At the crossroads of literature and history: Maninbo (10,000 Lives) as social biography.

Maninbo (10,000 Lives), Ko Un's 30-volume series of poems published between 1986 and 2010, represents a meeting point between history and literature. It can be seen either as historical writing in the form of poetry or as a literary narrative with historical content. The poet reconstructs the entire scheme of Korean history through the life-stories of numerous individuals, thus transforming their lived experiences into narrated history. Maninbo bears some characteristics of social biography, which is one way of writing history. However, it differs from other styles of social biography in its poetic sketches of thousands of individuals, which ultimately comprise a grand mosaic of Korean history. As a social biography, Maninbo reveals the ideals underlying modern Korean society: national independence, democracy, desire for reunification, and, most of all, humanism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]