What is it about?
In this paper, I look at Gary Pak's novel "A Ricepaper Airplane." In the novel, Uncle Sung Wha is an anti-colonial guerrilla on the run from the Japanese. He migrates to Hawaii where he works on a sugar plantation and becomes a labor organizer. On his deathbed he tells wondrous stories of the mountains of Korea, Kumgangsan or the Diamond Mountains, in particular. My hope is that mountains can be an agent of peace on the peninsula.
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Why is it important?
Tensions on the Korean peninsula are extremely high right now, so it is important to find cultural symbols that the people of both North and South Korea can appreciate. Mountains cover some 70-75% percent of the peninsula, and provide much-needed symbols of peace and reunification.
Perspectives
I moved to South Korea a little over ten years ago and have discovered the beauty and joy of hiking the mountains around Seoul and all over the peninsula. Some day soon I hope I will be able to hike the mountains of North Korea and share a cup of makgeolli with North Korean mountain lovers.
John Eperjesi
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: Gary Pak’s A Ricepaper Airplane: Memories of Mountains in the Korean Diasporic Imagination, ISLE Interdisciplinary Studies in Literature and Environment, July 2017, Oxford University Press (OUP),
DOI: 10.1093/isle/isx049.
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