Eun Mihee

This is a Korean name; the family name is Eun.

Mihee Eun (Eun, Mihee)
Mihee Eun in 2008; photograph by Samuel Sangwon Lee.
Born	(1960-09-20) 20 September 1960 Mokpo, Jeollanam-do, South Korea
Occupation	Novelist, essayist, college lecturer, columnist
Nationality	South Korea
Alma mater	Gwangju University
Notable works	People in Columbarium Minority's Love Song of the Wind Ten Thousand and Two Brewing Women The First Experience at 18
Spouse	Single

Korean name
Hangul	은미희
Hanja	殷美姬
Revised Romanization	Eun Mihui
McCune–Reischauer	Ŭn Mihŭi

Eun Mihee (Korean: 은미희; born 20 September 1960) is a South Korean novelist, writer, columnist, and a college lecturer.^[1] She was born in the Mokpo, South Jeolla Province in southern South Korea and moved to Gwangju at 3 years old and grew up there. She was a radio actress at Munhwa Broadcasting Corporation in Gwangju in her early 20s and became a journalist at Jeonnam Maeil newspaper later. While working as a journalist, she realized that she really wanted to be a novelist. She started her work as a novelist since she won first prize the Jeonnam Ilbo Literature Award for a short novel What Kind of Silkworm's Dream in Cocoon in 1996. After that she won Munhwa Ilbo Literature Award in 1999 for another short novel Bird Fly Again.

She received the Samsung Literature Award in 2001 for People in Columbarium, which is a novel of poor peoples' lives at an inn in a small town.^[2] Her novel Minority's Love received a good review in that it depicted the unique and serious introspection about life in the shadow of past as dealing with the dark side of love and life such as love between relatives and same-sex, which were contradicted, and not allowed socially. When she released the Song of the Wind based on an actual interview with strolling candy-selling entertainers that can be called as modern strolling-actors, she received sincere attention from the media about her literary skill as revealing the people’ characters while describing the joys and sorrows of their lives.

Her first collection of short stories, Ten Thousand and Two Brewing Women, received compliments because she expressed the nobility of life in detail through variety of peoples’ lives who lead lonely daily lives. Other her novels are: The First Experience at 18, and Wind Man Tree Woman. For youth critical biography: Genius Korean Painter:Jang - Seungeop, Goddess of Creation and Destruction - Camille Claudel, etc.^[3]

Early life

Eun was born in a small town as the fourth child and the third daughter of five. Her father was an art teacher at a high school who had three individual exhibitions and several group exhibitions as a member of Hwangto-Group. Mihee had a talent in painting like his father and received some awards during her elementary and middle school. However, she gave up her dream to be a painter because her father did not want her to be an artist. She started to develop her writing skill when she was at high school and received an award at a national writing contest. She got an admission from Seokang Technology Institute but needed to drop out of the school. Her oldest sister attended a graduate school and her older sister studied at an art college, so her family was not able to support her financially. In May 1980, she experienced serious panic condition when watching the Gwangju Democratization People's Uprising. Lots of innocent peoples’ death and violence done by soldiers that she met in her 20s made her look at the life as vain.

Career

Eun enrolled the Korea National Open University, and she got a job at Gwangju Munhwa Broadcasting Co. at the following year, but she had not been satisfied with the job. At the age of 30, she decided to concentrate on writing the novel, then 6 years later, she received ‘Jeonnam Ilbo Literature Award’ for a short novel, What Kind of Silkworm's Dream in Cocoon, in 1996 and ‘Munhwa Ilbo Literature Award’ in 1999 for another short novel, Bird Fly Again, and she turned into a professional novelist. However, she destroyed the award plaque in 2000 that she received so far and said,

“Plaque is just a souvenir to acknowledge of the birth of a writer. It might sound like presumptuous, but I badly hate the literature and art convert to the score. The writers should filter the stories that the readers can empathy through infinite imagination and experience. The writers should not stay in some limited fence like the stagnant water could be easily rot. Whenever I see the award plaque, it made me lazy since I recognized me as a ‘debut writer.’ Therefore, I destroyed all the plaques to have a mind of a beginner before debut.”

Her debut as a novelist was later than compared to her peer writers. She recalled that all her family had a hard time due to her brother’s constant business failure. Nevertheless, she mentioned that watching the Gwangju People’s Uprising, experiencing financially hard times, not receiving enough education so as to yield the chances to her siblings gave a nourishment for her life after all. When she decided to continue her study, she enrolled the Gwangju University in 1999 and got a master's degree from the school in 2010. After that, she started a Ph.D. course at Korean Teacher Department at Dongshin University in 2016. She has pursued her degree and has taught creative writing to students at Saengoji University,^[4] and screenwriting at the department of Broadcasting Entertainment at Dongshin University.

Written works

1996, Short story What Kind of Silkworm's Dream in Cocoon: 누에는 고치 속에서 무슨 꿈을 꾸는가Jeonnam Ilbo Literature Award^[5]
1999, Short story Bird Fly Again: 다시 나는 새 Munwha Ilbo Literature Award^[6]
2001, Novel People in Columbarium: 비둘기집사람들^[7]
2002, Novel Minority's Love: 소수의 사랑^[8]
2005, Novel Song of the Wind: 바람의 노래,^[9]^[10]
2005, Biography Chosun Genius painter Seungeop Jang: 조선의 천재 화가 장승업
2006, Short story book Ten thousand and two brewing Women: 만두 빚는 여자,^[11]^[12]
2006, Collaborated Audio book: Snack
2006, Novel The First Experience at 18: 18세, 첫경험,^[13]^[14]
2006, Short story I lost myself(Munjang Webzine January 2007)^[15]
2007, Novel Wind male tree woman: 바람남자 나무여자,^[16]^[17]
2007, Biography Goddess of Creation and Destruction of Camille Claudel: 창조와 파괴의 여신 카미유 클로델^[18]
2008, Short story A landscape with a Blue Mold(Writer open tomorrow 52, winter)
2008, Collaborated 2 and 1/2^[19]
2008, Picture book Shimchung Fell in Indangsu^[20]
2009, Novel Butterfly, Butterfly^[21]
2010, Picture book Introducing my Friend Butterfly
2010, Collaborated Thank you, Family
2010, Collaborated Class: All This Makes the Lost Memories
2011, Novel Black Skirt Sadako (Jeongja Bae),^[22]^[23]
2012, Collaborated Giddy Chatters of Eves^[24]
2012, Biography Pope John Paul II – The Light of the Human Race^[25]

Broadcasting works

Narration: SBS 5.18 28 Anniversary Special 2-part series – <Destiny - 80518>(18 May 2008),^[26]^[27]^[28]^[29]
Guest: SBS Field report- people world 230 – <Gwangju Diary of the Yellow Rose> (18 May 2005)^[30]

Columns

Live and think (2 January 2015 ~ 26 June 2015), column in Munwha Ilbo^[31]
Blue square (30 June 2006 ~ 7 June 2012), column in Munwha Ilbo^[32]
Mihee Eun's go out (2009 ~ 2011), column in Koomin Ilbo
Front Essay in Lady Kyunghyang June 2009^[33]
Columnist in Jeonnam Ilbo
Mihee Eun's Gwangju Walk, column in Gwangju Sibo

Awards

1995, Korea Women's Literature Award
1996, Gwangnam Literature Award^[34]
2001, Samsung Literature Award^[35]

References

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