The Naked Tree [graphic novel]
by Keum Suk Gendry-Kim (Illustrator), Wan-suh Park (Author)
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"The year is 1951. Twenty-year-old wallflower Lee Kyung ekes out a living at the US Post Exchange, where goods and services of varying stripe are available for purchase. She peddles hand-painted portraits on silk handkerchiefs to soldiers passing through. When a handsome young northern escapee and erstwhile fine artist is hired despite waning demand, an unlikely friendship blossoms into a young woman's first brush with desire against the backdrop of the Korean War at its most devastating."--Tags
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Member Reviews
I had never heard of the novel which was the base for this graphic novel. So the introduction by the original author's daughter was useful in providing some context for the story - and so was the afterword by the author of this book. Not that the story does not work on its own - but adding the details allow some cultural and historical details to be fleshed out.
The graphic novel starts with the death of a painter and ends with a posthumous exhibit of the painter's works. The only color in the graphic novel is in that final exhibit - showing the actual art of Park Su-geun. In between the two events, a woman tells a story of the war-time Korea - when she fell in love with the painter. The original novel was that middle part only - the show more fictionalized story which Pak Wan-So published in 1970 - the framing story belongs only to this adaptation. And it helps frame the otherwise bleak story.
There may be a love story somewhere in there but the whole of it is not really a love story. Instead it is a story of the horror of the Korean war - using both the story of the young girl who falls for the older painter and the different characters' memories. It is as bleak of a story as possible - with deaths not always ending up the biggest tragedy. It paints a world that does not exist anymore - where the traditions and the norms are changing while people still try to hold onto what they know. And somewhere in the North, the war keeps raging.
Korean graphic novels have a very specific style which rarely works for me. It works here to a point but I almost wish it was drawn in a more realistic style (mind you, it is realistic enough in places). But the story itself and the grimness of their circumstances (even when they find a reason to laugh) carries the book.
I am still debating if I want to read the original novel which this one adapted. On one hand, now I know the story but I am also curious to see just how different they may be and how some of the imagery was shown through words.
If you are interested in different cultures and you do not mind the graphic novel format, you may want to give this one a chance. But do not expect happy endings or a lot of hope. show less
The graphic novel starts with the death of a painter and ends with a posthumous exhibit of the painter's works. The only color in the graphic novel is in that final exhibit - showing the actual art of Park Su-geun. In between the two events, a woman tells a story of the war-time Korea - when she fell in love with the painter. The original novel was that middle part only - the show more fictionalized story which Pak Wan-So published in 1970 - the framing story belongs only to this adaptation. And it helps frame the otherwise bleak story.
There may be a love story somewhere in there but the whole of it is not really a love story. Instead it is a story of the horror of the Korean war - using both the story of the young girl who falls for the older painter and the different characters' memories. It is as bleak of a story as possible - with deaths not always ending up the biggest tragedy. It paints a world that does not exist anymore - where the traditions and the norms are changing while people still try to hold onto what they know. And somewhere in the North, the war keeps raging.
Korean graphic novels have a very specific style which rarely works for me. It works here to a point but I almost wish it was drawn in a more realistic style (mind you, it is realistic enough in places). But the story itself and the grimness of their circumstances (even when they find a reason to laugh) carries the book.
I am still debating if I want to read the original novel which this one adapted. On one hand, now I know the story but I am also curious to see just how different they may be and how some of the imagery was shown through words.
If you are interested in different cultures and you do not mind the graphic novel format, you may want to give this one a chance. But do not expect happy endings or a lot of hope. show less
A graphic novel that's a loose adaptation/reinterpretation of a classic South Korean novel, set during the Korean War of the 1950s. This was a fairly bleak tale of unrequited love and familial trauma, and not one that I felt built to much of anything. That, combined with what I found to be a fairly off-putting artistic style, meant that The Naked Tree was not for me, though it may work better for those who are familiar with the original work.
Keum Suk Gendry-Kim adapts a 1970 novel by Park Wan-suh into a graphic novel, injecting elements of the author's real life into an original framing sequence to emphasize the roman à clef nature of the work.
In the midst of the Korean War, a Korean woman in her early twenties works in a safe zone of Seoul at a booth at an American PX shilling souvenir portraits on scarves painted by some artisans who work on-site from snapshots provided by the clientele. She quickly develops a crush on one of the painters – who is a tortured soul destined to become become an acclaimed artist, not just a piecework craftsman – and pins on him all her dreams of escaping the dreary life of grief she shares with her widowed mother and compares to the show more lives of the other women around her.
It's a mild but engaging bit of coming-of-age drama playing out with some inevitable predictability but offering a rare and precious perspective of one America's several forgotten wars.
(Best Graphic Novels of 2023 Project: I'm trying to read all the books on the Washington Post 10 Best Graphic Novels of 2023 list. Four down, six to go! How many have you read?)
FOR REFERENCE:
Contents:
• The Naked Tree Lives Again / Ho Won-sook [daughter of Park Wan-suh]
• Prologue
• 1951
• Ok Huido
• Demands
• Chimpanzee
• Family
• Crossed Paths
• Women You Can Buy and Women You Can't Buy
• Crimson Gingko Leaves
• The Naked Tree
• Epilogue
• Artists I Have Loved / Keum Suk Gendry-Kim show less
In the midst of the Korean War, a Korean woman in her early twenties works in a safe zone of Seoul at a booth at an American PX shilling souvenir portraits on scarves painted by some artisans who work on-site from snapshots provided by the clientele. She quickly develops a crush on one of the painters – who is a tortured soul destined to become become an acclaimed artist, not just a piecework craftsman – and pins on him all her dreams of escaping the dreary life of grief she shares with her widowed mother and compares to the show more lives of the other women around her.
It's a mild but engaging bit of coming-of-age drama playing out with some inevitable predictability but offering a rare and precious perspective of one America's several forgotten wars.
(Best Graphic Novels of 2023 Project: I'm trying to read all the books on the Washington Post 10 Best Graphic Novels of 2023 list. Four down, six to go! How many have you read?)
FOR REFERENCE:
Contents:
• The Naked Tree Lives Again / Ho Won-sook [daughter of Park Wan-suh]
• Prologue
• 1951
• Ok Huido
• Demands
• Chimpanzee
• Family
• Crossed Paths
• Women You Can Buy and Women You Can't Buy
• Crimson Gingko Leaves
• The Naked Tree
• Epilogue
• Artists I Have Loved / Keum Suk Gendry-Kim show less
Basado en una historia real, este libro es la adaptación de una obra de culto de la literatura coreana, la célebre novela de Park Wan-seo, que describe con delicadeza los trastornos profundos y, a veces, invisibles engendrados por la guerra. En 1950, cuando estalla la guerra de Corea, Kyung tiene veinte años. Vive en Seúl con su madre. Un día, conoce a Ok Heedo, un pintor y se enamora de inmediato de este hombre tan talentoso. Pero Ok está casado. Muchos años más tarde, visita una exposición póstuma dedicada a este pintor y renace el pasado que ella pensó que estaba dormido.El título, ‘El árbol desnudo’ está tomado de una famosa pintura del artista coreano Park Soo-geun. (1914-1965), que inspiró al personaje de Ok show more Heedo. A pesar de su apariencia, el árbol desnudo no está muerto, perdió sus hojas, pero sus raíces se nutren del suelo que le permitirán volver a la vida cuando regrese la primavera. El libro contiene imágenes de los cuadros de Park Soo-geun a color y diferentes textos extras. show less
Nov 9, 2021Spanish
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Author Information
Wan-suh Park was born in 1931 in Gaepoong-kun, North Korea. She attended Seoul National University until the outbreak of the Korean War.
Some Editions
Awards and Honors
Awards
Notable Lists
Work Relationships
Is an adaptation of
Common Knowledge
- Canonical title
- The Naked Tree [graphic novel]
- Original title
- 나목
- Original publication date
- 2020
- People/Characters
- Park Wan-suh (writer, also fictionalized as Lee Kyeonga); Park Su-guen (painter, also fictionalized as Ok Huido); Lee Kyeonga (fictionalized version of Park Wan-suh); Ok Huido (fictionalized version of Park Su-guen); Choi Man-gil (boss of Lee Kyeonga); Diana Kim (friend of Lee Kyeonga) (show all 14); Hwang Taesu (electrician); Cash, a painter; Lee, a painter; Mrs. Ok (wife of Ok Huido); Ok Yeongnam (son of Ok Huido); Lee Hyeok (brother of Lee Kyeonga); Lee Wook (brother of Lee Kyeonga); Mrs. Lee (mother of Lee Kyeonga)
- Important places
- Seoul, South Korea; Korea
- Important events
- Korean War
- Epigraph
- I wrote my debut novel at the age of forty, but I remember writing it with the youthful, simple innocence of someone under twenty. Maybe that's why it doesn't feel like I was forty when I wrote it.
- Park Wan-suh from... (show all) the afterword in the original 1985 edition of The Naked Tree - First words
- SWISH
Ack!
Time to get up!
It's too bright. Close the curtain! - Last words
- (Click to show. Warning: May contain spoilers.)Hey, wait up!
- Original language
- French; Korean
- Disambiguation notice
- Graphic novel adaptation; do not combine with the original novel: The Naked Tree (나목) by Park Wan-suh.
Classifications
- Genre
- Graphic Novels & Comics
- DDC/MDS
- 741.5 — Arts & recreation Drawing & decorative arts Drawing Comic books, graphic novels, fotonovelas, cartoons, caricatures, comic strips
- LCC
- PN6790 .K63 .G4613 — Language and Literature Literature (General) Literature (General) Collections of general literature Comic books, strips, etc.
- BISAC
Statistics
- Members
- 49
- Popularity
- 612,887
- Reviews
- 4
- Rating
- (3.67)
- Languages
- English, French, Portuguese, Spanish
- Media
- Paper, Ebook
- ISBNs
- 4
- ASINs
- 2
