The Guinhoe (Korean: 구인회; Hanja: 九人會), or League of Nine, were a group of influential writers who initially lived and worked during the Japanese occupation of Korea. Founded on August 15, 1933, and ending sometime in 1937 with the outbreak of the Second Sino-Japanese War, the Guinhoe wrote works primarily advocating for artistic freedoms and social reforms with a largely modernist perspective.
The group consisted of:
The group was founded at the suggestion of film director Kim Yuyeong and novelist Lee Jongmyeong.[1] As time passed, it gained and lost members, with the final members being Yi Mu-young, Sangheo, Kim Ki-rim, Jeong Ji-yong, Park Tae-won, Yi Sang, Park Pal-yang, Kim Yu-jeong, and Kim Hwan-tae.
The group competed at the time with the Korean Artists’ Proletarian Federation (KAPF) which was a pro-socialism group with similar intent, but with a focus on realism versus the Guinhoe's modernism. It is unclear if the two groups were strictly adversarial, though there are various works of criticism written by either group of the other.[1]
The view that the Guinhoe were completely modernist has been contested since the 1990s, however, as the group did not tend to espouse a coherent agenda or doctrine beyond an initial anti-Imperialist sentiment, unlike the KAPF. Nonetheless, the general consensus view is that the Guinhoe broadly treasured the purity of literature and art for its own sake, in contrast to the KAPF's expressly pro-socialist agenda.
Because of the largely informal nature of the Guinhoe, most of its members acted independently and were associated by virtue of having aligned artistic views and knowing one another. This changed over time, as some members like Aneung became politically pro-Japanese, while others like Sangheo were decidedly anti-Japanese. The Guinhoe had originally been formed with anti-imperialist sentiments, and those who eventually espoused support for the Japanese Empire came to be viewed as traitors to the group.[2]
The Guinhoe published a magazine called the Siwa Soseol (En: Poetry and Novel), edited by Yi Sang in 1936. It only had a single issue published in March with a second planned thereafter, but was cancelled due to Yi Sang's departure for Japan in November.[3] Yi Sang died the following year at the age of 28 from tuberculosis, and his ashes were transferred back to Korea and interred at Miari Cemetery. Following this event, the Guinhoe largely disbanded and were fully dissolved by 1937.
The Guinhoe is referenced in the Korean mobile and PC game Limbus Company, with a fictionalized Yi Sang as one of the main characters. The group as a whole is depicted in fictionalized form primarily in the game's fourth chapter ("Canto IV"), with Dongrang and Dongbaek (based on Kim Yu-jeong) playing pivotal roles.
