Words of the Youth: 15th Anniversary Edition
Book

ISBN 978-89-344-8003-7 03800
Published by Maumsanchack, Seoul, Korea

Words of the Youth is written by the novelist Yeonsu Kim, and is one of the most beloved essays in Korea, since its first publication. In the preface, he confesses that he documented “the days I loved, the ones I loved, the things that temporarily resided in me and the things that are now missing from me.” He explains how he came to write about his childhood memories, and his sufferings from growing up, through beautiful sentences. These sentences that captured him in his youth are from Du Fu and Li Bai's old Chinese poetry, the prose of the Joseon Dynasty scholar, Ishibashi Hideno's Haiku, and lyrics from popular music. He says “Sometimes one sentence is enough to explain life.”

I wrote and designed the word ‘youth’ in the Chinese character. Repeated horizontal strokes, sharp acute angles of the lines when they are scripted, are reminiscent of the delicacy and sensitivity of the author's writings, and also perhaps the days of youth. It is like a thorn that pierces through a scar, and maybe it is (or was) something brilliantly shining. I reflected the fleeting beauty of youth, which is beautiful but ephemeral, through the colors of the cover.

• Design: Jaemin Lee

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• Client: Maumsanchack
  
• Year: May 2019