Twofold Song, by Yi Mun-Yol

In a beautifully illustrated and bound bilingual edition, famed writer Yi Mun-yol's story of the last encounter of an affair presents as allegory of ancients and modern mixed together, with a coda that changes all that primordial prehistoric metaphor into something altogether different. The title of the story and its writing parallel each other with a constant shifting of sides and views, past and present, contrasts and similarities, profound with mundane. At times, the story has the flavor of Korean drama (melodrama) on its surface, but the thought and structure of this story are subtle, complex and interwoven without answer, much like how life is. Translated by Kwon Kyong-Mi, illustrated by Kwak Sun-young. Hollym, 2004.