December 9, a lecture by Professor, Head of the Department of Korean Studies at Stockholm University Sonja Haeussler will be held at St. Petersburg State University.Theme of the lecture: 'Im Kwon-Taek’s Beyond the years and the Sŏp’yŏnje trilogy'

The lecturer will discuss the film Beyond the years (Korean: Ch’ŏnnyŏnhak, “Thousand year old crane”) produced by distinguished Korean director Im Kwon-Taek in 2006. The film is one of Im Kwon-Taek’s adaptations from Yi Chǒng-jun’s short story cycle Sŏp’yŏnje written in the 1970s. Beyond the years is mainly based on the story “Wanderer to the Village of the Immortal Crane” (Sǒnhakdong nagǔnae) but also draws on several episodes of other stories in Sŏp’yŏnje.

Stemming from the southern tip of the Korean peninsula, the film director Im Kwon-Taek had the same regional background as the writer Yi Chǒng-jun and shared with him an interest in the cultural traditions of their homeland. Being close friends, they collaborated in a number of artistic projects dealing, among others, with the specific south-western style of P’ansori storytelling, Sŏp’yŏnje. Im Kwon-Taek’s first film adaptation from Yi’s story cycle titled Sŏp’yŏnje (1993) enjoyed overwhelming positive reaction and praise by the national and international audience as well as film critiques and was extensively discussed in many research works. In contrast, Im’s second adaptation, Beyond the years, has not received much attention, although it marked a significant jubilee in his career being his hundredth film. There may be assumed several reasons for this lower grade of popularity, such as less attractiveness because of recurrences in subject matters, main characters and parts of the plot. However, it is worth to study how Im Kwon-Taek in Beyond the years deliberately made frequent references to his previous film and the literary source and thus addressed old and new questions in regards to the complicated history of the Korean nation and the fate of individuals on the backdrop of human’s attitude to nature.

Time: 12: 40-14: 10

Venue: 11 Universitetskaya nab., Department of Korean Studies, aud. 178 (2nd floor)