Poet Choi Du-seok to spend 10 months writing in Haenam-gun in long-term creative support program
Haenam-gun has introduced an invited-writer program at the Baengnyeonjae literary residence for the first time this year.
The county selected poet Choi Du-seok as the program's inaugural invited writer.
According to Haenam-gun on Friday, the invited-writer program was established alongside the existing open-application residency to allow writers of literary achievement and experience to stay at Baengnyeonjae for an extended period and focus on their creative work.
The Baengnyeonjae writer residency has operated since 2019 as a dedicated literary creative-space support program, connecting the region's rich literary assets and sense of place to contemporary literary production.
A defining feature of the program is that it places no restrictions on the content or outcome of creative work — supporting writers' autonomous activity whether they are developing ideas, drafting, finishing a manuscript, or simply taking time to recharge between projects.
Over the past eight years, 29 books have been published from works written or conceived at Baengnyeonjae, and some writers have gone on to win literary awards for work created there.
Among the most notable examples, the late novelist Song Gi-won, who spent an extended period at Baengnyeonjae, published five books there — including a meditation novel he considered the final task of his life and a poetry anthology. Poet Kim Seon-tae wrote his poetry collection "Jjalda" at the residence; one of the poems was selected for the Gwanghwamun Letter Board's spring 2023 edition, reaching a wide public audience.
Writers' stays have also become an opportunity to rediscover Haenam. Through outside writers' eyes, histories and places that had gone unnoticed locally have emerged as new literary subjects, and their works have helped bring Haenam's stories to broader audiences.
Novelist Lee Eon-ju drew on the history of forced labor during the Japanese colonial period at the Ongmae mine for a work included in her short-story collection "Modu-ui Anbu." Novelist Gang Jun traced the connection between Jeju naval commander Kim Man-il and Haenam, visiting sites including Ijin-seong, and published the result as the novel "Mal-eun Yongmang-haji Aneunda."
The program has also broadened exchanges among writers. In partnership with the Arts Council Korea, Haenam-gun ran a pre-debut writer residency from 2021 to 2024 for undergraduate and graduate students in creative writing programs at universities in Gwangju and South Jeolla Province, giving emerging writers the chance to live and work alongside established authors and experience a real creative environment.
As requests and applications for return stays from writers who had previously lived at Baengnyeonjae continued to grow, the county decided to add the invited-writer program to its existing residency offerings this year.
Choi, the program's first invited writer, began his literary career in 1980 and has published numerous poetry and poetics collections — including "Daekkok," "Imjingang" and "Seong-e Kkot" — establishing himself as a key figure in Korean realist poetry. His works, particularly his signature poem "Seong-e Kkot," have consistently appeared in middle and high school textbooks and college entrance exam materials, reaching readers across generations. Choi is set to stay at Baengnyeonjae for 10 months from this month through June 2027, focusing on developing and writing new work.
The county plans to provide Choi with a private writing space so he can focus on his work without disruption, and to create opportunities for him to interact with current resident writers and local literary figures. It also plans to organize related programs — including poetry concerts and special exhibitions — to share the writer's work with local residents.
"The invited-writer program is a new attempt to broaden our creative support by drawing on Haenam-gun's years of operational experience to provide a stable creative environment, and to ensure that the literary achievements and exchanges that emerge from that process feed back into the region's literary assets," a county official said.
kkm9971@heraldcorp.com
