marked) "Sparwehr sailed from Holland, with Hendrik Hamel as supercarge."
pp. 116-7: "The Late Regent, Prince Tai-wun"
p. 186: Yi Yong-ik
pp. 282-283: included a photo of playing Jang-gi
Estra: water-carrier, ba-duk, Kangwwondo mine,

2009년 3월 11일 수요일

Jack London's Itinery in Korea (to be continued)

JL stayed the Chinese Hotel in Chemulpo, and Mr. Emberly's Hotel in Seoul.
Mr. Emberly introduced London Manyoungi, who was hired as house boy for JL. After He came to the States, Manyoungi lived with London for threee years and then he left alone.
JL first purchased from the British Brown a horse which was blinded, then again bought a new horse from Russian minister Pavoff. He have never before experienced horse back riding.

Yokohama-Kobe-Nagasaki-Moji-Busan-Mokpo-Kunsan-Chemulpo-Seoul-Sunan-Pyong Yang
3 Feb. 1904: Simonoseki
13 March 1904: Sunan
21 April 1904: Wiju
22 April 1904: Castle in Wiju

4. Broadside collection

The London collection contains sixty-four broadsides(JLB1-64). Included in this category are the newspaper articles London write from Korea.

JLB 4: "Here are the first pictures from the Seat of war in Korea" (taken by JL) SFE, April 4, 1904
JLB 25: "How Jack London got in and out of jail in Japan" SFE, Feb. 27, 1904
JLB 26: "Story of Typoon off the coast of Japan" San Francisco Call, October 9, 1920; The Morning Call, sunday edition, nov. 12, 1893. written by JL, aged 17.
JLB 45: "Japan Officers consider everything a military secret" SFE, June 26, 1904
JLB 46: "Troubles of War Correspondent in Starting for the Front" SFE, April 4, 1904
JLB 47: "Interpreters and jow they cause trouble" SFE, April 26, 1904
JLB 48: "Japanese supplies rushed to the Front by Man & Beast" SFE, June 19, 1904
JLB 49: "Advancing Russians Nearing Japan's Army" SFE, March 3, 1904
JLB 50: "Examiner Writer sent back to Seoul" SFE, April 25, 1904
JLB 51: "Japs driving Russians across the Yalu river" SFE, June 4, 1904
JLB 52: "Cossacks Fight then Retreat" SFE, April 19, 1904
JLB 54: "How Jack London got in and out of Jail in Japan" SFE, Feb. 27, 1904
JLB 55: "How the Hermit Kingdom Behaves in time of War" SFE, April, 17, 1904
JLB 56: "Russian Warships patrol Pe-Chili gulf" SFE, April 7, 1904
JLB 57: "Japan's Invasion of Korea" SFE, March 4, 1904
JLB 58: "Japanese Army's equipment excites great admiration" April 3, 1904
JLB 59: "Japanese swim cold river under fire" SFE, June 9, 1904
JLB 60: "Footsore, Dazed and Frozen, the Japanese Truge through Korea" SFE, April 18, 1904
JLB 61: "Savage Victory" SFE, March 30, 1904
JLB 63: "Fightiong at Long Range" SFE, June 5, 1904

Ephemera Box 519 also has same SFE articles written by JL

JLE72: SFE, 25 April 1904
JLE74: SFE, 5 June 1904
JLE76: SFE, 18 April 1904
JLE85: SFE, 27 Feb. 1904
JLE86: SFE, 17 April 1904
JLE87: SFE, 7 April 1904
JLE89: SFE, 4 April 1904
JLE90: SFE, 26 April 1904
JLE94: SFE, 26 June 1904
JLE96: SFE, 9 June 1904
JLE97: SFE, 3 April 1904
JLE98: SFE, 4 March 1904
JLE99: SFE, 4 June 1904

3. Jack London Scrapbooks

The Jack London Scrapbooks were assembled first by JL and then by CL. Included are most of London's clippings, reviews of his books, and newspaper accounts of his activities. The scrapbooks from the single most important printed source of London's life and literary work, and give an excellent overview of how London was seen in his own time.

Scarpbook 4: 1903-1904
Scrapbook 5: 1904-1905
Scarpbook 6: 1905

All in Box 517

In this scrapbook, we can find JL's articles on Dr. Moffett and the Russo-Japanese War. Included San Francisco Examiner articles on the war.

2. Photographs: Photos taken or bought by Jack Lodon during his stay in Korea

1. "Korea I, II, III, 1904" (JLP 421-423)
315 photos taken by JL during the Russo-Japanese War; The photos feature Japanese and Russian solddiers and artillery, Korean scenes and religious building, villages, some fishing scenes, his arrival of Kunsan, Pusan, Chemulpo, Pyong Yang, Manyongi, and a few photos of JL himeslf.
2. Photo Album 1-13 (JLP446-451)
Most of the photoss, Jack and Charmian London took in their travels and at home were pasted into ninty-three small and thirty large photo albums. Contact prints of these photos have been assembled and are available for reference in Boxes 486-510. Each box contains five albums JPL 439-451(album no.1 -13). Title of album is "Korea" and dated in "1904".

However, some photos in the albums were taken not by JL but others, and JL might bought them in Seoul , and should be careful that some captions were wrongly described.

Interesting photos:
no. 247: no. 1 mapu escorted London during his stay in Korea
no. 220: no.2 mapu
nos. 221, 223, 224, 225, 30480, 40480: Manyongi
nos. 11, 1321, 1325; JL took many pictures of the wrestling scenes of Japanese soldiers and Korean play of Chang Gi. And utilized this wrestling(sumo) and Korean game of Chnag Gi in his novel of Star-rover.
Some photos of the head of Kim ok-kyun, Si-hyung Choi, and Ki Sang. and one shocking photo almost all naked.

1. The Korean contents of Huntington Library Jack London Collection

The Korean contents of Huntington Library Jack London Collection can be divided into four parts;

1) Correspondence : Most of his letters already published by Stanford university press.
2) Manuscript collection: Mainly his novels of Star-Rover, Cherry(unpublished), and his stories about the Russo-Japanese war and Manyoungi
3) Photographs: Photos taken or bought by Jack Lodon during his stay in Korea
4) Broadside collection: Included in this category are the newspaper articles London write from Korea.

1) Manuscript collection
1. London, Jack. Cherry: [notes for novel]. A.Ms. 63pp. 8vo. 1916. (JL 21313)
2. London, Jack. Cherry: [notes for novel]. A.Ms. 10pp. 8vo. & 12mo. (written in pensil). [pre 1917]. Also: note by Charmian London (1piece). (JL555)
3. London, Jack. Cherry: [notes for novel]. Ms. 17pp. 4to, & 8vo. (typewritten), 1916. Also: 4magazine clippings (11 pieces). (JL556)
4. Dr. Moffett: [article]. A.Ms. 31pp. 4to. Sunan, [Korea]. March 13, 1904. (JL605)
5. Dr. Moffett: [article]. MS. 2pp. 4to. (typewritten) Sunan, [Korea]. March 13, 1904. (JL606)
6. Dr. Moffett: [article]. MS. 2pp. 4to. (typewritten) Sunan, [Korea]. March 13, 1904. (JL20713)
7. The Jap: [Plot for Short Story]. A.Ms. 2pp. 8vo. (written in pensil]. [pre 1917]. (JL 818)
8. The Japanese: [Russo-Japanese War Sketch]. Ms. 2pp. 4to (typewritten). [c. 1904]. (JL819)
9. In Yeddo Bay: [Short Story]. Carbon copy (Ms) 12pp. 4to. (typewritten). (JL21317)
10. manyoungi: [note to write a study] Ms. 1p. 4to. (typewritten). [pre 1917]. (JL920)
11. On the Peking Road: [Russo-Japanese War Article] A.Ms.S. 39pp. 4to. Author's autograph corrections. (Incomplete). Ping-Yang, Korea. 5 March 1904. (JL1020)
12. Russo-Japanese War Commentary. Ms. 1p. 4to (typeWritten). [1904]. (JL1139)
13. The Star-Rover: [note for novel]. A.Ms. 2pp. 8vo. (written in pensil). [pre 1914]. Also: 20 newspaper clippings (24 pieces) and 1 envelope. (JL1192)
14. The Star-Rover: [notes]. Ms. 1p. 4to. (typewritten). [pre 1914]. Also: 8 magazine clippings (27 pieces). (JL1193)
15. The Star-Rover: [novel]. A.Ms.S. 1,054pp. 4to. Author's autograph corrections. Glen Ellen, California. 22 march 1914. (JL1194)
16. Travel in Korea: [Essay]. A.Ms. 16pp. 4to. (incomplete), Sunan, Korea. 10 March 1904. (JL1325)
17. Travel in Korea: [Essay]. Ms. 3pp. 4to. (typewritten), Incomplete. 10 March 1904. (JL1326)
18. The Yellow Peril: ABit of Data on the Japanese Question. A.Ms.S. 16pp. 4to Author's autograph corrections, Melbourne, Australia 12 June 1909 (JL1445)
19. Book Purchased: [notes]. A.Ms. 1p. obl. 8vo. Piedmont, California, [c. 1904]. (JL484)

2009년 3월 4일 수요일

Anatomy of Star Rover Korean Chapter

In 1915, Jack London published Star Rover. In it is there a short story on Korea. London based his Korean story upon several historical facts recorded by Hamel and Griffis. As he himself acknowledges, his story of Korea in Star Rober includes in fact Korean history and custom. So we can safely say that his Korean chapter is actually a combination of historical facts and fiction.
Time: 1550-1650
Main Characters
Adam Strang(Yi Yong-ik), Lady Om, Yunsan(Buddhist priest), Kwan Yung-jin, Kim, Pak, Johannes Maartens, Vandervoot, Herman Tromp, Hans Amden, Hendrik Hamel, Jacob Brinker, Emperor, the house of Min, Taiwun(Emperor's brother), Chong Mong-ju, Yi Sun-sin(the local magistrate).

Key locations
Cho-sen, Keijio, Chong-ho, Songdo, Fusan, Chenampo, Chemulpo, Pyen-yang, Kyong-ju, Wiju, Pyonhan, Kang-wun, Chiksan, Padok, Whang-hai, Masanpo, Yalu
Important words
Sparwehr, Minari, kimchi, Silla, Koryu
Strang's view on Japan (p.163-4)
But the people would have no dealings with us and two-sworded officials, in sweeping robes of silk that made Captain Johannes Maarten's mouth water, came abroad of us and politely requested us to begone. Under their suave manners was the iron of a warlike race, and we knew, and went our way.

Strang's First view on Korean coast (p. 164)
We crossed the Straits of Japan and were entering the Yellow Sea on our way to China, when we laid the Sparwehr on the rocks. She was a crazy tub the old Sparwehr, so clumsy and so dirty with whiskered marine-life on her bottom that she could not get out of her own way. Close-hauled, the closest she could come was to six points of the wind; and then she bobbed up and down, without way, like a derelict turnip. Galliots were clippers compared with her. To tack her about was undreamed of; to wear her required all hands and half a watch. So situated, we were caught on a lee shore in an eight-point shift of wind at the height of a hurricane that had beaten
our souls sick for forty-eight hours.
We drifted in upon the land in the chill light of a stormy dawn across a heartless cross-sea mountain high. It was dead of winter, and between smoking snow-squalls we could glimpse the forbidding coast, if coast it might be called, so broken was it. There were grim rock isles and islets beyond counting, dim snow-covered ranges beyond, and everywhere upstanding cliffs too steep for snow, outjuts of headlands, and pinnacles and slivers of rock upthrust from the boiling sea.
There was no name to this country on which we drove, no record of it ever having been visited by navigators. Its coast-line was only hinted at in our chart. From all of which we could argue that the inhabitants were as inhospitable as the little of their land we could see.
We drifted in upon he land in the chill light of a stormy dawn across a heartless cross-sea mountain high. It was dead of winter, and between smoking snow-squalls we could glimpse the forbidding coast, if coast it might be called. so broken was it. There were grim rock isles and islets beyond counting, dim snow-covered ranges beyond, and everywhere upstanding cliffs too steep for snow, outjuts of headlands, and pinnacles and slivers of rock upthrust from the boiling sea.
There was no name to this country on which we drove, no record of it ever having been visited by navigators. It coastline was only hinted at in our chart. From all of which we could argue that the inhabitants were as inhospitable as the little of their land we could see.
Topknot (p. 165-6)
The men were clad entirely in dirt white, with their long hair done up in a curious knot on their pates--the marriage knot,
Food (p. 166)
They were a poor and wretched folk, their food difficult even for the stomach of a sea-cuny to countenance. Their rice was brown as chocolate. Half the husks remained in it, along with bits of chaff, splinters, and unidentifiable dirt which made one pause often in the chewing in order to stick into his mouth thumb and forefinger and pluck out the offending stuff. Also, they ate a sort of millet, and pickles of astounding variety and ungodly hot.
Bread there was none, but we ate white rice (the strength of which resides in one's muscles not long), a meat which we found to be dog (which animal is regularly butchered for food in Cho-Sen), and the pickles ungodly hot but which one learns to like exceeding well. And there was drink, real drink, not milky slush, but white, biting stuff distilled from rice, a pint of which would kill a weakling and make a strong man mad and merry.(p. 171)
What we in extremity have eaten!-- Leavings of dog's flesh, putrid and unsaleable, flung to us by the mocking butchers; MINARI, a water-cress gathered from stagnant pools of slime; spoiled KIMCHI that would revolt the stomachs of peasants and that could be smelled a mile. (p. 193)
House (p. 166)
Their houses were earthen-walled and straw-thatched. Under the floors ran flues through which the kitchen smoke escaped, warming the sleeping-room in its passage. Here we lay and rested for days, soothing ourselves with their mild and tasteless tobacco, which we smoked in tiny bowls at the end of yard-long pipes.
Their houses were earthen-walled and straw-thatched. Under the floors ran flues through which the kitchen smoke escaped, warming the sleeping-room in its passage. Here we lay and rested for days, soothing ourselves with their mild and tasteless tobacco, which we smoked in tiny bowls at the end of yard-long pipes. Also, there was a warm, sourish, milky-looking drink, heady only when taken in enormous doses. After guzzling I swear gallons of it, I got singing drunk, which is the way of sea-cunies the world over.
Korean Army (p. 167)
They were armed with three-pronged spears, slicing spears, and chopping spears, with here and there a matchlock of so heroic mould that there were two soldiers to a matchlock, one to carry and set the tripod on which rested the muzzle, the other to carry and fire the gun. As I was to learn, sometimes the gun went off, sometimes it did not, all depending upon the adjustment of the fire- punk and the condition of the powder in the flash-pan
Plank (p. 168)
These planks were about six feet long and two feet wide, and curiously split in half lengthwise. Nearer one end than the other was a round hole larger than a man's neck.... before he knew what was doing, one of the planks, with a scissors-like opening and closing, was about his neck and clamped.
Korean character (p. 168)
To my joy, I quickly learned that the Koreans did not understand a fist-blow and were without the slightest notion of guarding.
I was more an honoured guest than a prisoner, and invariably I rode by Kim's side, my long legs near reaching the ground, and, where the going was deep, my feet scraping the muck. Kim was young. Kim was human. Kim was universal. He was a man anywhere in any country. He and I talked and laughed and joked the day long and half the night. And I verify ate up the language. I had a gift that way anyway. Even Kim marvelled at the way I mastered the idiom. And I learned the Korean points of view, the Korean humour, the Korean soft places, weak places, touchy places. Kim taught me flower songs, love songs, drinking songs. One of the latter was his own, of the end of which I shall give you a crude attempt at translation. Kim and Pak, in their youth, swore a pact to abstain from drinking, which pact was speedily broken.(p. 171)
Woman custom (p. 169)
Of them[ladies] we saw little, for their faces were covered, according to the custom of the country. Only dancing girls, low women, and grandmas ever were seen abroad with exposed faces.
Racial bias (p. 170)
The Asiatic is a cruel beast, and delights in spectacles of human suffering.
he[Kim] was the whitest man I ever encountered in Cho-Sen.
Korean horse(p. 170)
It chanced, at the first off-saddling, that I strolled around to witness the feeding of the dwarf horses. And what I witnessed set me bawling, "What now, Vandervoot?" till all our crew came running. As I am a living man what the horses were feeding on was bean soup, hot bean soup at that, and naught else did they have on all the journey but hot bean soup. It was the custom of the country.
Origin of synopses (p. 172)
I here mention Hendrik Hamel as my adviser, for it has a bearing on much that followed at Keijo in the winning of Yunsan's favour, the Lady Om's heart, and the Emperor's tolerance. I had the will and the fearlessness for the game I played, and some of the wit; but most of the wit I freely admit was supplied me by Hendrik Hamel.
Beacon system (p. 172)
And every evening, at fall of day, beacon fires sprang from peak to peak and ran along the land. Always Kim watched for this nightly display. From all the coasts of Cho-Sen, Kim told me, these chains of fire-speech ran to Keijo to carry their message to the Emperor. One beacon meant the land was in peace. Two beacons meant revolt or invasion. We never saw but one beacon.
Korean cloth (p. 172)
Keijo we found a vast city where all the population, with the exception of the nobles or yang-bans, dressed in the eternal white. This, Kim explained, was an automatic determination and advertisement of caste. Thus, at a glance, could one tell, the status of an individual by the degrees of cleanness or of filthiness of his garments. It stood to reason that a coolie, possessing but the clothes he stood up in, must be extremely dirty. And to reason it stood that the individual in immaculate white must possess many changes and command the labour of laundresses to keep his changes immaculate. As for the yang-bans who wore the pale, vari-coloured silks, they were beyond such common yardstick of place.
Korean court (p. 173)
In the great open space before the palace wall were colossal stone dogs that looked more like tortoises. They crouched on massive stone pedestals of twice the height of a tall man.
Synopses (p. 173)
These, Kim told me, were the Tiger Hunters of Pyeng-yang, the fiercest and most terrible fighting men of which Cho-Sen could boast.
Ki sang (p. 173)
painted KI-SANG or dancing girls who rested from entertaining,
The ki-sang invaded us, dragging us about, making prisoners of us, two or three of them to one of us, leading us about like go many dancing boars and putting us through our antics.(p. 174)
Political situation of Korea (p. 175)
In truth, she was the Lady Om, princess of the house of Min. Did I say young? She was fully my own age, thirty, and for all that and her ripeness and beauty a princess still unmarried, as I was to learn.
History of Korea (p. 177)
I am of the blood of the house of Koryu," I told the Emperor, "that ruled at Songdo many a long year agone when my house arose on the ruins of Silla."
Ancient history, all, told me by Kim on the long ride, and he struggled with his face to hear me parrot his teaching.
In my time I heard the echoes of the two invasions, a generation before, driven by Hideyoshi through the heart of Cho-Sen from Fusan in the south to as far north as Pyeng- Yang. It was this Hideyoshi who sent back to Japan a myriad tubs of pickled ears and noses of Koreans slain in battle. I talked with many old men and women who had seen the fighting and escaped the pickling. (p. 185)
Korean Drinking habit (p. 178)
Taiwun, the Emperor's brother, was a sot of sots, and as the night wore on he challenged me to a drinking. The Emperor was delighted, and commanded a dozen of the noblest sots to join in the bout. The women were dismissed, and we went to it, drink for drink, measure for measure. Kim I kept by me, and midway along, despite Hendrik Hamel's warning scowls, dismissed him and the company, first requesting, and obtaining, palace lodgment instead of the inn.
Next day the palace was a-buzz with my feast, for I had put Taiwun and all his champions snoring on the mats and walked unaided to my bed. Never, in the days of vicissitude that came later, did Taiwun doubt my claim of Korean birth. Only a Korean, he averred, could possess so strong a head.
Custom (p. 184)
In Cho-Sen seven is the magic number. To complete this number two of the provinces were taken over from the hands of two more of Chong Mong-ju's adherents.
Korean woman view(p. 180)
The Lady Om was a very flower of woman. Women such as she are born rarely, scarce twice a century the whole world over. She was unhampered by rule or convention. Religion, with her, was a series of abstractions, partly learned from Yunsan, partly worked out for herself. Vulgar religion, the public religion, she held, was a device to keep the toiling millions to their toil. She had a will of her own, and she had a heart all womanly. She was a beauty--yes, a beauty by any set rule of the world. Her large black eyes were neither slitted nor slanted in the Asiatic way. They were long, true, but set squarely, and with just the slightest hint of obliqueness that was all for piquancy.
Hamel Story (p. 185)
Of course it was really Hendrik Hamel at my back, but I was the fine figure-head that carried it off. Through me Hamel taught our soldiers drill and tactics and taught the Red Heads strategy
Capital of Silla (p. 187)
Kyong-ju had no wealth of farms or fisheries. The taxes scarce paid the collecting, and the governorship was little more than an empty honour. The place was in truth a graveyard--a sacred graveyard, for on Tabong Mountain were shrined and sepultured the bones of the ancient kings of Silla.
Isolation policy of Choson (p. 186)
A remarkable thing was the tides of Cho-Sen. On our north-east coast there was scarce a rise and fall of a foot. On our west coast the neap tides ran as high as sixty feet. Cho-Sen had no commerce, no foreign traders. There was no voyaging beyond her coasts, and no voyaging of other peoples to her coasts. This was due to her immemorial policy of isolation. Once in a decade or a score of years Chinese ambassadors arrived, but they came overland, around the Yellow Sea, across the country of the Hong-du, and down the Mandarin Road to Keijo. The round trip was a year-long journey. Their mission was to exact from our Emperor the empty ceremonial of acknowledgment of China's ancient suzerainty.
Body Seizure Incident and Hamel's Escape to Japan (p. 187, 188)
And while Yunsan nodded, while I devoted myself to sport and to the Lady Om, while Hendrik Hamel perfected plans for the looting of the Imperial treasury, and while Johannes Maartens schemed his own scheme among the tombs of Tabong Mountain, the volcano of Chong Mong-ju's devising gave no warning beneath us.
The people of Cho-Sen are fanatical ancestor-worshippers, and that old pirate of a booty-lusting Dutchman, with his four cunies, in far Kyong-ju, did no less a thing than raid the tombs of the gold-coffined, long-buried kings of ancient Silla. The work was done in the night, and for the rest of the night they travelled for the sea-coast. But the following day a dense fog lay over the land and they lost their way to the waiting junk which Johannes Maartens had privily outfitted. He and the cunies were rounded in by Yi Sun-sin, the local magistrate, one of Chong Mong-ju's adherents. Only Herman Tromp escaped in the fog, and was able, long after, to tell me of the adventure.
Folklore on Pyongyang (p. 190)
In Pyeng-yang I became a water-carrier, for know that that old city, whose walls were ancient even in the time of David, was considered by the people to be a canoe, and that, therefore, to sink a well inside the walls would be to scupper the city. So all day long thousands of coolies, water-jars yoked to their shoulders, tramp out the river gate and back. I became one of these, until Chong Mong-ju sought me out, and I was beaten and planked and set upon the highway.
Various towns in Korea (p. 191)
In far Wiju I became a dog-butcher, killing the brutes publicly before my open stall, cutting and hanging the caresses for sale, tanning the hides under the filth of the feet of the passers-by by spreading the hides, raw-side up, in the muck of the street. But Chong Mong-ju found me out. I was a dyer's helper in Pyonhan, a gold-miner in the placers of Kang-wun, a rope-maker and twine-twister in Chiksan. I plaited straw hats in Padok, gathered grass in Whang-hai, and in Masenpo sold myself to a rice farmer to toil bent double in the flooded paddies for less than a coolie's pay. But there was never a time or place that the long arm of Chong Mong-ju did not reach out and punish and thrust me upon the beggar's way.
Korean ginseng (p. 191)
The Lady Om and I searched two seasons and found a single root of the wild mountain ginseng, which is esteemed so rare and precious a thing by the doctors that the Lady Om and I could have lived a year in comfort from the sale of our one root. But in the selling of it I was apprehended, the root confiscated, and I was better beaten and longer planked than ordinarily.
Peddlers' Guild (p. 191)
Everywhere the wandering members of the great Peddlers' Guild carried word of me, of my comings and goings and doings, to Chong Mong-ju at Keijo.
The Yalu river (p. 194)
Beyond the Yalu, forty miles wide, was the strip of waste that constituted the northern frontier and that ran from sea to sea. It was not really waste land, but land that had been deliberately made waste in carrying out Cho-Sen's policy of isolation. On this forty- mile strip all farms, villages and cities had been destroyed. It was no man's land, infested with wild animals and traversed by companies of mounted Tiger Hunters whose business was to kill any human being they found.

Hamel Story (p. 194)
As the years passed my seven fellow-cunies came more to frequent Fusan. It was on the south-east coast where the climate was milder. But more than climate, it lay nearest of all Cho-Sen to Japan. Across the narrow straits, just farther than the eye can see, was the one hope of escape Japan, where doubtless occasional ships of Europe came. Strong upon me is the vision of those seven ageing men on the cliffs of Fusan yearning with all their souls across the sea they would never sail again.

2009년 3월 3일 화요일

Frank Norris Novels

The Octopus and Moran of the Lady Letty are representative of a period in the history of white American nationalism in which the health of the national economy appeared to depend on expanded exports to China, while the Chinese immigrant was being defined as a subhuman threat to the national body. This hypocrisy would structure representations of Asia, and Asians in America, throughout the twentieth century.

2009년 2월 25일 수요일

SS Haimun

SS Haimun was a Chinese steamer ship commanded by war correspondent Lionel James in 1904 during the Russo-Japanese War for The Times. It is the first-known instance of a "press boat" dedicated to war report. Nevertheless, Jack London was the first persson who sent war reports to the western countries.http://enc.daum.net/dic100/contents.do?query1=2012815147

2009년 2월 24일 화요일

Domenico Cimarosa

Enjoy Serenade for Flute & Guitar
By Domenico Cimarosa 1749-1801
Kazuhito Yamashita, Guitar / James Galway, Flute

http://cafe.daum.net/uhgchoir/LmZd/1?docid=16p8kLmZd120090204221944&q=Gli%20Orazi%20e%20i%20Curiazi&srchid=CCB16p8kLmZd120090204221944

Korea on Jack London's Novels

Korea on Jack London's Novels

The Cruise of the Snark - Chapter 1
"through the philippines to Japan. then will come Korea, China, India, the red sea, and the mediter"

The Human Drift and Other Stories - The Human Drift
"she has carved out for herself Formosa and Korea, and driven the vanguard of her drift far"

John Barleycorn - Chapter 29
"had a comfortable cabin and a coal stove. A Korean boy did the cooking, and i usually took"

The Little Lady of the Big House - Chapter 8
"gong for lunch rang out--a huge bronze gong from Korea that was never struck until it was first in"

On the Makaloa Mat: Island Tales - When Alice Told Her Soul
"and the concept worked. Chinese, Korean, Japanese, Hawaiian, Porto Rican, Russian,"

Revolution and Other Essays - The House Beautiful
"the philosophy of the spick and span. In Korea the national costume is white."

The Strength of the Strong - The Unparalleled Invasion
"dreaming a colossal dream of empire for herself. Korea she had made into a granary"

The Jacket (The Star-Rover) - Chapter 15
"the morning calm. In modern speech it is called Korea."

The Road and Other Stories - Bulls
"after that i get out on bail. it's no use. In Korea i used to be arrested about every other day"

The Valley of the Moon - Chapter XII
"Japanese, Italians, Portuguese, Swiss, Hindus, Koreans, Norwegians, Danes, French, Armenians,"

When God Laughs and Other Stories - A Nose For The King
"in the morning calm of Korea, when its peace and tranquillity truly merit"

Jack Lodon's articles on Korea

Jack London. "Japanese Officers Consider Everything a Military Secret" San Francisco Examiner, 26 June 1904, p. 41.

Jack London. "How Jack London Went to Front," SFE, 17 April 1904, p. 19.

Jack London. "Troubles of War Correspondent in Starting for the Front," SFE, 4 April 1904, p. 3.

Jack London. "Royal Road a Sea of Mud," SFE, 7 April, 1904, p. 3.

Jack London. "How the Hermit Kingddon Behaves in time of War," SFE, 17 April 1904, p. 19.

Jack London. "Japan's Invasion of Korea, As Seen by Jack London," SFE, 4 March 1904, p. 1.

Jack London. "Japanese Army's Equipment Excites Great Admiration," SFE, 3 April 1904, p. 23.

Jack London. "Cossacks Fight Then Retreat," SFE, 19 April 1904, p. 3.

Jack London. "Examiner's Writer Sent Back to Seoul," SFE, 25 April, p. 2.

Jack London. "Japanese in Invisible War," SFE, 12 June 1904, p. 1.

Jack London."Jack London's Graphic Story of the Japs Driving Russians Across the Yalu River," SFE, 4 June 1904, p. 1.

2009년 2월 20일 금요일

Jack London Bibliography

Lee, James S. "Jack London: War Correspondent in Korea." Korean Culture XV:1 (Spring 1994), pp. 26-33.

Kim, Yung Min. "A 'Patriarchal Grass House' of His Own: Jack London's Martin Eden and the Imperial Frontier." American Literary Realism 34.1 (2001): 1-17.

2009년 2월 18일 수요일

Terzetto: Tremate, empi, tremate , Op.116 - Beethoven

Enjoy Beethoven op. 116. (Terzetto: Tremate, empi, tremate)
I am researching this music, and wish to tell you something about Korea in it near future.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WjpfAjyIBOE

2009년 2월 17일 화요일

A Study of 16th Century Western Books on Korea: The Birth of an Image

VI. Principal Navigations
During the early stages of the Tudor dynasty, England was in political and religious turmoil. Accordingly, most of the publications leading up to the mid-16th century were related to the Reformation, and virtually nothing was published on the foreign markets of the Iberian Peninsula. However, from mid-16th century, the climate became conducive to the publication of new material on Asia, as more and more merchants, particularly in Plymouth, and intellectuals in London argued for the expansion of England's textile markets abroad.

The person who steered England towards the notion of the maritime empire was Richard Eden. Eden was a geologist by trade and had long been a stout advocate of English colonial expansion. In publishing A treatyse of the newe India in 1553, Eden had succeeded in reviving England's long held interest in the foreign colonies of Spain and Portugal. After Eden's death, Richard Willes translated and published several foreign texts on Asia such as Varthema's Travels, Pereira's Chinese accounts, and Maffei's Japanese accounts.

In particular, John Frampton translated Marco Polo's Travels, and is thus credited with being the first Englishman to introduce Korea to the English populace. The publication of the navigational records initiated by Eden got on track in earnest through the efforts of Richard Hakluyt. Although Hakluyt's life is well documented, few are aware of Hakluyt's contribution to the introduction of Korea to not only England but to all of Europe as well. In truth Hakluyt was instrumental in introducing to Protestant Europe the particulars about Korea, including its geography and culture. Hakluyt was an avid collector of Spanish and Portuguese maritime materials and, using Ramusio's Navigationi et Viaggi as a model, he published his Principal Nativation in 1589. This single volume book mainly dealt with English navigational records. Therefore, with the exception of the segment on travels to the Middle East, the first edition of Hakluyt's work did not include information directly related to Asia or Korea. Hakluyt's personal involvement with the East India Company, set the stage for England's maturity into a formidable seafaring world power.

In early 1580, Hakluyt realized that the Far East market could open up new opportunities for the exportation of England's wool products, and he determined that if he were to convince the English public, he had to educate them first. In the following years, Hakluyt devoted much of his time and effort to overseeing the translation and publication of scores of Portuguese and Spanish books on the Far East. In 1589, Hakluyt sponsored Richard Park's translation and publication of Mendoza's Historia. Subsequently in 1595, Hakluyt first introduced Linschoten's Voyages to English publishers and supported William Phillip's English translation of the work from the Dutch original. This particular work provided the English public with the first detailed geographical information on Korea. In 1601, Hakluyt himself translated Antonio Galvao's The Discoveries of the World.

In 1598, Hakluyt published the first volume of the second edition of Principal Navigation. Volume 2 followed in 1599, and volume 3 in 1600. In terms of content, there was such a disparity between the first and the second edition of Principal Navigation, that for all means and purposes they are separate books. This second edition was the fruit of Hakluyt's exceptional editorial skills and provided the foundations on which England was to eventually forge a maritime empire during the succeeding Elizabethan era. The second edition basically copied the format of the first. Volume 1 deals with materials related to the northeast sea route; volume 2, the southeast route; volume 3, the American continent. In providing a comprehensive overview of the maritime history of Europe during the age of discovery, the second edition of Principal Navigation was a working geographical dictionary. The second edition makes two significant references to Korea. Hakluyt managed to discover the Latin transcript of William of Rubruck's report to French King Louis IX, which had been lost for almost three centuries, and he included English translated segments in volume one of the second edition. In reality, Hakluyt had provided conclusive evidence for future historians that the existence of Korea was known to Europe even before Marco Polo. Furthermore, Hakluyt translated excerpts from 1590-1594 annual Jesuit letters written by Frois and Bresciano, dispatched to Rome and Lisbon, and included them in the second edition. As explained earlier, these annual letters had been translated into various languages throughout Europe between 1593 and 57 and had also been included verbatim in Guzman's Historia de las Missiones. The three letters, referred to as 'accounts' in Hakluyt's book, dealt with Korea's geographical characteristics and with the 1592 War between Japan and Korea. The first of these accounts was basically a translated excerpt from Frois's annual letter of 1590. Frois mentions that Hideyoshi "is to set forth his armies, & to passe to the land of Coray, which the Portugales call Coria, being devided from Japan with an arme of the sea." Frois points out that while the Portuguese in the past erroneously categorized Korea as an island country, it is in fact a peninsula lying merely 20 leagues to the West of Japan and bordering China. The second account is a compilation of translated excerpts from Frois's Annual Letters of 1591 and 1592, published in Rome in 1595. Some 14 typeset pages were devoted to Korea, a considerable amount at the time, and subsequently served as the basis for Martini's and de Halde's studies on Korea in the 17th century. Here Frois expounds upon Korea's geography, culture, and political system, Japan's preparations for war, the anticipated effects of the war on Hideyoshi's political influence in Japan, an assessment of Hideyoshi's political strategem during the whole affair, and personal hopes that the war would provide the Jesuits with a foothold into Korea and China. Although he refrains from making any direct criticism of Japan for instigating the war, Frois does mention that a large number of Koreans were captured by the Japanese and utilized in their war efforts, and that the Koreans were on the cause of justice in their struggles against the aggressors. Frois was particularly impressed by the Korean fleet force and provides a rather lengthy and detailed account of its exploits during sea battles with the Japanese fleet. The third account that deals with Korea is a translated excerpt of the Annual Letters of 1594, published in Milano in 1597. Here Bresciano lodges a stern criticism of Japan for maintaining a military presence in Korea in order to gain a upper hand in its negotiations with China. In sum, Hakluyt selected and translated representative Jesuit letters dealing with Korea for his second edition.

The second edition of Hakluyt's Principal Navigations was considered the most ideal model of maritime accounts to be published in Europe and was widely read among the European intellectuals of the time. And the 'accounts on Korea' included in the second addition remained the most authoritative introduction to Korea until the publication of Hamel's book in the mid 17th century. VII. Conclusion At the turn of the 16th century, what little Europeans knew about Korea could arguably be summed up in the single sentence on Korea featured in Polo's Travels.

By the end of the century, however, interest in Korea grew, as exemplified in Guzman's Historia de las Missiones, which allotted some 80 pages on the Hermit Kingdom. Sixteenth century Europeans had access to a considerably larger amount of information and knowledge about Korea than did their immediate predecessors; however, this information was nevertheless limited in scope and marred by prevalent biases. One explanation is that in the 16th century, Europeans necessarily saw Korea via the windows of China and Japan. Most of the Portuguese and Spanish documents on China dealt with Korea in reference to the tributary relationship between China and its neighboring countries, and this is the premise on which Europeans of the time understood Korea and other Asian countries in the region. Europe's main source of materials on Korea was the Jesuit missionaries in Japan, whose view of Korea was necessarily tainted by their inherent apprehensions about the unknown kingdom, zeal for Catholic evangelism, and personal hardships during the military invasion. In effect, the predominantly negative image of Korea that permeated the psyche of Europeans of the time is based on this backdrop. In the absence of copyright laws, these materials were readily translated and published in the major cities across Europe and served as the fundamental source on Korea for the Europeans until the publication of Hamel's Journal in the late 17th century.

A Study of 16th Century Western Books on Korea: The Birth of an Image

V. Materials from Spain, Italy, and the Netherlands
The Portuguese consistently referred to Korea either as Cauli or Core, as it was first introduced in Polo's Travels. The first European on record to employ the proper designation "Chosun" was Father Martin de Rada of Spain. Due to the influences of Padroado, Spain had been excluded from trade and missionary labours in Asia, and consequently Spanish historical records related to the Far East were initially few and far between. However, as Spain began to exercise its interest in the Philippines from the later half of the 16th century, Spanish materials on the Far East began to surface. In April of 1565, Miguel Lopez de Legazpi landed on Cebu and attacked the neighboring islands in turn, thus establishing Spanish colonial rule in the Philippines. Legazpi was succeeded by Guido de Lavezares upon his death in 1572. Lavezares vigorously promoted trade and missionary work in China and with the assistance of Chinese officials commissioned by the Chinese court to eradicate pirates who pestered China's southern coasts, he was eventually successful in dispatching an envoy to China. Martin Rada, originally of the Augustine order, was a member of Spain's first delegation to China. Based on materials furnished by the Chinese, Rada completed his Relation in Spanish in 1576, which he presented to King Phillip II. In the later part of Chapter 10, Rada explains the tributary system between China and its neighbors in Northeast Asia, and lists Korea as one of the countries that annually submits tributes to China. Rada goes on to explain that foreign envoys to China are required to stay in a designated district in Peking, thus providing more insight into the tributary system than had previous works by Polo and Barbosa. However, he does illustrate the limitation of his knowledge by implying that Chosun and Korea are two separate countries.

Rada's Relation was not published for a long time and remained in transcribed form; consequently, only a handful of Europeans at the time had access to its contents. In particular, Bernardino de Escalante's An Account of the Empire of China (Serville, 1577), the first Spanish book on China, relied heavily on the published Portuguese works of Cruz and Barros, and none of the materials related to Korea in Rada's Relation is included in this particular work. Although Rada and Escalente were both Spaniards who shared a common goal of opening up the Far East for trade and Christianity, they were nevertheless reluctant to share what they knew with others. Rada's manuscripts, however, played a significant role in the publication of another worked entitled Historia, written by Gonzalez de Mendoza. In 1583, Mendoza was commissioned by Pope Gregory XIII to write a book on China. Although he had himself never set foot in Asia, he completed Historia in 1585, relying on information provided in works previously published, such as Cruz's Tractato, Rada's Relation, Ramusio's Navigationi et Viaggi, the Jesuit letters, and Escalante's An Account of the Empire of China. Mandoza's Historia was frequently translated up to the late 16th century and reached its 30th edition, thus becoming the most well known work on China in Europe at the time. However, since the book focused mainly on southern China, it did little to promote new insight into Korea at the time.

In 16th century Italy, most of the literature on Asia was being written in Latin and Italian in cities such as Rome and Venice. Francanzano da Montalboddo edited Columbus' and Vespucci's ship logs made during their voyages to the American continent and published an Italian translation in Venice in 1507. Furthermore, Ludovico di Varthema recorded his travel experiences to Southeast Asia and published The itinerary of Ludovico di Varthema of Bologna from 1502 to 1508 in Italian in Rome in 1510, and again in 1511 in Latin. The first Italian book to mention Korea was Navigationi et Viaggi, edited by Ramusio, considered Europe's first modern collection of maritime travel accounts. Borrowing data from his contemporary explorers, Ramusio collected and edited various maritime records available at the time to formulate in Italian a three volume folio entitled Navigationi et Viaggi in 1550, 1559 and 1556. His goal was nothing less than to record for posterity the "위대하고 가장 놀라운 업적: 후에 삽입예정" currently promoted by Portugal and Spain. Since the latter two volumes were already completed in 1553, it is safe to assume that at least the drafts of all three volumes were completed by then. Navigationi et Viaggi is regarded as the first systematic effort to compile and edit the navigational records of the age of discovery. Ramusio placed particular significance on Spanish and Portuguese efforts to establish colonies in India and in the New World. Consequently, volumes 1 and 2 cover materials on Asia and Africa, and volume 3 is devoted to materials related to the New World. Ramusio also translated the original Latin edition of Polo's Travels into Italian and includes it in volume 2, thus publishing Italy's first book to mention Korea.

In addtion, Ramusio also compiled, edited and translated materials from the works of Empoli, da Gama, Tome Pires, Barros, and Duarte Barbosa, including them in volume 1. However, as observed earlier, since the publication of Portuguese sources was under strict supervision of the Portuguese crown, Ramusio was unable to include any other works that mention Korea, other than Polo's Travels. In the late 16th century, Portugal was the only European nation to actively trade with the Far East. With the support of the Vatican, Portugal monopolized the East Asian sea route, in essence controling all maritime trade with the Far East in central locations such as Goa, Malacca, Macao, and Nagasaki. However, from the late 16th century, with the dramatic shifts in the political landscape of Europe, more and more countries began to show an interest in Asia. In 1580, Spain's Phillip II annexed Portugal, thus constructing a vast sea empire stretching as far as Asia and the American continent. The Portuguese had no recourse but to share with Spain their materials on the Far East, which they had so jealousy guarded for so long. Furthermore, both Britain and the Netherlands, having belatedly realized Asia's potential as a viable market, expanded their trade with Asia, and with it information on the Far East, which had previously been limited to Catholic Europe, was steadily being disseminated throughout Protestant Europe as well.

The individual largely responsible for the success of Dutch trade in East Asia was Jan Huygen van Linschoten. He was born in 1563 in the Dutch region of Utrecht. When he was 16, Linschoten left home to team up with his brothers, who were merchants in Spain. It was not long afterwards that Linschoten began to harbor dreams of sailing the high seas. When in 1580 the union between Portugal and Spain made it possible for the Dutch to participate in Portuguese and Spanish trade in India, Linshoten set off to seek his fortune and adventure in Asia, arriving in India on September 21, 1583. Linschoten's official title was assistant to Vincente de Fonseca, recently appointed archbishop of Goa. Based on his 5-year experience in Goa, Linshoten published his Travel Notes in 1595 upon his return to the Netherlands. The short segment on Korea in Travel Notes is as follows: ..so stretches the coast from Japan again to the north, recedes after that inward, northwest ward, to which Coast those from Japan trade with the Nation which is called Cooray, from which I have good, comprehensive and true information, as well as from the navigation to this Country, from the navigators (he calls them pilots) who investigated the situation there and sailed there. Although Linschoten's above claim is doubtful, Travel Notes is significant in that it was the first book written in Dutch to properly refer to Korea as "Chosun." Linschoten's Voyages followed in 1596. The first edition of Voyages, published in Dutch, details the sea route from Europe to East Asian India, the Strait of Malacca, the Malay Islands, and the Chinese Coast. Linschoten himself had never traveled to the Far East, and the segments on China and Japan were based on materials compiled by Dirck Gerritsz, a fellow countryman who had the nickname of Chinaman, and books written by Maffei and Mendoza. Linschoten mentions Korea way into the Japanese segment. He explains that while Korea is situated in close proximity to China, with a north latitude of 34 and 35 degrees, virtually nothing is known about the country. Although reference to Korea is limited to its geographical location, Linschoten's book nonetheless played an important role in the opening of trade between the Netherlands and East Asia. In late 16th century, the Dutch sought to reach Asia from the (as yet uncharted) northern sea route. Lischoten was himself confident that such a route existed and personally lead the exploration of this region on two separate occasions, in 1594 and in 1595. Daunted by the failure of the first exploration to discover the northern sea route, the Dutch decided on the sea route previously established by the Portuguese and dispatched a fleet to India in 1595. Although Linschoten's Voyages was published in 1596, his sea chart had already published a year earlier, and the Dutch fleet embarked on its voyage to East Asia relying on Linschoten's charts.

The publication of Linschoten's Voyages provided a significant turning point in Europe's maritime history, for it was largely due to the publication of this book that the sea route to India and the Far East, previously known only to the Portuguese, became available to all Europeans. Not long after the first edition of Linschoten's Voyages was published, it was translated into several languages. The English and German edition came out in 1598, the Latin edition came out in 1599 in Frankfurt and Amsterdam, and the French edition was published in 1610. Among these the original Dutch edition and the French translation reached second edition. Frequently translated and widely read by Europeans of the time, Linschoten's work made a significant contribution to ushering Protestant Europe into the age of discovery.

A Study of 16th Century Western Books on Korea: The Birth of an Image

IV. Jesuit Letter Books
Jesuit letters from Japan provided Europe with its first real glimpse of Korea. Excerpts from these letters were transcribed and widely distributed among Catholic monasteries in Europe during the 16th century; however, it is important to note that these were not initially by and large made available to the general public at the time. Somewhat belatedly realizing the enormous propaganda potential of these letters for promoting public interest in and support of missionary work in Asia, the Society of Jesus eventually published the letters in book format. However, these collections of Jesuit letters are problematic in several respects: first and foremost, the Society of Jesus exercised extreme caution in their determination of which letters to make public.

Secondly, determining the western equivalents for terminologies relating to Asian systems and customs proved to be no easy task, not only for the original composers of these letters but also for those assigned to translate them into European languages. Thirdly, the contents of the published versions did not always accord with the original transcripts. The Jesuit letters were originally composed in Portuguese or Spanish and translated into Latin, Italian, French, etc. for publication, which provided the Jesuit authorities with some editorial and interpretive leeway. It was not uncommon for the published versions to include details that were not in the original transcripts themselves. To further complicate matters, zealots of the faith who scrutinized the original transcripts regularly edited out portions they deemed detrimental to the missionary cause, leading many historians to question the credibility of the published versions of the letters. Despite these apparent limitations, however, these collections of letters published by the Society of Jesus proved to be an effective medium through which 16th century Europeans could obtain the latest information on the Far East.

The first of these collections of letters, composed in Italian, was published in 1552 in Rome. The bulk of the letters in this particular collection were those dispatched from India. Subsequently the collection of letters from India, originally written in Portuguese or Spanish, were translated into a number of languages in Rome, Venice, and scores of other cities in Northern Europe. By the 1560s public interest in the Indian letters began to wane and they were eventually superceded by the collection of letters from Japan. In particular, when Frois was assigned the task of writing annual letters, the Japanese letters began to be set as the model for all Jesuit letters. Most of the letters from Japan were compiled in Goa and sent to Coimbra, where they were transcribed and sent to Rome and to various Jesuit monasteries throughout Europe. The first collection of Jesuit letters that dealt comprehensively with Japan was published in Coimbra in Spanish in 1565. In 1570, the Jesuit priests in Coimbra published some 1000 copies of the collection of Jesuit letters in Portuguese and distributed them for free, and in 1575 a Spanish translation was published in Alcara, Spain. In addition, the Italian version of the Japanese letters was first published in Rome in 1578. Thereafter, annual supplements of the Japanese letters were published on a regular basis. Annual Letters of Japan, which had made a substantial contribution to the introduction of Korea to Europe, was first published in 1593.

The first of these to make a reference to Korea was written by Frois in 1590, and it was translated into Italian and French and published in Rome, Milano, and Paris. The 1591 and 1592 annual letters in which Korea is featured in earnest were originally written by Frois in Spanish, but it was translated into Italian, French, and Latin and published in Rome, Milano, Venice, Douai, among others in 1595 and 1596. Furthermore, a letter written by Father Orantino Bresciano in 1594 and sent to Aquaviva, then General of the Society of Jesus, includes materials on the 1592 War between Japan and Korea, and the Italian version and the French version were published in Milano and Antwerp respectively in 1597. Most of the materials related to Korea between 1590 and 1594 were written by Frois and translated into most of the major languages in Europe.

Furthermore, English translations of these letters were included in Hakluyt's 1599 edition of Principal Navigations and were cited almost in their entirety in Guzman's Historia de la Missiones, published in 1601. This is arguably the most authoritative study on Korea to date since Marco Polo first used the term Cauli in reference to Korea. A more extensive examination of Frois's letters will be provided in the upcoming section on Hakluyt. Subsequent letters that included information on Korea continued to be published in Europe. However, the 1594, 1595, and 1596 installments of the Annual Letters of Japan fail to mention Cespedes's visit to Korea. They provide only passing references to the 1592 War and to the Korean prisoners of war. Therefore, these letters failed to provide any new information on Korea. Around 1600, yearly installments of Annual Letters of Japan were finally compiled and published. In 1598, Dom Theotonio de Braganza, archbishop of Evora and friend of Valignano, published Jesuit Cartas in two volumes. A compilation of some 213 letters, this work is widely recognized as the representative publication of Jesuit letters. This collection is of particular interest because it included the early letters of Vilela and Prenestino, segments of which treat Korea.

In 1601, Guzman published Historia de las Missiones in two volumes. In the process of illuminating the history of the Far East mission, Guzman managed to provide some insight on Korea. Guzman spent most of his adult life serving as the rector of the Spanish Seminary, attached to the Society of Jesus, and as head of the Toledo parish. Although Guzman had never personally set foot in Asia, his close study of annual letters from Japan and the transcripts of Valignano's Historia enabled him to complete Historia de las Missiones. The writing of Historia de las Missiones, which includes numerous letters of the 1590s, is fortuitous in the sense that many of the original letters archived in Spain have since been lost. As stipulated in the title, Guzman's work deals with the missionary works in the West Indies, China and Japan up to 1600. Of the 13 books that comprise the Historia de las Missiones over half are devoted to the mission in Japan. A segment on Korea, some 80 pages in length, appears in Volume 2, Book 12, Chapters 14 to 37 (pages 497 to 576).

Guzman correctly categorizes Korea as a peninsula and explains that Korea borders China to the North and the Tatars and the "barbarians" to the northeast. He states that Korea submits annual tributes to China, is constantly in war with its neighbors, is generally mountainous with great plains stretching up the middle of the peninsula, and cultivates rice and harvests a large amount of fruits and honey. Furthermore, the Koreans roof their dwellings with rice staw, are light skinned, gentle but strong when they have to be, and are adverse to all foreign trade, as well as visitations by foreigners. Guzman also adds some reflections on the backgrounds of the 1592 War between Japan and Korea, the remarkable exploits of Korea's naval forces, China's involvement in the war, and the process through which the peace agreement was reached. To his credit, Guzman does record Cespedes's visit to Korea in Chapter 27. Curiously enough, Historia de las Missiones was the only European book published in the 16th and the 17th century that makes any reference to Cespedes's visit to Korea. According to Guzman's account, Cespedes stayed with the Japanese and their Korean captives during his 18-month long stay in Korea and took a Korean boy back to Japan with him, in preparation for the establishment of a Catholic mission in Korea. In Book 13, Chapter 15, Guzman explains the reasons behind the war between Japan and Korea and emphasizes Korea's potential as a bridgehead into China. As we will see in our examination of Hakluyt's English translation of Frois's letters, Guzman's material on Korea is, by and large, a verbatim recounting of Frois' s annual letters to Rome.

A Study of 16th Century Western Books on Korea: The Birth of an Image

III. Jesuit Letters
Through the Padroado, Portugal was able to monopolize the Catholic mission in the Far East in the late 16th century, and Father Francisco de Xavier set out to fulfill his lifelong dream of bringing the Gospel to the pagans in Asia. It is through these Jesuit efforts that Europeans were able to receive news on Korea in earnest. Reference to Korea began to appear with some regularity in letters sent home by Jesuit missionaries working in Japan, and through these letters, Europeans of the time were able to piece together at least a tentative description of the culture and geography of Korea. However, there is some dispute among historians as to the exact time in which Jesuit priests first began to make references to Korea in their letters.
According to Donald Lach, Luis Frois was the first Jesuit missionary to mention Korea, having written in 1562 that Korea played an intermediary role in the transmission of Buddhism from China to Japan; however, this argument must be discarded. Jesuit missionaries had the opportunity to hear about Korea even at the initial stages of their missionary labours in the Far East. Although Xavier's letters from Asia made no mention of Korea, he first learned of Korea in December of 1547 from a Japanese named Ajiro in Malacca, where he prepared for his mission to the Far East. In addition, two Spanish priests, Cosme de Torres and Juan Fernandez, were informed by Ajiro and two other Japanese who accompanied him that "The Japanese also trade with another people, further away than China, to the east, called Corea. From there they bring silver and marten skins [...] they bring back cotton fabrics." Father Juan Ruiz de Medina, who researches Jesuit documents in Rome, conjectures that Father Nicolao Lancillotto of Italy, dutifully reported these encounters in his letter to Rome from Goa, and thus the first Jesuit news of Korea would have reached Lisbon by July of 1594 and would have certainly found its way to Rome by September of the same year. It is also feasible that in 1549, Xavier, Torres, and Fernandez might have heard about Korea from a Chinese captain en route to Japan. It is also certain that Xavier's party of Jesuit missionaries had access to intermittent news about Korea once they arrived in Japan in July, 1549. Furthermore, Xavier crossed paths with Korean envoys dispatched to Japan during his sojourn in Hirado in the spring of 1550, and in Yamaguchi between November of 1550 and September of 1551. If this is true then the first modern contact on record between Europeans and Koreans, with the exception of the Gores, can be attributed to Xavier and his party in 1550.

What had compelled Jesuit missionaries to make frequent references to Korea in their letters to Rome was, of course, their aspirations to bring the Gospel to the Korean Peninsula. The first attempt by the Society of Jesus to initiate missionary labours in Korea was in 1566. That year, Torres, then in charge of the mission in Japan with the departure of Xavier, dispatched Father Gaper Vilela to Korea, and Father Vilela did indeed initiate attempts to reach Korea. However, in his letter to Lisbon from Cochin, dated February 4, 1571, Vilela reported that due to the civil war in Japan, he was regretfully unable to make his trip to Korea at that time.
Subsequently the Jesuit missionaries in Japan made continuous references to Korea in their official reports to Rome. Significant among these was Vilela's November 3 report from Goa to Francisco de Borja, General of the Society of Jesus, in which the following observations on Korea were included: According to my information, this kingdom is said to extend as far as some very high mountains, and beyond them live people of white race, with whom however they have no dealings on account of the many dangerous wild animals that live in the mountains. It may be conjectured that these lands beyond could be Germany. The Mongols in question are said to be a friendly race. It will be five years soon since Father Cosme de Torres decided to send a Father there to see what might be done, and his choice fell on me. I set out, but met with much fighting on the road, Japanese battling against other Japanese, which prevented me from achieving my purpose. I should rather say, for it is very sure, that God so willed it, since he wished for the fruit which was gathered afterwards through my staying in Japan. That other treasure awaits the man who more deserves to win it. If Fathers were there, great service, I think, might be done for the Lord. And one can get there easily and with little trouble by the help of the kings of Japan. I mean with letters [from them], for a certain king is known there, so that this would suffice to be able to get into the land, and the Fathers who would go to live there could be assisted from Japan with whatever was necessary, for every year Japanese merchants visit the land. Entry too into China could be secured through the harbour of this kingdom which is very near to the city called Beijing, where the king of China lives. And if we go in, great benefits would follow, which will only appear with time.
The Jesuit missionaries indicated that they obtained information on Korea from Japanese merchants who frequented the shores of Korea. Information on Korea thus acquired was necessarily limited and superficial in nature. For instance, in referring to Korea, they retained the medieval designation of "the Kingdom of Corea" instead of "Chosun," the official title of the contemporary sovereign state. Furthermore, in quite erroneous thinking that Korea bordered Germany to the North, they considered Korea to be a viable route to Europe. For 16th century Europeans, Korea seemed like the final frontier that could bring a meaningful closure to the age of discovery. However, they also understood that establishing a Christian mission there would be a formidable task, a point accentuated by their perception of Korea as marked by mountainous terrain filled with lions and tigers and peopled by fierce warriors skilled in archery, spear throwing, and horsemanship. These initial misgivings about Korea notwithstanding, Vilela insisted that the Koreans were by and large a friendly people, and that although their language was different from Chinese or Japanese, they were able to communicate with one another via a common written language. Vilela maintained that despite the failure of the initial attempt to reach Korea in 1566, further attempts should be made. This November 3, 1571 letter provided the most comprehensive reference to Korea to date, and its subsequent inclusion in the Jesuit Cartas, published in Evora in 1598, made a substantial contribution to the introduction of Korea in Europe. Vilela's ulterior motive was, of course, to procure permission and support for his plans to establish a mission in Korea. However, his plans were ultimately rejected on the grounds that the success of the mission in Japan took priority over all others, and no missionaries could be spared to be dispatched to Korea. Furthermore, Vilela had lost his strongest supporter when Father Torres died in Japan in 1570. By 1572, both Vilela and the General of the Society of Jesus had passed away, and with them also died any hope for establishing a Catholic mission in Korea in the immediate future.
In the late 16th century, with the noted increase in the number of Jesuit priests and Portuguese merchants who visited Japan, it was inevitable that some Europeans would find their way into Korea, albeit more accidentally than intentionally. The earliest European accounts of visitations to Korea were indicative of the prevailing biases about Korea and its people harbored by the Europeans at the time. The first recorded European sighting of Korea occurred in October, 1578. Domingo Monteiro, captain major of a ship owned by Francisco Lobo, had already visited Japan on two previous occasions starting in 1576. He sailed from Macao toward Japan in July of 1578. Although the exact number of crew and passengers is unknown, there were at least 14 on board including Father Alfonso Lucena of Portugual and Father Antonio Prenestino of Italy. Monterio and his party left Macao 11 days behind schedule, and the cruise was uneventful for the next 20 days. However, 40 to 50 leagues short of their destination in Japan, weather began to change for the worse, and an unexpected typhoon drove the ship off course. Having lost its rudder, the ship drifted aimlessly on the open waters until it approached "a point on the Korean coast a musket shot away." Monterio, who had considered Koreans to be barbarous convened an emergency meeting, and ultimately determined to die at sea rather than risk landing on Korean shores. Fortunately for them, they arrived in Japan without further incident. Three months after this incident, Prenestino provided the following account in his letter composed in Portuguese and sent to Lisbon on November 8, 1578: Korea, a barbaric and inhospitable people, desires to have dealings with no other people. and they say that in the past a Portuguese junk wished to stop here, but these wicked people took their boat and all who were in it, and they were lucky to get away without being burned alive. As well exemplified in the letters of Vilela and Prenestino, the Jesuit missionaries and the Portuguese merchants harbored a rather negative impression of Korea. Prenestino's misfortune off the shores of Korea was well known among the Jesuit missionaries in Japan at the time. It was mentioned in Frois's Die Geschichte Japans. The account was also included in Annual Letters published by the Jesuits in 1598, and widely read throughout Europe at the time. The fact that these letters were published is in and of itself notable, in view of the Jesuit policy not to publicize materials that presented a negative view of Asia.
Following 1580, Korea once again received European attention, as the Jesuits in Japan began to chronicle the war between Japan and Korea. The bulk of these documents were written by Frois. It is uncertain at what point the Jesuit priests in Japan first caught on to the possibility of Japan's invasion of Korea. But in any case, they would certainly have realized this by 1580. In a meeting with Oda Nobunaga, who was supporting the Jesuit mission in Japan, Frois, Alessandro Valignano, and Soldo Organtino had the opportunity to listen to Nobunaga's ambitious plans to invade Korea and China. Furthermore in his letter dated November 5, 1582, Frois informed Claudio Aquaviva, General of the Society of Jesus, that Nobunaga "was planning to build then a great armada to go and conquer China and share out all his territories among his sons."

Frois went on to state that although using the war to further the Catholic cause in the region was not a particularly desirable proposition, the impending war, however, would most certainly provide the opportunity for the long sought evangelism of China and Korea. Since it took some two years for correspondence to traverse the distance from Nagasaki to Lisbon, it is likely that the leaders of the Jesuit brotherhood in Europe would have known of the possibility of war by 1584. After Nobunaga's assassination in 1582, the Jesuit missionaries were able to hear of Japan's plans for the invasion of Korea from Hideyoshi, who held the title of Kanpaku (Regent). On May 4, 1586, Jesuit Vice-Provincial Gasper Coelho, Frois and some 30 followers of the faith gained an audience in Osaka with Hideyoshi, who provided them with details on the planned invasion. The Jesuits were reported to have pledged their support to Hideyoshi. Coelho agreed to Hideyoshi's request for two battleships for the invasion of Korea, and added that if necessary additional support from bases in India could be made available. For his part Hideyoshi stressed that once China and Korea was conquered, he would give the Jesuits a free hand in the evangelism of the region. However, Hideyoshi's lip service to the missionaries proved to be an astute political gesture. In July of 1587, Hideyoshi, ever mindful of the growing influence of the Catholics in Japan, decreed the expulsion of Coelho and all the other Jesuit missionaries in Japan on the pretense of national security, although he was to postpone his own orders in a short time. In any event, Frois, in his October 17, 1586 letter, dutifully reported back to Europe about his audience with Hideyoshi, and consequently the Jesuits in Europe were privy to Japan's invasion plans a considerable time before the actual war in Korea took place. The May 4 audience has generated a considerable amount of interest, and controversy, among historians through the years.

Catholic historians maintain that Coelho's promise of military assistance for Japan's war effort was motivated by his aspiration to procure Hideyoshi's support for the Catholic mission in the region, and that he honestly did not believe that Hideyoshi would actually carry out his plans to invade Korea. However, such conjectures lose their credibility in light of the collective zeal of the Jesuits in establishing a mission in Korea and of Cohelho's personal reputation as someone willing and able to go to extreme measures for the Catholic cause in the region. Frois, Cohelho, and the other Jesuit missionaries in Japan knew only too well the enormous opportunity presented by Japan's successful invasion of the Korean Peninsula. This sentiment was also echoed in Valignano's letter to Aquaviva from Nagasaki, dated February 15, 1592. Valignano was in Japan just prior to the war as visitor of the Jesuit missions in Asia. Valignano concluded that Hideyoshi's plan to invade Korea was motivated by his wish to subdue the civil strife plaguing Japan, also adding that Hideyoshi might, in the end, prove to be God's instrument in the evangelism of China and Korea. However, it must also be noted that although the Jesuits did not openly censure Hideyoshi for his war, they did not trust him either and were uncomfortable with the idea of reaping the fruits of human violence, albeit for the Catholic cause. They were merely making the best of a bad situation, so to speak.

The 1592 War between Japan and Korea provided westerners with their first opportunity to visit Korea. Under orders of Gomaz, the Jesuit Vice Provincial, Cespedes arrived in Korea with a Japanese monk for the purposes of administering to the Japanese troops. He stayed there for approximately 18 months, until May or April of 1595, thus being on record as the first westerner to visit the Korean Peninsula. In addition, Cespedes made a brief stopover on the island of Tsushima, thus becoming the first European to introduce the existence of the island to the West. However, Cespedes failed to make any significant strides in the introduction of Korea to the West. His two letters written during his sojourn in Korea were filled with his personal impressions of the battles and of Korea's severe winter weather, and he made absolutely no mention of the culture, political system, and geography of Korea. In addition to their periodic letters, the Jesuits also left a variety of materials on the Far East. Most of these materials were compiled by Jesuits such as Valignano and Frois, during their missionary labours in Japan. Based on his visits to Japan on three occasions, Valignano completed the three volumes of Sumario de las cosas de Japon in 1577, 1580 and 1583, which later served as the basis for his Historia; however, the manuscript was not published during the 16th century and was not made available except to a selective few in the Jesuit brotherhood. Neither Sumario de las cosas de Japon nor Historia makes any mention of Korea. Besides this, Giovanni Pietro Maffei was commissioned by the Pope to write Historiarum Indicarum in 1588, based on his close study of Valignano's Historia and on his own encounter with Japanese boys who arrived in Rome in 1582. Along with Mendoza's Historia, Maffei's work is considered one of the most authoritative studies on the Far East in the 16th century, and it was translated into several languages and widely read in major cities throughout Europe at the time. Maffei's Historia mainly deals with the Portuguese conquest of Asia and the West Indies and the accomplishments of the Jesuits in India, and does not offer much on Japan and China. While Books 6 and 12 are devoted to China and Japan respectively, there is no mention of Korea anywhere in the book. This is more than likely due to fact that one third of Historiarum Indicarum is comprised of earlier letters, written between 1549 and 1574, which make no reference to Korea. It is also worth noting that Maffei relied heavily on Valignano's Historia and Pinto's Travels, neither of which make any reference to Korea.

Other than the Jesuit letters from Japan, the only material that mentions Korea is Frois's Die Geschichte Japans. As previously examined, Frois's book, written between 1549 and 1578, does make some passing references to Korea; however, it was not until 1926 that it was finally translated into German and published, and consequently it made little contribution to the introduction of Korea to Europe in the 16th century.

Study of 16th Century Western Books on Korea: The Birth of an Image

II. Travel Literature of Portugal
The Treaty of Tordesillas in 1493 secured Portugal's hegemony in Asia, giving it a free hand in Christian missionary labours and trade in the region. In 1498, Vasco Da Gama successfully reached the Indian port of Calicot, thus spearheading Europe's eventual venture into the Far East. Portuguese merchants and missionaries soon followed, producing various records on Asia. Portuguese records of the 16th century share two significant features: first, insofar as Portugal's contact with Asia was limited to India, Malacca, Molucca Islands, and Southeast Asia, the Portuguese records on Asia provided little new information on the Far East. Secondly, since the beginning of the age of discovery, the Portuguese Crown jealously guarded important information on the spice trade and the Far East, and as a matter of policy kept these records from the general public. These records remained in their original transcribed format until they were ultimately published in recent times. However, even without these restrictions, these 16th century Portuguese records had very little to say about Korea and would not have made a significant contribution to the introduction of Korea to Europe.

Along with the problem of the innate scarcity of information on Korea evident in these records, there is also the interpretive problem of the Portuguese use of the designation "Gores." Since Diogo Lopes de Sequeira's travel to Malacca in 1509, the Portuguese were known to have been in frequent contact with the Gores in Southeast Asia, a fact well documented in records of the time. Although some historians maintain that the Gores were in fact Koreans living on the island of Ryukyu, the 16th century Portuguese did not realize who the Gores really were. Consequently 16th century records on the Gores also made no contribution the introduction of Korea to Europe.
The first western literature on Asia written during the age of discovery was Tome Pires's Suma Oriental. And Book of Duarte Barbosa soon followed. Both books were written in Portuguese. Summa Oriental is the first recorded European manuscript in book format that mentions the Gores, whereas Book of Duarte Barbosa, written in 1518 by the brother-in-law of Magellan, makes a passing reference in Chapter 126 on the tribute-based diplomatic relationship between China and its immediate neighbors. However, both books were not published for a long time, remaining in transcript form, and they actually contributed little to the dissemination of new knowledge about the Far East at the time. However, they would go on to serve as a basis for numerous books on the Far East published in the late 16th century. Contemporary Portuguese historians such as Fernao Lopes de Castanheda, Joao de Barros, Damiao de Gois, and Jeronimo Osorio, used their influence in the royal court to gain access to such classified materials as Suma Oriental and Book of Duarte Barbosa, on the basis of which they were able to fomulate the history of the Portuguese empire in East Asia. Their works on Asia, which began in 1551 and took approximately 20 years in the making, focused primarily on India, South East Asia, and the Molucca Islands, with only intermittent references to China. In particular, Barros's Decades, published in 1552, conceding that the northern shores of China had yet to be properly charted by the Portuguese navigators, partitions the entire Asian continent into 9 territories, allocating the Chinese coast, Ryukyu, and Japan to the 9th territory. Barros, however, makes no mention of Korea. In his third edition of Decades, published in 1563, Barros provides a more detailed introduction of South East Asia, China, Burma, Sumatra, and the Molucca Islands. To his credit, Barros included in this edition a comprehensive introduction of China, based on information provided by the Chinese, as well as personal accounts from his Chinese servant. Barros writes at length about China's culture and customs, the names and characteristics of China's 15 main provinces, it's main cities, units of measurement, diplomatic relations with other countries, and also provides a detailed historical account of the first Portuguese ambassador dispatched to China, but says nothing about Korea. In contrast, Gois and Osorio merely cited previously published materials by Castenheda and Barros, and thus failed to contribute any new information on Asia.

In the mid-16th century Chirsitovao Vieyra, Vasco Calvo, and others who had been incarcerated by the Chinese authorities for smuggling, provided records on the diplomatic relationship between China and its neighboring countries, China's justice system, and details about Ryukyu and the 15 provinces. In particular, Galeote Pereira, who was captured by the Chinese for smuggling in March of 1549, only to escape in 1552, provided valuable insight into China. His writing, which provided a lengthy explication of China's justice system and its foreign relations, was frequently translated and widely distributed throughout Europe. It was translated into Italian in Venice, circa 1565, and into English by Richard Willes in 1577. It was also subsequently included in the Principal Navigation of Richard Hakluyt. Based on Pereira's accounts, Gaspat da Cruz published Tractado in 1569. With nine tenth of the book specifically devoted to China, Cruz's book is considered to be the first book on China published in Europe. However, since Cruz was primarily concerned with China's justice and administrative systems, no mention of Korea was made.

A Study of 16th Century Western Books on Korea: The Birth of an Image

I. Introduction
Abraham Ortelius's Theatrum orbis terrarum, one of the most definitive world maps of the 16th century, positioned the Far East at the right uppermost corner, the most distant region from the Iberian Peninsula. This was indicative of how little medieval Europe understood about the vast continent that lay to it's east. Subsequent European maps of the late 16th century demonstrated considerably more accuracy and detail in their treatment of the Far East, and to a large measure this development was due to the efforts to discover the "Indias," the spread Catholicism to the pagan world, and typological innovations.

As new sources of information became available under this backdrop, Europeans began to overcome the limitations of medieval knowledge of the Far East, replacing it with a more modernistic understanding of the region. The 16th century was not only the period during which Europeans steadily began to amass empirical knowledge about the Far East, but also the first time since Marco Polo's return from his historical travels to China that information on Korea began to disseminate throughout Europe. Although Korea was mentioned in only a handful of manuscripts and publications of the time, these efforts nevertheless lay the foundation for western literature on Korea up to the 19th century. Based on these accounts, the West was able to formulate an image of Korea, even before its ports were officially opened to foreign trade in the centuries to come.

The purpose of this article is to introduce 16th century European literature on Korea and to examine how Korea is depicted in these documents. This examination of 16th century western literature on Korea will yield valuable insight into 'the birth of a national image,' which has in recent years emerged as an important facet of studies in international history. The authors note that since the primary objective of this study is the introduction of newly discovered literature on Korea, materials will be discussed in the order of their respective dates of publication.

Scholarly research works on the process by which Korea was introduced to Europe have been few and far between, although passing references to Korea have been made in bibliographical studies as well as numerous studies pertaining to maritime records and Jesuit letters. Henri Cordier of France, Armando Cortesao of Portugal, and C. R. Boxer of England do provide sketchy overviews of how Korea was first introduced to the Europeans, as part of their research on medieval records and navigational logs of the 16th century. Donald Lach's comparatively recent study provides a comprehensive bibliographical examination of western literature on Asia, but only post 17th century works on Korea, such as those by Luis de Guzman, Martino Martini, and Hendrik Hamel, are listed. The situation in Korea fared no better. In 1931 and in 1935 Horace Underwood published the first comprehensive bibliography of old books on Korea written in western languages, and in 1963 M. Gompertz introduced a more extensive list, supplementing Underwood's earlier work. Although these bibliographies are invaluable source of information on western literature on Korea, they, nonetheless, leave much to be desired. For instance, both Underwood and Gompertz list the letters of Father Gregorio de Cespedes, dated 1593, as the earliest western document related to Korea, and both leave out a considerable amount of material on Korea within 16th century European travel literature and the early Jesuit letters.

루이스 프로이스와 《임진난의 기록》


『그들이 본 우리』시리즈 1권《임진난의 기록》이 드디어 빛을 보게 되었다. 한국문학번역원이 주관하는 이 시리즈는 16세기부터 20세기 중엽까지 한국이 근대국가로 형성되는 과정에서 서양인들의 눈에 어떻게 비춰졌으며 어떻게 한국에 대한 이미지가 변화되어 갔는지 알아보기 위해 구성되었다.

이 시리즈의 1권으로 발간된《임진난의 기록》은 16세기 동아시아에서 선교활동을 하던 예수회 신부 루이스 프로이스가 본 임진왜란에 대한 기록이다. 도요토미 히데요시가 정권을 장악한 직후부터 임진왜란을 일으킨 배경과 준비과정, 명나라 참전과 중국 측 배경을 여과없이 알려준다. 조선의 구체적인 위치와 지형 및 기후, 주요 생산물과 특산물, 중국과 조선의 사대주의적 조공관계, 서울의 모습과 조선의 국방상황, 대외교역과 쇄국정책, 종교와 의상, 언어에 관하여 상세하게 설명한다. 일본군의 전쟁준비를 비롯해 부산에 도착하고 서울을 함락하여 평양성을 공격하는 상황과 명군의 도래와 강화협상에 이르기까지 임진왜란의 중요과정을 서술하고 있다.

또한 이 책에는 지난 4세기 동안 동서양에서 보관되어온 프로이스의 필사본에 대한 서지사적 해석이 포함되어 있다. 이러한 서지사적 해석을 통해 한국의 이미지가 근대 서양에서 어떻게 유통되었는지를 살펴 볼수 있을 것이다.

서양인의 조선살이: 1882-1910

2008년 12월 로버트 네프 선생과 함께 [서양인의 조선살이]를 푸른역사에서 출판했다.

이 책은 구한말 한국에 체류했던 서양인들의 일상에 관한 이야기이다. 여기서 다뤄지는 시공간은 제한적이지만 내용은 포괄적이다. 1882년 조미수호통상조약이 체결된 시기부터 1910년 한일합방에 이르기까지 주로 서울에서 거주했던 서양인들이 이 책의 주인공들이다. 이 시기에 서양인들의 삶은 첫째, 다양한 국적을 지닌 서양인들이 낯선 땅에서 살아가는 경쟁과 협력으로 엮인 일상의 궤적 둘째, 서양인들이 숨기고 싶었던 알려지지 않은 뒷이야기들 셋째, 서양인들의 눈에 비친 한국 등 크게 3가지 관점에서 조망할 수 있다.

구한말 서양인들은 외교, 선교, 교역, 교육 또는 여행 등 다양한 목적을 가지고 입국해 서울, 부산, 제물포 등지에서 독특한 공동체를 이루었다. 이들의 일부는 사명감을 가지고 선교와 교육에 종사했고 또 다른 이들은 자국을 대표하는 외교관으로 혹은 고종의 고문으로 한국의 근대사에 뛰어들었다. 그밖에 마치 하이에나처럼 이권을 찾아 극동의 나가사키, 상하이, 톈진 등을 방랑하는 서양의 ‘낭인’들도 있었다. 이들 모두에게 한반도는 새로운 개척지이자 시장이며 삶의 터전이었다. 그리고 인간의 모든 인생이 그러하듯 경쟁과 협력, 사랑과 증오는 이들의 삶에 있어서 중요한 요소이었다.

구한말 한반도에서 서양인의 일상은 우리의 궁금증을 자아낸다. 그럼에도 불구하고 지금까지 간행된 대부분의 관련 서적들은 서양인이 한국을 방문해서 느낀 점이나 여행 중에 보고 들은 내용들 즉, 주로 관찰자의 입장을 중심으로 서술되었다. 그것은 구한말 서양인의 삶의 진정한 궤적을 보여주지 못하는 약점이 있다. 그에 비해 이 책은 서양인들의 삶에 초점을 맞추어 이들이 한국에서 실제 생활하는 모습을 보여주려고 한다. 서양인들이 어려운 환경 속에서 의식주를 해결하고 여가를 보내며 질병을 치료하고 동료들과 겪었던 희로애락을 추적하고 있다.

구한말 서양인들 중에는 새로운 한국을 창조하기 위해 목숨을 바친 헌신적인 사람도 있지만 때로는 전직이 의심스러운 사람도 있었고 협잡꾼에다 술주정뱅이 공사도 있었다. 다양한 군상이 어울려 그들만의 집단을 형성했다. 그리고 이 집단 속에는 기회를 만들거나 이용하며 이권과 목표를 찾아 하루하루를 보내는 일상의 이야기들이 숨겨져 있었다. 남녀 간의 사랑과 질투, 권력을 위한 경쟁과 협력, 고종은 물론 저자거리의 일반 서민들을 대상으로한 사업과 사기의 성공과 실패, 한반도를 둘러 싼 열강의 대립 등 이 책은 아직까지 잘 알려지지 않은 구한말 서양인들의 뒷이야기들을 전하고자한다.

이 책은 서양인의 일상은 물론 서양인이 본 한국과 한국인의 일상도 소개하고 있다. 서양인이 본 한국을 한마디로 정의하기란 쉬운 일이 아니다. 체류 목적에 따라서도 그러했지만 교육 여건과 환경에 따라 한국과 한국인의 일상은 각기 다르게 보였다. 특이한 것은 상당 수 서양인들이 한국의 자연환경과 한국인의 성격에 대해 많은 호기심과 애착을 보여주고 있다는 점이다. 그들은 아름다운 자연환경에 매료되었고 조랑말, 고양이, 진달래 등과 같은 한반도의 동식물에 대해 많은 기록을 남겼다. 또한 이 책에서 등장하는 서양인들은 서구문명의 중요한 매개자이었다. 이들은 틀니, 맥주, 스케이트와 같은 일상용품부터 자전거, 기차, 항공기에 이르기까지 다양한 문물을 소개했고, 이를 접한 한국인들의 놀라움과 충격을 생생한 기록으로 남겨놓았다.

이 책을 집필하면서 필자들은 구한말 서양인들의 일상을 가급적 원래 모습 그대로 복원하기 위해 해외자료에만 의존했다. 서양인들이 쓴 자서전 및 여행기는 물론이고 해외에서 발행된 일간지 그리고 알렌 및 포크문서 등 다양한 필사본을 이용해 이 책을 서술한 것이다. 특히 우리들은 아직 국내에 소개가 안 된 허드문서와 그레이문서는 물론이고, 세계 각지에 흩어져 살고 있는 그들의 후손과 인터뷰를 통해 미진한 부분을 보완하려고 노력했다. 이 과정에서 우리들은 초창기 항공기 사진이나 서울과 제물포의 모습을 보여주는 희귀사진들을 확보해 이 책에 싣게 되었다. 다만 한 가지 걱정은 우리 두 사람 모두 서양인들이 남긴 자료에 거의 전적으로 의지한 바람에 일부 사료와 사실에 대해서는 잘못된 견해가 있을 수도 있다는 점이다.

필자들은 구한말 외교문서의 수집과 선교사들의 자료를 정리하면서 문화를 중심으로 한 국제관계사의 발굴이라는 공통의 관심을 가지게 되었다. 필자들은 그동안 정치사 혹은 외교사로 일관되어 온 구한말 국가 간의 관계사가 이 책을 통해 보다 친밀하고 흥미로운 모습으로 다시 태어나기를 기대한다. 우리들은 이 책을 집필하면서 많은 사람들의 도움을 받았다. 평소 조언을 아끼지 않으신 연세대학교의 유영익 교수님을 비롯해 이주영, 안드레이 랑코프, 웨인 패터슨, 로스 자롭 교수님과 연암문고의 이용을 도와준 명지대학교의 윤병주 중앙도서관장님에게 깊은 감사를 드린다. 또한 곁에서 한결같은 마음으로 도와준 가족들 그리고 출판과 편집을 맡아 준 푸른역사의 백승종 박사님과 정진라 선생님에게도 감사의 말씀을 전한다.

서양인의 한국 이야기

구한말 서양인의 한국이야기를 쓰고 있습니다.