My Korea: Forty Years Without a Horsehair Hat is a cultural introduction to Korea, part memoir and part miscellany, which introduces traditional and contemporary culture through a series of essays, stories, anecdotes and poems. The book seeks to tell the reader all that he or she needs to know for a full and rewarding life in Korea or as a visitor passing through. Confucianism, Buddhism, relationships, everyday living, language and literature are comprehensively covered. Newcomers to Korea are provided with insights into daily life. They are told how to deal with people and the intricacies of honorific language, how to handle business dealings, how to be comfortable with social ranking, and how to react when they bump into the cultural wall.

Kevin O’Rourke, professor emeritus (Kyunghee University), Irish priest (Columban Fathers), who has lived in Korea since 1964. He has translated classical and contemporary fiction and poetry including Tilting the Jar, Spilling the Moon (Dedalus 1993), Poems of a Wanderer: Selected Poems of So Chongju (1995), Looking for the Cow (1999), the Yi Munyol novella Our Twisted Hero (2001); The Book of Korean Shijo (2002); A Hundred Love Poems from Old Korea (2005), and The Book of Korean Poetry (2006).

Acknowledgements

INTRODUCTION

1. KOREA IN THE 1960s

2. THE COLUMBANS
3. LEARNING THE ROPES
4. CULTURAL ADAPTATION
5. IN AT THE DEEP END
6. THE CULTURAL EXPERIENCE: WHERE TO BEGIN

7. THE CONFUCIAN MONOLITH
8. THE CHOS? N BUREAUCRACY
9. THE BUDDHIST INGREDIENT

10. EXCLUSIVITY MYTHS
11. CHILMAJAE SONGS – S? Ch?ngju
12. KOREA’S GREATEST ASSET
13. TALES OF THE IMMORTALS
14. AT THE CULTURAL COALFACE: IMMERSION, SUBMERSION? – TAKE YOUR PICK
15. NINE PRIEST IMMORTALS
16. SEEKING THE WAY
17. FOR THOSE OF US WITH LESS THAN IMMORTAL STATUS
18. LEARNING KOREAN
AFTERWORD

Bibliography

Index