Biography

Kim Seungok (The romanization preferred by the author according to LTI Korea) (born December 1941) is a South Korean novelist and screenwriter. Born in Osaka, Japan, Kim Seungok returned to Korea after its liberation in 1945. There, he was raised in Suncheon in Jeollanam-do where he graduated from Suncheon High School. In 1960, he studied French Literature at Seoul National University at a time that department and University were the center of intellectual discontent in Seoul. While at Seoul National University, Kim was a cartoonist for a Seoul newspaper and published his first major story at age 19 ("Practice for Life""). While a junior in 1962, Kim founded a literary Journal, The Age of Prose, and some of his first works were published there. Kim was an immediate literary success, a success that continued unabated until he was 25. His greatest success was "Seoul, Winter, 1964," a work that crystallized a Korean sense of loss and meaninglessness attendant to the industrialization of Korea and resulting nihilism. In 1967 one of his works, "Trip to Mujin," was adapted into the film Mist. Kim Seung-ok was the screenwriter, and director Kim Soo-yong won the Best Director award at the 14th Asia-Pacific Film Festival.