Recent Books
Dining Culture of China, Japan and Korea
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Kim Kyung-eun; Leegaseo Publishing: 336pp., 16,500 won
China, Japan and Korea have repeatedly coexisted and confronted each other over thousands of years. Their cuisines share similarities such as rice being a staple food; but their peoples have distinct traits. In this book, Kim Kyung-eun, an editor of the daily newspaper, the Kyunghyang Shinmun, compares the foods of the three countries and explores these features.
There are differences among China, Japan, and Korea in terms of rice use for example. In Korea, meals are made with rice and side dishes. In Japan, such foods as sushi and curry using rice as an ingredient are main meals. They don’t apply the concept of “main dish and side dish” to rice as Koreans do. In China, there is “fan” and “cai,” corresponding to the rice and side dishes of Korea, but cai alone can be a good meal. The Chinese tend to, if anything, put emphasis on cai, in that they need not eat fan if they are full.
Kim wrote a series of project articles, “Korean Food and Hallyu,” in the newsmagazine, the Weekly Kyunghayng for a year and with this as an inspiration he came to have an interest in food in Asia.
— Baek Byung-yeul
Kim Geung-soo Stage
Kim Geung-soo; Book Show Company: 220 pp., 20,000 won
Kim Geung-soo, a professor of dance at Chung-Ang University and former artistic director of the Korean National Ballet, conveys the story of the history and future possibilities of Korean ballet in this book.
On July 19, 2012, the Kim Geung-soo Ballet Company performed “La Chun Hyang” at the Peacock Theatre in London. The author details the process of how he toiled to make the show, based on a traditional Korean love story of a young couple, a success on the London stage.
Kim’s career, which began as a dancer with the Korean National Ballet in 1982 and consecutively as a ballet master and artistic director of the same organization, reveals his agony about how he has tried to imbue the unique color of Korea on Western dance performances.
Cooking Drawing Book 3
Thomas Slater, Kim So-eun, et al.; YOUR-MIND: 132 pp., 12,000 won
Independent bookstore and publisher YOUR-MIND has released the third edition of its “Cooking Drawing Book” series. The book includes 11 illustrated recipes under the theme “Weekend Lunch.”
Cooking something on the weekend is different from daily meals as the time makes people leisurely and lazier. Weekend cooking tends to be simple yet more amusing than everyday cooking and the third “Cooking Drawing Book” has a variety of suggestions for weekend fun.
Some of the recipes are practical, such as Chinese eggplant stir-fry or rice balls, but others are rather whimsical, including Stephan sandwich. Thomas Slater, the only foreign participant from the U.K., offers a recipe for carrot salad, while Shin Ji-sue gives a recipe for “Fool’s rice,” a one-plate lunch she made when she was in France as a part of an artist residency program.
Seo Ha-na’s sweet cake recipe should make a nice dessert for Saturday afternoon.
— Kwon Mee-yoo
Would it be okay not to get married?
Masuda Miri; Translated from English to Korean by Park Jung-im; YiBom: 164pp., 8,000 won
Japanese cartoonist and illustrator Mazda Miri knows that 30-something women think of marriage, their career and relaxation every day. She then worked on each topic and produced three easy-to-read comic books that concentrate on each topic in detail. “Would it be okay not to get married?” is one of them.
Marriage is maybe the biggest concern among women in their 20s and 30s. In the book are three female protagonists — a 35-year-old single woman called Soojjang, Sawako, who has been single for 13 years, and the pregnant Miko who gave up her career when she got married.
Soojjang loves her job as a manager at a cafe but worries whether she can live well without marrying, which she believes, can give her financial support. Sawako wants to date men, find a husband and have children but worries as her mother is the only one that takes care of her grandmother, who suffers from dementia. Miko can’t wait to give birth but at the same time feels afraid of the big change in her life. The author tells readers that no one can give them definite answers to their concerns but that they should trust themselves whatever decisions they make.
— Rachel Lee