The Memoirs of Lady Hyegyong: The Autobiographical Writings of a Crown Princess of Eighteenth-Century Korea | 
| Author: Jahyun Kim Haboush
Publisher: University of California Press
Category: Book
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Avg. Customer Rating:  9 reviews
Sales Rank: 234395
Media: Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 329
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.2
Dimensions (in): 8.9 x 6 x 1
ISBN: 0520200551
Dewey Decimal Number: 951.902092
EAN: 9780520200555
ASIN: 0520200551
Publication Date: April 22, 1996
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Product Description
Lady Hyegyong's memoirs, which recount the chilling murder of her husband by his father, is one of the best known and most popular classics of Korean literature. From 1795 until 1805 Lady Hyegyong composed this masterpiece, which depicts a court life whose drama and pathos is of Shakespearean proportions. Presented in its social, cultural, and historical contexts, this first complete English translation opens a door into a world teeming with conflicting passions, political intrigue, and the daily preoccupations of a deeply intelligent and articulate woman.
JaHyun Kim Haboush's accurate, fluid translation captures the intimate and expressive voice of this consummate storyteller. The Memoirs of Lady Hyegyong is a unique exploration of Korean selfhood and of how the genre of autobiography fared in premodern times.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 4 more reviews...
 Confucian Rice Chest March 4, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Not only that this is the only book about Korean politics at the court from a woman's perspective, but it is also one of a very few pieces of literature that was written in Hangul. Korea, together with Japan and Vietnam were influenced heavily by Chinese culture and literature. Noble men during this time studied and wrote in Classical Chinese, which left women, the less educated ones, to be masters of their native languages.
Lady Hyegyong memoir was written in her old age for the purpose of restoring honor to her father, uncle, brother and husband who were either disgraced or killed during the time they served at the kings' courts. This book gives the readers vivid (and even shocking) details of the ways of life under Confucian laws, how people lived, died and even murdered. In Confucius teachings, the authority of the king and the father was absolute. When the king ordered his subject to die, if he did not obey, he would be deemed disloyal. When the father ordered the son to die, if he did not obey, he would be deemed unfilial.
When Sado's mental illness was to the point of uncontrollable, king Yongjo had no choice, but to have him put to death for the kingdom's sake. When king Yongjo ordered his son to step into the (4ft x 4ft x 4ft) rice chest, and prince Sado did it without any objection, he was evoking the righteousness between father and son. If he evoked the death sentence as a king, Sado's wife and son would also be tainted by Sado's crimes and potentially would also be sentenced to death with Sado In having Sado's brother adopting Sado's son posthumously, he also was able save his daughter in law and grand child from the question of legitimacy.
Lady Heyegyong also demonstrated a life of virtue when she successfully maintained these proper relationships between herself and her parents, husband and son: `a perfect woman must obey her father when she is a child, her husband when a wife and her son when she is a widow' (Confucius).
 memoirs of lady hyegyong- interesting February 23, 2007
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
an interesting book. It makes the writings of a crown princess more informative and intense. I would recommend this book but readers might want to read a simpler version. The book is a little messy and isn't in the form of the beginning of the story to the end. Bits and pieces are told in different chapters.
Overall, an interesting story.
A compelling time travel January 23, 2007
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Beyond the scholarly merit and historical significance of this book, the story is hugely compelling, not merely for the facts of the chilling event, but for several other reasons.
First, the view Lady Hyegyong provides of the court life and the strict Confucian beliefs that hinge on filial piety, loyalty, virtue and honor is evident more in what she doesn't say than what is said. It's a growing subtle presentation of how life unfolded within these confines of faith, and as a result, how tragedy after tragedy continued to compound. One could read the Analects or any Neo-Confucian work, and not understand to the degree shown here the depths of the practice and belief that affected every aspect of life in the late Choson era.
Second, along with JaHyun Kim Haboush's careful introduction, the annotations she has so helpfully added, the glossaries and appendices, the book presents a highly respectful translation that brings forth all the humanity of the players in a way that makes the story unfold like a novel of hope, horror, survival and the desire for inner peace and heavenly redemption.
Third, by providing the historical literary context of these MEMOIRS (in the introduction), we benefit from understanding not only the historical events but the tense cultural climate and the severe limitations that Lady Hyegyong had to challenge and overcome in order to redeem the honor of her family. Almost as a self-reflective postmodern work of existentialism, the book stands as its own redemptive testament to its themes.
To read of this historical event from one who suffered in its aftermath, and who despite the strictures of her sex and position could tell of it with artistry, is an amazing literary experience.
 Good but somethings could have been better organized March 17, 2005
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
I think Haboush was trying to adhere to the original piece how the Crown prince wrote it but the sequence of events perhaps could have been ordered better? Because they are divided into 4 sections and each memoir tells the same story in different perspective and you have to go back.
Also some of the Korean names and terms I would have liked to have seen them typed both in Korean as well. It was had to make out what it meant.
It clarified, especially the last memoir (1805) how and why Sado seja was killed. History often sites that It was his father's extreme dislike for that drove to it. He could not have been disposed because there would have been factions that would try to put him back up on the throne.
The Korean Hamlet January 21, 2001
25 out of 26 found this review helpful
"The Memoirs of Lady Hyegyong" is actually four different works written by one woman, a circumspect, scrupulous, unfortunate 18th Century Korean aristocrat. The memoirs are, successively, a family injunction, a memorial, a biography, and a historiography. At the center of the collection sits Hong Hyegyong and her husband, Crown Prince Sado. "The Memoirs" span the reigns of Yongjo, Chongjo, and Sunjo, and the careers of Lady Hyegyong's father, Hong Ponghan, and her older brothers.Lady Hong Hyegyong was the wife of Crown Prince Sado, who in 1762, was ordered by his father, King Yongjo, to step into a rice chest, which was susequently bound and covered in sod. Crown Prince Sado had been punished by his father for a series of heinous murders caused by Sado's mental illness. Lady Hyegyong and her family, including her son, the future King Chongjo, then became the focal point of factional quarrels at court, each side using the execution of the Crown Prince, to its own political advantage. Lady Hyegyong, in the first three memoirs, strives to defend her father and brothers against chages of treason and complicity in Sado's execution. The last memoir is a defense of her husband. All four are addressed to her grandson, King Sunjo, to restore the honor of her family. Although Lady Hyegyong nor Haboush could ascertain the specific cause of Crown Prince Sado's illness, and Lady Hyegyong's anecdotal evidence is hardly scientific, I would like to offer ''hwabyong'', or, in Korean, ''fire disease'' or ''anger disease''. ''Hwabyong'', as offered by Alford in "Think No Evil: Korean Values In The Age Of Globalization" (see review), is ''...a unique Korean folk syndrome...'' characterized by ''...anxiety, panic,...and the suppression of anger...'' (p. 77). Korean fire disease's ''...symptoms reflect[s] the constraints of the culture: not just on the expression of of emotion, but the lack of opportunity...to change...''(p. 79). Only Crown Prince Sado,and the evidence offered in "The Memoir of 1805", can affirm this conjecture. The last work, "The Memoir of 1805", is a brilliant psychological portrait of Crown Prince Sado. It is a revealing exercise in historical writing, and also reveals the mind of an extraordinary woman trying to understand some of the most harrowing personal tragedies any spouse or daughter might face. "The Memoirs" can be compared to Lady Murasaki Shikibu's "The Tale of Genji", "Hamlet", and the lives of the Roman Emperors. One major failing of Haboush's''Introduction'' is, that she does not place the incidents in a broader historical and international context. But she does manage to argue against abridging and collecting each work into a longer historical novel. A broader focus would further aid in understanding Lady Hyegyong's dedication in defense of her brothers and father. This is not only a valuable history, but it is also another demonstration of the narrative powers of Asian women authors operating in a patriarchical, almost misogynistic, culture.
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