Central to the Korean pansori musical storytelling tradition is Chunhyangga, an eighteenth-century love story involving the romance between Yi Mongryong, heir to a noble family, and Chunhyang, daughter of a courtesan. In Chunhyang, novelist Jin Renshun reimagines that romance, challenging its premises and taking it in a radically new direction.

Chunhyang is the story of a mother and a daughter’s quests for independence and self-worth in a world where women are too often confined and devalued. Beautifully told, blending lyricism with humor, Chunhyang introduces us to a memorable cast of characters—from powerful officials to orphaned children—and carries us toward a dramatic and poignant conclusion.

• Jin Renshun, Author

  Jin Renshun's works include the novel Chunhyang, the short story and novella collections Peach Blossom, The Pine Town, and In Commemoration of My Friend Jin Zhi, and the essay collections White as a Lily and Sentient Beings. She has won many honors including the Chunshen Original Literary Award, Junma Literary Awards for Ethnic Minority Writers, Chuang Chung-Wen Literary Award, China Writers Publishing Group Award, Lin Jinlan Short Story Award, People’s Literature Short Story Award, Short Story Award of Selected Stories, Novel Monthly Hundred Flowers Award, and October Literature Award. Her works have been translated into English, Korean, Arabic, Japanese, Russian, German, and Mongolian. She is a member of the presidium of the China Writers Association and chair of the Jilin Writers Association.

• Allan H. Barr, Translator

  Allan H. Barr is a scholar of Ming and Qing literature and prominent translator of contemporary Chinese writing. His published translations include Yu Hua’s China in Ten Words, Han Han’s This Generation, and Ai Weiwei’s 1000 Years of Joys and Sorrows. He is a professor of Chinese at Pomona College in Claremont, California.