Patterns of the Heart: And Other Stories ~ By Myongik Ch’oe
(Columbia University Press, New York, 2024, ISBN #978-0-2312-0270-1)
Review by Bill Drucker (Winter 2025)

Patterns of the Heart is a collection of nine stories by Myongik Ch’oe, who was born in 1903 in Pyongyang, and lived there all his life. His life was a humble one, and not a typical life of a literary figure. He ran a small factory while writing fiction on the side. His works depict people in a state of constant flux, whether struggling through life in a city or on a rural commune. He wrote stories through many sea changes in Korean modern history; colonial occupation, two wars, liberation, and division of his homeland into two countries.
The date of the author’s death is unknown, but he wrote his best work from the 1930s to the 1960s. Then, he faded into obscurity – that is, until now.
These nine stories showcase the talents of a writer who was recognized in his time but whose reputation faded with war and the ideological transition of the North Korean state. The writings also provide views into North Korean life before and after the Korean War.
Ch’oe writes about dislocation, how people in periods of wars and in the midst of social transitions fall into a marginalized existence. As an educated man from a good family, Ch’oe knew well the conditions he was writing about. The social and economic transitions he described, created by war and invasion, revolutionary movements, and global influences, all happened to him too.
Ch’oe’s older brother was also a writer and a member of the Pyongyang literary circle. Later, when his homeland became North Korea, Ch’oe was known as a modernist writer. His works reflect on the chaotic and violent experiences of the times. Living through wars, revolutions and forced social change provided him with a lot of material which is reflected in his writings. He is often re-examining dislocation and its effects. The turbulent events of the times intrude into and temper the somber tone of his stories. Ch’oe had some peak years as a fiction writer, then his visibility and reputation diminished.
In some reviews of this unique collection, it is hypothesized that his presence was erased in South Korea for many years because his writings were thought to be “pro-North” and therefore banned by the National Security Law.
The story A Man of No Character deals personal choices and ideas of how to live one’s life – specifically, one character’s acquisition of wealth through business in contrast with another character who believes in acquiring learning. In the story, a young intellectual man encounters an older business owner. While he eats and drinks the man’s offerings, the young man has to listen to the man’s dealings in making money. The young man looks at his own meager existence as an intellectual. Even during these times, before the division of Korea, the gaps between old and young, familial obligations and personal choice, and traditional versus revolutionary were getting an airing in popular culture.
Patterns of the Heart explores the father-son relationship. An intellectual, drifter son confronts his ailing father, a former revolutionary and heroin addict. The story takes place in Harbin, the vibrant city in what was then Manchuria. In the background of the story is a time during which occupying Japanese were cracking down on Korean communist movements and liberation revolutionaries. The son sees only an old man, ravaged by heroin. He is unable to comprehend how his father continues in his rebellious attitude to the end, believing that the cause can live on.
The vehicle of the father-son relationship is used to explore the strains of generations. It also expands on political and social ideas, the violent historical events, and the trauma and sacrifices of the people under an authoritarian state.
Women play pivotal roles in Ch’oe’s work also. Their lives are used to contrast the urban and the rural existence. Women are portrayed as loyal, socialist daughters, but also as prostitutes, which the author uses to explore the lives of socially- and economically- dislocated people. Ch’oe uses these roles for gender, generational, moral, and social discussions.
In Spring on the New Road, a peasant girl experiences a harsh deceit and betrayal in an unforgiving urban environment. In Ordinary People, a sex worker is trafficked into Manchuria, a place considered to be a violent and lawless frontier. The story shifts to reflect the actions of people on the same train, particularly their insensitivity to the woman’s plight, and silent complicity with a society that will allow a young woman to be treated as chattel, and unwillingly transported to a place far away.
The Barley Hump is a longer and more mature work. It includes notes that are ostensibly biographical. One main character, Sangjin, narrates. At a point when the war is winding down, Sangjin returns to his village and witnesses the redevelopment of the region though a collective, peasant-led form of governance. After colonialism, wars, and internal strife, there is a new and more positive attitude among the peasant class. He expresses thoughts about a better life and communal solidarity.
For a short time, North Koreans, at the war’s end, did begin to rebuild under a socialist ideology. The people mobilized for reconstruction, with hopes of a new state. The story reflects Ch’oe’s hope in the newly-formed North Korea as it transitioned from colonial rule to a socialist society. Ch’oe would see three major ideological changes during his lifetime; from colonial oppression, to communism, and finally to authoritarian rule under Il-sung Kim.
The last three stories describe the writer’s disillusionment with war. He writes of war as a thing that creates no good for society and leaves only destruction and trauma in its wake. Ch’oe addresses the dislocation of not only the people, but of places.
It is notable that these North Korean writings were allowed out of the country. Some of the stories were apparently gleaned from little-known literary journals in which Ch’oe originally published. The current policy of the state prohibits intellectual and literary exports. This not just due to the attitude of the authoritarian leadership of North Korea, but also the anti-communist sentiment and political antagonism from the South Korean government.
The translation into English is by Toronto University’s East Asian Studies chair and associate professor, Janet Poole, who also provides a comprehensive introduction to the collection and a review of Cho’e’s life and work.