Clamp's Manga

Putting the words Chun Hyang in the title of Legend of Chun Hyang is deceitful. The characters, actions and themes are related to the actual Korean folk legend Chunhyangga in only the most tangential manner. As a result of the title, the manga begins to tread into the territory described by Emily Apter of poets like Rexroth, who created a fictitious basis for his poetry – does Legend of Chun Hyang really have any thematic or intellectual ties to the Korean folk legend?

In nearly every sequence, the manga departs precipitously from the canon, Korean Chunhyangga. We see a Chun-hyang who carries modern values of universal equality and female rights directly supplanted into Choson Korea, with awkward results. Traditional values of virtuosity and loyalty are no longer the central themes, as they are replaced by themes of individuality. Then, of course, there is the divine intervention of dragons and angels, and a sword-wielding Chunhyang who solves problems by confrontation and violence.

Since the original folk legend is distinctly Korean, it is worth noting that the authors of the manga are Japanese. This begs the question: why is a Japanese author basing manga on Korean folk legends? To rephrase – is there some perspective that a Japanese author can provide to this tale that the numerous Korean tellings have failed to provide? I feel that the manga has done no great service to the original, and that the title was merely as a ploy: to differentiate an otherwise standard, generic comic book by giving it some “legendary” background.