Kim Hyesoon

Kim Hyesoon is one of the most influential contemporary poets of South Korea. She is the first female poet to receive the prestigious Midang and Kim Su-yong awards, and her collections include I’m OK, I’m Pig! (Bloodaxe Books, 2014), Poor Love Machine (Action Books, 2016), and Autobiography of Death (New Directions, 2018). Her work has been translated into many languages, including Chinese, French, German, Japanese, Spanish, and Swedish. According to her English translator Don Mee Choi, “Kim's poetry goes beyond the expectations of established aesthetics and traditional ‘female poetry’ (yŏryusi), which is characterised by its passive, refined language… Kim's poetics are rooted in her attempt to resist conventional literary forms and language long defined by men in Korea.”

Kim lives in Seoul and teaches creative writing at the Seoul Institute of the Arts.