Publisher Changbi presents the collection of 86 poems

Publisher Changbi presents the collection of 86 poems. August. 13, 2016 07:07. by 조종엽기자 jjj@donga.com. This anthology has been created to commemorate the 400th volume in the Changbi Poetry Series, which began in 1975 with Shin Kyung-rim’s "Peasants’ Dance." This new book presents a collection of poems of 86 poets from the 301st to 399th volume of the series including Na Hui-deok, Moon Dong-man, and Kane Seong-eun. Each poem is short enough to be covered in one page. “The poems could be called as epigrams," Changbi editors said. "We hoped that readers could enjoy and relax with poetry as much as possible.”

Readers may not feel walking slowly into the woods as you read a complete collection of poems of a poet. Instead, they can feel the joy of reading a collection of short and sententious sayings of each book of poetry. “A father cries after hearing/ cold footsteps of his child/ who came back home at dawn after part-time night shift” from "Father and Daughter" by poet Kim Joo-dae. “Once there was a time when I liked myself as I was together with you,” from "Painful Paradise" written by poet Lee Yeong-gwang.

Reading preface by the poets is also intriguing as much as reading the feature poems. “Please do not try to read between the lines. Just look through the book,” poet Kwon Ji-sook says. “People in all ages know that writing a poem is extremely laborious and brings relatively low incomes. But I have never complained about it,” poet Min Young says.

About 20 years ago when the volume number of the Changbi Poetry Series was around the mid-100th, the book was priced around 5,000 won (4.53 U.S. dollars). As time went by, the price of cookies has increased almost 10-fold, while the price of collection of poetry has just doubled. Isn’t it too cheap to feel the sense of “the rusty nails" (referring to corroded nails or rugged toenails) in our daily lives even though we cannot visit Maldives in this scorching summer?