News at Eleven: [Ko Un's] frequent trips to North Korea,

a closed nation for most, made him famous and notorious among Koreans.

Internationally, he became a short-list candidate for a Nobel Prize.

Ko characterizes his poetry as containing elements of both music and history. He wrote in the preface of this book:

"My poetry is flow. That flow will at times produce rhythms as it strikes against the riverbanks or frolics, speckled by light and shade. Thus my poetry is resonance. In an interview with the New York Times in the late 1980s, I said that 'poetry is the music of history,' stressing the 'music' no less than the 'history.'"

from Korea Times: Poet Ko Un Preaches Songs for Tomorrow

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