Korean literature is the body of literature produced in the Korean language. For much of Korea's 3,000 years of literary history, it was written both in Hanja and in the Korean script Hangul. It is commonly divided into classical and modern periods, although this distinction is sometimes unclear. Korea is home to the world's first metal and copper type, world's earliest known printed document and the world's first featural script.

In general, the written arts have a tradition in epigraphic inscriptions on stones, in early tombs, and on rarely found bamboo pieces that formed early books. Repeated invasions and sacking of the east and west capitals, as well as the difficulty in preserving written texts on bamboo, make works before 1000 rare. Those works were entirely written in Chinese characters, the language of scholars, but of course incorporated Korean words and mindset. Medieval scholars in Korea learned written Chinese as western schoolmen learned Latin: as a lingua franca for the region. It helped cultural exchanges extensively.

Yi Sang (August 20, 1910 - April 17, 1937) is considered one of the most innovative writers in modern Korean literature. Crossing and blurring the boundaries between poetry, fiction and essay, his experiments in literary form and language, as well the psychological complexity of his inquiry into passion, eroticism and the indeterminate nature of self were unprecedented in Korean literary practices of his time.

Though most widely known by his pen name, Yi Sang was born in Seoul, Korea, as Kim Hae-gyeong. Most of his works were produced during the 1930s, during the Japanese Colonial Period. He was trained as an architect and for a time was employed as a draftsman in the public works department of the colonial Japanese administration. Reflecting his architectural background, his writing, particularly poetry, consciously employed diagrams and numbers to push the conventional boundaries of linguistic expression.

While visiting Tokyo in 1936 he was arrested on charges of "thought crimes." Prison took a severe toll on his health, which was already in decline from years of suffering from tuberculosis. He died soon after his release. He was 27 years old, according to East Asian age reckoning.

Charles Montgomery (born 1968) is an award-winning Canadian writer and photojournalist.

Born in North Vancouver, British Columbia, he spent his formative years on a farm on Vancouver Island, and was educated at the University of Victoria and Langara College. Montgomery began his career at the Lillooet Bridge River News the The Vancouver Sun. He lived in Hong Kong from 1996 to 1998, where he wrote stories for the Hong Kong Shipping Gazette and HK Magazine.

Montgomery's writing about environment, adventure, cultural convergence and myth has appeared in magazines and newspapers in Canada, the United States and Hong Kong, including Outside Magazine, Explore Magazine, Canadian Geographic, enRoute, The National Post, The Globe and Mail, The Walrus, and The South China Morning Post. His magazine writing has won four Western Canada Magazine Awards, a 2004 silver National Magazine award and the 2003 American Society of Travel Writer’s Lowell Thomas Silver Award for best North American travel story.