Formerly Titled: Oh, God!
Korean Title: Sarameui Tal
Author: Jung-rae Jo
Publisher: Munhakdongne
Hardcover | 241 pages | 196*136mm

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>>>This book is written in Korean.

About This Book

"Always, Raison detre of literature has been the study of human beings. History is only a part of it. The more we look into human beings, the more we get entagled into the question of what the nature of human beings is."

Here lies a photo. In this black and white photo taken allegedly at Utah beach of Normandy, a child-like looking Asian in German army uniform is under the investigation as a captive of US army. Having been drafted to Japanese army at first, he got captivated by Russian Army to get assigned into the enemy force at Manchuria borderline dispute arousing in August of 1939. Captured by German army this time, he was mobilized without mercy to construct the Atlantic Ocean Defenses. And during the Normandy Landing Operations, he finally became a captive of US army that couldn’t understand of his language at all.
Yet, he has not been fully identified so far. A website discloses that he was originally from Shinuiju in Korea with the name of Yang Kyong-jong and he got released from a British captive concentration camp when the war was over and emigrated directly to US where he lived a peaceful life until death. But it is doubtful of its accuracy.
Steven Ambrose, a US historian, mentioned in his book that the first four captives of US army at Normandy front were Asian Nazis, all Koreans. In December of 2006, a broadcasting company tried to trace their lives back but failed to find out their exact identities.

Oh, My Lord has the very person in the photo for its hero named Shin Gil-man. Motivated by a faded photo, Oh, My Lord almost coincides the period of the 7 year-long World War II. The characters in Oh, My Lord were thrown into the midst of the world history without their knowing till the end of their hapless lives. This is why their fate is regarded both tragic and ironical. They were at the very spot of the most important historic moments while they had remained all the time uninvited and forgotten.
The author Jo Jung-rae revives and memorializes their life by writing a novel, another way of ‘recording� of history. This novel gives us the opportunity to ponder over how an individual was drawn into the whirlpool of the history and yet thoroughly isolated from it, and over what a human being is all about.

About The Author

Born in Sunam Temple in Seoung-ju of Jeonnam province in 1943. He made his literary debut in Contemporary Literature. His works include The land of 20 years of raining, Yellow Soil, Grudge, the Shadowy Place for short stories, The Land of Exile for novelette, Tripitaka, A Fireworks Play, The Range of Taebaek, Arirang, Han River for long novels, and Everybody is a lonely tree for essay collection. He won contemporary Literature Prize(1981), Korea Literature Prize(1982), Manhae Literature Prize(2003), etc.



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